World Premiere

Here is the premiere of the music for my short film "Looking For Love." The music was composed by my very talented cousin David Barrera. When I first told him about this project about a year ago, he volunteered to do the music. How could I say no. And now the time has come and he has delivered.

This is just the scratch track. Also, the timing is not algned just perfectly. There is still some tweaking to be done on both our parts. Some of the notes I got from my last e-crit were to tighten up scene 080 and combine a few of our hero's actions.

So now it on to layout. That is the stage of the process where I finally get into the animation program and set things up. I am creating the sets with props from the school library. I'm getting the characters in place and setting up the cameras. I am also working on the costumes for my characters. Yes, I can give them a basic t-shirt, pants, or a skirt, but I'd like to come up with something that is interesting but not too distracting. I guess that's the struggle for any costume designer.

This week I have to only do the first third of the short. I will be submitting scene 010 to scene 080. I have the cameras set up and locked in place. Now I need to do a rough blocking with the characters. My mentor said I did not have to build the entire set. That was a load off my mind. I was going nuts trying to figure out how to design and build the cafe set. One thing I am having trouble with is the flower. I need the flower rig to bend and "wilt." I have tried creating the skeleton and attatching it to a simple tube, but it's not quite there yet. I need something by next week because it's needed in the following scenes.

So it's back to work I go! YEAH!!!

Trying stuff out

Here's a first attempt at the possible staging for Bishop. This is from shot 010. I was just experimenting and trying stuff out. The table, chair and book are from the school's library. I'm using the book for now as a stand-in for the laptop until I can make something more real.

I still need to work on the flower for the vase. Not sure how I'm going to do that yet.

Moving right along...

Here is the entire animatic for my short film "Looking For Love."



I still have not included scenes for the opening and end titles. I'll get to that later. I will probably be submitting this this Sunday "as is". I asked for comments from my class and Dana, my previous mentor. So, if they do not suggest any major changes, I will probably go "as is".

The whole short times out to about 1:07. That's :37 seconds longer that what they will allow from production next semester. This week I also need to come up with a production schedule for Class 6: Short Film Production. It has been said over and over that they are only allowing us a :30 second production schedule. Even my current mentor Kenny was stressing this a lot. The longer our shots are, the more time it will take to animate them.

I am hoping that I will be able to finish animating the entire film. High hopes indeed. The reason I say this is because a lot of my acting is from the waist up. Walk cycles are really difficult but I don't have any in my shots. I have Bishop getting up and down from his chair, but that's about it. And I remember everything Dana said in her e-critiques, "All the action start with the hips."

Now for the super cool part: My cousin, David Barrera, volunteered to do the music for my film. He came over the other night and picked up a DVD copy of my short film. Not this version, obviously, but the earlier version from the previous two weeks. He asked me what type of music I heard for the film, but I didn't really have anything specific in mind. We sort of settled on some light piano accompaniment that follows the changing moods of the film. Sort of like the music you hear with the silent movies of the past. Hopefully I will be meeting with him this weekend to go over what he has come up with so far. WOOHOO!!!

"Looking For Love" - Storyreel

It's been a while since I've updated my site. I've been busy working on the storyboards and animatic for my short film "Looking For Love."

Here is part 1 which I turned in last week:

Sunday night I received an awesome critique from my mentor. Here are a few of the things he had to say: "Very nice." "You nailed it." "Honestly, some of the best boards I've seen all week." Well who couldn't help but get jazzed after comments like those. That night I got back to work and nearly completed the second half of the animatic.

So here it is:

Her e-mail reads: "It's too bad she didn't go for the flower. I thought it was rather cute...like you."

I completed it two nights ago. I uploaded it into my PR at school and e-mailed my mentor for an early critique before I have to turn it in on Sunday. I also came up with a few more ideas so I'll be working on those some more.

The only thing that is bothering me is the technical side of the film. I have a laptop that is supposed to have characters moving on the screen. I have camera angles that depend on depth and characters being in and out of focus. I will definitely need to read up on Maya to see how it can be done. I know it CAN be done, I just have no idea how to do it. I have a friend that is going to build me a laptop I can use in Maya. I also have a cousin that has volunteered his services to do the music for my film.

So here are both scenes put together into one:

I still have a few ideas on how to plus the ending. For instance, when we see the second girl's laptop, there will be a pop-up window that reads "1 e-mail sent" next to a picture of our hero. Also, when we see the husband's monitor, the flower will wilt in our hero's mouth first and THEN he will shrink under the table. Also, when we see the husband's monitor we will also see the husband and baby in the foreground. They will have their backs to the camera, naturally, but they will be close to camera and a bit out of focus to creat depth.

So that's what I've been up to.

I've decided to go with...

After careful deliberation and listening to all the feedback from my classmates and friends, I have decided to go with "Looking For Love." I had recorded a pitch for "The Sleeper" and asked my classmates for feedback. They said it was a good story, but LFL was just that much better. One said TS was funny but LFL was a narrative that took the viewer along for the ride. There was a change in that Bishop as compared to the Bishop from "The Sleeper", who seemed to be a guy that stuff happens to.

So now it is time to start working on the storyboards, the set, layout design, and props. I need to start sketching all these things out so they will be ready when I start working in Maya.

By the way, here is my video pitch for "The Sleeper."

I was able to get both pitches in under a minute. I tried to keep the pitches to just the details that would be happening on the screen. That was some of the advice from my mentor. He also said the pitch is to be about as long as the short film will be. We'll see how it all pans out when I start working on the storyboards. For next week, I have to put the first half of the boards together into an animatic. It's basically the storyboards up on reel to see how it plays out.

Now comes the really fun part. The story will soon be locked down and I can start boarding it!