As far as the future, we’ve got a few feature film contracts lined up which will be an excellent opportunity to take advantage of our new 10k diesel generator (recently modified to add camloc connections) and our ever-growing HMI package. We picked up the generator on our way back from shooting in Kelowna towards the end of last year.

Stay tuned for more happenings, its been a busy new year!

The intensive studio course followed the success of another workshop we did at BCIT Film Flex program for graduating students who — prior to us — felt that they were lacking in hands on education and real world experience.

At both schools we brought in our 5-ton lighting and grip package truck for a week and helped provide the students a crash course in cinematography, Danny style…

It started with overviews of the truck, the equipment, and essential lighting principals such as: a) the inverse square rule for fall-off of light and b) the relative size of a light source as it relates to the softness of the light a.k.a. the importance of a large bounce or diffusion frame; we then built sets and put them hands-on through the process of shooting a scene.

Teaching was a very rewarding experience –The indigenous people at Capilano for example were grateful of our filmmaking wisdom and eager to apply their newfound knowledge to complete their film studies at the university. They will soon return to their native lands to become filmmakers and story tellers for future generations.

The BCIT Film Flex students began their final practicum following our workshop and worked for 30 days in the industry.

Currently Danny Nowak C.S.C and TALCO are looking for more opportunities to take the workshop on the road.

[Show as slideshow]

These photos were taken at the Capilano cinematography workshop.

The dolly belongs to Peter Reynolds and is an Italian made version of Chapman’s Peewee Dolly. It crabs and has an excellent hydraulic boom movement. Notice how we have triangulated the legs on the dolly (front wheels square at 90 degrees, back wheels parallel at 0 degrees) for a smoother dance floor style move — a trick we learned from Peter himself.

RED Cam underslung on Porta-Jib using an Italian Peewee pedestal

On the subject of old photos, here’s another one of the Italian peewee dolly in action for us.

Reynolds Peewee Dolly behind the scenes on UTAB

Scott first appoached us on the set of Under the Apple Box when by chance we were filming at an elementary school in Strathcona a few weekends after the Police Shooting. SUEME and WEBB were painting a mural for the community which involved children and school a few meters away from our Truck. The rest is in the ozone….and rolling through North Vancouver, Kerrisdale, and the Country Club.

We may have a few cameos soon, can you spot us?

Trounce Alley Lighting Company mural by Scott Sueme

TALCO outside the set of Brandon Paris Band, 'Can't Hate You' featuring unofficial artwork collaboration between street artists SUEME, WEBB, and ARPI.

If you would like to place the TALCO teaser clip on your site (you can scale it to any size):
It is easy to link to from youtube.
Just copy and paste the EMBED code from over there.
Then post a comment on this thread so everyone knows. We love you!

The Peter Reynolds Peewee Dolly can be pre-loaded on TALCO's 5-ton truck!

We’ve coined it the term, Reynolds Peewee dolly. This is a well machined Italian version of the American Peewee dolly, not to be confused with a cheap asian knock-off. In fact, this is the only one of it’s kind in Canada. Peter has done a nice job restoring it and it comes in sexy matte Black finish, with plush italian leather. That might be an exaggeration, but smoothness of the arm is not. In fact, the Italian Peewee dolly arm movement is much better then an actual Peewee crab dolly. We tried it ourselves and agreed.

Once the workhorse of Peter Reynolds fleet of grip trucks, the Italian crab dolly has been reconditioned like new to serve again. Thanks to him you don’t need to pay the standard $600/day for a hydraulic crab dolly. You can have a smooth hydraulic arm in a compact, full featured dolly; for less.

Reynold's hydraulic crab dolly soon to feature an 8-pack beer holder

For those not familiar with the hydraulic crab dolly — like everything American — they are a carefully controlled commodity which is only available by lease and never to own, by two manufacturers: Chapman-Leonard who makes the Peewee, Hustler, and Hybrid dolly, and J.L Fischer who makes the Fischer 11, Fischer 10.

These two giants control a monopoly. They only build so many units, so there is no supply, and it creates a demand. No one can own the dolly so there is no way to discount it. Even the rental house has to pay a lease to Chapman or Fischer every month for the privilege of renting the crab dolly to its customers. The design of the hydraulic crab dolly dates back to World War II. Originally manufactured to load bombs into airplanes, are these dolly’s really manufactured by Lockheed-Martin for Hollywood? It’s a conspiracy theory in the making.

Years ago an Italian company reverse engineered the Peewee dolly, rebuilt it with standardized machined parts for mass distribution, and outfitted it with a better hydraulic system. Chapman sued the shit out of them and banned sales in North America, crippling thier revenue and sending them out of business before they could establish a mass-production line and bring the hydraulic crab dolly to people like you and I.

Fortunately Peter Reynolds bought one of these units in their prime and brings the Italian crab dolly back to us now! In fact, TALCO can pre-load the Reynolds Peewee dolly on our truck today!

(BARNA-ALPER DEC 07) a condor rigged by TALCO lights a Delta farm set

As the SAG situation and economy combine to create a slow start to the new year for us in Vancouver, we look towards our next projects…Any takers?

At the moment we are passing our time collaborating with Brant McIlroy and Martin Testa of the innovative Brant FX company (their website is being redesigned) on a unique animatronic project completely unlike the last film we met them on over a year ago. A photo to the left shows a taste from the past as TALCO illuminates a large night exterior using a condor flying above a rural landscape supported by fog and rain towers by the effects duo, BrantFX.

They created the rain somehow without a pump truck because this was a docu-drama, not a big budget feature and the show could not afford the $3000 it would have cost to have a pump truck. They couldn’t afford a pair of 40′ trailers either with seperate grips and electrics. That’s where we came in with a carefully planned, minimal set of subrentals and our basic 5-ton package truck. Together Trounce Alley Lighting Company and BrantFX created a big budget hollywood look on a docu-drama budget. In fact, we were able to work out an arrangement to have our truck for 2 months of interviews preceding this shoot. This allowed us to push a new standard forward as far as what cinematically could be done in the confines of a docu-drama structure.

We like Brant and Martin because they have the same “can-do” attitude as us. They can literally take on any challenge no matter how immense — and pull it off for relative peanuts compared to a large studio. Like us, they have built a truck for the motion picture industry and they have the equipment and knowledge to create anything out of electronics, chemicals, metals — you name it — they’ve done it — their workshop is something straight out of Ironman.

Personally we’ve seen them cut steel like butter, use explosives, build circuit boards, weld, and experiment with rare mineral oils, all to the blaring sound of heavy metal on their studio’s sound system!

Of even more potential: the studio space BrantFX owns — when teamed up with TALCO the possibilities are endless! Whether its music videos, commercials, or anything that needs special effects and lighting — together we raise eyebrows for a fraction of a cost of the big studio outfits! We can provide everything from 20′x20′ green screens to a camera dolly and gib arm — your complete lighting and grip needs. They can provide the studio, animatronics, and effects. Good things are in the future.

Who’s going to be the first to bring us together and create million dollar results for relative pennies? We’ll keep you posted as this latest collaboration develops.

Thanks to a friend from Portland who first sent me a link to the Mercury’s thursdays morning blog post where I first viewed this documentary.

Reposted below, Carts of Darkness by Murray Siple:

Farewell Geoff Browne

Vancouver loses one of its finest spirited filmmakers in writer, director Geoff Browne of Boundless Light, known around town for his Tibetan documentary, Kall it Karma. He has moved to Los Angeles to pursue directorial projects on feature length productions.

He may be gone for now, but his name, along with TALCO, will be appearing soon on a 2-month shoot produced by Academy Award winning documentary filmmaker Malcom Clarke. Look for this highly controversial feature length docu-drama to be released within the next year making headlines big time.

TALCO is pleased to have participated in 6 weeks of interviews followed by 2 weeks of big budget reconstructions which will bring this terrifying story to life.

In the mean while, you’ll have to see Malcom’s recently Oscar nominated, Prisoners of Paradise – or perhaps even more intense his 1985 exploration of  American Vietnam vets hiding from a society in which they are no longer fit to coexist with, Soldiers in Hiding.

As for us, we are happy to have had an opportunity to work with filmmakers of such high caliber and for an extended period of time. Thanks as well to Barna Alper from Toronto for organizing, producing, and distributing this very interesting production.We look forward to working on many more amazing documentaries and we wish Geoff Browne great success abroad until we may next work with him again.