Crapbot Productions Blog

I get to play philanthropist thanks to Randstad!

This is totally amazing! I won first place in a video contest that was run by a company named Randstad and as part of my prize, the sponsor is going to donate $5,000 to the charity of my choice!  I also get $5,000 to keep for myself but in a weird way I’m kind of more excited about the money I get to give away.  Yo, I feel like friggin’ Bill and Melinda Gates over here!  This is really a once in a lifetime opportunity.  I try and donate to a few charities... [Read more...]

Check out our Crash the Super Bowl entry, Caves & Monsters

Back in October, some friends and I got together and shot an entry for Doritos big, annual Crash the Super Bowl contest.  When all was said and done, Fritolay recived a whopping 5,000 submissions so suffice it to say, we didn’t win!  But I do happen to think our entry is ridiculously good.  It features a group of table-top gamers playing a goofy D&D style game called “Caves & Monsters.”  If you’re a fan of elves, wizards, Doritos and lightning... [Read more...]

So…I sent a Giraffe into space for DoUpto.com

This fall, the microjob site Doupto.com was looking for an interesting way to introduce themselves to the Internet.  So…I attached their logo to a weather balloon and sent that sucker to the edge of space!  And since DoUpTo’s mascot is a giraffe, I stuck a little giraffe astronaut on the logo just kind of for the heck of it.  This was my first high altitude weather balloon launch but it went pretty well.  Unfortunately it took so long for the balloon to reach 100,000... [Read more...]

New documentary project: Greetings From Krampus!

Our pal, Krampus Believe it or not, back in the day lovable old Saint Nick used to run around Eastern Europe with a child-murdering demon from Hell. Legend had it that on Saint Nicolas Day, Santa Claus would arrive to reward all the good boys and girls with presents and treats. But if you had been naughty, Santa would call in the Krampus to torture you until you repented for your sins. Though the Krampus has been a major part of the Germanic Christmas tradition for centuries,... [Read more...]

Giraffes Gone Wild!

I went to the Brookfield zoo a few weeks ago and I did a little filming while I was there. For some reason, all the giraffes were just standing around licking the trees like they were the most awesome-tasting things in the world. I captured this bizarre phenomenon on film (ok, on my SD card) and later I dubbed in the conversation I imagined they were having in their secret giraffe language. Enjoy!  Read More →

My very first giant, novelty check!

The Crapbot does it again!  I love shooting videos about goofy looking robots….so much so that I named my company “Crapbot Productions.”  So last month when I heard about Royal Purple Motor Oil’s “Reel Wars” video contest I immediately knew I wanted to shoot an entry that featured a big purple robot that shot motor oil out of its fingers. Well, I built my “Purplebot” and shot my video and about 2 weeks ago I got word that my submission... [Read more...]

Samples of our recent HD work

If you’ve checked out the rest of this site you’ll know that I’m a big believer in shooting work on spec.  I’ve done a few spec ads that I’m really proud of this year so I thought I’d compile them here.  So here now are a few samples of our recent HD projects….  Read More →

FOLLOW ME TO THE GATES OF HELL!

Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning for the last 15 years I’ve stood on the side of the Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago and screamed out witty comments, nonsensical musings and viral video suggestions at the passing cars.  In all that time did anyone every hear me?  Probably not.  But I hated keeping those super-short messages bottled up inside of me so it just felt good to send them out into the ether.  Thankfully technology has finally caught up with my desire... [Read more...]

Monograms Travel buys “The Voice Over of Reason”

Awesome news!  The really cool travel website Monograms has purchased the web commercial we made for them!  I’m pretty proud of this one.  I wrote, produced, lit, sound-recorded, shot and edited the whole thing myself.  I even designed the cover of the fake book featured in the video; “Italian For Dopes.”  However I think our two actors, Chris and Kayce are probably the big reason the ad turned out so well. They really nailed their roles. UPDATE:  The... [Read more...]

Nerdcore For Life now on Hulu

So have you been waiting to order your copy of Nerdcore For Life for some reason?  Well guess what, I’m about to save you a couple bucks.  Because now you can watch the entire documentary for free on Hulu.com!  Well…you’ll have to sit through some Fed-Ex and Capital One commercials but at least you won’t have to pay anything.  Hulu seems to be kind of selective about the documentaries they stream so getting the film on there is a real coup for us. ... [Read more...]

Nerdcore For Life: Now on DVD!

I can’t believe the day has finally come. Today is August 3rd, 2010 which means that our documentary Nerdcore For Life is now officially available to own on DVD! If you’d like top purchase a copy, just head to www.nerdcoreforlife.com to place your order. What does the DVD include? Well, here’s a breakdown of what’s on there: The Movie -The feature-length documentary (of course) Bonus scenes -Nerdcore Night After party -The Sucklord meets Nomad -Nerdcore in Las... [Read more...]

Fermilab music video hits the web

The Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Switzerland is (finally) up and running! While the folks over in Europe are busy celebrating, we thought we’d take this opportunity to pay homage to the ORIGINAL king of the particle accelerators; Fermilab in Batavia, IL, USA. The LHC got it’s own rap video back in 2008 so we figured it was about time Fermilab had one too! Filmed on location in and around the Tevatron particle collider at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory,... [Read more...]

Coors Light buys our spec commercial

Hey! You’ve seen those Coors Light commercials where regular dudes crash a press conference and ask NFL coaches questions about Coors Light, right? Well Coors wanted more of those commercials to play on the “Coors Light Channel” on Tivo so they posted some footage of some NFL coaches giving answers and they invited filmmakers to use the clips in their own, original ads. I went for it and they bought and used my commercial! Here it is….. It was apparently available... [Read more...]

Haunts Against Hunger mini-doc

Way back in October I shot a mini-documentary for an ingenious event called Haunts Against Hunger.  Basically a bunch of very committed Halloween enthusiasts dress like zombies and hold a food drive.  The drive has grown nicely since it’s inception and now “home haunters” leave boxes in their front yards all month so people can drop off food.  As the video explains, they had a really successful drive this year. Big thanks to all the folks that appeared and... [Read more...]

Harley Davidson buys our promo!

A few months back I found an awesome website called Poptent which hooks up filmmakers with brands that are looking for creative content.  Harley Davidson held an Open Call on Poptent for videos that promote the new Harley Davidson Museum in Milwaukee.  Milwaukee’s only a 2 hour drive for me so I figured why not take a road trip and do a little mini-documentary about the museum?  Well, I just found out that Harley bought my video for a VERY nice amount!  The plan is that... [Read more...]

It is on like a Tevatron

One of the best things about being a filmmaker is that sometimes you get to go places and see things that are off limits to the general public.  My camera has opened a lot of doors for me but of all the crazy things I’ve been allowed to shoot, the stuff I got to film this past week takes the cake.  For reasons that are still not 100% clear to me, I got to spend 2 days filming a music video at one of the most important scientific facilities in the world; FermiLab.  FermiLab... [Read more...]

Movie meets world

I’m very happy to finally announce that we’ve signed a worldwide distribution agreement for Nerdcore For Life with a fantastic company called Journeyman Pictures.  Journeyman is based in the UK and they specialize is distributing offbeat documentaries.  They do a ton of business throughout Europe which is a market that we all think will be really accepting of a crazy documentary about rapping nerds.  Journeyman has some really interesting plans for Nerdcore For... [Read more...]

OMG! LOLcats musik video unleeshed on teh internetz!

It was exactly one year ago today, on July 12th, 2008 that Nerdcore rapper/producer Doctor Popular and I spent an afternoon in a garbage filled alley in San Francisco filming a music video for his song LOLcats. Nerdcore For Life is roughly 84 minutes long.  It took about 5 months to edit.  The music video for LOLcats is under 3 minutes.  It took me 12 months to edit.  Ok…I didn’t spend all 12 months editing the thing.  It just got pushed to the back burner for... [Read more...]

End of the road?

I stopped submitting Nerdcore For Life to film festivals a good while back and now that I think about it, I don’t think the doc has had a festival screening since October!  Oh my God, that feels like it was last month.  No wait!  We screened in the Lake County Film Fest a few months back.  Well anyway, I thought we’d go for one more and as it turns out, we were accepted to what will probably be Nerdcore For Life’s final film festival.  The fest?  The Hardacre... [Read more...]

New news about impending news

Well things are really going strong behind the scenes at Crapbot Productions.  Problem is that we can’t really talk about any of those things yet.  We’ve even managed to make some decent money this summer but I want to keep that on the DL for a few more weeks since I don’t want to jinx what we’re doing! If you can think of a better name for this guy than "Crappy the Crapbot" be sure to let me know. Our big news though is Nerdcore For Life related and we... [Read more...]

NC4L finally on the Facey-space

Nerdcore For Life has had a myspace page since pretty much day one and we have a pretty healthy collection of fans over there.  But the times…they are a changing.  A lot of folks made the exodus to Facebook a long time ago so I figured we should do the same.  So Nerdcore For Life finally has a Facebook page and you can become a “fan” of us by clicking right here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nerdcore-For-Life/79341126707 So what’s the benefit of becoming... [Read more...]

Youtube, we love you

Wow, well we hit kind of a mini-milestone today.  I checked the stats for Nerdcore For Life’s youtube channel and in total, all of the videos on our channel have racked up 1,500,120 views. The first video I posted to the channel was the Nerdcore For Life trailer on December 7, 2006.  I remember the date because you know….it lives in infamy.  So it took 2 1/2 years but we finally reached the 1.5 million views mark.  Most of the views belong to the trailer which... [Read more...]

Free Colorado NC4L Screening

A nerdcore fan at Colorado State University in Ft. Collins, CO contacted me about two months ago and asked what it would take to make a screening and concert happen at his school. We exchanged some ideas and the dude actually busted his ass and made the whole thing happen! He even got the school to sponsor it as an official event so the whole thing will be free and open to all. They even made up some really sweet posters: I’ll be there and so will Colorado’s favorite... [Read more...]

Talk Derby to Me

http://www.vimeo.com/4076671 Our on again, off again web series, In Your Face, Chicago is on again…at least for one more episode!  This time, host Chris Biddle rubs (and throws) elbows with the ladies of Chicago’s Roller Derby League, The Windy City Rollers.  For this episode we headed to the UIC pavilion to catch a WCR double header; The Hell’s Belles VS. The Fury and the Double Crossers VS. The Manic Attackers.  In between the action, the In Your Face, Chicago crew... [Read more...]

Neat Amp Magazine Piece

Hey so this is cool, Amp Magazine did a great story about Nerdcore For Life and you can read it by clicking right here, right now: http://www.ampmagazine.com/index.php/interviews/comments/nerdcore_for_life/ I did my interview for this so long ago I didn’t even remember what I said. I like this piece because it’s the first time a reporter included anything I had to say about craigslist. Without craigslist, I never would have been able to make the film; I found most... [Read more...]

We Heart Amsterdam

We’re back! After some genuine concern and worry about one member of our party, I’m happy to say that all of us (Beefy, MC Router, MC Lars, Ytcracker and me, Dan) survived our trip to Amsterdam for Glitched: The Dutch Nerdcore event. I think all of us would agree that it was one of the best, coolest, most special things we’ve ever done in our lives. It’s not just that it was a fun trip (which it was) it was because the guys that brought us out there (4Worx) were... [Read more...]

Beads! Boobies! Burlesque!

Uploaded with ImageShack.us Just because Chicago is about a thousand miles north of New Orleans that doesn’t mean that we can’t indulge in some pre-Lent revelry! Beads! Boobies! Burlesque! is a mini-documentary about Vaudezilla Production’s Mardi Gras-themed show of the same name,  which took place at The Blue Bayou Bar and Grill every Thursday in February 09.  Check out the short to see Chicago’s finest Burlesque performers strut their stuff on the city’s only bar... [Read more...]

Recent Visitors

I use a program to track where visitors to Nerdcoreforlife.com are from and shows their location on a map.  I’m heading to the airport in an hour and I thought I’d check and see how NC4L website’s traffic is doing one more time.  Check out this section from the Recent Visitor map: The Netherlands: Nerd Central I’m going to take this as a sign that Amsterdam screening and concert are going to go well.  Read More →

Two new Chicagoland screenings

Ah-ha.  We’ve got two screenings coming up that I don’t need to get on a plane to attend.  Both will be for the Lake County Film Fest in early March.  Here are the deets…. Friday, March 6th @ 6PM College of Lake County, Room B270 19351 W Washington St.  Grayslake, IL Sunday, March 8th @ 4PM College of Lake County, Room B270 19351 W Washington St.  Grayslake, IL It’s just a 90 minute drive to Grayslake so chances are good that I’ll be at both... [Read more...]

Greatest NC4L plug…ever

I subscribe to the RSS feed for the web show Geek Entertainment TV and the newest episode just made my day.  Rather than try and explain why, I encourage you to check it out for yourself.  Be aware:  This video is not safe for work!  Unless you work someplace where they don’t care if you watch videos of porn stars.  And if you do work at a place like that, let me know if they’re hiring. Click to witness the awesomeness  Read More →

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