View Full Version : DVC8 - Brent Graham - The Green Pixels


Brent Graham
May 1st, 2007, 01:35 AM
I worked long hours on this one. Not nearly as simple as the last entry. But a ton of fun. I certainly hope you all like it.

I wrote, shot, and edited this. My brother is the star.

Here is the movie poster...
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/attachment.php?attachmentid=2967&d=1177963573

Good luck to all!!!

Brent Graham
May 1st, 2007, 03:23 PM
You know, it's good to look at this list of film makers and know some of you guys from DVC 7.

What a great community this is...


Thanks.

Brent Graham
May 2nd, 2007, 02:15 AM
Noticed some posts listing what items were used...thought I'd add that.


Camera: Canon XH-A1
PC: Homebuilt
Editing Suite: Premiere 2.0 (cineform intermediate)
Microphone: Camera microphone (hey, I could use that sennheiser! haha! pity votes don't count!)
Tripod: Bogen cheapy
Head: Bogen cheapy (mini fluid head)
All motion tracking done per frame by hand (yeah, it sucked)


Any other questions, I'd be happy to help, advise, warn, praise, curse, etc.

Brent Graham
May 7th, 2007, 09:46 PM
Not sure when mine will post...so I'll throw out the "production journal" while I'm online.


Friday Afternoon - Filmed the scenes with my Brother as the actor (just him and me, tons of fun). Filming took three hours of directorial improvisation. (I wrote a script, then simplified it in my head while shooting, yeah amateur but whatever)

Sunday Afternoon/Monday Night - Frantically edited, hand keyframed the rotoscoping, inserted sound effects & music, hoped to get around to treating the color for more of a scary feel, but ran out of time.

Overall, I'd say I 'wasted' 12 hours on this short. Ha! I need to get a life!

OH, not sure but...

I've had some audio sync issues with my quicktime playback, including my own video and all the others so far...but as soon as I pause it and then hit play again, it's sync'd.

Anyone else had this?

Jamey Hastings
May 7th, 2007, 11:32 PM
Overall, I'd say I 'wasted' 12 hours on this short. Ha! I need to get a life!


Only 12 hours! I'm intrigued! lol if you got a life then you wouldn't get to have so much fun doing this! :)



I've had some audio sync issues with my quicktime playback, including my own video and all the others so far...but as soon as I pause it and then hit play again, it's sync'd.

Anyone else had this?

Yeah me too, but I figure it's just because my computers old and decrepit. :)

Mike Horrigan
May 10th, 2007, 09:04 AM
LOL! This was pretty funny!

I'll now be a little more careful with what I say around my electronic devices.

It may help to output a progressive file though. The interlacing wasn't too nice to look at during some of the scenes.

Funny video!

Cheers,

Mike

William Gardner
May 10th, 2007, 09:44 AM
Very funny! Nice job.

SPOILER ALERT: I really like the selection of shots, the TV peeking around the corner, the "dragging power cord" to show the chase. Very clever! And very well done for such a short amount of time. Good use of music and theme.

Good job,
Bill

Brent Graham
May 10th, 2007, 10:17 AM
Yeah, the flash streaming 'de-interlaced' my progressive. Not sure what happened there.

I'd suggest downloading the Quicktime and watching that.

Mike Horrigan
May 10th, 2007, 10:22 AM
Yeah, the flash streaming 'de-interlaced' my progressive. Not sure what happened there.

I'd suggest downloading the Quicktime and watching that.
Awesome! I'll do that...

Thanks for the tip.

Mike

Brent Graham
May 10th, 2007, 10:25 AM
I've disabled the Flash download...sorry. I was never happy with how it looked, but I thought it'd be easier for everyone. No more easy for everyone! Haha!


Potentially the quicktime audio sync goes out, if this happens just hit pause then play again, and it should sync, I've had this problem with all the DVC8 videos in quicktime so it might just be my computer.

Lorinda Norton
May 10th, 2007, 10:29 AM
Brent, I laughed all the way!! That was just too darn funny. Your effects were great, too.

Tell us some of the behind-the-scenes; for instance, your brother (I assume) hefting that thing above the fence, plus, did you get any looks/comments while running down the road/sidewalks?

Mike Horrigan
May 10th, 2007, 10:43 AM
Just watched it again (QT). This was very well done! Loved the music and some of the "TV" scenes... very funny!

I love my Wii as well. :)

SPOILER:

Great shot when he first comes out of the house and runs into the TV on the street. Nicely done!

What's the music that is used when he first gets on the laptop? Sounds very Star Wars' ish... :)

Mike

Hugh DiMauro
May 10th, 2007, 10:45 AM
I had belly laughs through the whole thing! Yours was the best use of theme yet! Your cuts and pans were perfectly executed and motivated throughout. Now THIS one is strong!

Brent Graham
May 10th, 2007, 11:18 AM
Haha, Lorinda...I'd be happy to.


Well, let me say that my brother is the funniest guy in the world, but he clams up in front of the lens! I left it running and we laughed all afternoon while doing this project. So much fun.


The whole lifting the TV above the fenceline...that was yours truly! I set the camera on record, ran around the fence, lugged that behemoth onto my shoulder, then directed him to climb over certain boards in frame, I then lifted the tv and moved it/him around like the angry brute he was! Haha, heavy TVs suck, I kinda wish I was brave enough to borrow a flat screen and use that.

All video on the laptop and TV was rotoscopped in later, with the exception of the youtube typing scene.

Mike* As far as the music, I always do this...I'll have to look them up when I get home. Most of the music was smartsound, I believe the 'dancing man' leifmotif is a track from the classic comedy library.

Also Mike, I don't own a Wii. IF you look real closely, you'll notice that the wii next to the television is a still I stole from some ad, I then tweaked it's size/perspective/color/brightness/grain so that it kinda looked like it was sitting next to the tv. But yeah, I'd like to have a Wii, but got no money and no time to enjoy it!!!

I'll make a list of the names and libraries of the music when I get home late tonight.

Hugh* On the theme, thanks for appreciating it, I wanted to make the "television" theme an actual character. One day I'd like to be in advertising and I thought it'd be a neat test to see if I could give human values to an inanimate object. Although I'm still jealous of your quality and opening scene.

Thank you all for your comments, I'm glad everyone laughed at this one.

More info to come (music, outtakes, etc.)

Lorinda Norton
May 10th, 2007, 11:55 AM
The whole lifting the TV above the fenceline...that was yours truly!
Sorry I wasn't paying better attention the first time! Went back and saw that the fence scene is a continuous take. That's one of my favorite scenes--much funnier to me that it's such a beast. :)

Really looking forward to the outtakes. I bet they're hilarious.

Jamey Hastings
May 10th, 2007, 11:59 AM
Brent,

Okay I'm totally a day behind in watching films, but I saw yours was posted today and just had to watch...I mean who can resist that title?

VERY FUNNY! hehe I absolutely loved the shots of the cord trailing behind and the T.V. peeking around corners and the fence...lol I think you really were successful in making the T.V. come to life. lol!

Your brother did a great job of looking scared and not-scared at the same time! lol as he was running you could tell that he was afraid but not THAT afraid...if that makes any sense! Anyway, it made it very comical and he deserves props for his performance!

lol I think it's funny that the TV wanted a WII? Did it think that would get your attention back or did it just really want one for it's own purposes? lol funny to think about! :)

Good flick!

Jamey*

P.S.


What's the music that is used when he first gets on the laptop? Sounds very Star Wars' ish... :)


Haha that's what I thought when I heard that piece too!

Mugurel Dragusin
May 10th, 2007, 02:29 PM
Very good work on this one, nice camera work and editing, I do find the music go well with the scenes, I like it :) Certainly like the ending, heh.

Bradley L Marlow
May 10th, 2007, 10:04 PM
Terrific!

I had a blast with this film. What fun indeed. I would echo most of what has already been written.

The chase scene was great and you had an excellent choice of music in there. Your goal of wanting to make an inanimate object such as the TV, seem real with 'unfortunate' human values- was realized. Well done.

I'm still waiting on a poster however... :)

Jeff Hendricks
May 10th, 2007, 10:51 PM
Funny stuff...

So is the TV saying "Wii" like the game?

I love the sort of satirical running style of the main character, reminded me a bit of the Benny Hill show or perhaps Monty Python...that was fun to watch.

Jeff

Ruth Happel
May 11th, 2007, 08:54 PM
I like the way the film really flowed. One scene went seamlessly into the next. You also really combined the music and visuals well to create the tension of being stalked by the tv- slightly scary tone to the music as the tv silently dragged its cord along in pursuit. The ending was funny. Great all around production and concept- I enjoyed it.

Brent Graham
May 12th, 2007, 09:53 AM
Okay, sorry for the delay...


Here is an outtakes reel I threw together, some funny stuff (for me, probably not you)

Haha!

OUTTAKES PEOPLE!!! :)

http://www.meta4productions.com/GreenPixelsOutTakes.html


Also:
Music:
Dancing Man - Vintage Comedy Library: Comic Gags
TV Chase Scenes - Band Vol 2 Horror Library: Dark Intentions
Man Escape Scenes & Laptop Scene - Band Vol 1 Action Library: A Small Problem

Other than that, I used some hits and stingers to begin and end sequences a little more aggresively. They were from the Sound Palette 5 disc.

The phone ring and hippo splashing effects were from findsounds.com.
The hippo video on the TV was from a hunt I filmed.
The Dancing man is the most popular video on YouTube.
And the TV is displaying a Wii ad I found on YouTube.

Whew! I think that's all I've got for now, if anyone has any more questions about anything at all...let me know, I'll be glad to answer!

Later!