Mistvalley Productions

Hello Everyone,

Quick update here. We are finally releasing the official name of our little film previously known as "The Portal". The official name for the film is: The Loyal Lucifers.

Best wishes,

Raied

I hope everyone is welcoming the Fall like I do. I am one of those people who actually loves it. The Fall has been certainly a favorite in the world of Cinema. It can represents the passing of an age or era, the losing of love,  the meaning to an end, and many other interpretations. Whatever you decide to interpret it to, I hope it is both joyful and meaningful to your life.

Onto post-production: We locked the picture a while back but we did not announce it because we were not sure of what the final duration time would be from a creative standpoint. Now we do, the film is 45 minutes long! Beyond anything we've expected! Of course with it came the extra work that we did and still are doing. Currently, we started the ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) process. It is basically having the actors re-record their lines of dialogue in a much controlled environment to try to get the cleanest audio possible while excluding any unwanted noises or sounds. In other cases, it can also help replace bad dialogue or poor delivery. Another great tool to help the filmmaker!

ADR can be challenging because you need to 're-live' the moments you did on set. In our case those moments were more than year ago. Why relive those moments? Because in order for you to deliver an overall believable performance, your voice needs to match the visual state you were in when the camera first captured it. If you looked upset, weak, tired, happy, sad, or a combination of these emotions or any others, your voice has to convey that. All pretty much while sitting comfortably in a sound-proof room, looking only at your lines of dialogue and the playback of the scene.  Lip-syncing is also an issue; trying to say what you said on set and match it word for word and with the exact same tone and speed is not easy.

We started ADR right after the film was locked because it requires time commitment from both cast and crew; unlike many other aspects of 'post' work where it would only require's the crew's commitment.

Stay tuned for more to come!

Raied

I hope everyone is doing well in this weather. Quick update here:

The first 15 minutes of the picture are pretty much locked. Our expectations were that when we finish editing, the final running duration of the film would be 15 minutes, but it looks like it will be longer! In away it is a good thing because many of the shots we have will find their way into the film providing that they fit within the context of the whole thing.

Other post-production work is already in discussion. We are having talks about who will be doing sound mixing and editing, ADR, and music. Nothing is finalized yet but our expectations are to start on few of these processes sometime in the spring. Stay tuned!

Raied

We are still looking inside all of the cans of footage we have. It is amazing how much we shot for a short film! Once it is done which should be soon, we will start to put the sequences together.  This is where the film actually comes to life, because it is where you start to piece it all together to make up seamless picture that flows from begging to end. It is also the most creative part of the process because it can go in so many different directions yet arrives to the same end spot or conclusion. So if you give the same film to two different filmmakers their cut of it wont be necessarily the same. It all depends on the choices they decided to make to reach the same conclusion of what the film is about. Ahhh the beauty of filmmaking!

Stay tuned for more updates!

Raied

We are still editing the film at this point and it will continue over the holidays. Ideas are coming bit by bit and looking at what we shot, there are a lot of choices to pick from.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Raied