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Showing posts from March, 2019

Film Day 2 (The War Continues)

March 29, 2019

Hello! Filming day 2 was a complete success in getting all the shots needed to finish up the film opening! :D I'm very satisfied with the work I got done.

First thing I wanted to share with you from filming is an updated set design because I wanted to move some more contextual props into the general filming area. I put in the NASA sign, a polaroid picture I had taken at the Kennedy Space Center the day before (I know, a perfectly planned trip before filming a science fiction movie), my Interstellar poster, some Apollo mission patches, a poster for the S.O.S.I. mission, and space books.

For the most part, I had won over my technology by preparing for all the possible problems that had happened last week. However, I did have some issues as my phone CONTINUOUSLY refused to take video and save it into the phone, despite there being plenty of space in it (I spent an entire DOLLAR on buying more space in my iCloud, and yet my iPhone refused to iWork).

For the rest of the footage, I had to use my friend's iPhone (without Filmic Pro) to shoot the final shots of the film. Visually I didn't detect any changes in quality, but you will surely hear of my panic attack on here if I do see it while editing.

Google drive, as wonderful as Google is for giving us amazing "free" programs in exchange for selling my entire search history (which at this point consisted of mostly "Why isn't my phone working?". Will expect some ads of phone repair services quite soon), was giving me MAJOR issues in uploading the videos. I had left it uploading all night and yet when I woke up, it had only uploaded half the videos and then another couple was missing as a whole. Eventually, I was able to get everything on there after a couple hours and banging my head on the wall.

One of my actors, Joey, who plays the brother in the film also dyed his hair a browner color so they actually look more like siblings. If I were to make an Oscar speech I would definitely use my short amount of time to thank his hair for its service.

The next step would be editing and probably recording some foley sounds to enhance the audio! Will update you of that soon :-)

Starting The End Before The Beginning

March 26, 2019

While I await the re-shoot day later on this week to correct all the messed up shots and revive lost footage, as mentioned in my last blog post, I have decided to work on the very final space shot of the film. I've included a little speedpaint of part of the process I went through to edit the shot.

I used a program called Paint Tool Sai and a drawing tablet to complete the image (I do not have the godly patience required to draw on a computer using a mouse). In the video, I adjusted the filter on the small transparent of the space ship in order to adjust the colors and contrast of the lighting to my liking.

I also applied the thirds rule to make a more interesting composition rather than just placing the ship in the middle. It also left space for me on the left to place the title and part of the opening credits!

And finally: here is the final shot!

Pretty good for a piece of junk on a black background with a bunch of dots on it!

I also individually saved a PNG transparent of the ship itself and the background separately in case I want to animate it moving to the side slightly.

Now to shoot with actual humans!

Intergalactic Photography

March 24, 2019

While I attempt to do what I can without my actors and actresses, today using a black piece of poster board and my desk lamp, I had taken some pictures of the space ship in different lighting intensity and positioned sources in order to get a good picture to then edit unto a space background. This is done to create my final shot of the film.

Here I posted several of the different screenshots I got from the video I recorded of the Firefly 7080. Some of them look extremely similar, but my mind always finds little differences to prefer one over the other. I am heavily leaning towards the top middle and the first of the second row! I also included a picture of the setup I had created with all the lights off in my garage so I had one concentrated light source. The light also has a "soft white", warmer toned light so it would be similar to that of sunlight coming from the nearest star/sun.

Will be posting the final scene edited as soon as possible!

The Technology Declares War

March 23, 2019

Rather than writing a long narrative about how stressful today has been, here is a small animated video instead.

Alas, although today was a complete mess all around, I have one more shot to get this right next week when all my actors and helpers are available (curse you spring break for taking all my people away from me!). Will update you on the status of this crisis soon.

In the meantime, enjoy these stills I had gotten today.

Props on Props on Props

March 22, 2019

Tomorrow is filming day!!! I am so excited to finally put all my gadgets and creations to use in the film!

Today I had created a couple more props I thought would be nice to show to you.

The main character, Halley, will be wearing this while she is on the spaceship! The logo I had shown before on this blog posting makes an appearance here. I salute the plain white t-shirt I had sacrificed from my closet to create this costume. One of the many white shirts I have ruined with acrylic paint, always in my memory.

After, of course, I had to create my little model of the Earth to remain in my slightly open drawer. What better way to show Halley missing her home planet than to have her stare at a miniature version of it longingly?

And last but not least, I had to create the virtual reality head gear. Luckily, my old Samsung galaxy phone had the perfect hardware. Attached to a headband from the Headbandz game, the small slot for the sd card allowed for there to be an ideal space for the "memory chip" to be. It is not shown in the picture, but I will be printing the S.O.S.I. logo and placing it in there as well.

Can't wait to see these props in action tomorrow :D !

Presenting: The FIREFLY7080

March 21, 2019

Finally completed the physical model of the spacecraft today!

Here is the beautiful product next to its original sketch!

I had first created the bottom portion by cutting and sanding down a styrofoam ball. Then, in order to make it appear more metallic, I had used tin foil to wrap it around the shape. In fact, the tin foil material texture makes an appearance on some actual spacecrafts.

The Viking Satellite

Pieces of Multi Layer Insulation protects the telescope. They look like ordinary household aluminum foil.

The Hubble Space Telescope

I then painted it a brown-bronze color with acrylic paint. I had used little pieces of broken technology to add some other details to it. I had put a bottle cap and an empty film container for the top part. A paper disk is put on the top to act as a satellite and a wire with blue paper and hot glue is used to make the solar panels.

I am excited to do my final shot with this small model! With the right lighting and placement, it should look like a real space ship.

Time is an Illusion (but an illusion necessary to the rubric)

March 17, 2019

As I had addressed in my storyboard post, I may have been too ambitious in all the shots I wanted to include in my opening. After further deliberation, I have made a backup storyboard shortening the film opening.

The scenes I have chosen to include are the in the house and the transition to the red room within the space ship. My reason for cutting out the final few shots while the character is listening to their mother's voice message is that as much as the audio gives some context to the story, it doesn't have as much substance and the shock factor that the first two parts do. The visual context clues in the first scenes are sufficient in introducing the setting and main character and even subtle aspects of the parts revealed in the later parts. On top of that, the holes in the plot make the audience want to know more. Why is she in space? Where is her family? Where is she in space? What's happening to the Earth? These generate interest in the story. By giving less to the audience, they want to find out more and continue to watch.

How the Mise-en-scene basically created itself

March 16, 2019

I had decorated my room the way that it is when I was in 6th grade and it hasn't changed since. Thank goodness I have the bedroom of an 11-year-old aspiring astronaut.

Most of the filming would be done in this area where the bed is. The window right by the bed should make for some nice natural lighting. The stuffed animals, light blue colored walls, the string lights, the pictures hanging on the wall, the teen novels and school textbooks all contribute to the fact it is a teenager's room.

On top of those visual clues telling the age and maturity of the character, certain aspects of the room actually foreshadow the future plot twist of the actual setting of the main character in space. For example, there is the NASA sign, the star garland, the sci-fi movie posters (star wars and interstellar), and the stick on glow in the dark stars and planets. I will make more of them visible in certain shots of the film. I will also print out a poster for recruitment for the S.O.S.I. right by the bed.

I am also planning on putting some broken parts of the machine on the desk and models of space ships to further emphasize her interest in S.T.E.M. through its discreet presence.

Mise-en-scene is essential in giving context through visual clues and I plan to utilize whatever I can to say more and have the characters talk less.

Hardcore Hot Glue Crafting + Scheduling Conflicts

March 15, 2019

The construction of the octagonal room has officially commenced. I have bought a couple of white foam boards to construct the side walls of the structure which I have posted the layout for in this blog posting. Time to put my hard hat on and do some rigorous hot gluing.

This video shows my first steps in construction which involved just gluing down the shorter side of the foam boards together at an angle. Because some of the foam boards did not match up perfectly well with each other, I then painted over some of the evident hot glue in between them with white acrylic paint.

After the first three were glued together, I glued three more on top to make the structure look taller (once upright, it would make it wider in reality).

Finally, the first wall was complete and I had repeated the process for the second wall.

This set design is an essential portion of my art direction to create an unnatural environment that would not be familiar to the viewer. It is meant to cause a feeling of confusion and disconnection with the setting of the scene in which this is used, which will assist in giving off anxious and unnerving emotions. How many people have been in a cramped octagonal room their entire lives anyway?

Moving on from the building of the space ship set, I had originally planned to film the scene tomorrow, however, because my main actress had gotten sick, I cannot begin filming as early as I had wished. Although this is definitely going to give me less time to edit and fix any mistakes, I will attempt to still remain productive this week in anything I can accomplish besides filming.

An Ode to Old Junk

March 13, 2019

I had taken a trip to the thrift store recently; a land of used wedding dresses, abandoned class t-shirts, and thankfully for my purpose, broken machines.

In this blog posting, I had discussed my search for useless objects to help create an ideal mise-en-scene with pieces of old technology for props. I had a successful haul, bringing home a broken alarm clock radio and an old audio transmitter.

Because the audio transmitter had no longer been working, I took it apart to incorporate the hardware on the back wall of the room in the space ship.

The alarm clock had many interactive buttons and such so I can incorporate its use in the frantic scene in which Halley is attempting

to fix the computer. The radio also is shown in the video operating. I could use the altering static sound during that sequence as well to emphasize the franticness and stress of the situation.

As filming time draws nearer, I am perfecting and putting all the pieces of the art direction together to make the environment as believable as possible in this technological atmosphere as it is an essential part of creating a science fiction film

SAVE OUR SOULS INITIATIVE

March 10, 2019

This is the official name and logo for the mission that Halley, the main character, is set on. This graphic will be on a multitude of products such as on the t-shirt of the main character, posters on the wall, on the patented technology, and more. The name, S.O.S.I. / the Save Our Souls Initiative is given due to the mission's purpose to send a group of kids into space in case the Earth goes through final irreversible changes that make it no longer suitable for life. The adolescents on the spaceship will be monitored to see with the futuristic technology how well they live in a long period in space. Although the creators of the space program attempt to save the Earth, they are making an increased amount of effort to find an alternative sustainable planet. If this is possible, then the remaining people back on Earth will join the kids from the S.O.S.I. and go to inhabit the new planet together.

I'm Not Only a Filmmaker... I'm an Engineer

March 09, 2019

Time to figure out a plan on how I am going to build my set for the spaceship scene.

Figure A in the image will either be a large piece of fabric (to prevent any odd reflections from lighting) or a large piece of paper covering flat against a wall. This serves the purpose of supplying the closed end of the octagonal set. Figure B will actually be duplicated to create more depth in the structure and will be the wall panels to the side of the character (made with foam boards). Figure C will be a piece of paper to have my chosen color of the floor. I plan on the structure being white as in color psychology it represents coldness and emptiness, which reflects how science is sometimes perceived and the negative quality of being in space.

Considering the octagonal shape of the room, it is actually a quite humorous genre convention in disguise. This tumblr posting actually has an example of 13 different octagonal structures throughout different sci-fi films. I suppose rectangular rooms were too realistic and not "sci-fi" enough for them.

SOURCE

Usvsth3m. (2013, June 19). 13 octagonal corridors from science fiction... Retrieved from http://usvsth3m.tumblr.com/post/53361080361/13-octagonal-corridors-from-science-fiction

So Much to Say, Such Little Time

March 08, 2019

Finally, I present to you, AFAR, a story of a dying Earth and a girl who longs to be with her family again.

These are all of the shots compiled into a video using the storyboarder software, which I found absolutely wonderful as I could see my shots play out as it would in the film, write notes, and add the script to the images.

However, I have come across an issue:
I have so much context I want to give within my 2-minute time limit.

The storyboard itself, although the time is inaccurate due to each frame taking up two seconds, goes up to 3 minutes, a whole 60 seconds above what it SHOULD be. Although my flowing ideas sabotaged me with ambition to accomplish this much, I must adhere to the rules. I will be thinking of ways to adjust the plot, and still make an exciting film opening.

My Mom Did Not Raise a Writer (But I'm doing my best)

March 07, 2019

I have discovered a new found respect for screenwriters.

While I attempted to think of any dialogue for a nice, lighthearted, normal conversation, every statement I thought of was nothing above absolutely mundane. Surely there is some kind of magic used when writing such interesting and engaging exchanges between characters. I'm not sure how trying to write a script resulted in me simultaneously forgetting how humans communicate with one another, but it happened. Nonetheless, I must conjure the best boring conversation I can. But now, I have found a reason to do it on purpose.

Before I complete my storyboard for my film, I created this script of the dialogue between my main character, Halley, and her brother, and the dialogue composed in the voice recording. I plan to draw my shots accordingly to show the first exchange with a shot/counter-shot and possibly some cutaways. The second exchange will be a constant noise in the background as a diegetic sound, being played from a computer aboard the ship.

Upon first skimming this conversation one might think to themselves, wow! This is so monotonous. And that person is absolutely correct.

The first scene of the film is going to be overly pleasant, cozy, and normal; completely dull on purpose, almost to the point of it being unrealistic (foreshadowing!). This will make a big contrast with the twist that comes when everything starts to glitch. From there on out, the dialogue also consequently shifts to something more loud and aggressive.

The continuation shows the beginning of the twist, as there is a misunderstanding in the characters in what is part of each of their reality. There will then be a transition to the space ship.

This last part of the script is the message from the mother via a voice recording that Halley stores on the ship. This gives further context to the story but nothing too explicitly stated as it is implicit through her explanation of what is going on on earth that it is not doing so great. This explains Halley's position in space overall, and why she would go into a virtual reality setting to see her family.

I am pretty happy with plot aspects that I got accomplished through my current version of the script, but as production draws near, there may be some changes to adjust to the time limitation. And, finally, a big salute to screenwriters! Developing a story through dialogue is just as essential as it is to develop it visually, different types of art to create the same goal of effective communication of an idea or feeling.

Art Dump

March 03, 2019

As I am still in my planning stage for my film opening, I have sketched up some ideas as I fill in any gaps I can in my art direction for the project.

This is a concept sketch of what the appearance of my main character will be. I have decided to name her Halley after Halley's Comet (kinda cheesy to name her after an astronomical body cause it's a sci-fi movie I know. If I can think of anything better I'll be sure to blog the changes. But for now, Halley it is!).

As mentioned in my blog post about the health effects, with my actress in mind, I have drawn her with abnormally pale skin. Possibly using some cooler toned makeup can also make her look tired and less lively.

Concerning costume design, as she is a teenager, she would be wearing just a regular t-shirt and some pants. The design of the t-shirt, however, will have the space mission she is set on. The mission will be known as S.O.S.I. , or rather, the Save Our Souls Initiative. Elaboration on this will be on the future storyboard posts to come up later this week!

And here is the glorious Firefly 7802! The name given is due to the design looking similar to that of a firefly. Another reason for the name is due to the fact that when I was little, I thought fireflies were actually shooting stars (no wonder my wishes of getting a dolphin for Christmas never came true). The solar panels are in a triangular form and are a great way to show in the design some logistics of the spacecraft in how it generates energy for such a long period of time (yay for renewable energy!).

I am very excited to actually execute these plans and see how they look in real life. See you soon with the physical versions of these!

Sandra Bullock Fan Club

March 02, 2019

Considering the genre conventions of Sci-fi, I pondered long and hard of a female lead in a film about space travel, and then I realized: without another male lead by her side, there has barely been any representation of a lone woman protagonist in space (Fun Fact: the first American woman to go to space was Sally Ride in 1983, about 25 years after NASA had first started. Sure took a while). Whether it be Anne Hathaway's Brand in Interstellar or Carrie Fisher's Princess Leia in Star Wars, they were always accompanied by another leading man like Mark Hamil's Luke Skywalker and Matthew McConaughey's Cooper.

So... lets put a girl up there!

My main inspiration for breaking these conventions that a Sci-fi world is a man's one is the character Dr. Ryan Stone, played by Sandra Bullock in Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity (2013). Although George Clooney was shown to be by Bullock's side for the marketing, his character is shadowed by hers throughout the film. Stone is a powerful, intelligent astronaut with a highly advanced STEM career and an amazing ability to work under pressure. Showing a woman in this role alone, without a male love interest or family member, was a bold move. Bullock even said herself "'It was brave,’...'They created a big tentpole action/science fiction film with a female lead, when it’s probably much easier to make it a male".

I dedicate my character to Sandra Bullock and all the girls who have only seen men take the lead in science fiction movies. It's time for some change.

SOURCES:

Administrator, N. C. (2015, April 17). First American Woman in Space. Retrieved from https://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2533.html

Collette, O. (2013, December 12). Dr. Ryan Stone: Everything a Typical Female Movie Character Is Not | Balder and Dash | Roger Ebert. Retrieved from https://www.rogerebert.com/balder-and-dash/dr-ryan-stone-everything-a-typical-female-movie-character-is-not

Garratt, S. (2013, October 28). Sandra Bullock: 'They were brave to make Gravity with a female lead'. Retrieved from https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/10405800/Sandra-Bullock-They-were-brave-to-make-Gravity-with-a-female-lead.html

One Man's Trash, MY treasure

March 01, 2019

It is time to get ready for production! One of my main concerns is creating the necessary props to make the art direction the best it could possibly be, as it usually is in Sci-Fi films.

I came across this video which showed how this production team created an entire futuristic city out of objects like computer parts and Christmas decorations. Inspired by this, I went and destroyed a few electronics of my own.

What at first glance appears to be an organized layout of some garbage, will actually become essential parts of my model space ship and technological props.

As expressed in the last blog posting here, my space explorer will have to go through extensive, daily health checks to ensure that they have not become ill and that all body parts are working properly.

Upon investigating my different parts, I have found some specific uses for certain ones. The bottom part of the mouse, with a skinny hollowed out space, can serve as a sort of finger scanner to possibly check blood pressure, radiation levels, etc. Regarding other technology, the outside casing of the Bell & Howell pest repeller can work great as a wall or machine fixture to talk into. The remote control parts can work universally for any fancy technology, with, of course, tons of confusing and probably useless buttons.

I'm not crystal clear on what I want to do with the rest of the parts; most likely they will be used as decoration or in the building of the miniature ship.

However, as I make more updates on my construction of props and part of the set, I will be sure to document the incorporation of these objects in a future post.