35mm Course Project - Kalashnikov

A central location of this WWII-set script was a town square and the presence of a Russian T-34 tank.  The school's backlot would be dressed for the square, which was to be strewn with rubble from recent combat.  At the outset, with the expectation of a model tank of some sort being purchased and detailed, we began storyboarding ideas and taking test photos.

I have always found this step to be among the toughest for the students to embrace.   In the absence of an accurate version of the item to be created, in this case the tank, any crude approximation is better than nothing for testing ideas.  There is no exception to that rule, in my experience.  No amount of conversation or assumed similarity of vision will put you on course like a test image will.  It's the reason thumbnail storyboards exist, and these are the thumbnails of effects photography.

Essential Lesson:
The lens will do a lot of the work for you, but you have to arrange the scene properly.  There are real benefits to using even an awful mock-up like this jumble of random materials.  Both the tank and box are... well, boxy, so you can begin to learn about how to match perspective between a foreground miniature and the background.  First, it's terribly easy to shoot the miniature from too high an angle because it's so controllable.  This not only makes it look like a toy, but such a high angle could be very inconsistent with the rest of your shots, drawing that much more attention to something being odd.  Second, you would see right away how important focal depth is.  Here, even though the wall and tank are supposedly right next to each other, they are wildly out of focus.  That is just not how things look when they are really so close, and it's better to realize this telltale weakness early so it can be avoided.  Third, and this is a constant of effects design, ask yourself how you would shoot that situation if you were really in that environment.  If it's documentary or other live action, keep the ideas grounded and composed in a way that is natural and realistic.  Moving on...

This photo has a sheet of dollhouse brick positioned to obscure the paved backlot.  Focus notwithstanding (it's a test), this shows how a substantial amount of ground can be replaced with a foreground miniature to change its texture, or in this case to fill with set dressing.  It saves a lot of money and probably time.         

Here, one of the actors sits amid a narrow stretch of set-dressed rubble.

This wider shot includes the foreground miniature, visually extending debris across a larger area.

The tank purchased was a nicely scaled R/C version.  We would have preferred a larger one, but it's better than having less intrinsic detail.  The one student dedicated to the miniature set, an experienced model-builder, scrubbed it of stickers and paint.  He then added color and weathering appropriate to the harsh winter conditions of the story.

He also created a set piece of the town square to stand in during wide shots with and without the tank.  Rubble, barricades, barbed wire, and other appropriate scenery was crafted to fit the scale of the R/C model.

With this amount of detail, we tried to frame the tank as it might really be viewed at its full size.  We experimented with foreground scenery, depth of field, and even longer lenses in an effort to remove the toy quality of its appearance

Throughout the construction period, pictures were taken to determine the best angles for seeing not only this set piece, but the full-scale set of the turret that actors would interact with.  Eventually the complex rounded connection of the gun and turret proved unlikely to finish, so it was decided to only shoot it from the side, back, and in close-up.  Shots of the front would use the miniature.

The turret exterior allowed actors to climb in and out at the location, but a separate interior set was built and shot in the soundstage.

A variety of scenes were accomplished by inter-cutting the two tank exteriors, and blending with on-set smoke pots and composited snowfall.

Their willingness to embrace miniatures as part of their tool-set allowed these students to realize a period setting in a credible way.They also gained practical experience and more versatility as photographers and designers, and at least one director.

Class Project - Gladiator

The class covered a lot of disciplines with this project.  To realize Maximus fighting Tiger in the Colosseum, multiple scales of the arena were built, in addition to armor, costumes, sets and makeup effects.  This was a large class, about 60 students, which both required and enabled a scene this large in scope.  I drew storyboards from the movie to pick out the basic compositions that were being intercut.  From these we could select a handful to reproduce, and later explore how editing could help make the most of that footage.

For shots revealing nearly half of the Colosseum, a 5-ft. long version was created.  It had little dimensional detail, since most wouldn't be seen in an extreme wide shot.  With atmospheric elements and action added, it mostly had to assume the proper bulk shape.   Still, it had a working valerium and enough dressing on the Emperor's booth to make it recognizable. 

To fill the stands, a classic crowd-making trick was borrowed from Ben Hur and Star Wars.  An assortment of painted Q-tips was suspended through metal screen in a box, and made to fluctuate by waving paintbrushes underneath.  Shrunken to fit within the stands and replicated throughout, the impression of a full and active audience was created.

The main entrance and Emperor's booth were built of wood and insulation foam at about a 1/12 scale.  Greater emphasis was placed on detail for the Emperor, with golden buttons, ribbon, foliage, and nicer fabrics adorning the booth.  The rows of seating were window blinds, whose lack of depth wouldn't matter because all shots of this set were straight-on.

Q-tips wouldn't work for such a close view of the crowd, so instead a similar approach was applied to live-action.  Part of the class dressed in togas (sheets), and was arranged in three rows in front of the bluescreen: a kneeling front row, a standing middle, and a back row kneeling on a table.  They were shuffled around for multiple takes of random cheering, and composited in place of their paper stand-ins.

Costumes were fashioned from inexpensive fabrics, and armor was custom-made with fiberglass for rigidity.

For shots of Maximus on the ground, rather than bring a lot of dirt into the soundstage, we shot in the dirt parking lot.  A 1/4-scale wall was kept out of focus in the background to appear further away. 

An insert shot of his axe piercing Tiger's foot was shot indoors on a small set, against bluescreen so the Colosseum could be visible in the distance.  A syringe filled with corn syrup forced a stream of "blood" out on cue.

The bulk of the fight took place in the small bluescreen stage.  It was so small, in fact, that we moved the screen and opened the outside doors to use the sun for ambient light.  Through trial-and-error with the editing instructor, a method for shooting hand-held was devised.  With tracking markers around the edges of the screen, we could identify anchor points for linking video layers in After Effects.  This was a very poor-man's approach, but effective.  A high-resolution digital still photo would be taken of each large miniature, and the live-action crowd composited into it.  Collectively, that background would move with the anchor points when linked, allowing a more dynamic range of camera moves for the fight.

35mm Course Project - Monster Monk

The first of my classes to incorporate extensive miniature use in their 35mm final project did so for a script about a mild-tempered monk who becomes a giant, eventually finding himself cornered downtown.  Rather than create a cartoonish Godzilla-like stomping scenario, his ultimate height was limited to 80-ft.  This meant we could build duplicates of existing buildings in town, and shoot forced-perspective scenes in-camera and on location.  Numerous storyboards and video tests were generated on the way to selecting final shots.

Among the miniature sets were his church, a section of road with facades, and two buildings' upper floor sections.  All buildings were constructed as 2-sided, or L-shaped, sets to show perspective and be self-supporting.  Some were further supported by a layer of 1/4" Plexi that would provide windows as well.  The exterior surfaces were sheets of insulation foam or foamcore to simplify the cutting of clean windows and doors.

The church itself was framed and skinned in wood, with solid 2" Styrofoam buttresses.  Stucco texture was achieved with joint compound, applied with textured rollers and stippled with pieces of carpet.  Sheets of Spanish tile for dollhouses were sparingly applied to the roof edges only, as all shots would be from eye level of people on the street.  Gypsum and other dried floral supplies added a natural element, as well as obscuring bare or damaged corners and walls.  To remove any background scenery that appeared out of scale, but still see the sky, we staged shots of the church on top of a parking garage.  This was scheduled on a Sunday evening to avoid any traffic issues.

The monk grows into a giant while inside the church, and bursts through the roof.  To create that moment, the actor crouched behind the building, with a special debris mix piled across his shoulders and arms.  The mix included sand, broken popsicle sticks, and painted Styrofoam chips.  The effects crew stood below him, with full buckets of the same debris.  With the 16mm camera shooting 60 fps, the monk bolted to his feet, throwing his arms up, as the crew emptied their buckets into the air with him.  In what is known as a "happy accident", the wind was whipping toward the camera position, meaning much of the debris stayed in frame for the whole shot.

The upper floors of a couple of buildings were planned for forced-perspective setups, also on the parking garage, with the nearby skyline beyond them.  These would allow him to interact via reflection or shadow as he walked past, integrating the scenery.  They were eventually shot against bluescreen, as the location shoot ran long.

The greatest amount of time was spent where he wakes up on the street the next morning.  Two adjacent buildings along a brick street were duplicated and slightly embellished for wide shots.  Everything from weathering of the stucco to bags of trash and street signs were reproduced for the miniature.  Molded plastic brick and shingle sheets stood in for the road and sidewalk. 

To make the most of the downtown location, one shot included a pan on the camera's nodal point, meaning it could cover a nearly 150-degree arc from an advancing mob onto the miniature set without giving away the illusion.  Dialogue between the giant and bystanders was accomplished by filming them over-the-shoulder against bluescreen and matching eye-lines, and in reverse from ladders on location.