Sonic FX Test 2

Did another FX test, this time with more frantic animation and a little more detail in the blue image.

Sonic FX Test

Here are my first thoughts on our blue streak done with a little After Effects.

Brown Bread Music Video 2

Day two was less intense. We thankfully started an hour later and had much milder weather. Firstly we filmed on an abandoned railway track which was lovely and picturesque and then we moved into the woods where there were some very useful old shelters that must have been used in the war. I had a lot less to do that so most of the time I was just able to observe the action. They used quite a fair few lenses, five in total and a couple of filters when needed.

Brown Bread Music Video 1

I offered to do a little more crewing for Brown Bread the other day when I heard they were shooting a music video-what I'm most interested in going into at the moment. We had a very early start at around 6.30 and then an intense shoot up until about three but all in all it was a very satisfying day.
I was general handyman, moving sandbags and digging holes for poles with barbed wire. As the pictures suggest it was a WW1 themed video so the band and actors needed a suitable hostile environment. The cold weather and perfect fog were a good start but for added realism the crew and I were all told to make a medley of "trench screams" whilst lobbing dirt down upon the cast to simulate various explosions.

Revised Storyboard

Here's a revised storyboard, it's basically my last one but with an extra frame.

More Spoof News

I thought that this was just a move (well worth a watch) but it turns out there are legions of spoof clips online made by "The Onion". Onion news makes a business of spoofing everything in a American style and puts out regular you tube videos.

A News Story

I thought I should get the dialogue sorted. It should end up being about a minute long. The more observant of you will notice a change needed in the storyboard.

News Anchor:

And we are getting some breaking news just in tonight coming from Leeds with reports of an unidentifiable blue object moving at extremely high speeds through the city centre, we should in fact be able to go live to our roving reporter Peter Zeitgeist right now, peter...

Peter:

Thank you James, I'm here in the city's pedestrianized centre where only moments ago many witnessed what could only be described some form of blue ball moving at hight speed aaand err take a look at some footage that was shot just now. All eye witnesses confirm that said object was in no way hostile, however many are still remaining cautious throughout their afternoon.

Bystander 1:

I wus jus cumin out'a Ainsleys and at first I just thought it were me cataracts playing up but then I saw that every which way folk were being pushed like ninepins and that.

Peter:

We have in fact now identified the object, it is here and none other than a bizarrely dressed jogger! Err Sir may I ask who are you and what is the purpose of all this?

Man:

Robotnic..... (sonic tune coming from tinny headphones) he's going to....... must....... COLLECT RINGS!!!!..... (running away) complete ZONE!!!!!!

Peter:

Well as you saw there james there doesn't seem to be any motive for these actions but we'll keep you posted, I've been Peter Zeitgeist back to you in the studio.

The Streak

Obviously our visual effects man is going to have more to say on this but my initial idea on our blue streak running through the city is somewhere along these lines. Not sure how to knock something like this up in After Effects but I'm sure it's perfectly simple.

Radiophonic Workshop

One of my tutors showed me this the other day with regard to my game environment music but I thought it was also a good insight into how industries can develop. As the video shows at this point in history the boundaries between sound design and composition started to blur a little what with the demand for hi-tech sci-fi sounds and all of a sudden people had to work with and in many cases invent new ways of making sound. It started to become more about inventing a technical processes of making the sound rather than just making a sound from already established means.

Late Music Video

Just realized I never put up my finished music video, here it is.

Storyboard 1

Now that we've finalized our idea I've made a little storyboard. This is by no means set in stone but I don't really see any necessity for any changes on the horizon.

The Decision

We've decided to go with the VFX Sonic + live action man. My Production Designer and I thought we'd go fully with the retro vibe and have our blue streak turn out to be a live action man running through the streets in a loud blue shellshuit. Then we'd add a few cardboard spikes to our runners and go to town on the makeup so that our runner looks "hedgehogey". Here are a few ideas I had for my costume.

The Real Joke News

This is probably the textbook example of a good news parody. It's got some nice over the top graphics and standard overly serious delivery.

Rival Ideas on the Board

Here is a little storyboard of our two rival ideas and a small description done underneath. It's a little late really as as soon as I in fact did this as soon as we formed our teams and formulated our idea.

90s News

I suppose the first thing to check out will be some 90s new broadcasts. Here are three that have the kind of graphics and cinematography I'm thinking of at the moment; simple tasks for our visual effects man Chris.

Chosen Brief + Brainstrom

We (Chris http://chrisclarkeyear2.blogspot.com/, Steve http://fatdog9.blogspot.com/and I) quickly came to the conclusion that we wanted to do the SEGA brief as we has some good clear ideas pretty much instantly.

My initial idea was that we live action film a real live hedgehog scuttling around a small set made to look like a typical sonic level. This would have the sort of appeal that any typical "cute animal film" such as the one below would have.

However after I rang a combination of animal sanctuaries and hire companies it became pretty obvious that getting hold of a hedgehog at a reasonable price was next to impossible, especially seeing as they're all in hibernation!

So we had a bit more of a brainstorm and finally two new angles on an idea popped up.

The idea is that we do a mock 90s news report on the havoc being caused by a mysterious blue creature which would later turn out to be Sonic the hedgehog. This would involve lots of loud colours and 90s kitsch and it would go one of two ways, either....

We would have a news presenter introduce a breaking news story which would then go to a reporter (either in a helicopter or on the ground) witnessing a blue hedgehog, played by a live action hamster dressed as sonic in some form of blue costume, destroying every inch of our miniature foamboard city in its path.

or...

We would have a news presenter introduce a breaking news story which would then go to a reporter (either in a helicopter or on the ground) witnessing a blue streak (done in After Effects) whizzing round the (real live action) city which would then turn out to be a live action man in some form of spikey blue shell suit.

So it's

real hamster in fake miniature city

vs

special effects enhanced blue spiky real man in real city.

But either way it'll be a mock 90s news report.

A brief history of Computer Graphics

The first feature film to use computer graphics was Westworld in 1973 and then again in the 1976 sequel Futureworld however these were only 2D. It wasn't until 1977 when Star Wars was released that 3d graphics came into play, albeit in the form of a simple wireframe Deathstar model. A slightly more advanced version of this simple wireframe technique was used in Ridley Scott's 1979 film Alien going as far as to show wireframe mountains. Graphics stayed in wireframe mode until the 1981 film Looker however I'm sure we'll all be more familiar with 1982's Tron which used a similar technique.

These effects were created by a number of production facilitates but sadly thanks to a poor reaction to Tron as a film and some difficulties during production made C.G.I in film temporarily unpopular. In 1984 the first photorealistic computer graphic images for a feature film, The Last Starfighter, were used. Graphics were used for all the spaceships, planets and high-tech hardware. For a few more years there were similar efforts in movies and then in 1985 Pixar made (arguably) the first CGI character in a film; a "stained-glass-window-come-to-life effect for Young Sherlock Holmes. It seems that Pixar are (again arguably) the godfathers when it comes to developing C.G.I as finally in 1995 they made the first feature length film rendered entirely from computer graphics, Toy Story.