(Short Film) A chess championship is transformed into a fierce Steampunk pirate battle between the finalists.
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CAPTAIN LOCKWOOD MAKES AN APPEARANCE
Dear Checkmaters, meet the talented Cory Lockwood! Cory plays Checkmate villain, Capt. James Lockwood, out to seek the ultimate demise of his rival, M. Emmeline Ashdown. Cory is a Theater major at The University of Texas at Austin and a talented martial artist. Look for his Checkmate video promo coming soon and follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
HMS Clockwork has finally emerged from the clouds. Captain Gray seems to have picked up a new crew of circus folk.
FRESH NEW BATCH OF CHECKMATE BEHIND THE SCENES STILLS!
This new batch features our leads Cory Lockwood, Lauren Bray, and Liana Ramirez. They each play Captain James Lockwood, M. Emmeline Ashdown, and Queen Tara, respectively.
The first three stills are from shooting day 4, where Cory and Lauren battled it out in a fierce pirate sword duel for the Checkmate cameras! The bottom frame is from shooting day 1, which featured Lauren and Liana as best friends at the Frisco Del Rosario high school chess championship. For more updates visit our Facebook page here
Hello fellow Checkmaters! We are pleased to announced that WE WILL BE RELEASING THE FILM’S NEW POSTER THIS FRIDAY! We are very excited to share the official image with you, starring Cory Lockwood as Captain James Lockwood and Lauren Bray as M. Emmeline Ashdown! Look for it in 2 days! In the meantime, visit our official Facebook page here
Steampunk market floating over Vienna today. Our airship is selling clockwork trinkets from London, silks from China, and French wine
PRODUCTION STILLS UPDATE
Check out some stills from Shooting Day 2. We shot at local Austin, TX brewery Thirsty Planet to achieve an industrial Steampunk aesthetic. The brewery shoot was a fun day full of steam and pirate sword duels! More stills to come so keep an eye out for them! Check out the film’s facebook page here
The year is 1896. Wearing emerald green at the ball in the Austro-Hungarian empire. HMSClockwork may be sailing far away…
A WORD ON COSTUMING
Out of the many pieces we made in the wee-early days of Checkmate, this is one of the few that actually made it to the final film. To create this custom hat, we went to a metal junk yard in Austin, TX called All American Recycling to find cogs and bolts to use for our Steampunk costumes. After a few rich coats of spray paint and a pair of victorian feathers, our piece was good to go! Here, our leading lady Lauren Bray wears this clockwork hat. In the actual film, Ms. Shila Farahani, playing the queen on the rival team, dons this clockwork bowler!
TWITTER TWEETS! TWITTER TWEETS!
Follow us at @FigmentFilms to get a daily dose of Steampunk adventure in your life! Our Checkmate writer Cara Shaffer shares the adventures of the HMS Clockwork as we sail the seas of Steampunk film production!
Amidst a pre-production delirium, we thought shooting a Wes Anderson-inspired short film about the making of our short film was a good idea. Scratch that. A GREAT idea. So we went ahead and spent a good day on this, managing to nearly burn the house down and to stain the bedroom carpet with indelible fake blood marks. Alas, this tribute to Wes Anderson was entirely worth it in the end, even if it’s not overtly Checkmatian. We Checkmaters hold it nearly and dearly to our hearts, so enjoy!
Check it out here.
COSTUME DESIGN THROWBACK!
We spent a great deal of time sewing, glueing, and spray-painting practically every article of clothing we happened to own. In the end, we didn’t use this costume for our leading lady, Emmeline, but it was worth it getting to experiment with the Steampunk aeshtetic. Many spray-painted walls and broken needles later, we decided to go thrift shopping to complete our characters’ looks. We were fortunate enough to collaborate with costumer Savanna Shaffer who found some gorgeous victorian dresses for the final look! This promo pic features none other than Checkmate writer Cara Shaffer!
POSTER TIME
In the last entry in the “old poster” series, Aaron Berecka reprises his role as a Checkmatian villain. This poster features Aaron’s signature “villain hands” which have seen extensive screen time in many of our previous films.
NEW CHECKMATE POSTERS COMING OUT SOON!
POSTER TIME
Also shot about 6 months ago, this poster features our good friend Aaron Berecka as a Checkmatian villain. Aaron is a fellow Radio-Television-Film student at The University of Texas and spends most of his waking time being a gaffer on student and independent films. Don’t ever ask him for a clothespin….ask him for a “C-47” ;)
POSTER TIME
We shot this poster over 6 months ago, when Checkmate was still an idea on paper. This is one of the very first things we did to kick off the Checkmate production and now we’re proud to say that the films is near completion. Since then, we’ve shot the whole film, shot cast & crew promos, and shot new posters so keep an eye out for them!
Meet Jade Jamon, Checkmate’s fabulous Assistant Camera. Jade is currently a student at The Art Institute and is working on her senior thesis. We were very lucky to have Jade on the Checkmate team and we look forward to sharing her behind-the-scenes interview with you!
