The VGkids were cool enough to let me come by and film them making the film's new t-shirts.

I had no idea the machines they use to print shirts were so awesome - the way it drops and spins around is kinda' hypnotizing. I think I shot way, way more footage of their machine than anything else.

The tees are 100% organic cotton unisex alternate apparel shirts - and all the profits help support our feature film. Get yours at big cartel.

Labels: Post-Production, Store, t-shirts, VGkids, Vimeo

The last week of work for Pedal has been a big multi-tasking challenge. It always seems like the holidays come with a traffic-jam of task and catching-up. I've been keeping myself overworked with re-writing / storyboarding / scanning those storyboards and editing them into the FToM timeline.

I've been recording new temporary voice-over tracks for pacing. Finishing our 64 Days production journal. Packaging up all the t-shirts, stickers, and (now) little owls that people have been buying from our new store. I feel like I've had great momentum this month and I hope I can find creative ways of keeping that momentum in the next four months!

Which brings me to a question I wanted to ask: Do any of you reading have ideas about how we can be more open in what Amanda and I are working on from now until May (when we film in Northern California)? Are you interested in seeing a list of weekly task? Are you interested in simply seeing more Production Vlog Updates?

I suppose my thinking is, the next few months are going to require a tremendous amount of focus and energy... and I'm a believer in the idea that people's interaction and involvement, even oversight, is extremely motivating and sparks creativity.


Moving on. I wish I could go into details right now - but it's not time for a full announcement just yet, but I'm far too excited to keep it all to myself: Amanda and I are very close to working with two very talented people who's work we think is amazing. One will be (hopefully) involved with areas of filming, and the other will be (hopefully) involved with areas of design and illustration. More on that as soon as possible - we don't like to keep secrets from everyone.

One more small note before I go - we've been migrating all our hosting and registration to Dreamhost, and over the weekend I accidentally deleted the .css file for our main site. So I ended up re-writing it from scratch. Then I stayed up until 2:30 in the morning re-writing 64 Days from scratch. Let us know if you spot any weirdness of certain browsers. Thank you.

Labels: FToM, p52, Post-Production, Store, Twitter, Writing

Erica and I stayed in a hotel room 15 stories up in Detroit for New Years Eve. It was a quiet night in and I enjoyed looking down at the few people (brave enough to be outside in single-digit temperatures) walking across the mostly empty streets just before midnight. We had a good view of the lights along the Ambassador Bridge as we were falling asleep... and I laid there thinking about about a lot of things really: I'm a year older... I've learned a few more lessons (the hard way)... I thought about the film and last year of work that's been put into Pedal.

This post isn't a resolution of any kind - but it is what I see happening with the project within the next year... what Amanda and I will be working hard to accomplish. 2010 is going to be a big year for Pedal - there's been an overwhelming amount of effort behind getting ourselves positioned to burst past some of our last and largest hurtles.

I've been frantically going over and over in my mind everything that needs to be prepped for this late-spring / early-summer. I have to say that I get so excited and anxious when I think about the scenes we'll be filming with Larry... they will be something very different from our 64 Days on the road. A more controlled environment - one that mostly will be indoors, lit very unnaturally, shot very particularly. Almost everything we're planning to capture should stand out very dramatically against the bicycle trip's footage.

Enough about that for now - there's still a few months for details on our upcoming week in Northern California.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't scared to say this out loud... to put it here in writing - but inside I do feel Amanda and I could have For Thousands of Miles done this year. I want that... so much. We're close enough to the end where it's something that's within reach. I've been patient for so long... and perhaps it's dangerous to focus on the end before we're there. It's a goal... but it can easily become a distraction.

2009 was a really exciting, really stressful, really amazing year for all things Project Pedal and life in general - and I know 2010 is going to be even better!

Before I signed off - I wanted to write about two quick things. The first being our long, long, long-overdue opening of the Project Pedal store! It's a humble grand opening - but we've posted our new FToM stickers, Project Pedal buttons, as well as our new FToM unisex tees.

The second being - I stumbled across a site called Project 52 that had a simple but great challenge: Project52 is a personal challenge geared toward getting fresh content on your website. The goal is to write at least 1 new article per week for 1 year.

Earlier last year I was closer in the habit of 2 post per week - but I know these last two months especially I've been struggling to keep up. So I've signed up at 52 in an effort to not two weeks go by between updates this year. I'd also love to get Amanda writing more here - we've been working a lot over iChat and Skype and I think her perspective on this leg of production would be interesting for people. Remember - if there's anything you'd like to know more about, please let us know. We're always happy to answer questions and be as transparent as possible.

Labels: FToM, p52, Post-Production, Store