Happy Thanksgiving!

So today I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone has a great day with their family, friends, and loved ones. Enjoy the time you have together and eat lots of food.

Random Movie Fact: In the 1977 film Jabberwocky, originally erroneously promoted and released in some countries as "Monty Python's Jabberwocky" against the wishes of Terry Gilliam. Threats of legal action resulted in the Python reference being removed from the title on all subsequent reissues.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

Feels Like Photo Week

So I was going back over some of my old photos today and I came across some old photos me and my girlfriend took the day before we started filming Voicebox which was back in May. For some reason I kept thinking to myself that the pictures were not good enough to be used or something...I hadn't forgotten that I took them, just overlooked them. Anyway I found three of my favorite photos and did some touch ups and here they are. Enjoy!

Random Movie Fact: In the 2004 film Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, the Mexican restaurant Veronica visits with the girls from the station is named "Escupimos en su Alimento". In Spanish, that means, "We spit in your food".

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

M and T Bank Stadium

So while I was at the charity event back in October I decided to take two pictures of the stadium since that is where the event was being held. We were up pretty high in the stadium itself and the field was beautiful especially in the serenity of emptiness in which it was. Here are the two photos I got of it.

Random Movie Fact: In the 1995 film Hackers, the high school scenes were filmed at Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, one of a few elite, exclusive high schools for students gifted in math, science and computers. Real school seniors were extras in many scenes. In the real school, the pool is on the first floor.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

Believe in Tomorrow's Children Charity Auction Photos 2 of 2

So here is the second round of photos from the Believe in Tomorrow's Children Charity Auction. Enjoy and check out yesterday's post for the rest of the photos.

Random Movie Fact: In the 2007 film Hitman, during the restaurant sequence, the scene in which Nika (Olga Kurylenko) talks about owning a squirrel/chipmunk when she was young was actually true for the actress, and the scene was improvised during filming.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

Believe in Tomorrow's Children Charity Auction Photos 1 of 2

As promised a while back here are photos from the Believe in Tomorrow's Children 30th Anniversary Charity Auction at M and T Bank Stadium. It was a great event to say the least. Great people, food, items for auction...it was a blast, I was very honored to be the official photographer for the event. So here are the first set of photos from the night.

Random Movie Fact: In the 2009 film The Ugly Truth, after wrestling with the Jell-O twins, Gerard Butler ad-libbed the line "I can still taste you. You know what I mean."

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

This Past Week

So this week has had its share of ups and downs, which seems to always be the case. I would have been posting up more this week because I had the free time for sure but I have been going through a lot of personal stuff (long story) that has been distracting me from writing. But I digress, the meeting on Monday went really well, I showed up professional attire, great attitude, we had an awesome discussion, so I was really proud of myself and it was a great learning experience. I haven't heard back from them and it is now Saturday, so I am almost confident they ended up going with a different company but we are young and I can see how they could of gone with a more established production house. It was an honor in itself to be considered among the big dogs around the state so I am happy just to have had the opportunity. In other events in my part time job with Render Perfect we did a cool green screen shoot which was a nice experience since I am still getting green screen lighting down to a science and we also had a shoot at the newest Goodwill store with a professional grade Jib, which was cool to see in action.

As far as today I have a meeting at 11:45 with a photo client (finalizing the contract and all that) as well as probably helping with some family business. We have a lot of great stuff coming up I have just had to get over my personal problems, which I am slowly doing...

Random Movie Fact: In the 2011 film A Dangerous Method, Christoph Waltz was initially cast as Freud, but dropped out in favor of Water for Elephants. Had he stayed, it would have been his second collaboration with Michael Fassbender since their work on Inglourious Basterds. Christian Bale was also considered for the role.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

Huge Meeting

Today is going to be a big day for us at TTP. We have a huge business meeting with what could be our first big corporate client. Corporate video is usually something that I tend to stay more away from, not because I can't do it just because it doesn't have much appeal to me. However this client proves to be an exception to that case by actually having some really cool stuff going on as a business. It is a unique opportunity for us as a production company and I just hope everyone will be thinking good thoughts today for us. Wish us luck...knock on wood!

I will posting up photos from the charity event we did on October 27th as long as the company receives the raw photos today, if not I will wait for them to get the materials.

Random Movie Fact: In the 2012 film Moonrise Kingdom, Laura Bishop shouts at various family members through a bullhorn. The idea came from co-writer Roman Coppola's childhood, as his mother Eleanor Coppola used a bullhorn in a similar fashion.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

La Cakerie Grand Opening

Today I was with my friend Zach (not the one from the pictures put up yesterday), shooting some footage of the grand opening of the new bakery, La Cakerie in Towson. Zach has contact with the owners and investors of the company and he was asked to film the grand opening today and asked me to tag along, so since I had another client postpone on me, I was able to come and work as a second shooter. It was cool, I got to get all the smooth artsy cut in shots while he focused primarily on getting the wide angle stuff so it was a great pair. The place is in a nice little part of Towson and if you have the time it is worth checking out, the food is delicious and they have great prices on everything. La Cakerie!

In addition to that, I am working on some photo edits for the charity event I did last weekend, I am sorting through a lot of them and if it wasn't for the hurricane I would have had them done a lot sooner but Sandy kind of slowed things down since I didn't have power...however here we are and they should be finished soon. Got some other things coming down the pipeline right now but I am waiting for things to flesh out before I go too deep in discussion with them.

Random Movie Fact: In the 1987 film Masters of the Universe, the reptilian henchman Saurod's throat was made to expand and contract by having the performer, Pons Maar, blow into a tube that ran from his mouth to the throat of his costume.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

Zach

So I have been sitting on these two photos I took of my friend Zach for a while now, I put them up on our facebook page but I kept forgetting to put them up on the blog until tonight. I like the nice use of black and white in them and that is thanks in part to the fact that he was wearing a white shirt. He was on the computer at the time rapping away so that is why his mouth is open, on the one which to me is the only issue with the photos. Otherwise I think they are very solid photos. Also it is or at least was his facebook profile picture which always makes me feel more confident in my work. Check it out and enjoy! More photos soon to come.

Random Movie Fact: In the 1995 film Friday, the neighborhood where the film takes place is the same street where the film's director, F. Gary Gray, grew up in South Central, Los Angeles. Principal houses that were used for filming were houses of old friends of the director. The scene where Deebo punches Red into the air is the house that F. Gary Gray grew up in.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess

October is Over

I hope everyone had a safe and productive Halloween yesterday! Halloween has to be one of my favorite holidays and this year I got to spend it with my girlfriend Ashley and I watched Evil Dead 2, what more could you ask for. October was our biggest month to date for To Tony Productions, no questions. We got to do a lot of great stuff, including coordinating a film shoot with Travis Pastrana, do photography at a huge gala event at M&T Bank Stadium, go on several film shoots with a fellow production company in Towson, start planning for our next music video, being the official photographer for the 3rd Annual Dundalk Zombie Walk, and working with a Los Angeles based crew at the Virgin Mobile Free Fest. It was a lot of traveling, hard work and dedication but now that this month is over I look back with a big smile knowing that TTP is moving forward at a great pace. We may not be moving at breakneck speed but slow and steady win the race.

So what is in store with November? Well we hope to start and finish filming for our next music video before the end of the month. I have perhaps one photo gig this weekend but as of right now it is up in the air. We will be working with a company based out of Seattle to do an intimate poem reading video, hard to explain but it will be pretty cool. Finally we will continue to work alongside [kp] mag studios and I will be doing my part time work over at Render Perfect Productions in Towson. It should be a fun and productive month, probably not as big as October but we will be constantly booking more work as the month progresses.

Random Movie Fact: In the 2010 film Easy A, Olive's family members are all named after foods: her parents' names are Dill and Rosemary, both herbs; her younger brother's name is Chip, and the one at college is named Kale, and the fact that her name, Olive, is also something edible is the subject of a joke in the movie.

Thanks for the support,
Daniel Hess