Space trash

[video grab of the show's title screen]

Synopsis

Space trash was an amateur video production, by a group of community television people, of pilot episode for a science-fiction parody show, which has once been loosely described as a show where Doctor Who, Star Trek, and Days of Our Lives, all meet.

Fleeing from the pursuing Evil Mungrel, Captain Incredible crash lands on the anarchist planetoid, the only dwelling being “The Pitstop.”  While on the planet, Malagena becomes besotted with Captain Incredible, and dreams about him saving the United Monetiarist's planet, “Dow Jones.”  And, Squisho entrusts Void Bleek with the care of the “Collective Reasoning Chip,” just in the nick of time, before Mungrel finds him.

Telling you anymore would give away the entire story.  So you'll have to watch the video to find out the ending.

Copies of the programme

As such, the programme is not publically available, although you might possibly see it at film festivals, and possibly on community television.  It may become available, at some time in the future, so keep an eye on this site, or e-mail the appropriate people to ask about it.  I'll be seeking to put small snippets of it on a website, currently there are only some still shots, here.

Production technique

The production was made as a live-switched two-camera shoot at two different locations:  The bar scenes in the Lion Arts Centre, and the rest in and around the theatre at the Angle Park Community Centre.  Scenes were shot in one go, as has been traditional for recorded television productions in a rapid manner.  Post production video editing mostly involved joining the scenes together, in the right order, rather than editing individual shots.  Stereo sounds effects and original music were separately produced and added to the video, afterwards, onto a four-track S-VHS audio master (giving stereo effects and music), then mixed down onto a final audio and video edit master (giving us mono dialogue, but maintaining stereo effects and music).  Much of the audio post-production being done hands-on, without any automation (very hands-on, with two or three people twiddling levels and pan pots simultaneously).

As I recall, the production was designed over a period of about a year (in the mid-1990s), in a series of group meetings.  Filming was done over a three week period (mostly 18-hour days, and without any days off, except for the changeover between locations).  And video editing over two weeks (I'm not sure how much time went into the music and effects production before their work was brought into the edit suite). 

Apparently it was shown to one of the television stations, where it got a bemused reaction—interesting, not quite our thing (though, oddly, I recall seeing something very similarly trashy a year or so later, on late night television), and that it looks like it was acted by a clown troupe (at least some of the actors were, though nobody had disclosed that to the station).

Links to web addresses of the cast and crew.


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Space Trash
Space Trash
Introduction
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