Category Archives: uncategorized
GutterWidth
Haven’t been doing many comics, lately:
Blood blood blood
Prompted by the latest How-to video from IndyMogul, I’ve decided to just list all the blood effects I’ve ever tried and thought of trying.
Tried:
Steadycam
My low-budget steadycam. Based on these instructions.
Does Ray Harryhausen love Stop-Motion a little too much?
I’ve been reading a book by and about Ray Harryhausen. In it, he describes his experiences on his various movies, and whenever he had to create a creature through any means other than stop-motion, he doesn’t like it as much. On the aliens from Earth vs. the Flying Saucers he says:
I was never happy with these creations. They always looked phoney and stiff, like men in costumes, which is what they were.
In Mysterious Island for a battle with a giant crab, he had a giant claw and a couple of legs made.
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Reaction shots
I always need to remind myself to shoot reaction shots. An easy trap to fall into is to focus so much on shooting a crazy spectacle that you forget to shoot the characters’ reaction to the crazy spectacle. Reaction shots are a cheap and easy way to get the audience to think about how the character is impacted by what just occurred. (Thanks to the “Kuleshov effect,” the audience can see an emotion, implied by context, even if the actor doesn’t show it. But you need to give the audience the opportunity to project upon them.)
They’re taking the hobbits to Isengard
Watching this video got me to thinking about phrases and words. What was it about “They’re taking the hobbits to Isengard” that makes it so catchy? I don’t think just any phrase from the Lord of the Rings would work.
For one thing, it has two fictional words. And both “hobbits” and “Isengard” are kind of fun to say. There’s also a very pleasing cadence to it.
The Frankensteins
My entry in the Gong Show got the best response since A Busy Day. It was based on an old skit my brother and I did when we were kids.
A couple more Film Geek videos
I made a couple more videos about things that probably only interest me.
How to be villainous:
And a thing on characters in movies that notice things:
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Jethro Atom
I finally got around to sticking Jethro Atom up on the web:
My first special-effects extravaganza. Continue reading