The Night Shift: Special effects affect

The Night Shift is the production diary of Fighting Owl Film's new independent supernatural-adventure-comedy of the same name currently in "post" in Mobile, AL. Over the course of the next several weeks and months, you'll get an insider's peek at what it's like for filmmakers to craft a new entry of paranormal pop culture from Erin Lilley, a producer and actress on the film.

Special Effects Affect

Somewhere, the clouds are opening, a bright light is pouring down from the heavens, and a choir of celestial cherubs are singing sweetly; for on this day, this day of days, the final special effects shot has arrived. Saints be praised!

Also on this day of days, I mailed off a package to our color-correction artist. This package held a hard drive that contained the entire film (minus that one effects shot, which will be electronically sent to him tonight), so he can work with the highest quality version possible. When he's finished, he'll mail it back to us, prepaid. Oddly enough, it cost less to mail the entire hard drive, with insurance, than it did to send one itty bitty DVD to an overseas film festival. Four times less, to be exact. By the way, that was the mid-priced option, too. For the amount of money they wanted for the "best" shipping option, I'd expect to see the package teleport before my very eyes. Oh, and that's on top of the exhorbitant entry fee.

Now, we're working on picking out and ordering promotional items for screenings and festivals. Thomas and I stayed up way past our bedtime (almost *gasp* 11 p.m.! We're boring, sorry), checking Web sites for cool stuff to give away. We're also looking for deals and codes because our promotional budget is, like the rest of the movie's budget, limited at best. We have one really exciting screening lined up (more on that another time), and the possibility of two more, so we've got to get cracking.

In other words, now comes the expensive part...

Meanwhile, we've got one more day of ADR to deal with. Right now, we're waiting on a list of lines from our genius sound editor, Shaun Burdick. Once that's recorded and mixed, and the color-corrected version comes back to us, we will have a movie. Correction: We will have a completed movie. We have a movie now, and it's really fun. Exciting, goofy, and really enjoyable. I can't wait for you guys to see it.

We're almost there, folks. Almost there.

We're still plugging away at this thing. In the meantime, you can follow The Night Shift at www.thenightshiftmovie.com. You can check out the poster, trailer, cast and crew, and some fun downloads. Heck, if you like, you can even be our friend on Facebook and Twitter (@NightShiftMovie), where you can follow more of the progress of the movie.