Main Filming Done

Yup, you read that correctly! :D

Main filming is now done (just as soon as After Effects is done rendering as I type this..)


I started Archon Defender with this shot, on Oct 8 2006 after a 1 week crash course in self taught character rigging and animation with character studio in 3d max. (Before this shot the most complex characters I had ever animated were the lego men in the rocketmen vs robots movies)

Now with this shot, the final storyboarded shot is finally done, and the film
will finally be in one single rough cut. :O I just realized that both shots have exactly the same vehicle model in it (and they are actually both the same vehicle...) I totally didn't intend that... spooky how that turns out sometimes :o

Now, I still have a couple shots to add to improve continuity and to fix up some rendering screwups, but it's pretty much onto the music and sound now.

Fun with motion vectors

Zoom Player has a neat function that will overlay video codec info over the video, in this case, showing the motion vectors that it's using to decode the video. This goes on behind the scenes whenever you watch a video, but it's neat to see the way that different elements end up getting represented in the video. I have yet to find an artistic use for this, but I will :D

It also has a cool looking 'unsharp mask' effect that looks great on smoke to give an artistic 'toon render' look. Too bad it's too late to go back and change 60 minutes of film :( oh well, there's always the next film ;D

What's In The Box?

I'm a big fan of the game HalfLife, so I was obviously well entertained by this short film:

Whether this is an indie filmmakers project or part of a larger viral marketing campaign isn't clear to me just yet, the website for the film just has a mysterious box that makes a loud rumbling noise when you mouse over it. And the production looks more high budget than you'd expect from a bunch of guys with an HD cam and 3D studio max. (The camera motion matching is really good... which means that someone on this production at least knew what they were doing.)

Still good though ;D

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Edit: I've watched this about 8 times over again today ;D This is rapidly picking up attention online, duh .. of course, because it's so damn cool. And I'm itching to find out what's "in the box" now ':|

In the trenches...

I'm getting closer to being done primary filming. 12 shots closer, to be exact. Trouble is, these shots all need some set building and rigging for animating and effects. But... It's geting closer to being done. Then it's a matter of fixing some screwups and adding some interstitial shots to smooth out the continuity, and it'll be done. :D

March 2009 update

It's the 1st of march already and the year is 1/6 gone :o onoes "Filming" is almost done, and I should have these last dialog shots done within a couple of days:

After that there are only a few action shots to link all the remaining pieces together, and then the film will finally be one piece. With the exception of the numerous rework shots where I have to go back and polish things up, "filming" is quickly wrapping up. Soon it will be time to do the audio, and overdub the voice actors, so sometime soon I will be putting out a casting call for voice actors (not yet though... still busy getting all the shots done...)