Gabriel

So, turns out myself and some friends are headed up to the Minnesota faire this weekend coming up. I think we're going on both saturday and sunday. Anyone from the pub I should look out for?

I'm not saying it was never a crazy idea, but after discussing it and looking at what resources and abilities we've got at our disposal, it's starting to look very possible. Of course it's going to take a very long time to do it. As of now we don't even have a script, and that alone will take a while to get done due to the length of the movie, and the fact that in order for all the work to be worth it and come out good in the end it's gonna need a pretty darn good plot behind it. I was mainly posting all that above to just see what other possible resources would be out there too, so definitely thanks for the offer, and I'll be sure to keep updates here with how things are going and when we reach the stage of needing certain things and such. Oh, and actually we've been coming up with everything without any chemicals messing up our brains... though there have been some kinda low budget movies out there made under the influence of a lot of drugs that have gotten a large cult fanbase... anybody seen Rocky Horror Picture Show?

I've been talking with a friend of mine recently, and we came up with a crazy idea... We're going to try and make a serious film, using our rather meager resources, and make it not be obviously low-budget. The kid's a technical genius, and after discussing it a while we've decided that it is in fact quite possible to pull off with a few certain techniques, and some of the equipment and acquaintances (and their equipment) that we have at our disposal. So far we've done a bit of work into the plot now that it's been deemed possible, and we've decided it'll be in a renaissance-type setting, in a somewhat fantasy land due to the fact that filming based in Iowa without options for travelling too far wouldn't work for a credibly historical version of what we want, but the main extent will be not having exactly historically accurate things as well as it being a made-up place with made-up people and such. While we aren't anywhere near being ready to film, seeing as we're planning on it being a full-length film and we've barely yet got a plot outline, but another one of the things we're planning to do is record an original soundtrack for it. We know a whole lot of amazing musicians in the area, but I figured it'd be worth a shot also to see if there's anybody out in the pub who'd be interested in helping with anything like that - recorded music, written out compositions to use, anything of the sort. We've also got involved in the project a friend of mine who is awesome at using all kinds of music software things... like can turn a plain midi file into sounding like a full orchestra with some synthesizer programs he has, but anyway... Basically even if all you can do is just one part of a musical thing (voice, and instrument, etc.), we'd be able to make it into part of a bigger piece of music or whatever through that. Basically our goal is to make a movie that the audience can actually connect with on an emotional level and such, and it's going to be a lot of work on our part, filming and especially post-production, so if there's anything anybody can think of to help out even a little bit, that'd be awesome. Also, if anyone out there would like to help out with tips and advice, costuming (donations, easy/cheap patterns, advice, etc.), fight choreography (we're planning on have a number of fights, including a mass battle, which after thinking on it seems a lot more feasibly possible even with low-budget than it could be), aforementioned musical help, and especially cameras and other filming equipment, or anything else you can think of. Also, whenever we've got a script out and start filming, if anyone in the area would want to play an extra at some point, or even possibly one of the film's characters if possible. We're also looking into possibilities for filming at a period-ish town, possibly at one of the permanent ren faire sites around or something like that, so if anyone has information on anything like that, like places we could use and who to contact for it, that would also be a ton of help. It was kinda funny... all started from a "wouldn't it be crazy if...", then became "Wait a minute, we could actually do this!" Once we've got stuff in the works, we'll probably start figuring things out for some fund-rasing benefits and that sort of thing. Hopefully we'll manage to pull it all off, everyone we've talked to about it has been excited about the whole idea of it. Anyway, that's all I can think of to say right now, and once again any kind of help would be very much appretiated.

Alright, so I may have procrastinated a bit in this, but... I could probably throw something together if need be anyway. So tommorrow (later today?) we're having a party for the crew of "The Amazing Pirate Action Swordfighting Comedy Show"... Going to be doing character development stuff, scriptwork, drawing up and signing the 'ship's articles', have a few pirate movies, whatever. General piratey fun and whatnot... and figured it'd be extra cool if we could have some at least semi-period grub for feasting and merrymaking and that sort. I think I'm just gonna get some beef and chicken, hack it up, and toss it on the grill with some vegetables (using the very period accurate aluminum foil as well most likely), some kinda basic soup, and a fried rice/stir fry kinda thing. Anyone have any kind of recipe suggestions or ideas for hors d'ouvres/appetizers? I seem to have a knack for just throwing things together and having it end up pretty tastey or somewhere between "not that great" and "bleugh!", but a little more structured recipes may help to lean the results more towards the former. Thanks in advance! (That is, if anybody responds before it's time I just throw it all together. In the case this isn't so, we could change that last line to "Thanks for bothering to read this," or "Thanks for the recipe," or if for some reason I'm feeling quite abnormally rude even a "Thanks fer nothin'!" I suppose you can take your pick of whichever you prefer, y'know?)

I remember reading also some things about various strong smelling herbs and whatnot being made into some form of nice-smell and being used like an ancient listerine mouthwash or menthos spray... and my Altoid tin claims the mints were first made when the company was founded in 1837, so certainly the idea of getting rid of bad breath must've been around for a while. If any of you more research-savvy can find anything more about that that'd be neat. Also from what I've gathered the Celts and other peoples tended to be prety darn clean, specifically that they kept a religious turned cultural (The Christian monks didn't have a problem at all with converted Pagans keeping with this tradition) habit of daily bathing and usage of perfumes and whatnot from the early BC invention of soap till at least the 1500's in Ireland... I'd assume it stuck around even later too, but not sure if the English conquest may have changed that with the whole trying to destroy Irish culture thing. Anyone know if any of that spread around more or stuck around during GAoP? While I don't really want to end up moving the conversation to a different topic or anything, but the question popped in my head also... Any evidence of period 'deoderant' type things?

Eh, I saw a preview for the Marie Antoinette movie in theatres a while ago... I didn't have too much hope for it from the start of the trailer, as right from the start it kicks off with an alt-rockish song typical to something off a highschool teen romance flick's soundtrack. In the words of the friend that was with me after the clip ended, "So yeah, that preview definitely made me want to die." I guess we'll just have to wait and see though.

It looked to me just to be... fingerless gloves. Like a pirate-times version of modern biker's fingerless gloves. Or maybe even just wrist wraps, which I know are used in martial arts to help keep your wrists straight in punches, in which case it'd just be a long strip of material wrapped around the palm and down around the wrist then tied off at the bottom. (About mid-forearm.) It'd make sense, since he has it on his swordarm, and fencing sort of requires good wrist form. I suppose the palm covering portion of it would also help with shipwork too. Anyway, that wouldn't be too hard to reproduce, and it'd make sense for a trained fighter persona to wear them, and I don't see how something as simple as wrist wraps would be not period...

Eh, like I said, random thought. Good points mate!

Well, this isn't exactly on the topic, but is pretty related I think, and is also just a thought. I haven't done a lot of research on the topics of fashion, I do know a few pretty basic observations on the way people act, and I've always been under the idea that, whether historians take it into account when analyzing things or not, human beings have always been human beings. So, going from there, look at modern society... If you go out and just look around at a mall, you'll see a lot of different fashions portrayed by a lot of different people. However, looking at modern art, photographs, or accounts in books, not even a decently sized portion of those fashions are portrayed. Media sorta covers the "average American", even if they only make up 25-50% of the population. I think that same observation can be applied when looking at history, which is why I don't necessarily take period pictures or accounts as complete and unquestionable truth on things. I tend to view historical things as an outline of what the society of that place and time was like, and that it's more psychology and sort of putting yourself in the place of a person from the time, or when looking at historical documents, figuring out what influences the author. To quote Winston Churchill, "History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it." I could see a pirate, or anyone for that sake, who, having spent time among native americans, may decide he likes the look of some native jewelry or trinkets and wear it. Or perhaps he's had contact with arabic or other asian people, he may somewhat mimic that culture's clothing styles, combining these things to make you a rather not-historically-accurately dressed sailor. But is it really that inaccurate to wear things that aren't considered the fashion of the culture? How many pub-goers are from America? Us Americans are a very fashion oriented culture, watch five minutes of TV, sort of like how it was earlier mentioned that the English were. Yet, despite that fact, my brother and some of his friends are into the 80's British Punk Rock subculture, with dyed hair and mohawks, and what regular society would call weird clothing. I doubt you'd see many of them either shown, or even portrayed truthfully in most American media, and even more that 300-400 years from now you'd find a lot of historical evidence that more than a couple people dressed crazy like that, even though there's a very large number of "Punk Rockers" out there. Now imagine what it'd be like to find historical evidence of them without the widespread use of media technology, and a significatly reduced number of artists and authors. You'd likely only find 'enough' evidence to support that only a few styles of fashion were worn in the early 21st century. Did that make any sense? Anyway, as I said that's just kinda my thoughts about it, and I'm not exactly trying to justify fantastical garb or that sort of thing, I just have a hard time believing that only one type of fashion style was around in any culture. Especially seeing as people in general tend to see what's different as weird, and like to ignore those weird things and focus on their generally accepted lifestyle. And now ends my quasi-off-topic rant.

I'll actually more than likely be at the Bristol faire this year, maybe I'll end up running into some of you mates. That could be interesting.

Oh no, it takes quite a bit to scare me off, but thanks again for all the welcomes. I was talking to Dabria, the one out of us that kinda handles all the when/where we perform and whatnot, and if anyone's interested in knowing we are more than likely performing Belly Dancing shows at this year's Nebraska Renaissance faire in Omaha Nebraska, (Not sure when that is now though, just noticed the site says it's May 14-15th 2005... Don't know if it's just not been updated or what) The Des Moines Renaissance faire (Though I think there's something about audtions for it this year, she was going to get ahold of the guy that runs all the faires to figure out what all's going on and when), The Iowa Renaissance Festival (May 5th, 6th, and 7th at the Amana Colonies, IA), and The Four Kingdoms Festival. (Date to be posted, in Rock Island, IL) That sounds like it could be a fun idea, Silkie. Oh, and on a random note that made me chuckle, walked by the television and caught the reporter saying "...and piracy is still a major problem..."

Alright, so it's been a little bit since I posted... but I've got schoolin' to take care of and whatnot, ya know. Anyway, was talking to one of the girls in the belly dancing troupe (well, there's only two of them and then myself drumming, but I guess we can still call ourselves a troupe), and apparantly we're going to be performing at the Omaha Nebraska renfaire or something like that, which I think is May 14th-15th if it's the same one I just looked up. Not sure what others we'll be at just yet... I'll make an update once I get all the facts straight. According to the site for it, Captain JP Boyd (The Pirate Comedy Show) and the Ministry of Petty Offenses will be there as well, and I know for a fact that means it'll have plenty of quality piratical goodness. Was kinda wondering if there's anybody in the area who may be going to that faire. Oh, and Merrydeath, lad would be the term I use to describe myself. Name's pronounced Gay-bree-ehl, not Gab-ree-ehl. You'd be surprised how many teachers have had trouble figuring that out...

Thanks for all the welcomes, it's great to meet you all too, and I'll be sure to get those drinks for you. Had a random thought earlier though, when I noticed there was a poetry thread started up. I tend to spend a lot of time just sitting around playing guitar, and have been doing a bit of songwriting recently and was thinking it might be fun to try either putting some of your poems to music, or flat out writing songs from scratch. I've got a somewhat decent recording program, and could probably whip up and record guitar and drum parts and see what happens, can't guarantee any singing on my part would necessarily sound great, but I thought it was worth a shot at doing. Come to think of it somebody's probably already thought of or done it - But like I said it was just the random thought of the day.

Hey! Having a bit of insomnia, and found the site so I figured I'd stop by and register. Umm... Suppose I could say a bit about me, then... I'm sixteen years old, and live in the wonderfully boring state of Iowa, where our closest seas are comprised of corn. However, my earliest childhood memories of watching movies involve vague remembrance of Cutthroat Island, Treasure Island, Muppet Treasure Island, Braveheart, (No, not a pirate movie, but it's still one of the five I remember) and The Three Musketeers. (Porthos was always my favorite character, even in toddler years.) May have a bit of piratin' in the blood as well, both sides of the family are full of Navy men and Gypsy ancestors, and what would a gypsy sailor be but a pirate? Re-enactment/Renn Faire-wise, I've been part of a group at my highschool where we become a medieval persona and go to junior high and elementary schools to teach lectures about the Middle Ages and Renaissance. I am the drummer for a belly dancing group that has so far performed at the Des Moines (We were technically street performers then), Amana Colonies, and Quad City Renaissance Faires, we actually had our own stage times and shows at the latter two. Currently I'm trying to turn a gang of land lubbin' Iowa-folk into an at least somewhat respectable pirating crew, humbly entitled The Amazing Pirate Action Swordfighting Comedy Show, (I'm sure some of you are thinking, "Like we don't already have enough of those...") though our expectations are at least a year or two before they're whipped into shape for real shows, for now it's just fun. Any suggestions and help for stage combat resources would be really appreciated, as right now I'm relying on a combination of my own martial arts experience, (been practicing Karate-based eastern style fighting since about the 3rd grade, some independant study in eastern sword fighting styles, and about three years of experience in western medieval and renaissance martial arts) acting experience from a comedy improv group I've been in at highschool past three years and the medieval lecturing group, and what seems to me to have been quite a bit of research into stage combat techniques and such, watching other choreographed combat groups, and practice with a partner who's done the same. Anyway, that's enough yapping from me... I believe tradition is I buy a round?