The Clone

The Clone from Lucas Warren on Vimeo.

This is another video that I made over the last couple of days, exploring an effect that I have been looking into i.e. the scope effect, the flare of the gun and the blood effect. For this video, I edited the all the footage in Adobe Premiere Pro, and did the VFX in Adobe After Effects this way the editing process became a lot faster than making it all in After Effects. Another effect I used in this video was a 'cloning effect' in which I could duplicate my dad within a single clip.

I learnt many of these effects from the website Videocopilot.com, a website which has lots of tutorials for VFX in After Effects, including the scope tutorial, the blood and the gun flare tutorial, all of which gave very satisfying results in this video.

If I were to make the video again, there are a few things I would do differently, for example one issue was that the battery died half way through the shoot, so next time I would make sure I have a charged spare on hand. Also I think that this shoot took longer than it could have me and my dad were making the shot list up on the spot, thinking of new ideas every second, however this is not a very good method because after looking at the footage I realised there were a few shots that would have helped the continuity of the scene or made the shot better for example, and also after looking at the footage, I noticed that sometimes the camera auto-adjusts to the light or looks very pale/overexposed, which is something I forgot to look at, during the shoot.

I have yet to decide on whether any of these effects will be in my film, but either way I have definitely make progress in terms of my skills. However I am not saying that the effects used in this video are perfect but are satisfactory for the effect I wanted to achieve.

http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/scopes/
https://www.videocopilot.net/products/action2/

Laser Missile VFX Test!

Laser Missiles from Lucas Warren on Vimeo.

This is my attempt at an effect used in 'Plot Device', during the sci-fi scene. This effect was a little more straight forward than the last (Black Hole test), but as I soon realised, the more I added to the effect the more complicated it became.

For this effect I used some of the resources from Video Copilot's Action Essentials plugin, for the ground hits and smoke, and also from their Optical Flares plugin for the 'Laser missiles'. Overall it is a very satisfying outcome and it is definitely an effect I could use in my film.

Also since my dad doesn't mind being in many of my videos he has agreed to play the part in my film, which will make it a lot easier. I have already came up with a lot of good ideas for the basis of the story now including him, and I will be writing my first draft of the screen play soon.

Black Hole Test Video!

The Black Hole Test from Lucas Warren on Vimeo.

After watching 'The Black Hole', I had to give it a go for my self, and above is my attempt at one of the effects in the video, and I was surprised how complicated it actually is to pull off (and even mine isn't very good). To begin I watched the actual video a few times to try and gain an understanding of how it could be done. And eventually we had a few vague ideas of how to start and began our shoot. We concluded that they must have had a piece of paper with a pre-made hole in the middle (or at least that's how we did it), then have the actor (my dad) hold the paper and put their hand through it. I wont go into the full process but it took me a while to figure out, however now I know the technique, I could do it again a lot faster.

This is just one of the VFX videos that I will make, and hopefully after watching more short films, I will have learnt a good handful of VFX to implement in to my film.

This looks a lot more complicated than it actually is!

Plot Device

Plot Device from Red Giant on Vimeo.

This video was made to promote Red Giant's tools for post-production and to show a community of filmmakers that something like this can be done without an extremely high budget. I love this video for many reasons, firstly the concept for the video is such a good idea in my opinion, as it allows them to show off each of their products whilst creating an exiting yet humorous film. Also the acting of the main character in this video was very well played and funny, especially his facial expressions throughout the video. This kind of video could definitely inspire a similar theme for my video especially with either the device or the alternate realities (or both?).


Red Giant TV Episode #57: Behind the Scenes of Plot Device from Red Giant on Vimeo.

This is the behind the scenes video (BTS) showing their process from concept to shoot to post-production, which was very useful to watch as it gave me a better understanding of their filmmaking process and also their inspirations, for example they mention how the sci-fi scene was inspired by Michael Bay (i.e. lots of lens flares and explosions).

The Black Hole

Short Film 'The Black Hole' from PHOTOPLAY FILMS on Vimeo.

This is a short film called The Black Hole by Future Shorts.

This is a really entertaining video with a very funny and creative concept, about a man who somehow manages to create a black hole from a copier, but uses it for the wrong reasons.
This video shares some of the key aspects that I hope to use in my video, for example throughout the entire video there is no dialogue, and similarly, the whole video is expressed though the visuals. I especially liked the acting of the main character, and the clever FX used in the video and there are definitely some FX that I would like to try (maybe in my film). I was surprised by how big the production actually was after looking at the credits, but overall this a very well done and profesional short film, and I hope my film can match some of the same qualities this video has. All I can say is that I will definitely be exploring some more of their work later on.

Getting Started...

This is the first of many posts that I will release, and I wanted to start off by saying what I intend to do on this course and my initial thoughts.

My goal for this film is to show off my filmmaking skills, but mainly my editing and VFX skills, as they are what I am really passionate about and hope to pursue in the future. I am constantly watching video tutorials online to try and improve my skills, and at this stage, I'm confident about my computer skills, but not sure how well my writing will be. And I am sure that the writing stage could surely be the longest and hardest part.

However, after talking to Mr Quirke, he gave me the clever idea to leave out the dialogue and make the visuals tells the story, which took a load off my mind!

At this stage I will be posting my research of other interesting short films with the same themes or genres to the ideas I've been having. At the moment I am interested in the themes of either exploring different parallel dimensions, or exploring the power of the imagination (which ever gives the better story and visuals / FX).