B Movies: Carnosaur 3: Primal Species

For our latest PPD Project, we were required to produce an abridged version of a B Movie we know using various techniques.

For myself, the B Movie I chose was Carnosaur 3: Primal Species, known simply as Primal Species in the U.S. I chose this film because this is one of the few B Movies that I have seen, and many of the key scenes were relatively easy to produce within the time limit we were given. For this project, I used a combination of stop motion with clay figures in front of a green screen, and digitally painted 2D settings.

 The U.S. DVD Cover.

For those who don't know, this plot of this film is set off when a terrorist group steals a shipment of what they assume to be uranium but turns out to be cryogenically frozen dinosaurs. After the dinosaurs kill the terrorists and hide out in a massive warehouse district, it is up to a special forces team to retrieve the dinosaurs before they escape.

How one would probably feel after seeing the utterly terrible special effects that make up this movie.

Still, in this blogger's opinion, the raptors are still pretty scary as hell to look at.

Time Plan April 22nd - April 24th

Date	Summary of Tasks
April 22	Continue production of B Movie.
April 23	Complete production of B Movie. Hand in and then begin tutorial practice.
April 24	Tutorials.

Time Plan: March 31-April 3 2014

Date	Summary of Tasks
March 31	Update of Blog/After Effects Tutorial.
April 1	Production of After Effects Animation. Potential completion of Film.
April 2	Production and completion of secondary B movie project.
April 3	Completion of After Effects projects and hand in.

First Character Design

As part of our 3D Modelling project we were required to design a character. This is a character sheet I produced. Yes, the quality is a little poor, but this is how it came out when I uploaded it to this blog.
This would also serve as my first attempt at Digital Painting and the use of textures.

My First Proposal Draft

Community Arts Proposal

Me and my Work:

As a designer I work hard to achieve a professional standard in my work. I work through a specific structure to get from start to finish, and my peers have claimed my work to be current and fresh.

I possess considerable experience in Adobe Aftereffects, Cinema 4D, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. I have produced projection mapping before, in that I produced an ident for the Sky Arts channel. I have also produced animated sequences such as a Diamonds are Forever title sequence and a Loop de Loop film.

Making it Happen:

Preproduction-

•  Initial Designs/storyboards
• Development/planning techniques and programs to use
•  Experimenting with techniques

Production

Postproduction-

•             Organizing sequences into montage/After FX
•             Sound design
•             Final Cut

TASK	Deadline
Preparing Proposal	17/03/2014
Initial Sequence Designs/Storyboards	18/03/2014
Concepts	19/03/2014
Visit to Installation area	19/03/2014
Presentation of Ideas	20/03/2014
Finalizing Sequence	25/03/2014
Projection Test in TV Studio	26/03/2014

Benefit to Myself:

I wish to produce this film because it would give me valuable experience for working for a professional organization. It would also give me a chance to present my work to a public audience, which would give me a wider exposure to work.

Marketing:

We intend to produce a webpage advertising our project. We will also market our project through social networking sites such as Facebook, Vimeo and I personally will include my project in my blog. Also we can print flyers or posters within the community.

Meeting the aims:

Our project brief is to create a montage of animated sequences which will be projection mapped onto one of two exhibits within the Discovery Museum, specifically a set of model ships or a set of four screens.

The objective of the client is to attract visitors to the museum through an aesthetically appealing and creative installation. This will also be the first time they have had a projection mapping installation in the Discovery Museum.

Evaluation

The success of our project can be measured through the audience’s opinion of our presentation through reviews which can be received through a forum within our group webpage. We can also give handouts in which they can provide feedback in the form of surveys.

Game Design

Video Game Cover

Above is a design of a cover for a video game we were told to create concept art for. In my design I included the color theme for my game: monochromatic with red being the only color.

The video game, Ashes and Roses, is a survival horror based on the Black Death.

THE LAST OF US

Just got the PS3 (at last), and am now halfway through my first ever PS3 game: The Last of Us. For those of you who don't know, The Last of Us take place in a world ravaged by the Cordyceps infection, a real life fungus which initially only infected insects but now has somehow transferred to humans. The narrative of this game is about Joel, a hardened survivor escorting a girl named Ellie across the United States in the hopes of finding a cure for the infection, along the way battling both infected and hostile humans.

Narrative

The main theme of the game appears to be survival, and how far one would go to survive. Despite nearly everyone being out to kill you, very few are actually truly evil people: like the protagonists, most of them are survivors like themselves who have forsaken their sense of humanity long ago for the sake of survival, while the rest are unfortunate people who have been taken over by infection and forced to attack anything that moves. What is interesting about this is that if you think about it, Joel and Ellie are not that different from the people they kill. Joel at one point admits that he has killed innocent people in the past, while Ellie, once she gets her hands on a gun, kills numerous enemies herself despite being only fourteen years old. However, what sets Joel and Ellie apart from the people they kill is that they still retain some compassion: despite everything she has witnessed and done, Ellie still remains focused on saving the human race, while Joel gradually regains his humanity through Ellie's influence. This underlying theme of humanity brings to mind the game's title: The Last of Us at first appears to mean 'the last of the human race', but now that I think about it, the title actually means 'the last of humanity'.

Gameplay

The gameplay itself reflects the theme of survival. Instead of the intense combat and exploration of the Uncharted series, also produced by Naughty Dog, the gameplay of The Last of Us focuses more on stealth, with the player either sneaking past enemies or killing them silently, with a shootout only occurring if the player is spotted. Exploration is more focused on scavenging for useful supplies throughout the game, similar to the 2013 reboot of Tomb Raider, and said supplies can be used either for upgrading the player character and their weapons, or building items such as medkits and shivs. The gameplay also appears to take after the Silent Hill series, in that along with guns the player is able to wield a variety of melee weapons, from wooden planks to axes.

Final Thoughts

In my personal opinion, The Last of Us is very deserving of the critical acclaim it has received from every review I have ever read. Even though I have yet to complete the game, I have been very impressed with the compelling story and its characters, and the gameplay is very easy to master for beginners, which though I have played dozens of games myself I feel is a big plus in a game's accessibility. Overall I will continue to play The Last of Us, and from there I will have a go at the Uncharted series, which I hear is at its core a modern Indiana Jones. I will definitely be looking forward to that.