It has been many moons (well 2) Since i last posted. Well things have been fairly hectic as we approach full production. FOAM digital now has 35+ people and we no longer fit in our meeting room, so we are looking to move from our existing premises (lecture room) into another premises (a bigger lecture room, if no one else is using it) Production has started on the construction of set props for the motion capture shoot and it looks like we’ll be able to create something resembling a set for the actors; window frames, doors, mantle piece, table etc. as well as 2 adjustable 8 by 3 foot ramps that we can use to make different surface inclines.. No really! You are on a steep mountain meadow!!
We also now have a complete first draft of the screenplay which is presently undergoing revisions. Our Art director Jackie has already scribbled all over it with art related requests (demands). So it will hopefully at the very least look good (arty). We now have a rehearsal and capture schedule that takes us from 25th July through to the 25th of August. This has been a particularly challenging task for the director, as he has found scheduling 45 scenes, with 8 actors, conflicting holidays, differnt combinations of actors in each scene and different set, prop and capture requirements akin to solving a 50 sided rubiks cube, underwater, whilst tap dancing. However, after a few nights of blankly starring at an excel spread sheet that is now too big to fit on a 40 inch plasma screen, we have a fairly concrete timetable for shooting. Still lots to do, as we still need to organise some of the more technical aspects of each scene and dry run the audio, facial and motion capture processes so we can keep the shoot moving along smoothly. Talking of dancing, We now have a new role in the team: student Natalie Curds has joined us to help organise some of the dance elements of the film and presently has the title “Mistress of the Dance” until we can work out what her job’s actually called. We also have a Music student, Thomas Duffin, who has offered to start looking at sound design, which will form a vital part in the overall narrative and atmosphere of the film. Also, our facial capture guy Geoff Samuels contunies to deveop his software and its coming along nicely; I know this because i now no longer fully understand his descriptions of how it works.
Cast news: Steph from our Gregg school contingent has now taken on the additional role of Stina’s Aunt. We have a new character: a boy in the village called “Petov” who we are now looking to cast as soon as possible. We have also started auditioning for the role of “Pipe Catcher”. All other roles are now cast. On the 2d art front, Dan Little our graphic artist has provided us with new logos for “FOAM digital” and “Stina and the Wolf” which are a vast improvement on the ones i knocked out last year.
Along side the production ramp up, we have also been developing a full film quality 720p demo sequence of footage taken from mo-cap right though to finished render and composite; complete with with foley, sound design and music. This is about 80% complete and we will post up the full sequence next month. For now. Here are some stills:
Stina Demo Stills
Other FOAM news: We now have a very large asset list for FOAM of all the characters, models and environments required for production. That should keep us busy for 25 years or so. Also, team members are now booked on to flights to Romania, so we can experience the Carpathian mountains for ourselves and hopefully bring some of that experience back with photos, drawings and video. (travelling out in 2 groups on 2 consecutive days.. the joy of on-line booking) Myself and Jackie will be flying out with 9 (at the last count) students. That’s all for now folks.
( Director of Spreadsheets)
