Friday, January 28, 2005
Sky Captain and...Tomorrow
It's been a while since I updated, I know. I've been busy with school, and lately it seems like Blogger hasn't been publishing at my house. I'm at school now, during a free period, so maybe it will work now.
Hm, not much is new. I saw Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. It's not the best movie ever, but certainly worth seeing because of its style - it's the first movie to ever be shot completely in front of a bluescreen. The only real things in the movie are the actors and a few props; the rest is all computer generated. I actually really liked it. It reminded me of old classic movies. Or, more recently, Indiana Jones. You've got your hero, you've got your girl, the world's gonna be destroyed, and the audience is just along for the ride. Sometimes this feels cliche and un-developed, but it seemed to work here, for the most part. We don't know the background of Sky Captain, but we don't really have to. It works. It would be interesting to see the movie in black-and-white - the lighting was very reminiscent of 1940s films. Very Capra-esque, I thought.
In the end, some people will love it, others will hate it. Some will find they're quite happy with just watching the action unfold onscreen in its unique style, others will want more character development. Me, I liked it. And I personally can't see why it at least wasn't nominated for a visual effects Oscar. With many parts you could tell that everything was computer-generated. But many shots - particularly those involving a landscape - looked really good. It seems to settle in an area right between looking "real" and looking "cartoony". But that's just part of the style as well; I think in many ways it's supposed to look like an animated movie rather than a live-action one. It's a lot like a comic book.
In other news: I plan on entering an online short film competition, so I'll finally get a chance to make a film that's entirely original and not for school. Woohoo! I've been working on pre-production for the last few weeks. The script is probably as good as it's going to be, and hopefully I'll move into production tomorrow. We'll see what happens. Some parts of the script seem fine, but with other pieces of dialogue it seems like something's missing. Hopefully I'll be able to fix that before filming tomorrow.
The title is Stuffed Fantasies. It will most likely be around 10 minutes long, but as long as it's less than 13 minutes I'll be okay (that's part of the competition rules). I don't think I have any chance of winning, since I'll be up against people who have been making films for much longer than myself, but we'll see what happens. I'm just trying to have fun and learn a little more. Hopefully filming will be completed by February 7, or February 22 at the latest. That will give me plenty of time in post-production to work on editing the final cut by the contest deadline (March 16).
Quote of Da Moment:
"Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died."
--Steven Wright
Hm, not much is new. I saw Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. It's not the best movie ever, but certainly worth seeing because of its style - it's the first movie to ever be shot completely in front of a bluescreen. The only real things in the movie are the actors and a few props; the rest is all computer generated. I actually really liked it. It reminded me of old classic movies. Or, more recently, Indiana Jones. You've got your hero, you've got your girl, the world's gonna be destroyed, and the audience is just along for the ride. Sometimes this feels cliche and un-developed, but it seemed to work here, for the most part. We don't know the background of Sky Captain, but we don't really have to. It works. It would be interesting to see the movie in black-and-white - the lighting was very reminiscent of 1940s films. Very Capra-esque, I thought.
In the end, some people will love it, others will hate it. Some will find they're quite happy with just watching the action unfold onscreen in its unique style, others will want more character development. Me, I liked it. And I personally can't see why it at least wasn't nominated for a visual effects Oscar. With many parts you could tell that everything was computer-generated. But many shots - particularly those involving a landscape - looked really good. It seems to settle in an area right between looking "real" and looking "cartoony". But that's just part of the style as well; I think in many ways it's supposed to look like an animated movie rather than a live-action one. It's a lot like a comic book.
In other news: I plan on entering an online short film competition, so I'll finally get a chance to make a film that's entirely original and not for school. Woohoo! I've been working on pre-production for the last few weeks. The script is probably as good as it's going to be, and hopefully I'll move into production tomorrow. We'll see what happens. Some parts of the script seem fine, but with other pieces of dialogue it seems like something's missing. Hopefully I'll be able to fix that before filming tomorrow.
The title is Stuffed Fantasies. It will most likely be around 10 minutes long, but as long as it's less than 13 minutes I'll be okay (that's part of the competition rules). I don't think I have any chance of winning, since I'll be up against people who have been making films for much longer than myself, but we'll see what happens. I'm just trying to have fun and learn a little more. Hopefully filming will be completed by February 7, or February 22 at the latest. That will give me plenty of time in post-production to work on editing the final cut by the contest deadline (March 16).
Quote of Da Moment:
"Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died."
--Steven Wright
# posted by Andrew Johnson : 1/28/2005 08:37:00 AM 
