Monday, 31 January 2011

ALL - Meet The Group

Group photo

Kyle Meeson- Producer



Nickname- Royal Kyle
Favourite sayings- "Hello!" "Caam Darn"
Favourite film- Fight Club
Favourite TV show- Lost

  













Sam Boyes- Director

 Nickname- Boy-Z, Boyzey
Favourite sayings- "hrmmmmmm"
Favourite film- American History X
Favourite TV show- Being Human










Alex McCluskey- Cinematographer


Nickname- Cluskey
Favourite sayings- "Buttered toast"
Favourite film- The Hangover
Favourite TV show- Loose Women

AM - Rough Ident Draft 2

Yet again the new updated Salex productions company ident.

KM - Ident Feedback

To get some feedback on the second ident that Alex (cinematographer) has been working on, I put a link to the ident on youtube through facebook and recieved some great feedback and suggestions:



Screenshot of feedback

Sunday, 30 January 2011

KM - First day of filming

Wednesday (26th January) was the first day of filming for the opening two minutes of our feature film "Suburban Zombie". We filmed the scenes with Jack Hanson (our protagonist) yesterday, and will be filming the scenes with the zombies later in the week. The filming went well, and we used a lot of coverage so we could see what lighting etc. would fit the best in certain scenes when editing. Here are some images and a clip of the filming:

Alex and Sam discussing different camera angles


Jack Hanson (our protagonist)










Using different levels of lighting for coverage, which will help when editing





 
































Wednesday, 26 January 2011

KM - George A Romero

George Andrew Romero (born February 4, 1940) is an American-Canadian film director, screenwriter, and editor best known for his gruesome and satirical horror films about a hypothetical zombie apocalypse. He is nicknamed "Grandfather of the Zombie." - Wikipedia description

Here are some of the films that Romero had directed in the past: Night Of The Living Dead, There's Always Vanilla, Jack's Wife/ Season of the Witch, The Crazies, Dawn of the Dead and Day of the Dead.

The first zombie films (such as White Zombie and I Walked With a Zombie) featured zombies which were in isolated settings and usually in high society, George A Romero was the first director to feature zombies in primarily urban settings, also in Romero's films such as Dawn of the dead and Day of the dead, the zombie characters are purposeful in the task of hunting and killing humans, rather than aimlessly wandering around like in the zombie films before him. This is an idea we are using in our two minute opening, as the zombies are trying to reach our protagonist (Jack Hanson) inside the house. Romero's style was considered radical at the time- looking at social issues in the context of grim entertainment.


(Michelle Le Blanc and Colin Odell- Horror Films)

Monday, 24 January 2011

SB- Filming Schedule

We are filming scenes with Jack Hanson on wednesday the 26th, during the remaining hour of daylight and when it gets darker. Filming starts at 4pm and should end at around 6pm.This gives us atleast an hour of daylight to film our flashback scenes. And atleast an hour for our present day scenes.

We are filming our zombie scenes on friday the 28th with the people we cast as zombies.

Thursday, 20 January 2011

SB - Zombies in video games

A Recent sequel for Resident Evil.
Zombies have always been a part of  the contemporary western culture, so understandably they would be introduced into games.  Resident Evil was the first stand alone zombie game that made a deep impact on society. The game was regarded as a huge success all over the world and is still the biggest franchise in the sub genre of horror survival games.


Frank West trapped under the tunnels of the mall.




Another game that has made a huge impact was the game Dead Rising, this game set the standards for zombie games after it. It required the character to play as the protagonist Frank West, a freelance journalist trying to get a good story who breaks into a quarantined town on a helicopter, he heads to the mall and finds the remaining inhabitants of the town barricaded in with the baying undead bashing the malls doors in. The game has references to famous zombie films as well as slasher films. The whole idea fir the game is based of 'Dawn of the Dead'.


'Left 4 Dead' is a new first person shooter based in a post apocalyptic world, The game was a huge success due to the fact it had 4 different campaigns that involved trying to get to a boat and escape, fight off hordes of the undead in a house while waiting for a military evacuation, getting away in a helicopter
An example of the atmospheric lighting.
on top of a hospital in the centre of a city, and getting to an airplane at an airport. The game used one of the most advanced AI systems "The Director" his made it s every time you played the game, the game would be different the infected would never spawn or suddenly burst out in a huge horde out of no where twice. The use of a program called"cinema effects" gave the game it's eerie atmosphere.

The survivors attempting to pass some of the undead.
The game was well received and was so successful that it spawned a sequel 'Left 4 Dead 2' This game ironed out the flaws from the first game and added more, Left 4 Dead 2 used a more advanced version of The Director that drives gameplay by procedurally spawning enemies, weapons and items based on the players' performance. In Left 4 Dead 2, the Director has been improved to encourage more participation by players, forcing players through difficult gauntlets to reach the extraction point. It also has the ability to alter elements of the level such as placement of walls, level layout, lighting, and weather conditions, making each play session unique.


Another unique feature of the game was the Zombie classes, The Boomer, The Hunter, The Tank, The Witch and The Smoker. They all have unique characteristics that make the game harder and force players to be tactical and follow certain strategies when wandering through buildings and streets.