Dave Patten's University of Entertainment

Team Meeting and Beers

You always have to have your team meetings with a few accompanying beers.  I'm meeting tonight with Ricks and Josh West to talk about a few projects and the business in general.

We're starting up a new documentary project with Meek Mill, we'll be out of the country for a few weeks at the end of January on a shoot and on the music side of things I'm finishing up the music video for "Believe Me" which is going to be possibly the greatest music video I've done to date haha.  I feel like if any of my videos ever hit 1 million views it'll be this one, so I'm pretty pumped.

But there's nothing more important than your team, and you have to be extremely careful when building it.  You need people you can trust.  People willing to invest their time before any money ever comes to the table.  They're the ones that will always be there.  When success comes, people creep out of the woodwork like you wouldn't believe... and a rule of thumb is never trust them, they're out to get your money and that's 100% where it ends.

"INSIDE" Takes 3rd at LA Reel

INSIDE won 3rd place prize at the Los Angeles Reel Film Festival!!

LA Reel is our 5th Official Selection, and third-time winner (haven't heard back from 2/5 fests yet so we're batting 1k right now!)

The festival is October 5th in LA.  Unfortunately we won't be able to attend but helllllllllllllllllll yes we took home a trophy anyway.

click here to visit the INSIDE Official Website

"Wait Jenny" Behind the Shoot 1

Props to Makeshift Circuit (the band that came out for the shoot) and their manager Renee for capturing this footage during the shoot!

For those of you who missed the live stream, check it out:

INSIDE New Website

Re-Vamped the INSIDE website -- now that it's a three-time official festival selection, it needed to be upgraded.  Make sure you check it out!  New insider info on the making of the film, photos and reviews.

      www.Inside-Movie.com

Fastest Film Conceptualization Ever

As noted in my previous post, I plan to shoot a film this week, because there is absolutely no time like the present.

I read an article on M. Night in the Inquirer today.  He shot his first feature when he was 22.  Case in point.

I met up with Josh West on Friday around 3pm.  We hit up Suburban Square to grab an iced coffee and brainstorm.  In that 3 hour session we thought of our idea.

 

I went home with it and wrote out the 40 page screenplay in 8 hours Saturday morning, from 7am-2:45pm.  Yes I remember the exact times lol I'm pretty damn proud of it.  An average screenplay is usually closer to 90-100pages, yes I know.  But this screenplay isn't a spec, it's a director's screenplay.  Yes I am coining a new term.  There is no detail written about location, or character descriptions, or actions because I already know them all in my head and saw no reason in typing them all out.

We crafted the story based on what we have available, shooting wise.  All the actors are people we know.  All the locations are either my house or Josh's, or local parks, creeks and parking lots.  No guns, car chases or explosions.  Stuff we can actually film!

I met up with Josh again today (Sunday) to edit the first draft.  We tied up every loose end and added some awesome new elements in about a 4 hour session.

Went home, watched a few episodes of Rescue Me (my new favorite show of all time) to clear my head, had dinner and brewed up some blueberry vanilla green tea, and went back to work.  I just finished the revisions aka final draft around 9pm.

You want to know work ethic? you come to me.

Weekend Writing and Film Challenge

I have some time this weekend and I want to shoot.  I don't feel like recording...  I don't feel like working my butt off to find a model for a music video... I just want to go out there and film a movie this week.

You may think it's going to be terrible, but I guarantee it'll be pretty good.  I spoke with Josh West already, we're going to play around with some ideas this afternoon.

If it turns out half decent, I'll package it up and send it off to a few festivals.  You never know!  Plus the more festivals we get in, the more opportunities to network.  And judging by the majority of the "independent" films I've seen make it to festivals... we should be winning half of them haha

Iowa City + Priceline = Money Bags

Maybe I'm just new to using flight and hotel services like priceline or travelocity -- and if that's the case then so be it -- but I was rather pleasantly surprised earlier this afternoon when booking flights for South9 out to Iowa City for the Land Locked Film Festival.  They saved me about $350!!

Inside has been chosen for the festival's music video selection, so Ricks, Josh West and I are all heading out at the end of August to attend the festival.  Networking opportunities such as these cannot be passed up.  I repeat:  CANNOT.

How did Inside get selected?

You can check out the blog post here from when I submitted the film 5 months ago!

I only have $1,000 in the bank right now (don't worry, our money all comes through to us at the beginning of August lol) because we've made a lot of recent investments.  We're moving into new office space at the end of the month as well -- but hell, this opportunity can't be passed up.  Not only can we network, but we're in the spotlight as one of the featured filmmaking squads.

I'm also going to get in touch with the radio stations out there and schedule a radio interview (or two) to hit up for extra press while we're out there.

On top of that, due to flight schedules, we have a lot of extra time on Monday.  Guess what we'll be doing?  Shooting a music video!!!  You got it.  Take advantage of every situation that gets thrown your way.

So if I don't see you at the festival, or if you don't hear me on the radio, or if you don't bump into me on set -- maybe I'll catch you at the bar Friday or Saturday night :)

Feature Treatment

As my previous posts have documented, Josh West and I hit the mountains this past weekend to work out the story for the feature film we are venturing in to.  We had our fair share of arguing over characters and motives, behaving like typical dorky screenwriters.  But after three days of straight working and brainstorming, we landed on the perfect story.

Earlier this week I had a lot to get done at the office so Josh took the reigns with the treatment and started working it out.  The man comes back two days later, blurry-eyed and hardly able to stay awake with a 25-page treatment.  That's what I call working, take notes!

"Crio Bay is the story of a small-town dockhand and orphaned son of an anarchist martyr who wants nothing more than to leave his home and escape the stigma and memory of his father’s death. Days from leaving, after fatefully finding himself aiding the unknowing sister of a fugitive wanted for a political assassination, whom he put behind bars, he is thrust into a web of deceit as he tests the boundaries of love, friendship, and right and wrong."

Soundtrack to My Day Feature

"Echo", "Too Proud" and "Discovered" music videos featured on Soundtrack to My Day!  Click the picture or click here to read the full article.

Dave Patten Radio Show Debuts

The Dave Patten Radio Show debuts!  Josh West and Dave Patten host.

Listen to internet radio with Dave Patten Radio on Blog Talk Radio