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| Natasha Badenov (Natasha McGinnis), Wen Lo Gai (Ryan McGowan) and Ding Bang, Abbot of the Jade Fender Temple (Ed McGinnis) |
The first task for the students of the Martial Arts Movie Stunt Class was character creation - a subject near and dear to my purportedly blackened and shriveled heart. So many possibilities! So many opportunities for parodies and paradoxes, outlandish exaggerations and wild and crazy combinations!
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| Chen Wang (Diana Ma) mixes it up with the catty fashionista, Macy Nordstrom (Mia Burdeau) |
This much freedom absolutely paralyzed some of my adult students. Despite explanations and prompts of simple ideas that could become the kernel of a character (animal! profession! parody!), some in the class were completely stymied. For our next movie-making class, I plan to have a good supply of one word idea cards to stimulate the creative juices of those more reticent students.
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| Grumpy Asian (Kuan Ma) is about to ruin Billy Joe Jimmy Bob Buckett's (Jesse Stephens) day. |
Unexpectedly, it was my youngest students that excelled at character creation. Still used to tapping their imagination without fear of ridicule, they created spectacularly detailed and original characters, which I then promptly hijacked and twisted, causing irreparable damage to their tender, young psyches.
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| Cyborg Samurai was the elaborate creation of young Jackson. |
Just kidding. I think.
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| The-Student-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named came up with this gloriously awesome character, Velvet the Cupcake Fairy. News Flash: Cupcakes are bad for your health. Very, very bad. |
Long story short, the character concepts varied greatly. From some I got as little as, “she likes to clean”. Others catalogued everything about their character, from fighting style and tag lines through languages and powers.
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| Dorothy Stender is absolutely priceless as the (almost) unstoppable Grumpy Tai-Tai. |
But, while I gave the students full rein to create their own characters for the movie, in the end, I was the one who would have to write the script. So, after the initial character genesis, I hunched over the wheel of creative control with white-knuckled hands and careened down the road like Mr. Toad, while my students pointed out directions and enthusiastically honked the horn.
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| Billy Joe Jimmy Bob Buckett (Jesse Stephens), Queen Rilo'a (Ellie Wilson), Neato (April Dawn Duncan) and Ooo Long (Lee Ann Haluska) |
I did my best to keep their original concepts intact, but in a necessarily short movie with 20+ “stars”, back story often went by the wayside, and details had to be tweaked, refined and brightened. Still, no one has complained. And I must confess, compared to the delayed gratification of my normal venue, it is great fun to hear the students giggle over their lines, quote each other’s characters, and ruin our takes with spontaneous guffaws.
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| Grumpy Asian (Kuan Ma) demonstrates to Queen Rilo'a (Ellie Wilson) the hazards of ignoring the "Keep Off the Grass" sign. |
Stay tuned as I feature each of the characters from this movie, and talk a bit about the original student concept and how each character evolved.
This one wonders just how many hours you've put into this now. Has it crept into the three digits yet? I wouldn't be surprised if it had. These are fantastic pictures capturing memories that I know we all will cherish!
ReplyDeleteIt hasn't been too bad yet, as during the summer I require little sleep. Besides, HoFS works great as a palate cleanser, and is far more productive than the Solitare, Bejeweled or Angry Birds that others turn to when the wheels stick.
ReplyDeleteIt's going to get really busy when Randy finally gives me the footage from his camera, though. Right now I'm just sitting on my hands with most of scenes 1-4 in the can (there are a few minor shots I want to redo). I can't work on the footage we shot on June 30th yet, because most of the camera 1 footage is unusable, and camera 2 kept overheating and so was offline for a sizable portion of filming. For a lot of stuff, Randy's camera (3) will be the only usable footage we have, so we may end up having to reshoot a few things.
I really need to get off my tookus and find out if there is a way for me to import multiple unrendered projects into Vegas, so I can edit scenes out of sequence, then merge them all together later with all the tracks still separated.
I need more hours in my days...
I find it very helpful and productive to have several projects to work on. Like you said, that way you don't turn to silly games when you're stuck on or tired with one project.
ReplyDeleteOh no! I'm so sorry the footage from camera 1 was so bad! :( Was it framing or something else? Don't worry about re-shoots as far as we're concerned. We're having a blast, and if we have to redo something, we know it's going to be a good time!
Good luck with figuring out Vegas. I've never really had the chance to edit movies, so I have no idea! I'm only decent at sound.
If I could give you some of my hours, I would, but alas, I need them all. :P