OOTBFX - Motion graphic designers ressources

Expectations – Beat Em by a Dollar

bish — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 02:50:35 +0000

I have a feeling most of my posts are going to start with a note to the effect that “it’s been a while since I made my last post”. My new years resolution was to update all the blogs … it’s now the 10th and I’m starting the first. Still, like my lovelife, I’d rather be sporadic in publishing than poor in quality. Although I may end up being both.

And I have something good to share for this one. A lesson learned without bitter tears which was nice for a change. Actually my tears are more salty and the last time I remember crying was when we lost the world cup rugby to the “mother country” because they had some Heath Ledger look alike with the midas boot.

The point is, if you were to publish just about everything Ari Gold says and cut out everything about anal or deviant sex you would be left with perhaps the quintissential “Art of War” as it relates to the business of making moofies. In Entourage Season 3, Episode 2, One Day in the Valley we get one of the best. Ari tells E (as he usually is when he is delivering gold – pardon the pun) “Expecations, you beat em by a dollar life is great, under by a dollar put a gun in your mouth and make sure I’m standing behind you”.

Now, don’t shoot yourself if you don’t make your box office projections but the rest of it is something I’ve been repeating like a mantra over the last six months as I was finishing the edit of a crazy stupid little low budget zombie flick. I’d made the move of booking the cinema once I was confident I had all the scenes fully covered and using the deadline as a way of making absolutely sure I completed post on time. By the way that’s not a move I would recommend – it worked for me but talk about a stressburger.

When not just one but two childhood sweethearts (and still total hotties – thank you facebook for putting CIA style background checks within the reach of the common man) found out about it (we had good viral marketing) and bought tickets online I realised that if this film sucked I would have made a dick of myself in front of not only everyone who is important to me but everyone who ever was.

I only had ten grand, an ageing Powermac G5 and, it has to be said, the best female lead a first time director could dream of, a brilliant co-director who just happened to be a stellar DOP who could get the absolute most out of an HDV rig and three hundred of the best extras that have ever been in any movie. But even with the wealth of human resources I was still well aware of the statistics regarding feature films made for no money and how many of them end up being … how do I put this delicately … shit.

The way I kept myself sane was by setting myself the achievable goal of having the film be “better than expected”. And when you are up front about the fact that you’ve made the film for nothing, it’s fair to say expectations are not high. So even if I didn’t end up pulling off one of those indies that stand up as a film and warrant a place on the racks at a DVD store (even if it’s one facing squeezed in between Street Kings and Columbus Day) people could still say “it was better than I expected”. And look whether that be someone’s assessment of my work as a director, producer, chippie or lover I’m happy with that.

It was also the perfect place to work from. In the initial weeks of post I was occasionally paralysed with Hunter S Thompsonesque “fear” at what I had put myself in for but once I had a goal that I knew I could achieve I was able to do the most that I could with each day towards that goal.

The end result was a film that not only beat expectations by a dollar but by a lot more than that in some cases. All the x’s (I don’t say that to brag – I have a lot of x’s and no current – nothing to brag about but most are still good mates) came out with a smile on their faces and perhaps more importantly most of the people I didn’t know seemed to have a really fun night at the movies. Well you can see the comments on our facebook page which you can get to via – www.iambish.com

Korb Music Video

oli — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 04:31:17 +0000

Amazing work by Korb…be sure to check out his other stuffs in the playlist to the right as well, very impressive and well done to Korb

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

Magic Studio Vfx Breakdown

oli — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:23:25 +0000

This is a great ad, it shows all the wonders of ‘hollywood’ and film making in general. They were kind enough to give us the VFX breakdown as well…enjoy!

Commercial

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

VFX Breakdown

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

Greyscale Gorrilla 5 Seconds Competition

oli — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:25:40 +0000

One of the important things you’ll need as a designer is a showreel and most of the time you can scratch almost everything you did at Uni/School (because they we not good enough) or you just don’t have anything to ‘constitute’ a showreel. Well Nick Vegas from greyscalegorilla.com is giving you a unique opportunity to produce a 5 second video clip, that will then be reviewed by him. These small competitions are the perfect opportunity to make great videos in order to create a great showreel.

What Are Five Second Projects?
We all want to make cool shit for our demo reel right? Sometimes you just need a theme to get you started… Some rules to fight against. Use the theme “Home Sweet Home” to make a five second motion piece and link it in the comments of this blog post. Please be sure to post a link in this post’s comments to ensure me seeing it

Rules

1. The animation can’t be longer than nine seconds. FIVE SECONDS is highly recommended!
2. The animation must fit the theme.
3. Only submit animation. Any and all animation forms are accepted (stop motion, hand drawn, cg, 3d, motion design, etc… ). Unmodified, videos will not be accepted, however.

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

Danny Yount interview

oli — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 00:56:08 +0000

Great interview of one of the great “opening title artist”. He has been invited and interviewed by the guys from Forget the film watch the titles.

Here is the interview:

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

AE Expressions: 24 hour sale

oli — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 01:56:10 +0000

Harry Frank from graymachine.com, is having a great sale on his AE Expressions 1 – 6 : $29 for 24 hours…”Got some spare time while you travel over the next few days? How about you learn some expressions!
I developed these courses over a long period of time, taking into consideration how designers work and can use expressions in their workflow. Since I released the series, I can honestly say that I’ve never gotten one negative comment on them.
So, drop a few bucks, support all the free stuff and graymachine and The Motion Exchange, learn something, and have an excuse to dodge the in-laws for a few hours. Win-win-win!
Check it out here, along with a free copy of Lesson 1 to get you started.
For the discount, use the coupon code: GOBBLE

Proforma – Use your web cam to model 3d objects

oli — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:12:24 +0000

I’m sure many of us, who started doing some 3d here and there spent countless either at university/school or even at home starting off with maya, 3dsmax or C4d, doing those object modeling for hours. Well, Qi Pan from the University of cambridge seems to have found a way to speed up the process with a web camera and probably a very complex programming method. Anyway have a look at the demo he made…

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

The Motion Exchange

oli — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:25:16 +0000

The motion exchange is now live and running and it is a great place for anyone in the “motion graphic department”. The website was created by Harry Frank (Graymachine) and it is a great social type website to get inspiration as well as critics from the best in the graphic business. Please make sure to check it out…

Motionworks Opening Credits Competition

oli — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 03:33:06 +0000

Motionworks needs a hot new opening title sequence for Unplugged, our popular motion graphics interview series. If you guys win, John Dickinson will be using YOUR work as the opener of his popular show. Get started and head there immediately for all the assets and requirements.

Doing it For Nothing

bish — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 09:08:19 +0000

It’s been a while since I was given this account and asked to do a semi-regular blog by one of the site admins and an excellent young bloke.

And as I sit here watching a final cut rendering timeline counting upward … wait a minute it said 29 minutes and now it’s saying 49. My mac has just changed bets on me out of turn, if this was a poker game you could get shot for that in some neighborhoods.

Anyway it gives me time to finally do a first entry. Basically I was asked because I’ve managed to make a highly dubious debut zombie feature film in Perth for ten grand that I won in a short film competition. The idea of the blog was to give some tips on how that was done.

Tip 1 – you’ll get more people volunteering if you’re doing something they think is cool. I had 300 zombie extras on set covered in bad green makeup and they did it purely for the love of zombie movies. I have a feeling you’d get similar responses for vampire movies and most other horror and genre movies. That just adds weight to my theory that if you are going to try and do a low budget film, a genre is your best friend.

Till next time, may the force be with yous.

Bish
www.iambish.com