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VFX MOVIE TRAILER

NO AI WAS USED IN THE MAKING OF THIS PROJECT
ALL WORK ON THIS PAGE WAS DONE BY ME
(I HAD NO OTHER GROUP MEMBERS)


WEEK 1:IDEA


SCRIPT

Once I started writing the script, I was immediately enthralled by the world building aspect of this project. It was thrilling to experience this level of freedom so early on. Previously at Whitecliffe, I had to make art that I disliked for the most part, even being forced to copy other people's works, which is absolutely the last reason why I am in this field. 
The issue is that we only have 30 seconds to display our idea, which means I definitely have to shorten the previously 28-second-long explanation down to less than 20 seconds. This was really difficult. I soon found out that hours of this project would be spent trimming off fat to make this video the correct length. 

I ended up getting the explanation of my concept down to about 10 seconds. Which allows me to add significantly more VFX to the trailer hahahaha.

pretty important


INITIAL CONCEPT 

Minutes after writing the script, I eagerly began drafting the first visual concepts for the trailer. This challenged me to be brutally realistic in what I could actually achieve as I was left without a group, which I have read is a large part of this grade. I am currently doing a group project in every class, and a number of people are sick every week. IT IS A WARZONE but I think I can manage, even though I have been left without a group.

Here is a simple synopsis of the fake movie on which I am basing my VFX trailer.

PIXHELL SYNOPSIS
The planet is on the brink of implosion and collapse due to a worldwide, soulless feeling of boredom. But people find salvation in the PIXEL: an unbelievably cheap, disposable, virtual reality video game device that has millions hooked in only a matter of hours thanks to the neuro-imagery that developers have carefully placed in between menu load times. Players all across the world are chemically rewarded for numerous different interactions made while using the device. Every step taken, every object touched, every thought had, every breath inhaled and exhaled... What could go wrong?



STORY BOARD 1/2 PLAN

Scene 1:  INTRO (DIGITAL)
-Text sequence
-Narration begins
-Music begins

Scene 2: 3D SEQUENCE (DIGITAL)
-3D object animation
-Stock footage
-Lidar scan (Animated)
-2D text animation
-Tracked?
-Zoom out?
-Music fade out

Scene 3: WAKE UP (BEDROOM)
-Birds eye view
-UI
-First SFX’s
-First IRL scene

Scene 4: TASK COMPLETE (BEDROOM)
- Mid shot
- UI
-”Task complete” visualisation


Scene 5: VISIT THE BEACH (BEACH)
- Over the shoulder -> Mid shot -> Long shot
- Next music track begins
-”Task complete” visualisation

STORY BOARD 2/2 PLAN

Scene 6: SPEND TIME WITH A FRIEND (COUCH)
-Long shot -> Close up
-UI
-3D Rendered environment #1
-Tracking
-Green screen
-Music intensity raises
-”Task complete” visualisation

Scene 7: START A FIRE (BEACH)
-Long shot -> Hand close up -> Mid shot
-UI
-Fire climbing up stick VFX transition
-Narration begins
-Music begins
-”Task complete” visualisation

Scene 8: COMMIT A CRIME (DRIVEWAY,CAR)
- Long shot  ->  Low shot -> Mid shot/close up
-UI
-Car window smash VFX
-Car window smash SFX
-”Task complete” visualisation
Long shot


Scene 9: MURDER (BEDROOM)
-Close up (zooming in 3d space)
-UI
-3D rendered environment #2
-Gun muzzle flash
-Gun SFX
-Green screen
-Tracking?


Scene 10: TITLE SEQUENCE (DIGITAL)
-Music climaxes
-Text (PIXEL -> PIXHELL) (BLUE -> RED)
-Fade out





ANIMATIC CONCEPT SKETCH 1+2

More focused sketches of what the animatic frames could look like


ANIMATIC HAND DRAWN FRAMES A gallery featuring all finished, hand-drawn animatic frames


ANIMATIC CONCEPT

ANIMATIC CONCEPT VIDEO (ONLY DRAWINGS)
An animation I made in Premiere Pro, showing each hand drawn frame without any edits. other than some slight color changes to make the linework more visible. This concept is a great visual starting point for timing elements of the trailer correctly.


ANIMATIC DEVELOPMENT


ANIMATIC (BASELINE FINISHED)

I added hair, touched up the actor's facial features, and adjusted many other minor details to each hand-drawn frame.

I cleaned up the text sequences by making them digital text,
Added some simple UI,
Added music,
Added sound effects
And added “task completed” feedback so the audience has a better understanding of what is happening in front of them.


DETAILED ANIMATIC W/ EXPLANATION

DETAILED ANIMATIC W/ EXPLANATION
This is the same as the previous video, except it shows which # shot we are on,
and which camera angles/techniques are to be used for every second of the animation.
This allows me to convey my ideas effectively and fulfill them with ease, being able to look back on this video whenever I need direction.

In a team situation, this would be exceptionally valuable.





WEEK 2:CONCEPTS -> LIFE

FILMING

FILMING
This is a video comprised of all the filming that took place for the trailer.
I planned for the trailer to be shot in only four different locations and for the majority of the frames to be still. This allowed me to do a large amount of the filming myself, with a tripod. The other shots were assisted by my younger brother. (EG., bird's eye view)


EDITING


EDITING
This video is not only showing how complex and layered the trailer’s Premiere Pro file is,
But it visually breaks down how the majority of the shots and effects were integrated.


3D ASSETS

3D ASSETS
This video features the creation of my first 3D environment. Modeling, texturing, 3D camera animation, and rendering.

In order to add tracking to the scene, I decided to import the greenscreened MOV directly into my 3D software. I then chroma keyed the green out through rigorous trial and error. I have never composited, let alone used a shader graph.



WEEK 3+4:TEDIOUS NATURE

GREEN SCREEN REMOVAL

GREEN SCREEN REMOVAL

I don’t know WHAT I was thinking.
but I thought I would be able to use this purple bed sheet that was TERRIBLY lit as my make-shift greenscreen.

I filmed multiple of my scenes in front of this setup due to time constraints (only having access to the camera and tripod for 2 days). I soon realised that I would have to manually mask out the non purple areas FRAME BY FRAME because I didn’t have greenscreen/lighting accessible to me while I was at home sick.

The task of manually masking frame by frame for three separate scenes turned out to take over half of the time I spent on the entire project. If I were to ever do anything VFX-related again in the future, the main thing I would change would be buying a $30 green screen from the warehouse hahahaha. This purchase would have saved me days and days of work.

The following video demonstrates how many frames I had to manually mask with the pen tool for this trailer.




3D ASSETS PART 2


3D ASSETS PART 2

This video features a second 3D environment I decided to model, texture, animate, render, and composite. Experimenting with very simple geometry, but using real-life textures and realistic lighting. I am pleased with the result!

WEEK 5:HOME STRETCH

RENDERING

All went well for rendering except..

I AM USING A MAC, SO IT KEPT UPLOADING THE FOOTAGE I WAS RENDERING ONTO ICLOUD INSTEAD OF STORING LOCALLY, WHICH RESULTED IN PREMIERE CRASHING OVER AND OVER. OR HAVING MISSING FILES.

This was a serious issue that took days to fix, as I couldn’t figure out where my footage was going or how to keep it where I needed it.

Apple sucks...




WEEK 6:WOOOOOOOOOO
FINAL REFLECTIONS


HOW I FEEL  

I am VERY proud and relieved at the fact that I successfully conceptualised,  scripted, storyboarded, hand animated, digitally animated, 3D animated, modeled, textured, rendered, filmed, edited, composited, added VFX + post processing , sound design, constantly troubleshooted, made a huge amount of behind-the-scenes videos to display my working process in a way that allowed me to spend more of my time creating, and documented it all on this website that I developed for this class.       BY        MY      SELF.


WHAT I COULD HAVE DONE BETTER AND HOW I WILL  AVOID MAKING  THE SAME MISTAKES IN THE FUTURE

COMMUNICATION
Next time, I will communicate effectively with my lecturers and classmates, EVEN WHILE BEING SICK to ensure that I have a group, and get the education + information that I need.  I can achieve this using email , teams, or another messaging app.

EQUIPMENT
Next time, I will rent out/buy better equipment to avoid having to spend a huge amount of time replicating what could have been done in minutes. I seriously underestimated the time-consuming nature of manually masking. Especially when manually masking multiple people. Realistically, I need a green screen anyway, so I will buy one and hope to never run into this issue again.

TRACKING
In the future, I will spend more time on tracking. Specifically, I aim to use After Effects more extensively, as I did most of the tracking in Premiere Pro via manual keyframes. Though if I were to use Premiere again to track, I would require the eyes of someone else to help me figure out what looks “off” about the scene. This sort of tunnel vision is something I can run into quite frequently when trying to reproduce organic effects via animation keyframes. Just another thing that will save me a significant amount of time in the future.

SOUND DESIGN
In the future, I will spend more time and effort designing the sound. Specifically, the pacing of the music, the fading in and out of sound effects, and the clarity of the narration to ensure the plot/purpose of the piece is understood. A way I can achieve this is by once again, having another person look and listen to the project, providing feedback from the audience’s perspective, and letting me know what I should adjust.

FILE MANAGEMENT
For upcoming projects, I will prioritise sorting out the file management as I go OR formatting it all from the start. Not doing this ruined my life, making it so I consistently couldn’t locate what I needed. It also caused massive software issues, and mental health issues from spending that many hours on a file browser hahahaha.




HERE IS THE FINAL VIDEO WITH AND WITHOUT COLOUR GRADING/ POST PROCESSING




FINAL WITHOUT POST PROCESSING



FINAL VIDEO WITH POST PROCESSING+COLOUR GRADING



TUTORIALS USED







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