So at the beginning, I wanted to use both my dad's and brother's voices in the shots in which they were speaking in Japanese. However, I thought it would be more interesting if they were shown to be the same person within the digital realm by having the same voice (mine). This also allowed me to put my dubbing and editing skills to the test.
At first, I wanted to make this project a little more ambitious by having an actual budget, purchasing a green screen, and having my uncle make the music/beats. In the end, I had to sample various instruments and sound effects to create original Frankenstein beats and ambience music.
This whole process has been difficult, with written reflections and blog posts proving more difficult than the creation of the final product.
Also, I had originally planned on getting help from more people other than my brother and dad. I have an uncle who has a recording studio and could've helped with audio and filming since he has some cameras. However, due to him working on other projects this was not possible.
Sunday, April 7, 2019
CCR
It's here
Written Podcast
Hi, I'm Omar Villasana - writer and director of the film opening 'Aged Reflection'. Today I will be discussing various aspects of my project and hopefully answer some questions.
I will begin with briefly explaining what my project is about. In the year 2267, humanity has made it possible to digitally clone a brain and run it 10 times as fast in a virtual environment. This has allowed members of society to 'meet themselves' from the 'future' in order to gain insight on what direction their life should head in.
As a science fiction movie it breaks conventions by introducing more personal, individual psychological questions that are not usually touched upon in most science fiction movies dealing with issues such as dictatorship or conformity. In this society, your own clone decides who you are, which asks the question of what make you 'you'.
The question that the movie is posing is "Who am I", by offering an easy solution to this question via the digital cloning of a person so that it answers the question for them.
The film could be watched by anyone whether young or old. Because since life is a process, people are constantly changing and asking themselves "Who am I", regardless of the stage of life in which they find themselves in. This also differs from other Sci/Fi movies dealing with 'rebellion' that may positively engage with more younger viewers such as teens and young adults.
Aged Reflection is an invitation to a philosophical discussion directed at people in general.
Before this project, I already had some experience on video editing and sound design. On this project, however, it was the first time that I had ever created music by having instrumental samples from various different songs as well as digitally created beats that would blend them all together. Some animal noises were used and edited to create the eerie soundtrack as well.
This was also the first time I had added dubbing into one of my films. Inserting audio that you recorded is quite easy, but to have it match the lips of someone who had already said it - well.. I found it to be somewhat difficult and took me various times to re-record and adjust the way I had placed the audio in the editing software.
There was very very little that I had taken from online, and everything that I had taken was thoroughly changed to make it my own and properly add it to the film while making it fit and look nice.
The film's logo seen at the beginning was taken off a website that offered to create logos for other people and was copyright free. I adjusted the image using the software adobe photoshop and inverted the colors as well as added a couple of touches to make it look even more sci/fi than it already was.
I had integrated physical technology such as my camera, microphone, headphones, and phone to create the audio and raw footage for the film. While I used a variety of software and applications on my phone and computer to change the nature of the material that I had collected. Garageband was used for the music samples and beats, some iMovie for the editing, and adobe photoshop for the changing of the image's color and brightness.
Something that I feel I could improve upon if I remade the opening or produced the film as a whole, would be to spread out information instead of condensing it into a small segment of voice-over as I had done.
The way in which I had begun to think about the idea was too ambitious and not helpful for the creation of a small two minute. I had created a whole universe inside my head. A world with rules, boundaries, customs, and history. Different ways in which technology had directly impacted the people on this world, and how their society functioned very differently from ours.
These people had an opportunity for the meaning of life to be revealed to them by a wiser, established counterpart of themselves. The existence of the digital clone and the information it disclosed to the person about themselves gave them drive, direction, meaning, purpose, and eventual fulfillment. The key to a happy life.
What the challenge was, in my case, was to be able to zoom in from this broad concept and convey a story that takes place within this universe. But most importantly, my goal was to share the profound nature of it with others. This is where I think my opening needs improvement. Since there was a lot of information I wanted to insert into the video I was unsure of how to go about it or create the proper context for what the viewers were seeing on screen to make sense.
And at the end of the day, there was only so much I could put into the clip. So, I decided to make the opening show the story of a boy who was meeting his digital clone for the first time.
Written Podcast
Hi, I'm Omar Villasana - writer and director of the film opening 'Aged Reflection'. Today I will be discussing various aspects of my project and hopefully answer some questions.
I will begin with briefly explaining what my project is about. In the year 2267, humanity has made it possible to digitally clone a brain and run it 10 times as fast in a virtual environment. This has allowed members of society to 'meet themselves' from the 'future' in order to gain insight on what direction their life should head in.
As a science fiction movie it breaks conventions by introducing more personal, individual psychological questions that are not usually touched upon in most science fiction movies dealing with issues such as dictatorship or conformity. In this society, your own clone decides who you are, which asks the question of what make you 'you'.
The question that the movie is posing is "Who am I", by offering an easy solution to this question via the digital cloning of a person so that it answers the question for them.
The film could be watched by anyone whether young or old. Because since life is a process, people are constantly changing and asking themselves "Who am I", regardless of the stage of life in which they find themselves in. This also differs from other Sci/Fi movies dealing with 'rebellion' that may positively engage with more younger viewers such as teens and young adults.
Aged Reflection is an invitation to a philosophical discussion directed at people in general.
Before this project, I already had some experience on video editing and sound design. On this project, however, it was the first time that I had ever created music by having instrumental samples from various different songs as well as digitally created beats that would blend them all together. Some animal noises were used and edited to create the eerie soundtrack as well.
This was also the first time I had added dubbing into one of my films. Inserting audio that you recorded is quite easy, but to have it match the lips of someone who had already said it - well.. I found it to be somewhat difficult and took me various times to re-record and adjust the way I had placed the audio in the editing software.
There was very very little that I had taken from online, and everything that I had taken was thoroughly changed to make it my own and properly add it to the film while making it fit and look nice.
The film's logo seen at the beginning was taken off a website that offered to create logos for other people and was copyright free. I adjusted the image using the software adobe photoshop and inverted the colors as well as added a couple of touches to make it look even more sci/fi than it already was.
I had integrated physical technology such as my camera, microphone, headphones, and phone to create the audio and raw footage for the film. While I used a variety of software and applications on my phone and computer to change the nature of the material that I had collected. Garageband was used for the music samples and beats, some iMovie for the editing, and adobe photoshop for the changing of the image's color and brightness.
Something that I feel I could improve upon if I remade the opening or produced the film as a whole, would be to spread out information instead of condensing it into a small segment of voice-over as I had done.
The way in which I had begun to think about the idea was too ambitious and not helpful for the creation of a small two minute. I had created a whole universe inside my head. A world with rules, boundaries, customs, and history. Different ways in which technology had directly impacted the people on this world, and how their society functioned very differently from ours.
These people had an opportunity for the meaning of life to be revealed to them by a wiser, established counterpart of themselves. The existence of the digital clone and the information it disclosed to the person about themselves gave them drive, direction, meaning, purpose, and eventual fulfillment. The key to a happy life.
What the challenge was, in my case, was to be able to zoom in from this broad concept and convey a story that takes place within this universe. But most importantly, my goal was to share the profound nature of it with others. This is where I think my opening needs improvement. Since there was a lot of information I wanted to insert into the video I was unsure of how to go about it or create the proper context for what the viewers were seeing on screen to make sense.
And at the end of the day, there was only so much I could put into the clip. So, I decided to make the opening show the story of a boy who was meeting his digital clone for the first time.
Thursday, April 4, 2019
Film's Music
The music or type of music found in this opening is inspired from various shows and represents a general aesthetic.
Starting the filming process
I have now started the filming process. The way in which I have developed the idea for this science fiction film has been very interesting. Before starting the shooting process and setting up props (or the lack thereof) I had no idea on how I wanted to go about actually filming it.
I had created a universe in my head along with a fictional society and rules. However, once you begin to film you begin to understand what you are able and unable to do. Taking these limitations into account, you form an idea in your head of what you will actually do.
And once an idea is formed you start from there. Although there will not be much budget in the film, you work with what you have and convey as much as possible with the use of editing.
Sunday, March 10, 2019
Comparison with Inspiration Films - 'The Matrix', and 'The Truman Show'
The Matrix is a story where humanity became enslaved by robots who used them as living batteries by placing them in small capsules where they would live out their lives in a virtual reality program called the "Matrix" where they co-existed with other humans who were connected to the same reality.
The Truman Show takes place in a dystopia where the life of an unwilling participant became broadcast on television as a show. Truman lived in a world that was heavily monitored and entirely controlled by the studio and director. It was as if he lived in an existence all by himself. With everyone around him being hired actors, he was the only one who truly experienced the world that was being presented to him. Although this film is not
My story will incorporate elements from both of these films. The setting will be in a virtual reality for the majority of the opening and approximately half of the film.
Unlike the Matrix, there will be no other inhabitants or human minds in the main character's world. Similar to The Truman Show, there will be computer AIs that act as elaborate NPCs that would emulate the non-existing actors in my story.
My story has the element of outside observation that is present in the Truman show and not in the Matrix. As well as technological aspects from the Matrix that are not present in the Truman show.
Sci/Fi Aspects of Film
Science fiction is almost always characterized with imagined future or technological advances that have a major social change and display a changed, usually dystopian, civilizations. This film is no exception.
Virtual reality has always been a subject that has both intrigued and scared me. And I'm not talking about the "virtual reality" that we have access to today, but rather, TRUE virtual reality. A state of consciousness most similar and comparable to a lucid dream with built in UI.
This, and the idea of being able to transfer one's being/brain onto a computer, or live in a completely digital state where no organic material is involved.
My story takes place in a time where virtual reality could only be experienced through digital cloning. They had not yet been able to truly transfer a brain from flesh to machine in the same way one can get prosthetics for certain organs or limbs that function exactly as their organic counterparts. In other words, no born human can manifest as a machine.
What they are able to do is take the brain of a living person and copy it exactly as it is down to individual neurons firing. The brain, to them, is essentially a biological program that is predictable and closed circuit.
Virtual reality has always been a subject that has both intrigued and scared me. And I'm not talking about the "virtual reality" that we have access to today, but rather, TRUE virtual reality. A state of consciousness most similar and comparable to a lucid dream with built in UI.
This, and the idea of being able to transfer one's being/brain onto a computer, or live in a completely digital state where no organic material is involved.
My story takes place in a time where virtual reality could only be experienced through digital cloning. They had not yet been able to truly transfer a brain from flesh to machine in the same way one can get prosthetics for certain organs or limbs that function exactly as their organic counterparts. In other words, no born human can manifest as a machine.
What they are able to do is take the brain of a living person and copy it exactly as it is down to individual neurons firing. The brain, to them, is essentially a biological program that is predictable and closed circuit.
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