Welcome back to the construction blog of Brian Sarvis and Joe Carabeo’s newest feature film, Help Wanted (Working title)
I’m gonna keep it real simple for this post.
Here’s is our diner set.
Of course it needs some decorations and some dressing to make it complete, but there is still something very off about it. We looked back at the photos that we’ve had on this blog (which has now become a picture reference for us) and decided that we don’t really like the aluminum in the background.
It was a half punch so to speak and we wanted a full punch. We felt that if weren’t gonna have a full back wall of shiny aluminum, that maybe we shouldn’t have that one piece of aluminum there at all. It was sorta of a tease.
So we decided to tear that sucker down and put up a matching chalk board.
VIDEO – Brian scrapping away at the left over glue.
Some people were wondering if there was “actually” a script to our feature film, Help Wanted (working title)
Well, here it is in all it’s bloody color glory.
If you’re interested in investing in our film or reading the script, please contact us at astrayproductions.com – our contact info is on the bottom of the page.
Thanks for checking out today’s blog post. Catch you next Wednesday.
So we talk to our main executive in charge of the grounds, Robert Guva, about the dilemma of the door. And of course being the extremely nice person that he is, said that he possibly has a door that’s not being used in one of the scary barns. He said if it’s not being used, we can put it to use. Awesome.
So we took a look.
BELOW – The search begins.
BELOW – Maybe up here!
There were a few doors after all.
And this guy was the one. But how are we gonna get him down?
Oh we’ll just drop him out the barn.
Plan worked. The easiest thing we’ve had to do this whole construction period.
We’re very happy with the waythey turned out. But now it’s time to get to finishing up some unfinished business, like doors all types of doors.
First, we had to install the fake cabinet doors that would be placed on the fake cabinets by basically screwing them in from the back of the cabinet that doesn’t even exist.
Once these were screwed in and secure, the Hollywood cabinets would then be leaned against the back wall with the hopes of someone, someday, attempt to open them and become frustrated.
Now it was time to have at the main door.
Our goal was to have a double swinging door. So the first thing that needed to happen was strip everything off that stopped that from happen for us.
While we were in the area, Brian and I also decided it would be the perfect time to start creating the illusion of our kitchen. Which first meant that we have to block out the windows. So that’s what we did.
Once all that was done, it was time to take a journey back to our “favorite” place on earth, Lowe’s.
Time for some door shopping.
Just like everything else, this is where the trouble starts. We thought, ” OH yeah. They’ll have all the doors in the world for us to choose from”. So not the case. After taking the measurements of the doorway that were dealing with and then going to the store. We found out the hard way that there’s no such door with our measurements. This then lead the discussion of, “Maybe we should saw the door” or “Maybe we should just keep looking on other places”. As fun as all those options were, if we were to keep looking we would lose lots of time and possibly still not end up with something that we could use. But if we were to cut the door, Joe’s skills will be truly put to the test for cutting a completely straight line with a table saw. Both risking money and time in the process. So, of course, the executive decision was for Joe to put everything on the line. No risk no gain, right?
So there’s the door. One of the biggest concerns that we had was that our door would be hallow on the inside. If this was true, when Joe trims the edges of the door, the door would then reveal to have just a big hole in the inside because the door is not solid wood, but pieced together. Making the door completely unusable. Lets find out the hard way.
First thing, lets see if this door fits.
Of course it doesn’t. So now it’s time to begin the trimming.
Hello again, welcome back to the adventures of Brian Sarvis and Joe Carabeo, as they try to get their feature film (Working Title) Help Wanted, made. Right now we’re at the construction stage. A lot has been done so far, but now our heroes must deal with the winter cold, lack of electricity, dying spirits and now…
a broken boom box.
Besides that, everything is coming together with hard work and inspiration.
But on this day, a deal was struck.
Electricity is coming!
Now it’s time to clear everything that didn’t need to be there , so that in the process of the electricity coming through, we don’t set the whole place on fire. Just in case.
So it’s time to clean up.
Good bye to all of our fine art.
Below – Where did these pans come from?
Below – This is how the cabinets will look like, but imagine it sitting up.
Below – Another view next to our blue corner.
It’s time to get that chalk board up. We start by places the braces.
Then Brian lays in the final touches, cleaning up little sections of glue.
And up it goes!
Not bad.
I can’t wait till there’s electricy, then we can put the over head lights in.
Anyone want to buy some stools, they really are for sale. Just contact us or leave a message below.
Below – The chalk board.
I also can’t wait for the set dressing to come in and really make this place a full character.
Below – The on lookers
Below – The look of the diner with the sun coming in.
A lot is gonna happen in these booths. Watch and see.
You’re not gonna believe this, but chalkboards don’t exist any more.
How do we know? Well, basically we thought that the task of buying a chalk board was gonna be the easiest step for us. Nope. We searched in ever single store that we could drive to, in the normal driving vicinity, and guess what? They were no where to be found. We couldn’t find chalkboards anywhere. Ether that, or we really are in the middle of no where.
But in truth, it’s hard believe that in this day and age chalkboards do NOT exist.
So we found us a sink instead.
But back to the chalk board.
So basically what had to happen is the same exact process that seemed to happen with everything on this project.
We had to make it ourselves.
Below – Brian creates the frame for the what would be the size of the chalk board, which is gonna be placed on the wall as our menu.
With that frame done, it was now time to make the black board section of our chalk board. It amazed me that you can really just buy the material for a chalk board and lay it down anywhere, then boom, you have a place to write with chalk.
Below – Brian lays down the black of the black board.
At the same that Brian was putting the works on the chalk board, it was also time we finished up the cabinet doors that were gonna be placed on the back counter. This would be another bit of fakery for the sake of movie making, because there is not gonna be any cabinet’s, just the door. But these doors needed color though. So what batter color than the awesome blue that we’ve been rocking the whole time.
Below – Brian has finished the black board section of the chalk board.
Below – The back cabinets getting their coat.
Below – The cabinet doors with their new coat of blue.
Below – The doors now with their knobs.
And now it’s dark outside.
Which means its time to stop working cause we can’t see, and it’s very cold at night time.
Below- Our only warmth is this working light.
It’s so nice.
Tune in next time as there’s a possibility that our hair styles will change even more!
I wish there was a story to tell about this, but there really isn’t. We rode up to the set like we usually do and…
There it was.
Long story short (I guess) I’m just gonna say that I wanted that thing knocked down anyway.
Below – The Diner so far. Now with it’s newly created stools. I dig.
A real cool thing came with the stools when we bought them, AGE!
You really can’t buy that type of age anywhere. We just thought it was a cool incentive. In the ad it said that the stools came with 60 years of history. I wonder what type of people have sat in these stools in the past 60 years? Who’s butts have glided across leather, what stories their asses can tell, where did they go, who they’ve met. Where are they now??
I bet they didn’t know that 60 years later that they would be in a feature film by two crazy film makers.
But we did.
The stools still had to be melded together to complete the illusion, but that could wait.
Below -After a lot of rubber mallet hammering, we have the beginning looks of the wall slot. Soon will come the kitchen set dressing behind the wall and then we can slide plates of food across it all day long. That should really put it together.
Below – Ohh spacious.
Below – A view from the “kitchen”
We also took some aluminum and connected it to the wall. Will it stay, will we take it off, time will can only tell.
Below – Things are getting messy again.
Below – Another view of the stools, the booths and our floor. Where do we go from here?
I know that some of the stools are gonna go to a stool hospital. Their heads have fallen off.
It’s also about time to start thinking about what the outside of the diner is gonna look like. We have the ideas, but stay tuned to see what we actually do.
Remember back in the day when we were thinking about make diner stools that would be a conglomerate of car parts?
Well, we never gave up on the idea. That’s why we took another road trip, back to the Sarvis shop!
Today we play with steel!
So as you could tell from the images from the last few posts, the new stools “Look” the part, but they don’t quiet measure up. But we found a solution, and that solution came from the mind of the man of steel himself, Brian Sarvis.
Below – The devices that make the impossible, possible.
So, what Brian proposed that we do, is basically take muffler piping, cut it to the length that we would need to expand the stools to, and squeeze the ends down so that they would fit snug into the holes of the bases and that rest the chair together as one piece. Easy right?
Oh yeah, none of that can be done with human hands. But that never stopped him before.