Welcome to the AnimiVirtus.com film blog, writing up free web-based resources and showcasing cool, interesting or inspiring shorts in whatever free time I can muster as regularly as I can muster it. Enjoy, subscribe and tell your friends!
Jun 01 09
Showcase: Animated Shorts
These are two shorts I’ve had in my collection for a while now, but haven’t posted yet. Pretty simple as far as the 3D goes, but the story and mood work well for each piece, so they’re effective and entertaining short films in my opinion.
May 11 09
Showcase: The Hunt For Gollum
As I’m sure many of you have heard over the past week, The Hunt For Gollum premiered on the 3rd of this month, basically blowing away most fanfilms of the past in one swell blow. This is the essence of a fanfilm: a movie based on another movie (series), made by fans for the fans with no financial benefits attached to the completion of the film (apart from the potential for being recognized and careers begun, etc.).
Apr 30 09
Link Dump: Eclectic Edition
Well, here’s the finale in those “tons-of-stuff” brags I’ve been making the last few posts. There’s a bit of a mix in here, but mostly the usual categories of free stuff and tutorials, with a few random ones thrown in at the end just for the sake of it. Enjoy, and see you next week!
Gimme the goodies…
Apr 27 09
Showcase: Signs
Today’s showcase item is something I found through Videomaker Magazine’s newsletter last week. It’s a pretty cool little short that shows pretty successfully the effectiveness of editing, a simple concept, and a good, short, human story. The coolest part I thought at first was identifying with the main (male) character of the story, and then being able to watch his life go on an upward curve from there. I suppose that’s what we most often find intriguing and lovable in the first place, when we find bits of ourselves in the characters whose lives end up being what we wish ours were. Or maybe it just gives hope. Anyway, on the low-budget side of things…
Apr 23 09
Link Dump: Tutorial Edition
As promised, here’s a pretty mondo list of tutorial and resource sites for your educational pleasure. I’ve organized the list, just like last week’s, into what made the most sense at the time. If you’ve got additions, suggestions, objections, or anything else, definitely feel free to comment on the post and let me know about more knowledge available for free on the ‘net. Yess…knowledge….
Apr 16 09
Link Dump: Free Stuff Edition
First off, welcome to the new blog! Yes, I know it’s awesome. I’m proud to say it’s my whole site collection hosted on one domain, inter-linked, organized and consolidated. Awesome. So now…on to the link dump.
I’ve got a massve…and I mean massive collection of links ready for ya. So massive, in fact, that I’m breaking it up into a multi-part series, because frankly, opening tons of links at once won’t be fun for you, and copying and pasting and reviewing what all of them are won’t be so fun for me. Not all at once, anyway. So next week, Link Dump: Tutorial Edition. But let’s get started with part 1.
Feb 08 09
Showcase: Games, Zombies and ‘Net Stars
Well, it’s been about three and a half months since my last post, and while I apologize for the wait, I haven’t completely neglected this blog. I’ve amassed a pretty massive collection of showcase and link dump material for the next while, and continue to receive newsletters and am on the prowl for tutorials and resources. Long story short, the final project’s finishing up, and there’s a vast pool of links about to come your way in the next few weeks. Starting now… Gimme the goodies…
Sep 11 08
Link Dump: Storyboarding
Well this one’s going to be very quick, as it’s been the most busy and hectic and honestly frustrating week so far at school and I am exhausted to the point of brain-no-function. So here it goes… Gimme the goodies…
Feb 24 08
From Here To Awesome
I stumbled upon this video today while surfing the Google blog, and decided it was worth showing to you guys. It’s a great testament to the fact that indie filmmakers indeed have power, and possibility in the socially-confined world we’re living in today. It also links to a few good videos with filmmaking tips, a video from Head Trauma and director Lance Weiler, both useful and interesting shot videos to really get your head around the fact that you have power, you can go out and make a short film and get the audience and make a splash.
The key here in my mind now, though, is that it’s a short film. Of course the length doesn’t actually matter, if the trailer looks good enough, someone will buy it, but if it’s a short film that looks thoroughly professional, well done and generally entertaining, it’s a good step in the right direction. The most important thing, though, is that it’s important to the filmmaker, and that they care about it and love it enough to carry it on despite the difficulties. Personally, LATENT(CY) wasn’t that project for me. But I’m hoping that after school ends (or even before) I’ll have scraped together some film-loving friends with enough interest and passion and drive to make another short film, and hopefully this time, we’ll be proud enough to make a campaign out of the thing.
It also occurred to me that if you’ve already got a short film made that can be shown on YouTube and other video sharing sites, then show it. And not only that, post bulletins about it, send messages about it to all of your friends, make a website, sell DVDs, get the name out in the public’s eye because it’s your project, and it’s your responsibility to showcase your own work. After all, if you’re not proud enough to show it off, what kind of impression does that give? Best of luck and happy filmmaking!
Feb 21 08
A Note on Shaky Camera Work
Earlier today I got an email from StudioDaily, a pretty fascinating online industry magazine and resource website about filmmaking, visual effects and editing. In the letter,one of the headlines was this:
Over at Film & Video, Bryant Frazer talks with director George A. Romero about his return to low-budget filmmaking with Diary of the Dead using Panasonic HDX900 and HVX200 camcorders.
So naturally I emailed that quote off to the first friend I thought of when I think of zombie movies, and he responded pretty quickly saying that he didn’t like the new “Blair Witch sort of style that’s coming back.” That I can completely understand, so I responded with the following passage, which is the basis for this post:
I kind of like the shaky cam style that’s on the rise, it’s more viral and amateurish, and it blurs the lines between amateur films and professional ones, making it so that it doesn’t matter as much anymore to the audience if it’s a “real movie” because they can’t always tell, so it’s not worth bothering about. If it’s good, it’s good, and it deserves praise, if it’s bad, well, they leave it alone (or flame it, the bastards). Sometimes it’s hard to see or hard to handle (I got mildly nauseous watching Cloverfield), but I think it’s a cool way to kind of get the super-hype of paying high attention to lighting, costumes, and even set design a little bit out of the way, and letting amateurs get more into the field, simply because the cheapest way to film (handheld and shaky) is often the most real feeling, because it’s not completely stable like a statue, nor is it to the extent that Cloverfield was (though that was pretty wonderfully done). Basically, it give me even more of a chance to go out and shoot random stuff, put it all together in some sort of cohesive, understandable and entertaining story, and then market it and get attention because it looks real, it could be real, and if it’s good, people will appreciate either the documentary-ness of it or the realistic acting and detail of the thing. So basically I don’t put anywhere near as much effort into the preparation of the film that Hollywood does, and I can still come out with a viable film to show at festivals and gain a reputation among the biggies of the business. So that’s why I like it. As a style, though, you’re right, it’s hard to take sometimes.
Now, that being said, I haven’t seen the trailer for this, but I’m going to look it up and see what I can find, heh.
NOTE: You can see the trailer here. And I actually was a little disappointed with it when I watched it.
Feb 21 08
Stop The Violence film Complete!
As some of you may know, I was involved with the cross-country-collaborative effort for the Stop The Violence documentary film. The film was contributed to not only by AnimiVirtus Productions (me), but also Neighborhood Studios, a group based in Ohio. The film was basically a series of interviews with students, teachers, parents and other high school staff about the issue of school and teen violence and aggression, and essentially coalesced into a 20-minute film from two different parts of the country with one core message: Stop The Violence. Take a look at the film below, and please add it to your DIGG, StumbleUpon, and del.icio.us collections to help us raise awareness about our cause and the effort we’re fighting for. Thanks for your support!
[googlevideo=http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2773469669682076759&hl=en]
Jan 11 08
Films Page Complete!
I know I’ve been bad about updating this blog. But, I’ve added a reminder action to iCal that reminds me every Monday and Friday about updating the blog, so I’ll never forget or have an excuse to be distracted again. It’s really a mental kind of thing, once I know I have to do something, it’s still in my mind as something that needs to be done until it finally is. So that’s the function, and hopefully it’ll work. It’s already working for today, since I turned on my machine and got the reminder message right away. So that’s the news on the blog’s back-end.
The news on the front-end, however, is I think more exciting. Most of you know I put up the film page a few weeks ago, with a pretty nicely laid out section for LATENT(CY), the most recent film I’ve completed. Well, after trying once and having the results deleted somehow, I sat down yesterday and finished off the page. It now has, in addition to that one caption, a full list of the films I’ve done in the last two or three years, complete with links to watch and/or download them all. There is a closing paragraph that is important to me, about the use of the internet and free distribution to get a voice, a message, out into the world, and it’s what I’m hoping to do with my films from now on. Personal projects I want to be download-able and viewable form anywhere in the world at any time, so I’m offering them all free for download via torrent file sharing technology, as well as YouTube videos. Of course, the more serious projects will also be available for purchase, but that’s really a good Samaritan kind of effort on your part, since they’re freely available in multiple forms on the internet.
On the closing note, I’d like all of you to go to the TED site and check out their talks. They are riveting, I can’t stress that enough, talking about everything from building sustainable housing worldwide to creating a massive digital super-library with customizable teaching and learning resources, completely free of charge, for anyine and everyone in the world to use. Open source is the future, and digital gives way to freedom in a materialistic world, and the two combined have astronomical potential in helping to better the future and the lives of people and the earth. So watch, and help out. Make a difference.
Dec 30 07
Showcase: Coloc Strip
To be entirely honest, I’m not even sure if this is a music video or just something some fans made, but it’s pretty friggin’ cool. From a visual effects standpoint, it’s awesome, I can think of how they might have done this, but it seems like tons of work to me. It’s an awesome collection of a bunch of different shots from a few different places of people doing things. That’s a super lame explanation, but here, check it out:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fq6Fz32YeG0]
Check out it’s page here.
Dec 29 07
The Waiting Room…in the can!
The Waiting Room is finally completely shot and locked! I’m super excited to finally have this done. We fiddled with lighting more than usual on this shoot, and I liked it quite a lot. Direct light from my work light was too harsh, so we simply bounced it off a tinfoil-covered piece of cardboard sitting on the desk on the opposite wall, which gave a perfect soft back light from behind me. Next, we taped a piece of tin foil on the window in front of me, pointing the two track lights on the ceiling toward it, bouncing that light off the tin foil and onto my face, giving a nice soft glow that looked almost like it was coming from the paper I was writing on. It was a very nice effect, and perfect for the scene. Michelle really helped out on this shoot, being the cameraperson, the lighting technician and whatnot. It was fun to play with the lighting and get the shots I wanted to get in a relaxed, small-scale environment. Unfortunately, I only had the chance to take four pictures while shooting this stuff, but at least it demonstrates the lighting configurations I had set up. Take a peek at all of them here.
I think an awesome thing about low- and no-budget filmmaking is the ability to just improvise with what’s there at the time, with what you’ve got and what you know. I knew I had two little tin foil reflector type pieces (actually I just knew metal is reflective and I had some at the time), and I could use those to light up the scene in the way I needed and wanted. I’m excited now to relax tonight, and I have all day tomorrow to cut the thing together, start figuring out music, and finish up my school violence piece I’ve been not-so-diligently working on since last Spring.
Dec 18 07
New Films Page!
The Big Announcement
Well, here it is, finally a ‘films’ page to showcase the work of myself and others involved with AnimiVirtus Productions. I know I haven’t posted in quite some time, and that this is the only thing that’s happened on this blog since that post, but I’ve been working on my personal blog to establish an effective, efficient, productive workflow solution that is entirely digital and helps me keep track of all the things I have to do, including how close to being completed they are and other information about each project. Completely unrelated to this blog at the momentum, I’m hoping that once that’s figured out I can schedule times during each week to post a new resource website, showcase item, and other things on this blog while maintaining my personal blog and personal life as well. I’ve also been working, am finishing up school, and getting ready for the holidays and my move out to Vancouver. I haven’t been incredibly active in these areas, but they are still pressing areas that need tending to.
OK… now the Big Announcement
The films page is on the right hand menu, has a listing of films made by AnimiVirtus Productions, along with descriptions of the films, places to buy copies, watch the films online, and other links for each of them. At the moment there is only the one feature LATENT(CY) on the page, but more will come as they are made (duh!). So for now, enjoy the new page, the layout, the screenshots (oh yea, did I mention there’s screenshots?) and the links for the film. More will come as it is edited, and hopefully I’ll be able to finish shooting The Waiting Room soon and be able to post some photos and stuff for that, as well as get it finally completed before I move. Yea, that would be nice. Enjoy the new page!
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