David Tarleton, Debby Takikawa and Noah Wyle at the Newport Beach Film Festival

This picture was taken the day of the film festival premiere of What Babies Want, at the Newport Beach Film Festival, April 24, 2005.

Pictured here (from left to right):

David Tarleton - Producer/Co-Writer/Editor of the film.
Debby Takikawa - Producer/Co-Writer/Director of the film.
Noah Wyle - Narrator, and one of the subjects of the documentary.

David Tarleton at the What Babies Want Premiere

This picture was taken the day of the premiere of What Babies Want, outside the historic Lobero Theatre, in Santa Barbara.

I was a Producer, and Editor of the feature length documentary.

It was Sunday November 7, 2004.

It was a beautiful day. The event started with wine and cheese outside the theatre.

Tracy and Noah Wyle were there, who both gave so much to this film. David Crosby, who contributed a song to the movie, was there.

It took me awhile to make sure everything was working with the audio levels inside the theatre (the Lobero's sound system left something to be desired - but otherwise the Lobero was a great space for a movie premiere).

I shared that day with my girlfriend Adria, and my parents, who had flown in from Virginia to attend the premiere. The night before, Mom and Dad also saw "The Miss Firecracker Contest," the play I directed that Adria was starring in.

The documentary went over extremely well, and Debby arranged for my family and me to stay at an amazing bed and breakfast in the Santa Ynez Valley that night.

We had a panel discussion after the film, and we invited members of the audience to ask questions and comment on the film. I was blown away by the audience reaction. Many of the people who had something to say had been deeply moved by the film. I'd never experienced something quite like it before.

People were in tears.

I was genuinely moved by the audience reaction. There was such a heartfelt outpouring of emotion over the event of the film. People were weeping, talking about birthing their children -- talking and their own births. Bringing up a oceans of pain and a worlds of joy.

Debby Takikawa, the director, worked very hard on this film, and spent over 4 years of her life working on it. But she gave a huge shout out to me, and I really got a lot of love and appreciation that day for the work I did on this movie. I spent the better part of a year making this film, and I really appreciate everyone who attended our premiere. All of the participants, film makers and audience alike, felt something very special that day.

I believe, from the audience reaction that day, that this film is going to be seen by a lot of people -- and can maybe help people -- and I'm really happy to have been involved.

Days like this are one of the reasons I got into film making in the first place.

Mars

Life on Mars.

Photoshop/After Effects/Bryce

Copyright (c) 2002 David Tarleton
All Rights Reserved.

Sweet Tooth

There's something out there, in the shadows. Something with a sweet tooth.

A young man takes out the trash through endless industrial hallways.

He's not alone.

This is Sweet Tooth, a short horror movie I co-Directed with Brandon Ellison. I was Director of Photography, Editor, Visual Effects, Steadicam Operator, Sound Designer. Brandon was Producer/Director/Writer/Lead. (Bit of trivia: Brandon played Jesus' bloody body double in Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ!)

Brandon had the idea to make this short, and made a puppet, so we went out to the Glendale Galleria one Saturday in 2001. For about 4 hours, we ran around the underbelly of the mall, with me shooting my Sony PD-150 on a Steadicam JR, and Brandon running around in front of the camera.

On many shots, I did only one take - when he's putting the trash in the dumpster, for example. For other scenes, I got a lot of coverage, and the real energy of the show came together during editing.

Brandon came up with the idea after he got a job working at the mall, and got creeped out taking the trash out through the creepy cooridors.

I think you see a lot of my style in this - the use of steadicam, the improvisational, balletic use of camera, fast pacing, syncopated rhythm, unique compositions, use of flutter cuts, rich sound design, etc. It was a fun collaboration.

Copyright (c) 2001 S&B Productions
All Rights Reserved
This is for my online portfolio.

Adria Away At Sea

This is a picture I took of my girlfriend, actress Adria Dawn, on a recent weekend getaway to Laguna Beach. I took it with my cell phone.

The Making of Double Vision

I Produced and Edited The Making of Double Vision, for Sony Pictures.

Dean Blagg was the Executive Producer, Mei-Juin Chen was Producer/Translator, and Steve Miller was Producer/Writer. Winston Davis and Associates was the production company.

The three producers - Mei-Juin, Steve and I - sat together for a couple of months, with me at the controls of the Final Cut, and figured out what to do with the mountain of footage we were given. I re-cut every single scene from the movie itself, punching up the energy throughout and even moving lines around. I intercut the documentary footage with re-cut clips of the movie juxtaposed against interviews linked by narration with use of editorial segues punctuated by rich sound design. There's a lot of my style in this cut.

Often when you give the studio executives a first cut, you get back pages of notes, and you begin the negotiations back and forth to get to the final cut. This film was the first time for me where the first cut delivered to the client was the version that went on air.

The program is 22 minutes long, and played on TV around the world.

Copyright (c) 2002 Sony Pictures
This is for my online portfolio.

The Trailer for The Sea Is Watching

I edited this trailer for The Sea Is Watching for Sony Pictures a couple of years ago.

The film was based on a screenplay written by Akira Kurosawa, and directed after Kurosawa's death by Kei Kumai.

I was the editor of both the international and domestic trailers, and Dean Blagg was the producer. Dean's one of the partners at Winston Davis & Associates.

I've always liked working with Dean, and I've worked with him on a number of projects. One of the things about working with him that I think is cool is that he respects the fact that I know how to make movies (since I've produced, directed, and edited for years), and so he generally works like an executive producer with me. He'll give me a script, and I'll come back in a few days or a week with a spot. I've often gotten a Producer credit on my jobs with Dean, because I end up mostly self directed.

Dean's instruction to me on this one was "give me a chill up my spine." So, I spent the next 3 days looking for music that I used as a temp track to cut the spot. The final music was all composed specifically for this trailer by Lee Sanders, who is the composer for The Amazing Race, with whom I've collaborated on What Babies Want, Dinner, and countless other projects.

I tried to be very delicate with this one, with a haunting, minimal sound design (I always do my own sound design), and a careful juxtaposition of shots. The sound used for the transitions was a combination of real ocean sounds and sounds I created on an Alesis Airsynth.

A trailer is a kind of remix of the original movie. When watching this piece, you're seeing my favorite bits of the movie combined with totally new music, and totally new sound effects (except for one sound that I used from the actual movie - you get to guess which one). I've taken the shots out of context, and recombined them to create an entirely new piece. The pacing is different, the mood is different, the tone is different. There is an essential similarity between what a film editor does and what a music producer does.

Copyright (c) 2003 Sony Pictures
This is for my portfolio.