In preparation for the Spinning the Compass music video I’m doing, we’ve put together a quick advert for the goggle props that I made for the video.  Just for fun more than anything really.

Seems to have been quite well received – one chap from New Zealand commented on a forum ‘Hope you don’t mind but I have copied the link to my evil Mates down at Weta. Coolness!’

If I’d been drinking coffee I would’ve spat it over my keyboard.

I went along to the Frightfest ’International Short Film extravaganza’ at the Empire Leicester Square today.  ’To My Mother and Father, the horror film I did some effects for last year was in the line-up along with ten or so other shorts.

I’d seen the film beforehand at the BFI but the soundtracks now been refined as has the grading.  I also thought the edit had been tinkered with as well, but that might’ve been my imagination.  The film really does look fantastic in terms of production values and looks like it was shot with a much bigger budget than it actually had.

It went really well and got a good reception from the audience.  It was nice to see my work up on a big screen in front of an audience.  You’re always critical of your own stuff, but a few shots of the effects that made me wince previously actually looked fine this time round.

There were also loads of other really great shorts on the bill as well.  The ones that stood out for me and certainly got the biggest audience reaction were the ones with a comedic edge (not to say the more serious ones didn’t too – check out ‘Through the Night’ if you can).

I guess it’s because you only have a short time to grab the audience so if you can make them laugh then you’ve got them straight away.  The biggest hit was probably ‘Papa Wrestling’ which is a spanish short about a retired wrestler who goes on a violent rampage after bullies steal his son’s lunchbox.

Absolutely hilarious, it had everyone in stitches.  Luckily the whole thing’s available on YouTube so I’ve posted it below.

There was also ‘Nelly and Lio’ which is  a french language Canadian production with a thelma and louise vibe which was really quirky and very good.  The two leads were fantastic.

There was also ‘Rise of the Appliances’ which was about household electronics taking over the world.  Sounds silly, and is, but it’s also hilarious and very well made.

I could only find sections of those two on Youtube but I’ve posted them nonetheless.

Papa Wrestling

Nelly and Lio

Rise of the Appliances

Some good news.  I’m pleased to say it looks like 0.L.Droid is going to be shown as part of Weekend at the Asylum 2010, the UK steampunk festival in Lincoln, which is fantastic news.

Oldroid from The Dark Power on Vimeo.

So I was up at six this morning and into Crystal Palace Park to shoot the first segment of a new music video.  This is to accompany the title track of my brothers steampunk album Spinning the Compass.

Luckily the weather behaved itself and we spent several hours with Tom wandering around wearing the steampunk goggles I recently made.  Didn’t get too many odd looks, so maybe all the joggers are used to such things.

Crystal Palace Park is great for steampunk as it features a victorian dinosaur theme park (which we took full advantage of) and loads of cool victorian architecture left over where the palace once stood.  The statue pictured above looked very nice partially silhouetted against the morning sky.

It’s kind of par for the course to do this kind of video in a mock sepia effect with a film grain filter with scratches and noise added.    I’m trying to avoid doing that this time, instead I’m going to desaturate the whole thing, not to make it black and white but to give it a slight monotone feel.  I may leave the above shot untouched though as it does look quite nice ;0)

The monotone look will be balanced with a ‘lamp-lit’ orange hued sequence shot inside which will feature shadow puppets. This is kind of narrative driven so I won’t give much more away than that.

We were trying to keep the reveal of Tom in his getup til abit later on, so alot of the initial sequence has been shot focussed on foreground objects and keeping tom out of focus moving about in the background til ‘the reveal’ pictured below.

We’ve got some nice shots so far – I’m just assembling an initial edit.  Seem to have shot tons of footage though – there’s over twenty minutes and it’s only a five minute song!  With a load of additional stuff to shoot think we might have to make some harsh cuts…….!

I’ve had another go at taking some pics of the new steampunk get-up. I’ve added a bracket that holds the top hat in place. I figured that even if this guy is trapped in an electro-shock gizmo, he still wouldn’t want to be seen without his hat ;0)

Here’s a pic:

And here’s a Flickr photoset too.

Had a quick try with this one.  I’ve got some magnets holding the mask in place at the mo, they’re not strong enough though so I’ll have to figure out another way of holding it in place.

Not easy taking decent photos of yourself.  I’ll do some better ones later.

With hat? Not sure.

A few more pics.  The apparatus is made from various pieces including pieces from old cameras.

To accompany the mask I’m also making a skull cap which I’ve sculpted in chavant oil clay. The idea is that this is either an electro shock skull cap or maybe from an electric chair. The circles will each have cables dangling down as though the skull cap had been wrenched from equipment that it was previously attached to. I’m hoping they’ll look like dreadlocks.

The idea is that the character has been disfigured by the electro shock therapy he’s received and that’s why he’s wearing the mask. The whole thing will be topped off with a jauntily angled top hat ;0)

The silver mechanical piece is the heads from a VHS player.

Here’s a quick shot of the plaster mould I’ve made of the chavant skull piece. I’ll be laminating this with more fibre glass.

I’ve done a little more work on this.  As well as the mask the idea is that it comprises a skkull cap perhaps like those used in electric chairs or shock therapy.  There’s be loads of cables hanging down from it like dreadlocks.

Here’re the beginnings of that idea.  I’ve incorporated the heads from an old VHS player into the piece.

Started working on a new Steampunk costume.