The Adventure We Knew As 2005
This year started as a mystery adventure. After eight months of industry indecisions and unstable games Martin began to distribute his promotions once more. During that time we both worked with Theatre In The Raw on a few of their productions. Then it happened... Martin got the phone call from the Stargate Shop asking him to come and work with them on the ninth season of Stargate SG1 and second season of Stargate Atlantis. It was thrilling for him to be finally in a shop directly connected to the production itself. Martin's career was once more, taking necessary steps forward.
The Ghost projects that Christina was hoping to get involved with went nowhere so she stepped aside and explored well needed physical activity. She put up a ghost page so that her own creativity was satisfied and hopes to one day get an opportunity to work on a well structured Ghost documentary where she can exercise her interview abilities. In order to flex the other muscles she took up archery on a more serious level. She has no goal to be an Olympic archer but she wanted to safely be shooting and have an official certificate to say she is serious enough. So she took Boorman Archery's course (Royal Archers) and spent as much time as she could on the field. She hopes to return to physical performance (Stage fighting etc.) and get the opportunities to remind her body of how it is supposed to work. Martin plans to, one day soon, follow her onto the field and discover the sport as well.
She also started a Yahoo Group in order to try and gather together Entertainment Industry People in Vancouver. The meet-up group she was part of was not going well so she hoped to have somewhere where the group could gather and not have to put up with meetup fees and problems. You can find this group here. Come on over and join us.
The BC Renfest idea is coming along slower than expected and/or hoped for. We have had a number of people play games with the project and others who tried to take over but we plunge ahead anyway. During the year we have been developing the business plan and discovering the differences between business practices here and elsewhere. We (Martin, Christina, Tarnia) took a business plan course run by The New West Board of Trade. The whole Renfest project has spread itself through the year with attendance at Hat's Off Day and Sea Vancouver. We now have a good idea, from the surveys, as to what public here seems to want and feel they need in order to enjoy themselves. Now we need people who can work with us to complete the goal and provide BC with a project that will create income for artists and a place to be for the public while supporting tourism. I would say we are well on our way, as the business plan is growing in size and will soon be a complete book. Our biggest project yet.
We do still need some key people so if you think you are up to it please let us know.
Once more Martin declared his birthday of no importance as he was excessively busy with Stargate BUT he insisted on having a Birthday Party for Christina. The Birthday cake, this time, came from Aran bakery. Wheat free and full of rich chocolate goodness.
On the Family Front: Christina's Older Brother visited with his family and Martin's Sister also came for a 'camp out' before moving onto her Boyfriend's family visit on the island.
V-Con was also on the schedule this year. We had not made it to the convention yet as we were not in a position to financially support a convention and we discovered very early on in our convention history, that we don't know how to just go to a convention. We need panels and activities to do or the experience is not complete. They had informed us last year that there was no room on their programming schedule for what we do so we stepped back and accepted the fact that we may not get to V-Con. This year, during a discussion with a new friend in the LOTR group, we handed her a copy of our promo CD simply because we were eager to make new friends and ask about the fan community and how it works out here. She passed it onto a friend who passed onto his friend who just so happened to be the conchair. And voila.. A trip to V-Con and wonderful panel opportunities. As we were not there the year before we can not compare but we got the feeling that the convention may be on an up swing and if their membership declares us 'worthy panelists' then we would be more than happy to return. Being local and having panels to do makes it well worth the energy. We must admit... We miss having a convention audience who appreciates what is being shown them. It has been too long without.
Hallowe'en once more saw baby pumpkins in the car. This time in the back window. We went to the FANS Hallowe'en party and judged the costume party for them. We also went on the ghost trolley tour and headed out to Tarnia's to spend Hallowe'en night itself with her and her family. Christina spent one day face-painting at a private party (through Partyworks) and a group of us went out to The Ghost Train at Bear Creek Park as well as Stanley Park's nighttime candle lit walk. Out by the train we had a wonderful experience. As 'The Elf' and 'The Ranger' posed for pictures 'The Elf' suddenly looks up and says "Is that an owl flying over head?" All look up to see that it is true. An owl had flown overhead and had landed on a near by tree. 'The Ranger' snatches the camera and begins to stalk the owl. Six shots later he is so close. Then 'The Elf' grabs the nearby witch (Teri) and says "Go Harry Potter. Sneak up and see if we can get a shot of you with the owl." She got as close as she could (tree in front of the tree the owl was in) and posed. We got a great shot with the owl technically looking over her shoulder. Beautiful.
Also this year was Bilbo's Birthday and the opening night of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Both successful costume get togethers..
Christina had the chance to work with writers at Vancouver Film School. She worked with a small group of actors in reading and critiquing writer student's work in order for them to do a rewrite and return with a modified version to be re acted and recorded for them to look at.
They both also assisted with two indie films. For one they worked assisting as set dec and props (Gang Of Love) then they did some prop building and bruise make-up for another. As well, Christina took a small role as the waitress. It was a wonderful feeling being in front of a camera once more. Something that should hopefully happen more often in the future.
At this moment Martin is on the same construction site in Port Moody. He is enjoying restoring the old historical house and is, at present, building cupboards and re structuring the kitchen. In the New Year he will return to Stargate for more challenging projects and exciting adventures.
Christina is face painting at various Christmas Parties and working with the 14 Ft. Rocking horse at Metrotown. Although many of these already exist in the US this is the first one in Canada that we are aware of. It is an exhausting delight to be hand rocking this huge horse.
Both are helping Theatre In The Raw out once more by assisting them in reorganising and redesigning their studio space in order to make it more efficient and useful.
Christina is doing her best to keep connected to the Independent Film Meetup Group. She has met a few really good people who have similar dreams as she does and the drive to get them accomplished. There is no recommendation to take over the world, here, but a little corner of it can't be bad for the soul.
^_^
Christina still has her own Cafepress store. She is also finishing a photo book she plans to list with Lulu press.
Due to last year's financial brick wall we haven't been able to heal yet so a trip back to Toronto and/or a holiday is out of the question but we are hoping to be able to save up enough money to see many of you out of town friends and family within the next year or two (at the latest).
If you would like to keep updated about what is happening with us please feel free to send an email to:
newsletter at carrhunger dot com
of course replace 'at' and 'dot' with the appropriate symbols (@.)
We are still hoping we can collect copies of all the movies Martin has worked on so if anyone out there has any for sale cheap... Let us know. If you are wondering what we already have, simply ask. If you need to see what Martin's worked on click here. It hasn't been updated since he started to work for Stargate but it is pretty accurate.
Raise a glass to the future and the future will raise a glass in reply.
Christina and Martin
Click on card image for a 300DPI version for printing.
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