Good morning, Steemians!
The slow, knee by knee crawl towards production continues with the fist horror / thriller film made on and with the Steem blockchain. So this article doesn't get bogged down, if you need a brief synopsis CLICK HERE.
Yesterday, I began collaborating with a concept artist - Norm Quiros - for Changelings. I'm thrilled to be working with Norm again. We communicate well and have a foundation of a shared love for story and movies that helps make our collaboration fun and exciting. Years ago we collaborated on a fantasy idea I had been writing and thanks to him the wild ideas floating around in my head first became real. I think his work has a fantastic quality, sharpness and humanity that I appreciate. Everything he draws ends up feeling alive.
In any case, I sent norm the script for Changelings Wednesday and he was quick to respond with his initial impressions of the characters.
Here's the description I gave for Father Smith:
SMITH, 30’s, a priest with brown hair, knocks on the door with his free hand.
And for Judith:
JUDITH opens the door. She’s older. late 40’s, curly blonde.
MY COSTLY MISTAKE
So as you can see the character descriptions were a bit sparse. At the time of writing it I didn't actually think I'd attempt to make this film, so I left the finer details in my imagination. However, after I decided to explore what it would TAKE to make it, I should have updated the character descriptions to be more specific.
Why? Because Norm does not work for free. We don't have THAT kind of relationship.
If I had been more specific and expanded on the written detail - and sent photos of the actors I saw in my mind - Norm wouldn't have to revise the basic models he conjured from his imagination. So, I've lost a major portion of a day his labor and the costs of creating these mockups has already increased by 30% due to my shortsighted thinking. To his credit, Norm did exactly what he should have done, imagine and sketch the models we were going to use to convey the terrible and terrifying transformation at the midpoint of the film.
Now, you might say, why bother revising them? Well, once I get the sketches to a place that conveys how I want the transformation of the creature Father Smith to look, I'm going to consult with a visual effects person / house to see how they think it can be done and for how much. In order to communicate the body type and age, which changes everything, the models need to be more specific. I can't walk up to an effects artist without a high degree of detail and expect them to get it right on accident. If I do, my effort and capital will be completely wasted.
The sketch isn't too far off from Toni, the actor I kept in my mind while writing the piece.
As for Father Smith, you can see that Dan is quite different looking than the sketch. He typically has more facial hair - which is how I'd like to have the character played - and he's huskier. This is probably going to change how we have to approach the transformation. Dan has more surface area! :)
Also, I want dan to act in this and would love to show him a model that looks like him. That's kinda fun!
So as things go, there was a bit of a stumbling block and I was reminded that as a creator, I have to have more details plotted out in my mind if this thing is going to work.
Thankfully it'll only cost me a few hundred dollars to re-learn that lesson and not the thousands the film will take to complete.
More sketches later. If you like movies and want to see Changelings get made, please follow and share. My goal is to earn a substantial portion of the budget via Steem.
Thanks,
Phil
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WHO DIS IS
If you want to know who I am and what Distant Signal is, check this out. It's sort of a manifesto. The TL;DR is that I've won an award for producing, make a lot of reality TV, live in LA and think that artist and media incentives are ill-aligned and serve large corporations and not independent artists.
WE’RE PART OF STEEMFILM COMMUNITY
CHANGELINGS
The fist horror / thriller film made on and with the Steem blockchain. Use this hashtag to find out all about it!
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MISSION
To create narratives, comedies and documentaries that are short, fun, interesting and cinematic.