My Name is Chris Thompson, and I represent one half of the film company S.K.P.B.
We create films about highly relevant social aspects, such as possessed houses, Crashed alien space craft and the horrific Pokemon Card Underground of the 90s.
This blog will serve as our work in progress blog, as well as a place to vent out all the things i've learnt and anything that may help other movie makers.
On a day, kind of like most other days, i decided to hop into forbidden planet ( I do that actually every day in the vague hope it would be the one day they have a sale). Amongst all the things that are ridiculously expensive but i have no interest in (un-posable busts, seriously) in the corner of one of the display cases was a 2001 a Space Odyssey Moon-bus. Having just watched 2001 with Guy I actually ended up very drawn to this ship and the sequence it had appeared in the film. However, at a price-tag of £64.99, double the price of my cherished and beloved Zero X model I decided to give it a miss. This strange craft lingered in my mind. I liked the design, there also isn't probably many of them in existence.
In the end I decided the only way i'd end up buying the thing is if i made a movie with it.
The set up we used featured:
A 3x1 meter Blackscreen.
A pole.
A bent clothes hanger.
Blue Tack.
A G-clamp and table.
Underpants (Black)
Cloth and other soft things to catch the models if they fell off.
The Models where held in place by the clothes hanger which attached to the pole through a hole in the cloth. The underpants where then used to hide the pole. This technique worked great with the moon bus but not quite so well with the Eagle, as its heavier.
To achieve movement we tried various methods, holding the camera like a stedi cam, trolleys etc. In the end we duct taped the camera to a rowing machine and moved it back and forth with that. It greatly limited the distance it could go, but at least it was smooth.
To get y axis movement we wound the tripod to maximum height, loosened the winder control, and let her drop back down slowly.
Once we had the shots we needed we put them into final cut, changed the composite method to "screen" and there you go. Any background issues can be graded out and things like stars and landscapes can be graded in.
In Septemeber 2010 as part of our Hnd course in film and media, we where paired up and tasked with adapting an Irish myth into a short film. Along with Guy and fellow Student Brian Trainer we came up with Warzone, a radical rein-visioning of the myth and focusing on the Betrayal aspect.
We where then given a list of things that where considered slightly too ambitious and should probably be cut or scaled down from the film....
So we kept them all in and scaled them up (I added another tank).
In class with help from our tutors we developed the Story and the filming process itself. While I feel we almost had to much time (i got complacent, then lazy) it did give us that little bit more time to think, then what we usually do, as in rush in and have it edited by the evening.
There where 2 real Battles for WarZone. The location and the Props
The Location Was a total Nightmare. I had assumed that a public Forest Park would be free to the use of filmmakers as well as the public so when I approached the Northern Ireland Forestry commission they handed me a bill for £5.000 up front. I phoned up to see if they had confused us with a Professional film crew and got a very angry response from the man on the other end.
With just over a week to go till filming Guy and I cruised the green belt of Belfast. The city council were very welcoming but their parks really just did look like parks. Eventually in a desperate gamble we asked the Stormont estate.
Stormont had never occurred to us as its the most politically charged place in the UK, there was no way they where going to let us have British soldiers running around in the grounds, we'd cause some sort of incident. Admittedly, we'd shot Mission to the Unknown there but this was a far bigger shoot.
Turns out, we where totally wrong. They welcomed us with open arms, provided wardens to keep passers by out of the set, a location base and Specialised parking. "Its no problem, after all its a public park". Take that Belvior! The one stipulation was we couldn't use replica guns, i was happy to work with this.
The Props was another Major concern. It was decided fairly early on to not explain what time period this was set in as getting accurate uniforms would have gone well beyond budget. However there was a constant worry at the back of my mind that we didn't have enough kit, the Trousers didn't match the Jackets the webbing belts haven't arrived, there where mo webbing braces etc.
What you saw on screen pretty much bankrupted me and i've only recently been able to stabilise my bank balance as a result.
At the end of the day, I think we got enough across, more kit would have been nicer to keep the army enthusiasts happy but it wasn't the focus of the story. we did the best we could.
Anything we couldn't get from Ebay, we made like the machine gun above. Basically a drilled pipe with plumbing bits.
One thing that I initially worried about was actors, while Guy was an easy choice for Simmonds(no offence) we needed a strong actor to play hunt after a brief casting call, we chose actor David Bell. This turned out to be a fantastic choice as David was not only a good actor that brought a lot of character to Hunt, he also had Air-softing experience which made him a believable soldier.
On a cold mid January morning we began filming, both actors were not available so i stepped in to double for Hunt while Brian directed, With Dale Morgan on Camera and James McMullan on sound. Here we filmed some of the chase, and all the machine gunner sequences. See if you can spot my shots in the film.
James agreed to be our Machine Gunner. Heres a picture of him absolutely loving it.
The gunner was going to be barely visible so there was no need to kit him out too much, Just a green jacket and a real army surplus helmet. We took this approach with the whole German army, and thus had to evoke their presence with sound as opposed to people.
A really awesome looking dog also came along and nicked all our cookies....
Day one wrapped after about 2 hours of filming, I was a tad skeptical but there wasn't much more we could do.
Day two was a far bigger day where we shot the remaining parts of the film, as Brian had shot day one, i shot day 2 and we quickly got into the character sequences with David and Guy. Both had clearly learnt the script and performed really well, as a result filming was near seamless with only 2 line flubs in the whole performance, there wasnt any flash flooding either, TAKE THAT WEATHER MAN
Around 4:30 after everyone had been suitably covered in fake Blood filming wrapped, we made a triumphant, over the top exit down Stormont mile and then ran for home.
The Maser Tank, one of the Japanese governments slightly more successful developments in retaliation to the constant attacks by giant monsters. These mechachanic leviathans badly wounded the Gargatuas, made Gigan jump behind a row of trees and made Godzilla blink when one shot him in the eye. Rendered here in ULTRA PANOVISION (like panovision but more ultra) Made in Vue 9 Google Sketchup and Photoshop. Not my first attempt at modelling on of these ages ago Guy and i entered a Godzilla themed sketch into the LAFTA awards (Language and film theatre awards) showing the importance of learning another language.
Inspired by the shot of Gayos building its nest on top of the unfortunate Tokyo tower from Gamera 1, I decided to try and evoke the same effect with a similar scene from the original Mothra, when Mothra destroys Tokyo tower and begins cocooning herself to it. Tokyo tower is a heavily modified form of the google sketchup model by frenchrouge off google 3d warehouse. It was rendered in Vue 9. The web was done in deviantarts "DA muro" It was touched up in photoshop.
Im warming to the new Daleks, to be honest i think one of the reasons most people dislike them is because they actually haven't done much, the BBc's commissioned 5 new shiny Dalek props and so far they just sit there and yell things at people.
This inspired me to do this, the battle worn Eternal Dalek stands victorious over a vanquished city.
Just got this started, found the foam boards in JJB sports (Forestside) for 14.99. They're interlocking foam weightlifting mats.
While in the tutorial, Click Zach went for a very bulky, futuristic, functional look, I'm going for a more streamlined look based on feudal Japanese Samurai
I measured out the chest pieces for the armour Taking care to make sure it will measure up correctly to my chest, it is recommended you use templates to check first but i'm lazy. (and nearly payed the price for that as initially the two pieces didn't quite match up).
Tomorrow i'll try moulding these to the shape of my chest using a heat gun (apparently a hair dryer also works).
Don't know if this will make it into a film, would hope so. With luck at least it means i'll actually have a costume to go in at sci-fi events. Nobody wants to be the dude dressed as himself, sitting in the corner while all the Captain Scarlet's are mixing with the S.H.A.D.O girls.
Rule 5, From Shyporn Theerakulstit's Godzilla: History, Biology and Behavior of Hyper-Evolved Theropod Kaiju lecture. DON'T TRADE GODZILLA TO ALIENS... ALIENS CANNOT BE TRUSTED Check out the lecture, its very funny.Click here From Invasion of the Astro monsters, Mysterious aliens intend to trade a miracle cure for all disease in exchange for Godzilla and Rodan, you can probably guess where this is going...
I'm Chris, I make movies, I live in belfast, tis a funny place...
Currently have several film projects on the go:
The Darkside of Venus. (In Production)
The main project S.K.P.B is undertaking, The story of a failed mission in which the two survivors have badly fallen out but nether the less must work together to make it back home alive.
Warzone. (Post Production)
A foot soldier and his commanding officer are caught out in a battlefield, the officer must decide between loyalty to his comrade or survival... Should be out this week, fingers crossed...
The House (working title) (Post Production)
Thought up and shot on one dull windy Saturday, Two Graffiti artists are invited up to an abandoned house in the hills by their friend, nothing can prepare them for what happens next, also should be out very soon.
Two other things I have been trying.
I've been building a Cyberman Costume for a Doctor Who short film i have been wanting to make for a while. Its coming along slowly... very slowly...
After watching the Indy Mogul tutorial on sci-fi armour. Click here!
Im actually going to give it a shot, ill post pictures and stuff. :)
