Action Designer | Motion Capture
In cased you never made it through The Tech due to its long run time and goofy plotline, here’s the final fight scene from it with Chelsea Steffensen, Nathaniel Pierson, and myself. It’s one of our better ones.
Flitz, creator of the self-described “nerd” webcast The Chotto Show, came to the San Francisco Bay Area for a day to shoot a little video he calls “Tour”. From the Youtube description:
The second sort of offshoot of the Stunt People film “Contour,” the short film “Tour,” takes place among one of the many adventures of the San Francisco tour guide, Law (Eric Jacobus). Law picks up a couple of tourist, Flitz (Amra RIcketts), and Dude (James Gilstrap), looking to see the San Francisco sites. Sadly for law, the tourist are actually looking for a tour around the city, and not the narcotics that usually come along with the “tour” Law offers. Amidst the misunderstanding Law’s tour competition Carter (Shaun Finney), shows up, to snuff out law. The two tourist get caught in the middle and chaos ensues.
Tour is like Reno 911 mixed with Kung fu cinema. No scripts, all improve and full of awkward moments, with a taste of action to wet your whistle in true Stunt People fashion. Watch and enjoy! ^_^
Directed by- Eric Jacobus & Amra Ricketts
Edited by- Amra Ricketts
Tour from Amra Ricketts on Vimeo.
“Tour” was mostly made through improvisation (except the fight). There will be a few other Contour / Detour offshoots while we get ready for the Detour feature film. Some characters will cross over into the Detour feature, though those characters may end up being played by different characters. For example, “Carter” in the above video will be played by Dennis Ruel.
Discovery Channel’s “Time Warp”
Stuntmen episode with Ray Carbonel and Eric Jacobus
(Extended Action Footage)
When Ray and I went out to Boston to do Time Warp we brought around a little Flip Video to shoot random stuff in Boston and also to shoot some extra footage while doing the segment. When the episode aired, we were so proud to be on TV, but they left out a few stunts, and they had edited the fight into a weird barrage of punches and kicks. Here it is, mostly unedited.
We’re hoping to get some extra slomo footage, such as my HK spin and Ray’s fall onto the metal table. And sorry but the video is a little glitchy. Editing 3ivx video is a pain in the butt, and the best I could do has some extra weird frames thrown in for no good reason.
I don’t know how long this will be on Youtube, but here’s our segment from Discovery Channel Time Warp’s ‘Stuntmen’ episode!
Day 0 – Thursday – November 13, 2008
Micah Moore and Blake Faucette (“Dogs of Chinatown”) flew myself and Emmanuel Manzanares and Shawn Bernal of Lazy Brown Productions out to North Carolina to shoot a teaser for their upcoming feature, “Beat Down Boogie.” We’re going to put our parkour / tricking / fighting skills to the test for Moore and crew with the hopes that All Aces can take this teaser to investors and raise some cash to make a funky hiphop-style heist/chase action film.
Day 1 – Friday – November 14, 2008
We started Day 1 by getting some breakfast at a swank cafe near Raleigh where the prices ended up underselling the decor. Upon entry Micah muttered, “Oh no, what’s this place gonna cost?” But it was so early that this was the only place open, and we weren’t willing to trek to the next town to find a more dingy place. And it was cheap. We ate some big breakfasts, talked shop, and went outside hoping to shoot in the foyer, but seeing that the management was out of office we had to ditch the idea.
At Micah’s place in Greensboro, Shawn passed out from a cold, and Manny and I played some Megaman 9 waiting to go to Green St. At the Green St. club, we did some acrobatic fighting near a stage, and upstairs we did a tiny bit of indoor parkour, followed by good ol’ fightin. Manny and I had never fought together, but nobody would’ve guessed it.
Dinner downtown after Shawn woke up, rested and less sickly. At the Green Borough we ate, and we went to the back of the restaurant to shoot a 2 on 1 between the LBP guys and myself. A few acrobatic kicks, group fighting, and a painful backfall was all we needed to call it a night.
Off to a storage facility to do some green screen shooting for titles and promo stuff. I was allowed to ditch the group to go meet up with someone while they finished up their shooting, and that was that!
[me in BDB]
Even ninjas have day jobs.
9 to 5 Ninja is an upcoming martial arts action-adventure mini-series featuring The Stunt People. The series begins with Aya (Anne Lundbom) and Gunner (Eric Jacobus) as two ninjas working for Ninjatel, a San Francisco non-profit that specializes in espionage, surveillance, extraction, and maiming on a ‘case-by-case’ basis. All proceeds go towards the relocation efforts for displaced ninja refugees from various ninja-clensing turmoil overseas in countries like Laos, Cambodia, and Somalia.
Shooting is complete and the episodes will be out in the coming months.
http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2146657&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1
9 to 5 Ninja Trailer – The Stunt People from Eric Jacobus on Vimeo.
Dennis Ruel and Ken Quitugua face off in episode one of “Rival Grocers,” a series written and directed by Ken himself. Chuck (Ken) and Jim (Dennis) are grocers from separate supermarkets. They face off when they meet down in a parking garage during a grocery delivery.
Shot in August of 2007, “Detour” is a sort of offshoot of “Contour” where Law (Eric Jacobus) goes to rent an apartment and strikes a deal with the landlord (Shaun Finney) where he’ll get a discount on his deposit if he takes care of a squatter (Chelsea Steffensen) outside. This is also one of our first collaborations with Pete Lee, who did the camerawork.
