The Beach Where Their Journey Ends…(maybe)

We may not know for sure what planet the characters from both sides of the Cylon-Human war in Battlestar Galactica were standing on at the end of “Revelations,” but at least we can tell you more about where the scene was shot.

Blogger and BSG fan bloginhood was smart enough to train his family to location scout for him! When they saw the BSG crew out shooting late last year on a beach in Tsawwassen, they took some great pictures.

Check out his story here and let him know what you think.

And yes, that beach will be on the 13th Colony‘s location scouting list for this summer.

More Caprica Location Pics

I don’t want to give anyone the impression that the 13^th Colony is made up of a bunch of stalkerazzi, but once again, the Caprica production team has chosen to shoot in a public location REALLY CLOSE to where one of us works. Either we’re building quite a network up here, or we’re just getting lucky.

We have more exclusive Caprica set pics today. They could be considered spoilery, so they’re under a cut.

The Galactica Cliffhanger Party

by spacepug

Alas, no one screamed at the end. Too stunned, I think. I will admit to a certain amount of excited squeaking of the “OMG, is he gonna do it?” variety about midway through the episode. But I wasn’t the only one! That’s the advantage of seeing the show with such a large group of people who are just as into it as you are.

Twenty-nine 13^th Colonists gathered at Eighties Restaurant for our Frakkin’ Cliffhanger! Season Ender Party on Friday night. There were BSG discussion topics on each table, including “Michael Hogan deserves an Emmy!”, “The Chief is SO gonna kick Tory’s a**” and “Gaius is a wacko but we love him!” but the conversation never seemed to lag. There were all sorts of theories about what we would see, but I don’t think anyone expected what we got.

There were some scary moments right before 7pm when the broadcast signal went wonky, but Space Channel solved the problem (or the gods made the solar storms die down) so we had a great viewing party!

When the dust had settled after the broadcast, everyone got to vote on the entries in our “Artistic Challenge.” We had a clear-cut winner and he got a very special prize from our surprise guest. Eric Chu, the concept artist who designed so much of the look of the re-imagined BSG, from Centurions to Basestars to the Galactica herself, has been an undercover 13^th Colonist for awhile now, and he let everyone in on the secret when he presented our winner with a wonderful signed poster of one of Centurions. Eric brought a friend along, Alex Leung, who did the blueprint view of the Galactica that is often visible on the screens in CIC. He’s obviously a big fan of the show and it was great to have him along.

We had some tough trivia questions at the end, for which the winners were handsomely rewarded for the depth of their geek knowledge. Not sure if our Seattle visitor will be able to play the vintage VHS tape of a classic BSG episode, but he didn’t refuse the prize!

So we’re back into another long wait, but they might just have given us enough to talk about for the next six months!

Season Finale Review: “Revelations”

by millari

MIND=OFFICIALLY BLOWN

(It’s a review, so yes, there are spoilers behind the cut…)

Just Any Old Caprican Diner

Wonder what Caprican food is like? Or Gemenese? For more pictures from more angles, check out the 13th Colony photo gallery over here at Meetup.

Gotta love the zeroes and ones in the logo. Probably not the final version of the logo, just one for their letterhead during production. For instance, when X-Files was in town under the name “Done One” their letterhead logo had a windmill (blades in shape of X) and a knight on a horse holding a lance. Likely not the one they’ll use for the theatrical release.

Hungry for Caprican Food?

by spacepug

That’s the joy of being in Vancouver — nowhere else can you get sushi on one side of the street and Caprican or Gemenese food on the other!

The pilot for Battlestar Galactica‘s prequel project, Caprica, was shooting last night in downtown Vancouver. Popular filming location the Smile Restaurant was transformed into Sa’s Place, which serves Caprican and Gemenese food. The Smile was also noticeably used in Bionic Woman last year.

Better quality pictures will go up on the blog this weekend, including the Caprica filming logo, which is likely just a filler for now and not the final image.

13th Colonists are so lucky….we’re here and you’re not!

Battlestar Back to Kamloops

I don’t even want to speculate why, but Battlestar Galactica is returning to Kamloops for filming next week. Kamloops is a city in central BC where scenes from the so-called Algae Planet and the Temple of Jupiter were shot for Season Three.

The exciting opportunity for BSG fans in Kamloops is that the production is looking for local extras! They are looking for men and women, of all ages and ethnic backgrounds, but you must “have an athletic build and a clean cut look or be slim with long hair or dreadlocks.” Here’s a link to the casting notice from a local paper, with the time and place for auditions.

Go for it, BC fans! Be a part of Galactica history…

Episode Review: “The Hub”

Check behind the cut for millari‘s review of the latest episode — the one that made at least one legion of shippers go awwww….

Can’t See the Planet for All the Trees

by spacepug

A brave group of 13^th Colonists headed Into the Woods this past weekend, in our continuing search for Battlestar Galactica shooting locations. We’d been tipped off by someone on the show that Kobol scenes in Season Two were shot in Capilano Park and Lynn Valley on the North Shore. We’ve covered most of the trails in Capilano and a fair portion of Lynn Valley. Four scouting missions so far, two to each park, and we have yet to positively identify a single shot. We know we’re in the right areas. We suspect we’ve come very close to locations doubling as Caprica and New Caprica as well. There are just so damn many trees. Plus, more than two years have passed since shooting and “the big wind storm” of December 2006 could have changed the landscape quite a bit since then.

We even utilized the most up to date technical tools to help us. I thoroughly recommend the iTouch for wandering through a forest and trying to match screen shots to actual trees. Unlike my iPod, the larger display screen is big enough that there is no risk of tripping over a random tree root while trying to get the right perspective. My foot is healing nicely, now, thank you. Doubt if that use for the iPod & iTouch was foreseen by the genuises at Apple, but they would be proud.

Except for coming up with a new technobabble phrase, “good fern density,” we came up empty. And the kicker is the local newspaper published a story the very next day indicating the BSG crew had been shooting on the North Shore woods all of the previous week, just in a different river valley. That will likely be our next destination, but it is obvious we could spend all summer looking for trees and still never be sure we’d found the correct sites.

So, blog readers, we’re turning it over to you. Do you know where this swing set from “Flesh & Bone” is? Note the red posts and the teeter-totter (see-saw, in some countries) in the background? Should be easy to find, right?

A Sign from the Stars?

by spacepug

Nearly every coffee shop I go into in Vancouver has the daily horoscope taped to the front counter. Something to read while you’re waiting for your morning dose of caffeine. Most places around here post Georgia Nicols‘ version. She’s a very popular lady around these parts and her column appears in one of our daily newspapers. Her writing is witty and accessible. You can count on her to start your day with a smile.

So as I was reading yesterday’s Pisces report, imagine my surprise…”what can you do to help create the family you want to be part of? (Short of being part of Commander Adama’s crew on Battlestar Galactica)”

Well, I was so thrilled that I wrote to Georgia to tell her she’d made my day. Not only did I get a lovely thank you back from her, but she passed along a story. It seems one of the rigging crew on Battlestar is also an avid reader of her column and a Pisces. He took the article to the set yesterday, where Edward James Olmos (also a Pisces) is directing the current episode. The crew really enjoyed the reference.

Much smiling ensued, I’m sure.