Word Is Yours, Grab It! Chapter 01: The first episode of the viral video for Grabbler, a social networking multi-player word game.

Client: iplaysocial
Year: 2009
Role: Concept, Storyboard, Modeling, Animation, Compositing
Applications Used: Maya, Cinema 4D, After Effects

The ‘work-in-progress’ second segment of experience design for a leading luxury brand.

The lighting setup is way too complicated than is actually seen. Normality plugin for AE was also used to make some last minute lighting adjustments and for adding rim lights.

Client: Kieon
Year: 2009
Role: Modeling, Animation, Compositing
Applications Used: Cinema 4D, After Effects

The second logo experiment for fxfunda.com (a vfx knowledge sharing community)

Client: FxFunda
Year: 2009
Role: Concept, Modeling, Animation, Compositing
Applications Used: Cinema 4D, After Effects

The concept logo animation for an upcoming FxFunda project (TBA), a vfx knowledge-sharing community from India.

Client: FxFunda
Year: 2008
Role: Logo Design, Concept, Modeling, Animation, Compositing
Applications Used: Cinema 4D, After Effects

This is a WIP first test of the initial segment of a promo I started working on for Grabbler game (find it on Facebook).

At this moment it is more like messing around stuff to come up with accidental creation, I am sure the final promo will be something else altogether.

This also happens to be my first test with Thinking Particles in Cinema 4D.

Client: iPlaySocial
Year: 2009
Role: Concept, Modeling, Dynamics, Animation, Compositing
Applications Used: Cinema 4D, After Effects

It’s a lo-fi animation sequence in which the teen of the title strolls pensively through her neighbourhood, chug-a-lugging a jug of SunnyD in preparation for a pregnancy test. With cut-out Xerox images of Ellen Page, hand-drawn typography and a whimsical tune by kids’ balladeer Barry Louis Polisar on the soundtrack, it immediately tells us this is going to be a sweet, funny-sad film with an indie spirit.

And, of course, it is.

Year of production: 2007
Film director: Jason Reitman
Title designer: Shadowplay Studio

Other credits
Title designers: Gareth Smith & Jenny Lee,
Title sequence producer: Ari Sachter-Zeltzer,
Music: “All I Want is You” by Barry Louis Polisar

Watch it here

Hailed by many as one of the most memorable recent title sequences. Title designer Gareth Smith talks about the process of creating the title sequence.

“The Juno opening title sequence was truly a labor of love for all of us at Shadowplay Studio. It took nearly supernatural patience in order to get through the main task involved in the creation of the title sequence: the printing, hand-tracing, xeroxing, cutting and coloring of over 900 images of Juno walking through her neighborhood. But we had a fantastic time working on the project and were glad to be working with our hands instead of the computer.”

Shadowplay Studio worked with director Jason Reitman before on Thank You For Smoking, which is still one of the most viewed title sequences on Forget the Film, Watch the Titles. Reitman, who says he’s a “big fan” of opening credits, brought the designers in on the project very shortly after he signed on to direct Juno.

“When we first met with Jason about it, he played some of the music he was thinking of using in the soundtrack, including Kimya Dawson’s songs with the Moldy Peaches. This music, the tone and originality of the screenplay, and the uniqueness of Juno’s character, led us down the path toward creating a low-fi, hand-animated title sequence.”

“We wanted to create something that had texture and a little bit of edge, but also imparted the warmth and heart of the screenplay.”

“Jason also let us know that he wanted the opening title sequence to take place after the first scene of the film – the scene in which Juno is admiring a discarded living room set on a lawn. Because we were able to start the process of designing the title sequence before the film was actually shot, it allowed us to create something that integrated very nicely into the story-line of the film. It seemed natural to show the credits while the audience followed Juno from the opening scene, through her neighborhood, and to the convenience store where she gets her pregnancy test.”

“This decision allowed us to do something a little unusual for an opening title sequence: focus the sequence entirely on the main character of the film. This allowed the audience to really get a sense of, and get immersed in, Juno’s unique, quirky point of view of the world.”

“We flew up to Vancouver during the final week of shooting the film, and were able to get some time with Ellen Page and Jason the day after they finished shooting the movie. We shot thousands of photos of Ellen walking on a treadmill with a high-speed camera from a number of angles. Jason had a guitar with him and strummed out some chords to help get her in the right mind-set.”

“We then took these photos back to our studio and edited together a rough animatic which allowed us to figure out the timing and shot selection for the final title sequence. When we had something that everyone was happy with, we began the laborious process of hand-creating the title sequence.”

“Every element that appears in the title sequence was hand-made, including the typography. We used the computer to save us a tremendous amount of time to layer the elements together, but tried as best as possible to adhere to the idea of mimicking the limitations of shooting stop-motion animation from a real-world copy stand.”

“To create the cut-outs of Juno, we printed every frame, outlined Juno, then photo-copied the prints several times to degrade the quality. Each of these frames were then hand-colored and cut out with scissors. This is a process that we’ve been wanting to try out for quite a while, and this project seemed like the perfect opportunity to do it.”

“Toward the end of production process, we were asked to create the hand-animated season title cards that appear in the film, as well as the end titles, which we created a custom typeface for. After the film was released, we were invited to collaborate on the design of the music soundtrack and contribute drawings and cut-outs for the dvd.”

“Despite the massive amount of time it took to pull this off, we were happy to be working on it every time we picked up a pen or a pair of scissors. Jason Reitman’s constant enthusiasm and positive energy inspired us throughout the production process, and we are proud to have been involved with this film.”

Here are some images of the process of creating this striking title sequence, makes you realize that you dont have to necessarily need eye-candy CGI to create a memorable graphics.

Lord of War title sequence

Lord of War starring Nicolas Cage features an incredible title sequence that of a journey of a bullet from the arms factory to the guerilla rebels in Africa. An interesting study in live and CG compositing and HDRI reflection.

L’E.S.T. visual effects supervisor Yann Blondel talks about the digital techniques he employed for key sequences in Lord of War opening ‘bullet factory’ titles

At the beginning of the sequence we dive on a machine. This machine has been created/extended using CGI and some animation has been added to it. That shot had also been accelerated and stabilised.

Inside the machinery everything is CGI until we emerge on the conveyor belt.

The conveyor belt itself is CGI and the bullets are as well. The background needed to be reconstructed in CGI because the camera was waving a little too much and we wanted a straight trajectory. When the bullet is picked up, the actor and the hand have been shot against green screen and composited on a CGI background.

After being tossed back on the conveyor belt we fall in a tube. Here, again, everything is CGI until we fall in the crate full of bullets (which is obviously CGI).

We emerge on the second conveyor belt. The background has been retimed and stabilized. Here only the foreground is CGI. It’s exactly the same case when the crate is opened in the Ukrainian Harbor.

When the crate is opened again in Africa it’s another story. When the bullet falls and rolls on the ground everything is CGI. We had shot a nice movement but the distance with the ground wasn’t good. We had to recreate the whole background in CGI to gain a couple of inches! And as there were moving elements it wasn’t simple.

Then the bullet is tossed in another crate full of ammunitions (all CGI). While being loaded into the truck and travelling through the jungle the crate and the bullets are CGI.

In the street, until we get thrown on the ground, only the crates and the bullets are CGI. But when we get loaded in the magazine everything is CGI from background to the magazine and the barrel of the AK47.

And then, when the bullet is shot we only added a CGI bullet, some guys fighting in the street, accelerated and stabilized the shot.

Software details:
XSI, Shake, After Effects, Photoshop and Matchmover for 3D tracking.

VFX:
L’E.S.T. (visit the link for some major vfx shot breakdowns and stuff.

Watch and Download it here

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Saul Bass (May 8, 1920 – April 25, 1996) was a graphic designer and Academy Award-winning filmmaker, but he is best known for his design on animated motion picture title sequences, which is thought of as the best such work ever seen.

During his 40-year career he worked for some of Hollywood’s greatest filmmakers, including most notably Alfred Hitchcock, Otto Preminger, Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese.

His most famous title sequence is probably the animated paper cut-out of a heroin addict’s arm for Preminger’s The Man with the Golden Arm.

Saul Bass designed the 6th AT&T Bell System logo, that at one point achieved a 93 percent recognition rate in the United States. He also designed the AT&T “globe” logo for AT&T after the break up of the Bell System.

Hollywood’s man behind the title
Movies never started the same after Saul Bass made a mark with bold, symbolic sequences.

By Susan King, Times Staff Writer

DURING the classic studio era in Hollywood, movie title sequences were generic.

“Every studio had its own look,” says film historian Jan-Christopher Horak. “They did [titles] the same way; just the names changed.”

But when the studio system started to wane in the 1950s, title designs began to evolve. “They started doing more inventive things,” says Horak. “The film begins over the titles or you have an open book and the pages will be turning.”

That was a start, but Saul Bass took the form to an entirely different level. A true pioneer, he turned movie opening and closing title sequences on their ear with bold, graphically vivid designs. His title sequences would often resemble an animated film.

“Like the good designer that he was, he would come up with some kind of iconic symbol to encapsulate what the movie is about,” says Horak. In Bass’ design for Otto Preminger’s 1960 epic “Exodus,” the symbol is an arm holding up a gun. For Preminger’s 1958 romantic drama “Bonjour Tristesse,” it’s an exaggerated tear dripping down the face of a young woman.

Bass’ posters, soundtrack album covers and storyboards for the “Psycho” shower sequence ? Bass drew the storyboards for director Alfred Hitchcock for the iconic scene ? plus screenings of a montage of film titles edited by Bass and his wife Elaine are currently on display at the Skirball Cultural Center.

“Saul Bass: The Hollywood Connection,” which was developed with the curatorial guidance of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, also features screenings of his Oscar-winning 1968 short, “Why Man Creates.” And on select Tuesday afternoons this month and in February, the Skirball will screen films for which he designed the titles and the posters.

Born in New York City in 1920, Bass studied at the Art Students League in Manhattan before attending Brooklyn College. “He came out to California in 1948 and starts doing print ads for movies, though he didn’t get credit,” says Horak.

Bass’ first big break came when he collaborated with Preminger on the 1954 film “Carmen Jones.” Preminger was so impressed with his poster design for the film, he asked Bass to create the opening and closing titles.

Bass gained acclaim for his designs for Preminger’s classic “The Man With the Golden Arm,” the director’s 1955 drama about a jazz musician (Frank Sinatra) struggling to overcome heroin addiction. He selected a black-and-white cutout arm as the central image of the poster and the opening title design.

He continued to work with Preminger into the 1970s, as well as providing startling designs for Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo,” “North by Northwest” and “Psycho” and working with Billy Wilder on such films as “One, Two, Three.”

Still, says Horak, “most of his money he made doing other things. He designed a lot of famous corporate logos ? for example, the Bell telephone logo. He would get paid millions for just [the logo].”

Bass started doing more and more corporate work in the 1970s and ’80s. “From what I’ve heard, he priced himself [out of the movie] market,” says Horak. “He wanted too much money for what he was doing.”

That is until Martin Scorsese hired him to create the title designs for “GoodFellas,” “Cape Fear,” “The Age of Innocence” and “Casino.”

Bass died in 1996, but his popularity continues. Horak says his posters “really stand out because they are so interesting as graphic designs. For that reason, they have become highly collectible.”

Carmen Jones: the Title Credits

Schindler’s List poster (not used for the final movie)

Around the World in 80 Days: the Title Credits

Anatomy of a Murder: the Title Credits

Spartacus: the Title Credits

West Side Story: the End Credits

The Cardinal: the Title Credits

Seconds: the Title Credits

Cape Fear: the Title Credits

The Seven Year Itch: the Title Credits

Bonjour Tristesse: the Title Credits

North by Northwest: the Title Credits
*freakin’ amazing if you consider the time it was made!

Exodus: the Title Credits

In Harm?s Way: the End Credits

Advise & Consent: the Title Credits

The Age of Innocence: the Title Credits

War of the Roses: the Title Credits

The Man with the Golden Arm: the Title Credits

Vertigo: the Title Credits

Psycho: the Title Credits

It?s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World: the Title Credits

Bunny Lake is Missing: the Title Credits

West Side Story: the Title Credits

Goodfellas: the Title Credits

Casino: the Title Credits

More info about Saul Bass and a wide array of his work with reviews on individual work can be found at the following url:
not coming to a theater near you

Also watch some of the title sequences designed by Saul Bass:
Title Sequences by Saul Bass on YouTube

Saul Bass has left behind a legacy that is still followed by motion designers worldwide and in Hollywood, most of all. Catch Me If You Can title design was a tribute to Saul Bass as I had mentioned in my earlier post on this thread. He still continues to inspire…

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Its easy to draw parallels in this sentence with characters that inhabit Frank Miller’s Sin City.

Savage, noir, medieval-style survival stories involving evil villains, ruthless goons, not-so-bad good guys, corrupt cops, deadly dames and so on. Frank Miller’s interpretation of style is so updated and savage that the viewer almost fails to recognise the parody or parallels to the noir cinematic vision.

Robert Rodriguez‘ cinematic transformation of Frank Miller’s comic series (ee, graphic novels, as fans of this genre love to call them) stays true to the original storyline, storyboard and noir style.

Alright that said, shot, sliced and done, here’s a story behind the maker of the movie, Robert Rodriguez. If you thought that ‘guest-direction-by-Quentin-Tarantino’ was a cheap gimmick, you are goddamn wrong.

He was only 23 year old when he made his breakthrough movie, El Mariachi on a meagre budget of $7,000. The means he adopted to gather budget for the movie is already a legend in itself. He sort of ‘rented’ his body to medical research for a mere amount and the rest financed by the his friend, co-producer and main character of the movie, Carlos Gallardo (you can also see him in the sequel Desperado as one of Antonio Banderas’ guitar wielding buddies).

The movie was written, produced, shot, cut and directed by Rodriguez originally intended for Spanish home video release, won Audience Award at Sundance Festival and was later picked up by Columbia Pictures and released in the US. He also provided special effects for the movie. In the meantime he ended up developing some kind of technique to depict shooting sequences and blood splattering in the same shot that he later used extensively in Desperado and the final instalment of the trilogy Once Upon a Time in Mexico.

It was the first Spanish and also the lowest budget movie ever to be released by a major studio in Hollywood. Robert Rodriguez’ studio is called as Troublemaker Studios, formerly Los Hooligans (the name of the comic strip he wrote and drew as a teen for a local Texan daily), is far removed from Hollywood.

His buddies include new generation film-makers like Quentin Tarantino, Richard Linklater and so on. All these are the same outlaws who had quit Director’s Guild of America when confronted with reasons that I’d discuss later.

After El Mariachi brought him to Hollywood circle, he continued his work on the sequel, Desperado. It introduced mexican damsel Salma Hayek to American audience along with Antonio Banderas. This movie also gave opportunities to some of his favourite actors like Cheech Marin (is a really brilliant actor from Los Angeles who plays 3 different roles in From Dusk Till Dawn!), Steve Buscemi (used to be the usual suspect of indie flicks), Danny Trejo who appeared in most of Rodriguez’ movies.

Little info on Cheech Marin (born Richard Anthony Marin) I might add. Cheech Marin is a legendary figure being one half of the cult 70s comedy duo Cheech and Chong. Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong were a comedy duo who found a wide audience in the 1970s and 1980s for their stand-up routines, which were based upon the era’s hippie, free love and (especially) drug culture movements. Cheech played a cholo from Los Angeles, while Chong was a burnt-out “druggie” whose entire life revolved around getting high. They were sort of Monty Python of the US back then.
Their best-known comedy routines include “Earache My Eye“, “Basketball Jones“, “Santa Claus and his Old Lady“, and “Sister Mary Elephant“. Perhaps their all-time most famous line is “Dave’s not here, man” (from their self-titled debut album).

The next movie From Dusk Till Dawn was his second collaboration with Quentin Tarantino, where Tarantino scripted and acted alongside George Clooney. This movie starts off as a gangster flick but somewhere in the middle of the movie, some major genre-hopping happens and et voila! you have vampire flick! Never before any movie shocked me with this kind of uncompromising look at genres.

Then came The Faculty (a scifi horror) which also featured Class of ‘98 cover of the Pink Floyd classic “Another Brick in the Wall”. Then it was Spy Kids which spawned into a trilogy. That’s another story. Once Upon a Time in Mexico didnt impress me much because I hated that Enrique schtique.

Meanwhile(this is one of the most commonly used words in comics, meanwhile), Frank Miller had had a bad experience with his comics being made into movies in Hollywood like Robocop and stuff and he had eventually given up the idea of turning his graphic visions into movies any further.

“Walk down the right back alley in Sin City and you can find anything.”

Enter Robert Rodriguez, a long time fan of Frank Miller who invited him once to his Los Hooligans Studio in Texas and showed him the piece that he had shot, composited and showcased in a single day (The Customer is Always Right which starred Josh Hartnett and Marley Shelton) which became the opening scene for Sin City when it became a full-fledged movie. Frank Miller was convinced that his noir-style graphic vision could be translated to motion picture media.

Robert Rodriguez insisted that Frank Miller share directorial credits with him since the movie would have major contribution in terms of visual language, narrative and style.
Director’s Guild of America had different ideas and according to one of their silly laws couldnt recognise Miller as a director and so it goes, Rodriguez resigned from the DGA.

A point to be noted here is that Frank Miller’s graphic novels are no less than noir movies in terms of mood, atmosphere, style and narrative.

“This is blood for blood and by the gallon. These are the old days, the bad days, the all-or-nothing days. They’re back! There’s no choice left. And I’m ready for war.”

Sin City
The movie comprises of 4 stories and 3 are main stories that take place in a place called as Basin City and the epilogue was exclusively written for the movie by Miller and Rodriguez.

1. The Customer is Always Right
2. The Hard Goodbye
3. The Big Fat Kill
4. That Yellow Bastard

Spoilers ahead!
This is the story of people (or rather survivors) in a city that never sees the sunlight and rains once in a while, even expect a snowfall sometimes.

There is an Old Town run by deadly dames, hookers who seem to have their own laws that govern the Old Town and the cops are off-limits to this area of the city due to the truce between Old Town prostitutes and the Senator Roark (Powers Boothe) with his mercenary squad led by Manute (Michael Clark Duncan).

Old Town is led by Gail (Rosario Dawson) who is an expert with hand cuffs and rope knots.

All Stars Factor:
Hmmm… well I am not going to talk about all the stars in this movie like Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Rutger Hauer, Jessica Alba, Michael Madsen, Josh Hartnet, Elijah Wood, Benicio Del Toro, Rosario Dawson, Brittany Murphy, Michael Clark Duncan and so on.

This is about the Chuck Taylors that most of the characters wear in this movie. Interestingly, most of the prominent characters in this movie wear Chuck Taylor (Converse). Kevin (Elijah Wood) wears black ones to suit his sinister character, Marv wears the Chuck Taylor (dont know what color it is), Dwight (Clive Owen) does sport red ones. Is that a coincidence? I dont know for sure. Definitely not a product placement a la Bond.

Anyways, what sets this movie apart from rest of the crappola that Hollywood feeds is the passion involved in making the movie. That’s one of the reasons why El Mariachi got such a critical acclaim, so did Desperado.

Desperado didnt have an exciting storyline to back up, no A-list actors or big budget sfx and stuff. But still it managed to raise above the indie circles, the driving factor for such an escalation was the presence of passion. As usual there were naysayers who dismissed Rodriguez as a punk with no artistic drive or something but it took 10 years down the line for him to shut them up forever. And sure did he shut them up!

Those things aside, Sin City is a remarkable movie in terms of execution and style. It gave a new life to movie adaptation of comics, think of bummers like Superman Returns. Where as Batman Begins was a fresh look at the superhero (its directed by one of my favourite directors, Christopher Nolan who had earlier directed the cult classic Memento).

Back to Sin City again, there are no good guys here, there are only not-so-bad guys and ultra-nasty bad guys. Bruce Willis plays his nth role as a hard-as-nails ruthless cop (not so hard but aging), but Mickey Rourke as Marv steals the show with his prosthetic makeup and also beefed up torso.


He’s lightweight boxing champion if you were not informed by now, he’s also appeared in Rodriguez movie Once Upon a Time in Mexico for which he had shed lot of weight.

The look of Sin City
Robert Rodriguez decided to shoot the entire movie on greenscreen and later the CG backgrounds to be added in the post-production. Most of the cars in the movie are not real. Only a few props were used like the tables in the Kitty’s bar scene and the cage where Hartigan is kept. Incidentally this is one of the entirely HD movies along with Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Casshern and Immortel.

Note: Casshern is a Japanese flick that is more like a live action manga, it is unbelievable how they have captured the entire look and feel of manga animation to live action using some cutting edge technology and it is really a stylish movie. Visuals are vibrant, strong and dazzling.

The foreground plates were then processed for chroma key, converting to BW and then followed the process of matchmoving, CG backgrounds and the works. There’s a special edition DVD of Sin City (double disc) that features the movie completely in green screen background the way it was shot but only it runs 10 times faster.

By the way Kitty’s bar is where all the lead characters of the movie meet (not actually but sort of seen at the same time). If you notice for a second when Marv enters the bar when Nancy Callahan (Jessica Alba) is firing up the dance floor, Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez can be seen sitting by the bar table. Creator of Sin City, Frank Miller also appears in a cameo as the ‘Mercedes owner’ priest who gets bumped off by Marv in the confession stand.

Jessica Alba is the only weak casting in this movie, she cant act and she kind of looks like J Lo in distress, rest of the cast provide brilliant performances especially Nick Stahl with his sicko Roark Jr./That Yellow Bastard role and also Elijah Wood who plays a total anti-thesis of his Lord of the Rings role.

Of course, there’s life after Lord of the Rings, you can also check him out in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, another brilliant movie that most people didnt like much.
That movie is a proper acid test for whether you are a romantic or not. Check that out yourself, not a date movie at all, not even a tear jerker but an intelligent movie in the lines of Before Sunrise and also Before Sunset (directed by Richard Linklater).

Sin City has already reached a cult status both with cine-going audience and the graphic novel readers. Sin City is one of those rare experiences that Hollywood constantly doesnt come up with. If you havent seen this movie by now, you are really missing something.
Sin City is a brilliant movie in terms of visuals, narrative and the various other factors that you will realise once you watch the movie yourself, or you already know if you had already watched it.

There are so many things about this movie that I dont know where to start and end. This post was about my personal opinions and observations regarding this movie, I may not necessarily be right in some places. Do point them out if you find one.

Fresh dope from Sin City camp
Sin City 2 and 3 are slated for release in 2007 and 2008 respectively, the shooting for Sin City 2 has commenced last month if I remember correctly, Marv and Nancy are returing from the first part for a different story along with a few characters of Sin City, there’ll be a brand new cast to look out for. As you can recall, the prologue of the movie stars Josh Hartnet and that section is supposedly one of the stories of Sin City 2.

Was Sin City a blockbuster?
Are you nuts? Majority of this world population is morons and halfwits, only a few set of people will really love and enjoy Sin City and the rest watch stylized mediocre action flicks with a superhero wearing an undie over his cape. If you were one of them, you wouldnt be reading this post already.

Support good movies and listen to good music. Trash average stuff, media is trying to endorse mediocrity. It is where an entire generation is fed crap with stuff like Sex and the City, i feel sorry for morons who wait up till late night to watch such mindless stuff.

But well, may be that’s just me…

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