Streets and Daggers

Greetings, one and all! This week saw a wide spread of work being done. First off, the stunt team met and ran the newer members through a few dagger plays.

Next up, we did a street scene shoot with the models, and then worked on integrating that with the live action footage.

After that, we did set extensions for several other street scenes, and sweetened a few effects shots, including faking a flaming arrow.

Lastly, we have finally begun creating buildings for the Forgotten City…

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

City Shots and Doomed Delves

 Greetings, one and all! So, after three days of religiously checking the weather, we managed to sprint out and get the city establishing shots in the two hours of full sun before the clouds returned. Well, the close up shots, anyway. The super wide one will require a smaller scale model.

Anyway, come Sunday it had been a long week for everyone, so we unwound with another live action dungeon delve. This time, the people who ran it in April helped me set up and operate the obstacles for the others…

All in all, a fun time, and the maze retains its thirty-three percent survival rate.

Now we move into a new area of problem solving, as we work out the most efficient way to make a tiny town, and the best way to craft an automaton…

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

Ruins and Coastal Runs

Greetings, one and all! So… the weekly news… Well, first up, we started out this last week with a bit of a drive along the coast, where we picked up background plates for a few other shots…

Now I just have to sort out which ones will work best for what. A job in and of itself, let me tell you.

On top of that, I’m happy to report that the buildings needed for the street level establishing shots have all been completed, and now we await a day with the proper weather conditions to film them.
With that completed, we move on to ruins and towers…

The ruin on the left has received its base coat, and the tower on the right will be seen at night, and mostly backlit, so we can make it to a smaller scale than the other buildings we’ve created thus far.

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

Altered Action and Persistent Painting

Greetings, one and all! Well, things seem to be coming together. After struggling to find anyone that fit one of the roles in the short script we wrote about a month ago, we restructured the narrative to allow us to use people we know we can find, and adjust things like the fight scene accordingly.

This time, there’s a lot more dagger work at play. Fortunately we have a fair amount of experience with that.

On top of that, we continued the tedious process of painting the buildings for the city establishing shots. All the roofs and stonework now have their black basecoat, and the beams on about half the buildings have their first layer, as well.

Naturally, with the holiday things got slowed a bit, but I hope to have good progress, and if all goes very well, shoot next week.

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

Brushes on the Town

Greetings, one and all! So, despite a sudden cold that slowed productivity, we still managed to finish detailing all the buildings, and actually roof most of them. On top of that, we took some of the paint we used on the original sets and used it on the wattle and daub part of the miniatures. While it looked quite bright in the direct sun, it’s really amazing how brown it is in indirect light.

 After that we finished and sealed the roofs. Next up, detail painting and weathering, along with a spot of window-making.

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

Bringing Things Together

 Greetings, one and all! This week has covered a small spread of filmmaking tasks. From concept art to detailing and shingling the city houses, production has continued apace. Sadly, I currently have no pictures of those phases, but I have it on good authority that footage of them will be making it into a BTS reel, at some point…

On the stunt side of things, this week the team combined what they’d learned these last two weeks into one package.

This led to them cycling through partners as they practiced a series of short “fight and die” loops that they choreographed. All in all, I must say they did a very good job.

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

Strikes and Stones

Greetings, one and all! Continuing in the theme of shoring up that which has been missed, this week the team met to work on the aspect of flow in their fights, focusing on momentum, daisy-chained actions, and smooth transitioning.

Yes, it sounds boring, but the end result makes them look far more impressive.

On top of that, the week has been filled with plots and plans, as I revise scripts to figure out what we’re shooting this year. On the post-production side, the models are slowly coming together. The roofs and supporting crossbeams are on, as well as some of the detail work. This includes carving out stones with a ballpoint pen.

I don’t even want to think about how many hours it took to do that…

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