EDITING
Editing is one of the most important aspects in film making. Independent projects are notorious for being a bit long-winded. Laurent Daubas, our primary editor, is also known as Laurent Scissorhands. He will leave the fluff on the editing room floor where it belongs and move your narrative at a fast pace to connect with the viewer in the most effective way possible.
AUDIO SERVICES
Ear and Gear. That's the secret to this most important aspect of film making. Have you noticed that the most compelling indie productions have pristine, clear-as-a-bell audio? We can help you on location with the ability to record monophonic to 16-tracks of audio. Shotgun mics and wireless lavalieres can make a stunning difference over using your camera mic.
ONLINE TRAINING
One-on-One online training is available via Skype. From preproduction through editing the final print, we can guide you through the process, not will online tutorials, but with a realtime human being. Our most common training subjects are cameras, lighting, Adobe Premier Pro, Adobe After Effects, Trapcode Particular and a variety of other software tools and plugins.
GALLERY
OUR TEAM
GREG FOREST
PRODUCER/WRITER/DIRECTOR
Greg Forest has been the CEO of The Music Office and has been in the recording and video industry for over three decades. Forest got his start in video in Austin in 1985 recording a number of musical artist on his OverDue Records label. He was retained by the Texas Music Association and Texas State office of Film & Music to be the director of the MIDEM booth in Cannes in both 1988 and 1989, helping Texas record labels with licensing of intellectual property across Europe.
SANDY THOMSON
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Sandy Thomson has the most important piece of gear needed to capture great images - her eyes. Framing almost every shot of our first short, "Memory Hole," she has only expanded on her HD skill set. Thomson is the owner of a photography studio in Kerrville, Texas. She excels in all genres but her landscape photography of West Texas and the Big Bend area are renowned.
LAURENT DAUBAS
EDITOR/2ND DP
Laurent is originally from the mountain region of France and traveled to the Hill Country via Los Angeles where he studied film. Laurent is also a gifted graphic artist/designer that has been creating posters and other graphics. Une bon ami por tout les crew!
BRANDON CURTIS
KEY GRIP/2ND AD
BRANDON CURTIS KEY GRIP/PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Brandon is currently studying at the University of Texas Austin in their school of Radio/TV and has joined us for the 2016 shooting season - this year as a bonafide crew member rather than as an intern. Brandon's attention to detail and great sense of image composition have made him an invaluable asset to the team.
ABOUT THE GROUP
About the Group
The Hill Country Film Group was formed in 2013 by a group of film enthusiasts to share their gear, information and skills to produce independent films with tools that are very low cost. One of our primary goals was to prove a good film can be produced with budgets that are actually attainable. Our first short, "The Memory Hole was released November 11, 2013 in honor of the 50th Anniversary of the JFK assassination.
Personal Info
CURRENT PROJECTS
THE PROCESS
We shot our first interview May 29th with a great interview featuring Randall Bramblett. Randall has been around the block and shared a few anecdotes from his career and tips for those just starting out. The Process is a web-based series that investigates the creative process of guiding ideas to market. Interviewing musicians, poets, digital and traditional graphic artists and others to whom the creative process is the bread winner, The Process seeks to find what brings out the muse in successful artists. We shot our first interview May 29th with a great interview featuring Randall Bramblett. Randall has been around the block and shared a few anecdotes from his career and tips for those just starting out. |
David Broza, an Israeli musician, activist and songwriter was given the unpublished poetry of Townes Van Zandt after his death in 1997. In 1994, David Broza performed with Texan singer Townes Van Zandt during a Writers in the Round concert in Houston. When Van Zandt died three years later, he left Broza a shoe box full of unreleased poems and lyrics with a request that Broza set them to music. The result was Night Dawn: The Unpublished Poetry of Townes Van Zandt,” which was released in 2010. David is now revisiting Townes’ legend by interviewing those who knew him in Texas and Nashville. While in Texas for an appearance at the Kerrville Folk Festival, David began interviewing those in the immediate vicinity. On May 31st the crew picked up David and filmed three interviews while being chased by rain across the Medina and Kerrville area. We interviewed Kinky Friedman, Dalis Allen and Kid Curry on a non-stop shoot-n-scoot with the rain at our backs the entire time. Next up is a trip to Austin to film more interviews at the ground zero of Townes’ career, There are many musicians, club owners, producers and drinking buddies who knew Townes well and we are looking forward to filming some great stories. |
FREIDENKERS In the mid 1800s German immigrants poured into Central Texas to homestead and create farming communities that flourished as a result of hard work based on the German work ethic. Stony scrub land was transformed one rock at a time into farms that created prosperity and economic security for the many communities they founded. There was only one problem, their Texas neighbors were not only envious of their farming success but considered the Germans to be outsiders in the communities they founded. The Germans were Freidenkers, a movement that honored the traditions of free thought, open debate and a strict ethical foundation. Unfortunately for the Freidenkers, they believed in a dogma of non-violence and were proponents in the abolition of slavery. Such beliefs didn’t sit well with their Confederate neighbors and struggled as best they could to keep their cherished homesteads while not participating in the politics or military mustering in the South just prior to the Civil War. Freidenkers is a documentary focusing on this little-known part of Texas history. The film is currently in preproduction and will start production in Fall 2016. |
THE SEARCH FOR TOWNES VAN ZANDT