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S.E. O'Brien and myself just finished four days going over the current draft edit and determining the CGI shots required for the film. This involved having to rewatch all Firefly episodes over and over to study lighting and coloring of the CGI sequences. It was a hard job but someone had to do it, eh?
After this visit, we have abut 70 percent of the CGI mapped out. The visual effects team is now ploughing through the many required renders. This will take a while: One minute of rendered video can take 3 days to complete!
Other visual effects updates, comes from our own Dave "The Fez Pimp" Hodson, as he has completed writing specific software to key and rotoscope the many shots we want to add great animated backgrounds to.
On the editing front; we have lost several months in editing due to the fact that I had an overwhelming desire to run my motorcycle into a tree and smash my right arm and shoulder YEY!! I'm on the mend. I took most of the brunt with my head and there wasn't much up there to start with.
All focus at present is on getting the edit completed. This will allow us to commence score foley and replacing dialogue. Currently doing sound tests with various mics and techo stuff to capture and recorded replacement dialogue and sound effects.
So a couple of setbacks but still well and truly flying.
Stay shiny and make sure you check out our regular chats on The Signal Podcast. We have a new one coming up with the visual effects team. – MJ
Browncoats: Redemption (the other super-shiny fan film now in production) >>
April 26, 2009
Gorramit! Forced to Watch Firefly Over and Over...
The Official Bellflower Blog >>
Firefly Ship Works >>
May 11, 2009
Browncoats Save The Day (Again)
The last few weeks have been some of the busiest times for the Bellflower. It saw the first edit of the whole film nearing completion. It is an indescribable experience to see your vision for a film come together in front of you. Sure, you film it, plan it, sit in quiet little spots dreaming about it, playing the scenes over and over in your head. But to see it in front of you – coming out the way you hoped it would – that's pretty shiny.
This weekend we have our very first rough cut viewing with the local crew (local = Australia). This should give us a feel for the flow, the edit, and things that stand out that may need tweaking. I'll let you know how it goes.
This past week also saw a massive number of skilled special effects artists, under the watchful eye of S.E. O'Brien, starting to shape the scores of CGI shots in the film. New ships, new models, some of which you can see here; many of which you'll need to wait a bit longer for.
Great new additions to the crew (thanks to this wonderful site) are two sound engineers that have started work on bringing The Verse to your ears. Welcome to Eron And Mark. Those guys are now part of the family and are forever entwined in the Bellflower weave.
We also had several requests for Bellflower t-shirts, posters and DVDs from our site, We made a few shirts and posters up and Sean and Bentley gave them away at the Creation Con last November. We have about four different designs and about 6 different posters; but they weren't ever intended for sale, just gifts. We may post some pics of the shirts and posters on this site soon if you like, but don't know if we can offer them to take away at present.
In summary; These last few weeks have seen more activity around Bellflower than ever before and more Browncoats joining the cause. It's a shiny time to be in the Black. – MJ
September 25, 2009
Bellflower Delayed, But Not Dead
No one is sadder than me that Bell isn't out there, flying into everyone's home right now. Is Bellflower Dead? Will this small corner of the Verse ever see the light of day?
ARE YOU NUTS?! Of course she will! This delay, while unfortunate, is already leading to an even bigger and better Bellflower! We've had some new animators come in to the fold, and with this, new capabilities and new ideas. We have some amazing works happening here, but before I get too far gone in the shinies, let me tell you where we're at:
The whole film has been edited, reedited, tightened, all for a better film, I assure you. I can watch some scenes and can barely express how proud I am of what we have put together. Bell is rapidly becoming the film I wanted to make. And for me that is the best feeling.
The CGI team – Sean Kennedy,Gordon Robb, Peter Sussi, Adam and many more – are perfectionists. They are putting so much care and detail into the city of new Melbourne, for example – it's bigger and better than ever! More ships (including some familiar face) birds, wild life, people... I have seen some of the roughs and let me tell you, it's all just amazing.
We are putting a lot of effort into the sound production under Mark Zelmer whose sound production skills are really lifting things to scary levels.
But I can hear you now – sure, that's all nice, but when's the bloody film coming out?
Most honest answer I can give you is, "When it's ready." We can't betray the trust of our fellow Browncoats with anything that is not absolutely the best we can make it, and as long as I see this getting better every day, we will keep at it.
From the bottom of my heart, thanks to all who are working tirelessly to make Bellflower great, and to all the fans who continue to show great interest in our good works.
So, we are still flying, things are moving along better (in my opinion) than they ever have, and when you see the final result, you will be happy we took the time we did... I hope. – MJ
