The Hive is pleased to announce our latest motion comic project “The Straw Man”.

“The Straw Man” – Motion Comic Synopsis

A reclusive former gunrunner Frank Mansfield hides out in small desert town, Pahrump Nevada.

He’s hiding from his former boss Art Brown, a leading provider of assault weapons to the Mexican cartels and one of Southern California’s most untouchable criminals. Art Brown is the man with the money, the ATF connections and the cartel ties.

Frank Mansfield was his right hand man for several years. Decades even. Frank Mansfield grew tired of his life, not just the criminal aspects but everything. He didn’t just want out. Frank wanted to reinvent himself, a total reboot. So he decided to pull a final job to finance his permanent escape.

Frank Mansfield - The Straw Man Motion Comic

Art Brown was to be victim. Frank earned Art’s complete trust, now he was going to use it against him. It was time to rob Art blind. He decides to sell Art’s guns on his own, to a rival cartel. Soon after he leaves the only home he had known Los Angeles and the only love he had known Eva Martinez behind.

Eva’s a beautiful damaged girl. A flash in the pan actress who’s career is on the wane. Her drug use and self destructivness has pushed Frank and everyone else away. His love for her is real but so is his disgust. She’s become someone else. A walking tinsel town cliché that he’s tired of dealing with. Frank disappears without warning. Leaving her to sink deeper and deeper in desperation quick sand.

The comfortingly anonymous life that Frank Mansfield is leading suits him just fine. Or at least that’s what he tells himself. Frank thought a change of scenery and a boatload of money would work. But there’s one problem. You can’t get away from yourself and your memories. He misses Eva. Frank can’t erase her from his mind. A romanticized version.

Concept Art - Motion Comic

Art ends up swooping Eva up at her weakest moment. She’s without her anchor, her rock; she thought Frank loved her unconditionally. Now she is depending on Art to survive, a man she needs but doesn’t love. Since Frank has completely vanished this is as close to revenge as Art is going to get. Besides she’s a fun plaything to him. Soon Eva starts feeling that Art is done with her. Art is pushing her away just like everybody else. She can’t let this happen. Eva makes it clear to Art that if she leaves her she will open her mouth about his business. Art can’t let that happen.

It’s a late night in Los Angeles. Eva’s best friend and former body double Ana drops her off in front of an old Hollywood party spot.

Motion Comic Art - "The Straw Man"

Ana was there for Eva in the good times now she’s hear for the bad. Her last real friend. Eva is there to see Arnie Klein America’s largest comedy star in more ways than one. Arnie gets rough with her at his big debaucherous party. Eva bolts. She can’t do this even if it would help her career.

Now she’s alone in the heart of the city. Eva doesn’t notice the creeping SUV that is tailing her. The SUV pulls into the alley. As Eva passes a pair of hands yank her in. She’s murdered under the cover of night.

Frank feels a twinge as he watches one of Eva’s old films. He needs to talk to her. So he calls and gets the machine. He leaves her a message

Ana goes to Eva’s apartment the next morning. She’s worried that she never got the pick up call she was expecting. As she enters and sees that Eva is no where to be found, a couple of policemen follow her in. Ana knows know, Eva is dead.

The police make it clear that they really aren’t the men for the job. This is completely routine for them, not a whole lot of compassion for a girl like Eva. Ana withheld something from the police though. Eva’s phone. That’s why she walked she was messed up and phoneless. Ana sees that there is one missed call and it’s from Frank Mansfield.

Frank receives a call. He thinks it’s Eva but it’s Ana. He hears about Eva’s fate in stunned silence.

Frank hits the road. Even if Art Brown and his business partners have made Frank persona non grata in LA. He can’t just let this go. Frank is back.

He will follow the trail from Arnie the movie star to Art Brown his old nemesis. Art needed to make Eva disappear so he used Arnie to lure her into a trap. A hired hit.

From the backlots of Burbank to the projects of South LA. Frank will go anywhere and through anyone to find out what he needs.

For more information, contact Yesenia Higuera yesenia@hivedoes.com or (310) 926 4932

The Hive and Deacon Entertainment Complete a Mini Documentary for The Department of Education’s TEACH Campaign focusing on recruiting Special Education Teachers

The Hive and Deacon Entertainment are pleased to announce the completion of a mini documentary for The Department of Education’s TEACH Campaign. The mini documentary chronicles the TEACH Campaign’s objective is to recruit Special Education teachers.

The film features parents of Special Education children describing the positive impact Special Education teachers have had in improving the education and the quality of life for their children. Special Education Teachers discuss the progressive influence of their profession on the children they instruct.

“Collaborating with The Department of Education and Deacon Entertainment on the mini documentary was a great experience” said Yesenia Higuera, Partner of The Hive and post supervisor on the project. “Special Education Teachers are amazing individuals and I am proud to have worked on a piece to promote this admirable profession”.

Producing the mini documentary was Damon Lee of Deacon Entertainment. In addition to the mini documentary, The Department of Education and Deacon have produced TEACH PSAs to promote the recruitment of teachers.

About The TEACH Campaign:

The TEACH campaign is an initiative of the United States Department of Education designed to raise awareness of the teaching profession and get a new generation of teachers to join the ones who are already making a difference in the classroom. At TEACH.gov you can learn what it’s really like to be a teacher and get the tools you need to launch your own career in education.

About Deacon Entertainment

Founded by Damon Lee, Deacon Entertainment is a Hollywood production company that develops and produces projects for urban audiences and its crossover segments.

About The Hive

The Hive was founded in 2009 and specializes in creative film editing, motion comic animation and transmedia content for multiple new media distribution options. The Hive has provided post services for Deacon Entertainment in conjunction with the Department of Education and Laureate International University. Founding Partner, Yesenia Higuera, previously edited The History Channel’s documentary “The People Speak”.

The Hive recently completed editorial and post supervisory services on the official Centennial Anniversary of the US Navy. The video was recenlty shown to Naval troops during the Centennial Celebration and is featured on the US Navy Website.

Please contact Yesenia @ (310) 926 4932 or yesenia@hivedoes.com for all of your Corporate, Education and industrial videos

Honoring the 100th anniversary of Naval Aviation underscores our commitment to sustaining a Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard that wins wars, protects the home front and enables peace. Our air forces are strong because of the support of our service members, their families and the American public. By honoring Naval Aviation, we honor our country and assure America and our allies that their security is guaranteed by a strong Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard team.

 

The project was directed by Justin Etheredge and post production services were completed by Yesenia Higuera of The Hive. The promotion video shows Macy Gray rehearsing and recording tracks for her latest studio album “Covered”.

The following is an article from the Rolling Stone Magazines Website:

Macy Gray Sings Metallica, Radiohead and More on ‘Covered’

Gray on crossing genres: ‘I imagine if I was a metalhead, I would feel bad about rearranging James Hetfield’

Macy Gray is set to release Covered March 27, and the singer says this project is a long time coming. “After my first record I wanted to do a covers album, but I guess covers albums have kind of a stigma, they’re not known to do very well and they’re designed for people when they’re not doing their own thing anymore,” she tells Rolling Stone. “So I was talked out of it, but I’ve always wanted to do one.”

Macy Gray - "Covered" New Album Promotional Video Film Editing by The Hive

So how did Gray convince everyone around her that singing other people’s songs was a good move? “Finally I had this idea to do rock covers and everyone liked that idea,” she says. Covered finds the Grammy-winning voice behind “I Try” taking on such signature rock bands as Radiohead, Metallica, Arcade Fire, My Chemical Romance and many more.

Yes, Macy Gray does Metallica’s ”Nothing Else Matters,” and kills it, starting off the song slow, haunting and atmospheric, before her  jazzy vocals kick in. It’s a radical reinterpretation, one she’s already gotten the band’s approval for via her producer. “I didn’t talk to Metallica, but the producer, Hal Willner, did ‘cause he’s friends with them and he said they played it a bunch of times and they ‘adored’ it, that was his word,” she says.

She has directly contacted a few of the artists she reinterpreted. “I emailed Gerard Way, he said it was awesome,” she says of her take of My Chemical Romance’s “Teenagers.”

“I just met with Aaron [Bruno] of AWOLNation about three days ago, we went to lunch,” Gray says. “He really liked ‘Sail,’ but it’s funny ‘cause he had a lot of questions about how we did it and what made me want to do it and stuff. I thought that was cool.”

Gray was inspired on the record by Nina Simone. “I was watching [Simone’s] version of ‘My Way’ and she did her own thing completely, it’s nothing like the original, and so that’s when I decided to go get whatever songs we really loved,” she says. “I think that’s the thing people do, they cover the songs and they try to do it kind of like the artist. But we just completely did our own thing.”

Having a completely different style than the artists she covers – whether it’s her rousing take on Radiohead’s “Creep,” the Eurythmics’ “Here Comes The Rain Again” or “Nothing Else Matters” – allows Gray to take the songs wherever she wants. And she admits she was free tackling some of these songs because she was a fan, but not in the genre herself. “I imagine if I was a metalhead, I would feel bad about rearranging James Hetfield,” she says. “But being that I’m not, I just naturally did my own thing, so it made it a lot easier.”

For Gray interpreting rock artists seemed to be the best approach, as she attempted some Prince songs as well, but they didn’t work. And one artist she wanted to cover so badly she tried  five songs but could never make work was Fiona Apple.

“We had a few that were disastrous,” she says laughing. “We tried ‘Criminal’ and ‘Sleep To Dream,’ then we tried ‘Extraordinary Machine.’ That was the one we really wanted to do, but it’s hard to do her because her songs are so moody, and if you take it out of that it doesn’t sound right.  Her songs are so dark and moody already, so if you move it around it’s weird, and if you do it dark and moody you might as well just leave it as is.”

The Hive has completed, an Amazon Studios Production, of the first full length feature motion comic created from original artwork, The Alchemist Agenda based upon an original script by Marty Weiss.

The motion comic was produced by Marty Weiss, Yesenia Higuera, and Benjamin Price. The Hive (www.hivedoes.com) created the artwork animation and post production services on the feature.

"The Alchemist Agenda" Motion Comic

Motion Comic "The Alchemist Agenda"

The Alchemist Agenda is the story of a nautical treasure hunter who discovers a WWII U-boat off the coast of New York; he sets out on an international pursuit to discover the formula to alchemy with a beautiful professor who has a secret agenda of her own.

A Motion Comic is an animated Comic Book. All artwork for “The Alchemist Agenda” has been created specifically for the project. Motion Comics are a unique medium in which to tell the story and create a specific style for the film.

“The complete 90 minute motion comic was started from scratch and finished within 3 months. It was an exciting challenge finding the right style of artwork and complete full post on the project in such a short amount of time” said Yesenia Higuera, producer, editor and post supervisor on the project.

“As far as we know, there has never been another full length motion comic feature that was created from original artwork” said producer Benjamin Price of The Hive. The goal of the motion comic was to create a blueprint for the film version. Everything from the sound design to the final edit was carefully crafted.

Motion Comic Studios - The Hive Los Angeles

The newly formed Amazon Studios is looking to make commercial motion pictures based on scripts and movies submitted by budding screenwriters and filmmakers. They have a first look deal with Warner Brothers. “We are excited to introduce writers, filmmakers, and movie lovers to Amazon Studios,” Roy Price, director of digital product development for Amazon Studios, said in a statement. “Full-length test movies will show stories up on their feet and attract helpful feedback at an early stage. We hope that Amazon Studios will help filmmakers experiment and collaborate and we look forward to developing hit movies.”

The winning scripts and movies will be chosen based on commercial viability, according to Amazon, and judged by a panel of people in the business, including Bryan Singer, “The Usual Suspects; Ivan Reitman, “Ghostbusters”; Jack Epps Jr.,”Top Gun” and “Dick Tracy”; Mark Gill, former head of Miramax; Mike Werb, “The Mask” and “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider”; Michael Taylor, “Bottle Rocket” and “The Pursuit of D.B. Cooper,” to name a few. (Credit: Amazon Studios).

The Alchemist Agenda was written by Marty Weiss who won Amazon Studios first scriptwriting competition in November 2010. The motion comic version of the script is a test film that will be judged by Amazon Studios and has the potential to win $1m and having the movie made into a live action feature by Warner Brothers.

 ”The Alchemist Agenda’” Title Sequence

The Hive was founded in 2009 and specializes in creative film editing, motion comic animation and transmedia content for multiple new media distribution options. The Hive has provided post services for Deacon Entertainment in conjunction with the Department of Education and Laureate International University. Founding Partner, Yesenia Higuera, also edited The History Channel’s documentary “The People Speak”.

Contact: Yesenia Higuera

Phone: (310) 926 4932     Email: yesenia@hivedoes.com

Tags: Motion Comics, Animatics, Storyboards, Film Editing

Contact: Yesenia Higuera

Phone: (310) 926 4932     Email: yesenia@hivedoes.com

Tags: Motion Comics, Animatics, Storyboards, Film Editing

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