Reviewing and Rescouting

Greetings one and all! While we didn’t do as much work on the new short as hoped, this week did see several days of roughing in a trailer for the Nine Isles project, using test renders for the rough blocking. Once that’s been locked off, we’ll use those to find the original audio tracks and effects footage needed for the higher resolution version. Thus far we’ve come to the point where refinement is needed, but the basic layout is there.

Next up, with one major real life obstacle finally out of the way, the first task with our newly repaired car was to go scout an old filming location before the weather changed.

Hard to believe it’s been nine years since our last quarry shoot, but the growth of the trees sure sell it. We spent most of the hike walking in the shade, over trails that were far more muddy and mossy than last time, and the once almost high desert like quarry is becoming more hemmed in by the young fir trees. Also the berm that our Sith lady stood on for her dialog has since been converted to gravel. The kind of location it would for for has definitely shifted over time. 

Lastly, the contemplation of an obligation toward beauty as a creator has led my thoughts toward the ol’ Stormborn universe. As some of you may know, it’s a world I’d written stories in when I was a teen. They weren’t very good, but the unfettered creative freedom led to some interesting worldbuilding nuggets that I’ve been extracting and reshaping for the shorts and webseries that we’ve released thus far. In that vein I’ve been working on two things.
First, dividing what’s actually canon from what was referenced once in an unpublished short story, and then trying to look at that world through the eyes of an audience member without decades of backstory. Second, the old ideas were very space opera in their design, with most planets being represented by a single unique biome. However, if one realistically wants to shoot these things, one needs to have other ways to differentiate locations without having to travel hundreds or thousands of miles. To that end, I’ve been thinking on the architecture and fashion for the different worlds and factions, attempting to give them each a unique look, which also dovetails nicely with the obligation toward beauty bit.

So… yeah, this week has been far more random than most, but at least there’s progress, even if, in some cases, it’s just what you’re not going to do in future.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

New Tech and Classic Combat

Greetings, one and all! At long last, after a couple months of the world going a bit crazy, things have finally settled enough for me to turn my mind toward learning the new editing software. That short we shot last summer/fall was made for this sole purpose, so it was kept succinct, but with a few specific effects that I will likely need in future, so we’ll see what this tech can do…

Moving on, the previous week left us pretty exhausted, as there was a fair amount of “the rest of life” work to be done, but it did put one in the mood for philosophical musings that aren’t currently developed enough to put in a  blog, but they centered on the concept of beauty as a creator.

Last but not least, the full team finally met, and we went into more advanced parrying drills, this time adding in the shield, before breaking out into the first “last man standing” melee in a long time…

There was at least one person who was surprised at how long they survived, and there were a couple surprise upset victories.
Moving into the new week, if all goes well we hope to continue to learn the new tech, and see if it can really do everything we need from it.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

Close Blades and Contemplative Days

Greetings, one and all! A new week of filmmaking finds us in yet more development. Frankly, the weeks seem to be melting away through the combination of development work and basic life stuff. We touched bases with some more organizations as well, basically doing a spread of follow-ups from previous endeavors.

The slightly more filled out team met Sunday and continued on with the parrying drills, particularly focusing on close guards and full speed intercepts.

This was followed by a classic exercise with a time-crunching twist, where several stunties worked to regain the glory lost by last time’s sudden death mechanic.

On top of all that, an event hosted by another indie film group, coupled with market news from Disney and other organizations, has gotten me thinking on the best mediums for releasing our work, as well as what format of narrative would work best for those mediums.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

Developing Characters and Alternative Actions

Greetings, one and all! Given that so much energy of late has been put toward preparing for presentations, we took the post-presentation breather to develop some character motivations for the next script idea on the docket, using a useful little tool called Four Corner Opposition. At its simplest, it centers around how four different characters will interact with the core theme of the film. A great example is Batman Begins, with how the characters of Bruce/Batman, Falcone, Ra’s al Ghul, and the Scarecrow each use and respond to the core theme of fear. In my case, we’re looking at four different perspectives on the theme of “rule” or control. So yes, this is shaping up to be a villain-heavy narrative.

In a more active vein, despite many people getting sick, we still had enough stunties for a decent veteran’s practice. Specifically, thinking through alternative responses to attacks, beyond one’s preferred methods.

 This was a stretching one, but it led to a few pleasant surprises along the way. An important part of the process includes coming up with bad or non-optimal ideas, because the truth is that an action that could get you killed may be only a wrist turn away from being a very effective action.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!