Sci Fi Nerd

Hey everyone,

 I am very excited (and terrified) to be in MG&A this semester. I've always been interested in Science Fiction films ever since I was really young and I've always wanted to have animation and VFX in my movies. In fact, my mom took me to see The Matrix at a theatre when I was 8 (even though it was rated R, she went and saw it first, just to make sure it wasn't too scary......thanks Mom!) and after I walked out, I pretty much knew I wanted to make movies, somehow, someday. It might seem a little old and cliche at this point since it became such a cultural landmark like 15 years ago........but right from the very first frame, they start off with my all time favorite credit sequence. I used to dream in the same shade of green. So iconic, so good....

The main reason I'm in MG&A this semester is because I was fortunate enough to help my friends Blake Horn, Zeke Spector, and Ally Cunningham make their thesis film last semester called ASH. Unfortunately, I can't post a link as it's being sent to film festivals, but if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend you snag a copy of this year's Best of Park DVD and give it a watch. It's a fantastic beautiful film.

Anyways, on ASH I worked as a grip on the set and saw the process of building the sets for the interior of a spaceship and then helped film all the miniature versions of the spaceships in front of green screens in Park. It was interesting because we would have to light each shot in relation to where the sun was and where the planets and spaceships were in relation to another. We also did lots of cool camera moves so the ship would move along the Z-axis with the miniatures hanging from C Stands, suspended by fishing line against an evenly lit green screen. Blake then composited all of this footage with matte paintings of Earth and space that Ethan Burnette made in Cinema 4D. And then I bugged Blake to let me watch him make holograms and zero gravity effects in AE and asked him what I should do to learn all of this stuff so I could make a Sci-Fi film for my Senior Thesis. He told me about Arturo's class, said he walked into MG&A terrified of motion graphics but worked hard and set aside time everyday to practice and eventually enabled himself to make ASH. I really hope to do something similar for a film I'm making called Nirvana.



Another big inspiration of late that I saw was a film called True Skin, very very VFX heavy short film....heavily inspired by Total Recall, Enter The Void, Blade Runner, District 9 (the type of films I'm obsessed with.) Check it out. I really hope I can do stuff like this in the near future. 10,000 hours right?

 Ok, just one more link. The title sequence for Enter the Void. Genius. Another example of something I'd love to make.

Enter The Void Title Sequence

I can't wait to work hard and learn as much as I can from this class and all of my fellow classmates. Cheers y'all!