Forced Perspective Research

Thinking through some possible FX scenes.

LOTR Forced Perspective



LOTR Forced Perspective Moving Camera



Forced Perspective Shots



Giant Robot FX Test



Movie Magic Episode 5 - Forced Perspective



The Keeper Of The Cardboard Key

Mark Wahlberg Talks To A Necronomicon

I couldn't help it. The title of this post sounded so absurd I had to use it. Anyways.
There's no better way to celebrate Halloween then perusing or participating in Instructables. Don't know about Instructables? Then check it out for yourself. http://www.instructables.com

It's simply a place to see and post How to and DIY projects of all kinds. From "How To Bake a Cake" to "How To Blow Up a Cake" people have submitted projects of all kinds. So Halloween is a great time to see what people are doing, or to post your very own instructable.

I decided to submit my Prop Necronomicon How To Vid as my very first Instructable, and I'm proud to say it's being FEATURED on the Instructables home page. How nifty is that?



I've been a longtime lurker on Instructables and it's pretty cool to have my first submission be featured. Glad so many are enjoying the project and I appreciate all the feedback, comments, and messages I've gotten. Feel free to take a look at the step by step instructions as well as the posted video there.

INSTRUCTABLES: Necronomicon: Book Of The Dead

This will certainly be a neat addition to the Halloween Video this year. So exciting.

In other news. I CANNOT BELIEVE THEY DID WHAT THEY DID ON SNL.

My wife and I joked about what they should do next to follow up Mark Wahlberg Talks To Animals skit, and as I was watching SNL this passed weekend they actually did exactly what we were joking about.



I'm still laughing my ass off. So this makes Mark Wahlberg pretty cool in my book and almost redeems him for doing the movie Fear.

Weapons Training

Here are pics and freezes from the MKX 300 Weapons Training scene.

First a few action figure poses.

Agent Windows.

Agent Weir.

The Vampire Keels.

The Vampire Keels again.

The MKX weapon prop, nights before. I had just purchased some led tap lights and had glued them on using welder glue (amazing glue). The gun itself is a mix of Simply Orange bottles, gray cable, bolts and washers, great stuff, red and white led lights, and an old video camera, all spray painted with black and silver.

The fully finished weapons prop. Although I realize now that it was missing a few lights that day.

Getting ready to shoot the MKX 300 scene. Aaron Plouffe is our test zombie.

Weapons Training Graphic.

Nigel.

Nigel introducing the MKX Weapon.

Windows about to demonstrate the weapon on a test zombie.

The test zombie.

After the zombie has been killed.

The Vampire Keels.

The Vampire Fangs.

Holding the vampire back

The vampire in restraints as Windows explains how to kill a vampire.

The MKX 300 lcd screen.

The Vampire Keels hit with an MK 9mm Silver and Garlic Bullet

The Vampire Keels hitting the bloody wall.

Always follow up your bullet hit. Weir with the wooden stake. Windows with the sunlight emitter.

Zombies

Here are the freezes from the last scene we shot this past Saturday. The zombie scene. If you were someone who wanted to be a zombie and you were not there, not to worry, there will be plenty of opportunity to be a zombie, especially coming up in July.

This was a fun shoot. I had a lot of fun and I certainly hope that everyone else had as much fun as I. I always love those days when there's a set full of people. William Stine did an excellent job on the zombie make up. Arlanda M. Robinson did her own zombie make up and did an excellent job as well. Arlanda and the rest of the zombies were awesome, especially Skylar playing our resident brain eating little girl zombie.

And the cops were kick ass as well. Richard Gaither and Aaron Plouffe backing us up as featured extra cops. And finally I was able to get my main cops in action, Nicole, Chris, and Brandon. I decided to take my character out of this scene so I could concentrate on the camera work and directing. Wanted to make sure we got this just right.

And of course special thanks to Jacob Hauser who was our first test subject for squibs in the first video blog, he returned for this shoot to be zombie #4 or is it 5? I actually don't know. Very very special thanks to Brian Tally, our resident production coordinator/key grip/trouble shooter. Thanks for once again backing me up and helping all of us out, and for making every shoot as smooth as possible.

And a very very very truly heartfelt special thanks to Kelly Emerson and her family for making us welcome at their home and for allowing us to shoot so much at the Northwoods Stables as well as helping us out with other locations and props. None of this would have been possible with out you Kelly.

Here come the the freeze frames.

Zombie Megan and behind her Zombie Jacob.


Zombie Randi


Arlanda and her excellent make up job.


More of Arlanda's excellent make up.


The Zombie Elijah and behind him part of Zombie Tally.


Brandon (Agent Weir) calls for back up.


Nicole (Agent Jack) comes in with her pistol.


Nicole aims.


Randi gets a bullet in the brain as Zombie Jacob gets blood on his shirt.


The aftermath


Nicole and Chris Plouffe (holding the MKX100 series weapon) witnessing the aftermath.


Brandon also witnessing holding the MKX300 series weapon.


The Zombie Skylar with brain in hand.


The Happy Zombie Skylar.


Your last line of defense against zombies. Left to right Brandon White, Richard Gaither, Nicole Nastazzio, Chris Plouffe, Aaron Plouffe.


Only a few more scenes to shoot. I'm editing as we shoot, then I've got the rest of the score to do, but all in all I should be at a final cut for this short/episode before the end of the month (fingers crossed.)

Monster Research Pics

Yesterday was working on Monsters day. I had started building the frame work for a particular creature, and went out and bought materials for another. The episode itself features mainly Zombies, Vampires, and a Werewolf, but these other creatures I'm trying to include will be featured in the intro and as inserts throughout the show. I'm trying to convey that Shadow Company deals with monsters of all kinds, therefore really establishing the size and variety of this particular universe.

I also spent sometime at Barnes and Noble today. I found myself thumbing through magazines, Fangoria, Gorezone, Horror Hound, as well as others. What started as perusing became me taking pictures with my cam phone everytime I saw an image that intrigued me. A few of these were images from ads for merchandise of T-shirts. I do recognize one image from a retro horror flick from back in the day called RETRIBUTION (creeped me out as a kid).

Mainly these are images that somewhat express the style and structure of some of the creatures the Monster Cops go up against.

Plus it

It was sort of Walt Disney's motto. While working on any project, he always asked, how can we plus it? Meaning, what else can we do to make it even better? It's a way to turn things from satisfactory to good, and from good to great. I don't want to work on anything I don't feel I can turn into somthing great. I think we've got a good episode, but a whole lot of work needs to be done to hit greatness.

The one thing on my brain is monsters, of course. If I really work at it, and work to plus it, I can make a goofy little short filled with dialogue and comedy, turn into something REALLY great. We can put some people in make up, sure, but what else can I do to plus it.

Here's an amazing example. I found this video 2 years ago. I drooled over it and ponder it often, always wondering how and when I can attempt such a feat. This is a great example of plusing it, as well as the kind of grandiose type creature I'm looking to include in Monster Cops.



Here's what the description reads:
This Stone Golem was constructed using about 5 foam mattresses, over 50 sticks of hot melt glue, and 8 cans of grey and black spray paint. The foam is glued in large thick sheets (approx 20cm thick) to a fabric bodysuit, and the deep cracks are carved into the foam surface. The bodysuit has a zip up the back to allow the wearer to enter it, and the zip is concealed by abutting foam. The soles of the feet are made of corflute that has been sliced in half to expose corrugations that act as grip. The arms are about twice the length of the wearer\'s arms, and act as swinging weapons made entirely of soft foam. The golem took about 100 hours of work to construct, between 3 people. On its first appearance, the Stone Golem sent twenty bold adventurers into a hasty retreat without so much as touching them.

This along with the previous posts, are examples of what I need to accomplish to get to where this episode needs to be.

So I need to find me some mattress foam. LOL.

The Dregs Of Humanity

It's on my brain. And I know it's probably not going to happen the way I need it to, but just for ponderings sake here is some research for me to further look into that may come in handy if I decide to attempt to do this particular scene I have in mind. And yes the title of this post is a reference to an 80's tv show called "It's Your Move."


http://www.vilethings.com/vilethings_skeleton_marionette.htm

http://www.squidoo.com/marionette

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2007/05/how_to_make_a_pinocchio_m.html

Wings

I'm going to attempt to build wings. Monster Wings. Here are some research vids for me to peruse over later.








AND two links to folks who've already endeavored in this project.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Articulated-Wing-Framework/
http://www.tokyopop.com/Robofish/tp_article/286954.html

Monster Cops Vlog 020908

Visual FX Test 2808

Gunfights are mandatory in Monster Cops. But good gunfights are a requirement. In all honesty you can't beat the real thing. And when I say real thing I actually mean blank firing guns. I've used them in the past and they are just amazing. I am fascinated by the use of prop nonfiring guns and then later compositing gun fire over the footage, but with blank guns you get the same realism you'd get with the real thing. The smoke, the blowback, the shell ejecting, and just that overall feel and sound.

However I do have to run tests to look at my options, because putting the gun effects in after the footage has been shot costs me nothing. Now I do have blank guns, but some of these scenes call for more than one gun firing within a shot. So here I am testing it out, gun flash composites, nightvision filter, I even threw in a neat little blast just for the heck of it. Let's see the 20 second test shall we.



So what do I think. I think it's rather neato to watch, but I still think it's not up to par for what I want. First of all I haven't put in the shells being ejected and for me that's a big minus. I like to see the actual action on the gun and the shells pop out with each shot. I think some of the flashes look fine, but too long on the shots and they look too produced. The gun sounds are fine, seeing as how I recorded them myself from real guns. I like the nightvision, should fit in fine with our other nightvision footage. The blast really sucks. Heck I'm looking for perfection here and I haven't found it. However some of this in small spurts cut in with the actual blank firing gun footage should do fine. Vince DeNiro I wish I could afford ya. Perhaps when we do the feature.

In other news I'm actually finished with casting for this episode, but if you were looking to be cast, not to worry, I've got so many great resources and people now that I've just got to do 2 or 3 more, so I'm actually still casting for two more Monster Cops shorts. But more on that later.

Video blog coming up on locations, fx, casting, rehearsals, and all of the behind the scenes goodness that is Monster Cops.

Our tripod was a napkin and a coaster.

A great article from Studio Daily about some of the VFX work on Cloverfield.

Cloverfield Carnage
How Double Negative Smashed Up Manhattan
By Bryant Frazer

And an interview with Matt Reeves from Shocktilyoudrop.com.

The way Cloverfield was shot is a good example of how I want Monster Cops to feel especially with the monster and battle scenes, minus the puking factor of course.

Working it.

Figured I'd post some pics of what's been going down for the past month or so. Next I'll post the first Monster Cops Video Blog.

I'm still in the middle of casting, but below are pics of some of the actors that have for sure been cast.

Brandon White, showing off in one of the new costume pieces.


The Adorable Nicole Nastazzio


Comedian Greg Romeo


Doug Hanks, who is also loaning us the use of his guns as well as gun expertise and a location to fire these guns at. Thank you so much Doug.


Danielle Motley has been cast in the much sought after role of Greenly. Yes Danielle I'm using your headshot, and yes I stole it off your myspace, get over it.

And if you're one of the many actors who were looking to audition for the role of Greenly I'm sorry, but I am still actively looking to fill other female roles and will continue to keep in contact with all of the actors who have been emailing me.

Others cast but not pictured:
John Burcham
Lisa Molenda
Will Atwood
Jamie Bertman
more to come.

Secured almost all of the locations. Special thanks to Kelly Emerson for giving us her ranch to shoot at, which has an amazing backwoods area. She also put me in touch with the person who can get us in to shoot at this massive warehouse in downtown Winston.


Kelly's been a real Godsend, she's also contributing some possible props/costumes as well as giving us an in to a Helicopter.

I've been hard at work at creating one of the prop guns for the movie. I felt the Monster Cops needed a specialized weapon, not unlike the Ghostbusters proton pack, or the Plasma Rifle from Aliens. I took my inspiration from Indy Mogul. Everytime I see empty bottles now, I just see gun parts. A full video on how I'm making this will be done later.



Here it is with a final paint job, but still without the final parts and accessories added.


Here's our Special FX guy William Stine working on the Werewolf FX. I'm not going to post too many photos of it just yet, don't want to completely give it away. William you're doing an amazing job.





Still going through casting, still looking at locations, alot is still up in the air, but so much has fallen into place. Can't wait to shoot this one.