Draft complete

Well, the Twilight script has now completed it’s first draft and is being re-written and tweaked as we speak. Am now exploring the feasibility of various things I would like to achieve in the film and that may take several months. I feel it is vital to tackle however – it will determine not only what I can achieve in the film but may very well determine the whole look and feel of the film.

My plans are to take the computer graphics a step further and make my set from them. It is after all much cheaper than building a set, and you can be more adventurous too as you’re not limited to space and budget. My first efforts in that direction this past fortnight has been drawing the local pub where some of the films scenes take place.

And here is the first draft…no doubt it’ll change a lot down the line.

You can see already that the whole thing isn’t going to look naturalistic, there is inevitably a drawn theme to it. But that’s no bad thing. My thoughts are for doing a similar thing to the characters.

The difficulty will be getting the actors inserted into the set. Will post my tests on this blog later no doubt.  Also, graphics like this takes a while to render (so have had to order more RAM – which may take 2 months to arrive, no thanks to Apple) And there is so much more I have to learn about rendering with decent light (Global Illumination, Caustics and Ambient Occlusion to name just a few) Oh, so much to do! I’m in Geek heaven again!

In the meantime, if anyone wants to give me money to buy a good camera (£700-£1,400) or some decent lighting lamps (£300) feel free. Cos I’m skint! (More on my search for those later in this blog too)

…and the lovely Rita!

Richard Leigh’s production of the live show wot I wrote “The Twilight Ballrooms” had a successful run at Jermyn Street last month and there is more to come in 2011. Michelle Roberts who plays what’s left of the “Roger McGuffin Holiday Dancers” took some great photos. These will be appearing on the Twilight Ballrooms website in due course. Meanwhile I was able to use one of the photos to create this demo poster.

 

Blowin in the Wind

Had a little learn and play with the Daylight System in 3ds-Max today. Made a little weathervane from scratch to render in it that I imagine would probably sit well aloft the Twilight Ballrooms main tower. Maybe we’ll see this shot again someday in such a context, though hopefully less plain looking (Come on, I quit Art when I was 12 years old. That’s what happens when your homework is pointlessly sticking bits of dry pasta to cardboard!)

And I’m excited about seeing Gareth Edwards movie Monsters soon. Saw an interview with him on the Culture Show the other day. The guy is doing exactly what I want to be doing (if only I had the money). He’s living the dream! And I want his big flat screen TV too. From what I’ve seen he’s really committed to the immense amount of work that is involved whilst coming up with some very imaginative stuff – though I’m pretty sure it’ll look low budget compared to my attempt here at a weathervane. Now they ARE scary!

Stop press…

Richard Leigh has persuaded “Malcolm Marvelle – Master of Mystery and the lovely Rita” to return to Jermyn Street Theatre this November 2010. Ticket information will soon be available on their website.
It’s a show not to be missed. But don’t just take my word for it. Click the video here to get a brief glimpse of what others have thought of past shows in the “Twilight Ballrooms Guestbook”

Dream House!

In the mid-nineties, central Europe was gripped by the biggest thing in music since Michael Cretu’s “Enigma” stormed the charts in 1990. Swiss-born Robert Miles released “Children” – a style of music that would later become known as Dreamhouse/Trance. It was to be played in clubs and caverns all over Europe for the next 35 years and would later prove popular with fitness instructors, DIY superstores and speeding motorists.

I would now like to present “La Twilight Serenissima” – my own humble tribute to this, often deliberately forgotten, genre of music. This track was originally intended to be a cheesy underscore for a magic trick.