Assignment 1: The Rough Cut Video

Greetings my army of loyal mutants and various other subjects of the... oh wait... wrong speech.... Ok. Joke's done: I finally managed to get the shots together, showing what I wanted for this particular project on the theme of power. What I can say is that it worked out fairly well... despite a laundry list of problems that need to be fixed for the final shooting of the video but more on that later. Right now: I present the rough cut of... I have no idea what I'm going to call this thing... anyways....here it is:

Now having seen the video in all its glory... the list of problems with this thing that I have at this moment I'll come back to in a moment. Because those who have been following the blog will have probably noticed that there were number of planned shots that did not materialize in the rough cut, and will also not appear in the final cut. The two shots in question:

The audio recording that explained the existence of the cache - this was dropped on account of it being completely irrelevant. It adds nothing to the plot and if anything confuses the heck out of things.
The bandaging of a wound - two reasons that this was dropped: The first was the cost factor: I don't have the money lying around. The second major reason was the venue I'm filming in has carpeted floor... so drips and drops would just get lost in the carpet, and then I would have to clean the carpet - complications compounded as I have NO idea what would get that stuff out - note to facility managers - Less carpet, easier for me to film and lower cleaning costs all round.

So looking at the laundry list of problems, well, most of them are related primarily to the audio and there are some camera angle and timing issues - based on the rough cut of course. So looking first at the audio:

1. Something is supposed to be banging on the door for a while, and the going away. thinking of making it growl as well, scratch and claw at the door.
2. The audio track in the background... not sure if there is going to be one because I think that might detract from the mood unless I can find something very suitable/appropriate for it. I'm not sure what to use but its probably going to be rock or metal.... maybe Drowning Pool, Trapt... maybe even Bon Jovi
3. Sound effects well given the ending I have in mind some serious gunfire needs to be found, as well as the voice screaming a challenge... I think I sound... kinda gay when you playback my voice... see if I can get Morgan Freeman or maybe Samual L. Jackson to scream out the line of dialogue I have in mind...

Now in terms of filming:

1. Camera angles need some work in this one to get things to flow smoother - especially the tracking shot across the table.
2. Shorter on the loading clip.
3. Shorter on the storing clip.
4. Shorter on the blaster assembly.

Having given this some serious thought, I'm thinking about revamping the script just to get a better scale of the scope and power of the weaponry involved... I know they are just Nerf blasters, but Nerf afficanados know that in terms of tacti-cool appearance it generally goes from the small or core blasters through the full blasters then the bigger blasters. So in terms of how things get picked up... I'm thinking of revamping the order, going from the reloading sequence to the blaster selection: from Core Recon with 6 dart mag, to Recon with Stock with 12 dart mag, then a Full Retaliator with a 12 dart, then adding the 18 dart mag and then adding the Laser sight, PPS, and assault grip, then the stampede, adding the assault bipod and laser sight with the 25 drum mag.

I figure this will give that escalation of POWER as the weapons get more and more impressive.

Now given that a fair number of people have seen the rough -- including a bunch of people I bullied/bribed/cajoled in to watching it, a strange question that came up: "WHAT HAPPENED BEFORE WE SEE THE CHARACTER?" Hmm... I'm not sure I actually want to answer that by adding filming or even if I want to answer that at all at this point. Whaddaya all think?

But for now... what I need to finalize are this laundry list of problems that need to be attended to, and also the revamped and final version of the script. There goes my weekend off...