We Wish You A Mirror Christmas [Review: Black Mirror]

Two men sit in an isolated cabin exchanging stories about their past. Their past is our future, a post-Google Glass world where mobile technology is implanted directly into the optic nerve so, for example, it becomes possible to "block" other people, preventing communication in real life as well as online. Black Mirror is back for this one-off Christmas spec-fi drama.

For the unitiated, Channel 4's Black Mirror is a series of speculative fiction TV dramas created by Charlie Brooker, a twenty-first century Twilight Zone with stand-alone dramas inspired by the rise of digital media tech. Brooker has always been the ultimate hatchet-wielding reviewer - for this episode, satirical targets include friend-blocking, online pick-up gurus, and personal assistants such as Siri or Cortana.

As with previous mini-series, the acting in this episode is super: great performances particularly from a creepy Jon Hamm. The combination of the three subplots is OK but personally I think the ideas would have been better suited for three full episodes.

However all the sci-fi concepts and subplots are a diversionary tactic. Brooker has used this episode to declare war on one primary target, and by the end of the episode you will hate it as much as he does. It is of course the soundtrack - Wizzard's "I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day."

Work In Progress: Ravenclaw

A more detailed bird model for a close-up

Five Miles From Woodstock

Five Miles From Woodstock performing at Howl At The Moon in 2010, filmed in glorious Standard Definition:

Five Miles From Woodstock are playing the Horse and Stables London on 6th December - find out more on their Facebook page.

Mortals! You Defy The Gods! [Review: Interstellar]

Heroic archetype Cooper (Matthew McConnaughey) leaves behind his family and pilots a ring-shaped starship through a wormhole created by mysterious, godlike entities. His voyage takes him across an unfamiliar galaxy, accompanied by a crew who spend most of their time in stasis and a robot with a disturbed sense of humour. Yes! As you have probably guessed, Chris Nolan's new film Interstellar is pretty much a re-make of Ulysses 31.

Interstellar is space opera with a 21st century feel. The first act takes place on a bleak, near-future Earth where the farming ecosystem is slowly failing. The interstellar mission of the middle act is never a voyage to seek out new life and new civilizations but a desperate last chance to avert the death of humanity, and the story remains personal at all times, helped by some soul-wracking performances by McConnaughey and Anne Hathaway.

There are one or two silly scenes - the father-promises-daughter-he-will-return-home subplot (although it's there for a good reason), and the scenes where the Endurance crew brainstorm complex maneuvers and solve physics problems too quickly - it might be totally justified but it sounds like plot-hole technobabble.

On the other hand this is a compelling vision of the future, with so many elements that do make sense, including the technology. No Ulysses 31 remake would be complete without NoNo, but TARS and CASE are worthy additions to the canon of science-fiction robot companions, with their original physical design and programmable levels of honesty, sensitivity and humour. As you would expect from yet another Chris Nolan / Lee Smith collaboration, the cinematography, effects and editing are superb.

Now We Are Six

David Novan, Joshua Westbury, Brandon Butterworth and Molly Brown. Photograph by Michael To

The Sci-Fi Gene blog has made it to exactly six years today, and I have been making short films for almost six years. Saturday's screening of Last Zombie Standing at Croydon International Film Festival was a chance to reflect. This is one of my favourite projects from the last six years and I'm proud of what we achieved in that 48 hour period.

Croydon was also a chance to look forward and be inspired: the films on show were diverse but all packed with originality. The prizes were all well deserved - you can find out more about them on the festival website www.croydoniff.com Hard to pick favourites but I particularly enjoyed the winning animation Mend and Make Do by Bexi Bush, Katie Garrett's experimental film combining poetry and dance, and The Cleaners, a mockumentary about the hard-working staff responsible for keeping the ocean floor tidy.

Meanwhile the story goes on - work continues on Reply To All and on the Broken Bird music video. I'm considering projects for next year, possibly including a 3D film, and I enjoyed connecting with filmmakers and film enthusiasts at Croydon - who knows where those connections will lead?

Last Zombie Standing [posters]

I'm looking forward to being part of Croydon International Film Festival on the 25th October. You can now check out the full programme and find out more about this event on the extremely friendly festival website. Meanwhile here are two alternative Last Zombie Standing movie posters for your enjoyment.

Stonely's Pet Dinosaur Book Trailer

Book trailer made for the launch of Stonely's Pet Dinosaur, a new rhyming picture book written by Naomi Burman-Shine and illustrated by Callum Graham. This was a lot of fun to make. The book is available now from the Stonely's Pet Dinosaur website here, or via Amazon here - so if you know any kids that like dinosaurs (rare I know) then check it out.

"Last Zombie Standing" Screening: Croydon International Film Festival

Zombie rights minidoc "Last Zombie Standing," originally shot in Croydon back in 2009, returns to the scene of the crime for the 2014 Croydon International Film Festival on 25th October.

Work In Progress: Try Sleeping With A Broken Heart

Adjusting the mesh, adding auricles, coronary vessels and other details

Combining some procedural textures

Inner glow...

[produced in Blender 2.68]

Work in progress: Heart of the Matter

Modelling a heart in Blender, for use in the Broken Bird video

Basic heart mesh

Adding the major vessels. More detailed work to follow...

Google's Asimov-Compliant Cars

BBC News Technology reports here on an interesting feature of Google's self-driving cars: they are programmed to break the speed limit in certain circumstances. If surrounding cars are speeding, the Google car may deduce that driving below the limit would be unsafe and so accelerate by up to 10mph to match the other cars.

This is an example of an autonomous robot following Asimov's First and Second Laws of Robotics: obeying the laws given to it by human beings, except where such orders would allow human beings to come to harm.

There's nothing in the article about the Third Law though. Would an unoccupied Google car choose to drive itself off the road if it was the only way to avoid a collision? And what would the same car do if it were carrying passengers, or if there were also a risk of hitting pedestrians? I wonder if we are really ready for an autonomous robot that can calculate the lesser of two evils.

The Three Laws appear throughout Asimov's many Robot novels and short stories - they're a clever framework for exploring and writing about human moral and ethical dilemmas. In the short story "Evidence" robot psychologist Susan Calvin (one of science fiction's greatest characters) spells out the links to human morality. Interesting that we are now building robots that are so complex that there is a need to consider robot ethics.

Brain The Size Of A Planet [Review: Lucy]

According to modern science I use 100% of my brain, although not necessarily all at the same time. According to Hollywood - yet again - we all use only 10% of our brains, and unlocking the full 100% could give us godlike powers. I worked hard to deconstruct this myth in my award-winning* short film "We Can Get You Some Really Cheap Gear" so I am a little disappointed that the rest of you haven't moved on. What do you all have for brains? Pudding?

In Luc Besson's new film Scarlett Johansson plays Lucy, a tourist who is kidnapped by drug traffickers and receives an unintended dose of an experimental product that has been surgically implanted in her abdomen. As the drug boosts Lucy's intelligence and strength she manages to escape her Triad captors, but as her telekinetic powers grow she realises she only has a limited lifespan, and she must find a way to stay alive - and stay human - long enough to do something meaningful.

However, about a third of the way through Lucy, I realised that unlike Limitless, it isn't really about brainpower at all. Once this becomes clear it's possible to sit back and enjoy a pleasantly surreal experience. The brainpower story is just background styling for a plot that's about achieving potential in a much more general sense. Besson loves his technobabble - and what's not to love, especially when delivered by university lecturer Morgan Freeman.



*Kino London Film Of The Week (April 15th 2012) an award which, as far as I am aware, Luc Besson has yet to receive.

Work in progress: Broken Bird

Modelling a stylised dove for Broken Bird.

 Trying out some basic materials. Still working on the mesh.

Rigging wings for flight.

Modelled in Blender 2.68

Broken Bird music video shoot day 2

Over two days we shot visuals for "Broken Bird" and "Nocturnal." The challenge for this project will be to bring out the strong characters and personalities, fantastic or mythical elements of Ariel's songs. 

For "Nocturnal" we were able to shoot in gorgeous forest and garden locations.

Preparing for an action sequence in the forest.

Meanwhile work continues on the animated elements for "Broken Bird."

You can find out more about Ariel Undine and listen to her music on her website here.

Broken Bird music video shoot day 1

Project: two back-to-back music videos for songs by Ariel Undine. This project has been in top secret planning for over a year so it feels good to finally get it into production.

Mobile music video studio mark 1

Mobile music video studio mark 2

Ariel in action. Weather and conditions were perfect and the sheep at the other end of the field behaved themselves (probably star struck...)

Not everything went to plan: what's the difference between an improvised blue screen and a kite? Turns out, no difference at all.

One does not simply walk into Somerset.

You can listen to Ariel Undine's music on her website here:

http://arielundine.com

Kinetic Typography Double Bill

Two inspiring masterpieces of kinetic typography:
"From Paper To Screen" a short film by Thibault de Fournas about typography and the evolution of the cinema title sequence.

"Shop Vac" a lyric video for a song by Jonathan Coulton, animated by Jarrett Heather.

You can watch my lyric video for John Anealio's song "Steampunk Girl" here.

Where The Underworld Can Meet The Elite [Review: Mostly Harmless]

Angel Rose: pilot, interstellar trader and disappointment to her parents. Desperate to pay her debts, escape her mother's somewhat unhelpful matchmaking efforts, and get away from her drab home planet of Slough, she agrees to ship a cargo of gold across a pirate-infested region of space. It's fair to say her mission doesn't entirely go to plan and Angel is about to learn some important lessons about survival, join the quest for an ancient alien artefact, and make some new friends - not necessarily friends that would meet her parents' approval.

Mostly Harmless is a novel set in the Elite universe, written by Kate Russell. Although the author is an accomplished technology journalist and writer, this is her first novel but it's confidently written, packed with interesting characters, and really brings out the danger and paranoia of the Elite setting, while throwing in plenty of humour - as the title might suggest, there's a hint of Douglas Adams in the writing style. Also, as another reviewer pointed out there are three strong women in pivotal roles - is there a Bechdel test for novels?

This novel was supported by a Kickstarter campaign and was part of the meta-funding campaign for the Elite: Dangerous game which has just been released as a beta. Kate's campaign rewards included the opportunity to name a character in the novel who would be guaranteed a gory, painful death. Let's just say the book delivers on this front too.

The end result is an enjoyable and satisfying space opera - and perhaps a promising start to a fiction-writing career.

Steampunk Girl (John Anealio) - Lyric Video

Download This Song For Free: www.johnanealio.com

"Steampunk Girl"
from Laser Zombie Robot Love by John Anealio
(C) John Anealio 2012

Features the Steampunk Girl artwork by Len Peralta

Animation (C) Joshua Westbury 2014
With thanks to the Blender Foundation

"Steampunk Girl" Screening: Kino London

The premiere screening of "Steampunk Girl" will be at Kino London, at Electrowerkz in Angel, on 7th July 2014. Doors are at 7.30. You can find out more about this "open mic film night" on the Kino London website.

Steampunk Girl is a song by John Anealio: discover more of John's music here.

When Words Collide [Work in progress: Steampunk Girl]

Putting the final touches to the Steampunk Girl video now: one major scene still to render, which will take approximately 20 hours to create 40 seconds of film. There's still time for things to go wrong, but provided there aren't too many crashes the film will be ready for a premiere screening at Kino London on Monday.

My first foray into kinetic typography has been really satisfying. I'm working in Blender which has advantages and disadvantages. KT lends itself very well to 2D animation and a lot of videos have been made using 2D packages like After Effects or Photoshop. It's not hard to simulate some 3D effects in these programs as well. For me it makes sense to work in a 3D space, not unlike making a physical stop motion animation, I think this matches the way I think. Also Blender is designed for really fast creative work once you are familiar with all the short cuts, and where you actually need 3D effects, or smoke, particles, physics, fluids etc. they are all built in. I also found I could use the compositor to create a look and feel for the animation, for example incorporating fake shadows, motion blur, vignetting etc.

For KT music videos, one issue must come up quite often, irrespective of which animation software you use: what do you do when you hit an instrumental break and there are no words to base your animation around? I came up with a solution, but you - and I - will have to wait until Monday to see if it worked...

Beauty Of The Beast

"Beauty Of The Beast" featuring Darren Charles

Lyrics and music by John and Sue Edward

Video directed by John Edward

 This music video was screened at Kino London in June. My contribution is small - morph effects in one scene. Although I only met Mr. Charles at the screening, I had already become very familiar with the left side of his face in the preceding weeks. I'll write more about morphing in a future post - in the meantime enjoy the song.

Gallery Update [Reply To All]

While post-production continues on comedy short Reply To All, taking on board some very helpful suggestions from our producer's trip to Cannes, you can check out the film's website here - including lots of new photos from the production weekend. It's been a long journey from the Kickstarter campaign to here, and there's still a lot of hard work to come, but based on the most recent cut, I can confirm that thanks to some excellent editing, the final film will be around 10 minutes long, and it will be awesome.

The Joy Of Text [Work in progress: Steampunk Girl]

Over the past few weeks I've been working on a new animation project: a kinetic typography video for Steampunk Girl, a song by musician John Anealio. I'll post more updates as I go. I'm discovering there's something immensely satisfying about animating with words.

You can discover John Anealio's music here.

Mechanical Maps

It seems I am not alone in my wish to pay tribute to the Game of Thrones animated map: there are plenty more tributes and parodies out there on the Internet. Here are a few I particularly liked: Firstly "The Simpsons" take which you may have seen - a match made in heaven.

Huge amount of skill in this extendable castle illusion.


Purdue University staying fairly close to the original Game of Thrones sequence.

I love this! a very professional job with a social media theme for HootSuite.

And amazingly, a blatant rip-off of the Game of Thrones map - in a classic computer game from 1994.

Double Jeopardy Part I [Review: Muppets Most Wanted]

I waited years for a decent adaptation of Dostoyevsky's The Double - then two come along at once! A sincere but naive young man works in a backbreaking and thankless role - managing a cabaret show. Every decision he takes seems to backfire, and just when things can't get any worse a mysterious stranger appears, almost identical to the hero yet effortlessly popular and successful, and worse - nobody else notices the difference.

There are many ways of indicating to the audience that what they are watching is actually psychodrama. Muppets Most Wanted takes an unusual approach. At first glance everything appears normal but if you look closely you may notice that almost all of the characters are portrayed by brightly coloured puppets, clearly to indicate that they are aspects of Kermit's splintered personality.

The cause of the splintering becomes clear: Kermit's longstanding internal conflict over his feelings for Miss Piggy. Now his ego is banished to a metaphorical Siberian prison while his id, in the form of Constantine, runs the show in more ways than one. However a series of subtle cinematic devices serve to indicate that they are two sides of the same frog - the beauty spot that supposedly distinguishes them but can appear or disappear too easily, or the beautifully filmed scene where the two characters see each other through a mirror. Admittedly it's a loose adaptation but I think Dostoyevsky would be proud to think that his work had inspired this intelligent and challenging film.

Milestones [Reply To All]

There are so many little milestones in the making of a film. After another day of work with the Reply To All editor and animator, we've finally got a rough cut that goes from the beginning right to the end. There is still a lot of work to take this rough cut to a polished final version, but for now this is our Golden Spike moment.

We've also replaced the scenes that Premier Pro decided to delete randomly. Everyone's a critic! And even in placeholder stills our family of animated co-stars are looking great.

 I've also completed a couple of other projects: my London Mechanism animation (a whim that became a minor obsession), plus a transformation scene that will appear soon in a promo video. I'll post more about that project soon. So there will be a short breather before our producer returns from Cannes and work continues on Reply To All.

London Mechanism

My animated tribute to a certain fantasy TV series...

Produced in Blender 2.68, scored in MuseScore.

A Tuf Act To Follow [Review: Tuf Voyaging]

Five mercenary treasure hunters are on the trail of a real find - a massive ancient starship packed with bioweaponry and genetic secrets. They need a ride willing to keep his mouth shut, so they turn to the eccentric, cat-loving captain Haviland Tuf.

Tuf Voyaging is a novel, or more accurately, a series of novellas detailing the adventures of Tuf as he styles himself an Ecological Engineer, travelling the galaxy with his newly-acquired seedship and offering its services for a sharply-negotiated price. It's written by some upstart fantasy novelist called George R.R. something who you've probably never heard of.

Tuf is a curious character - a hermit who prefers feline to human company, smarter, greedier and more devious yet also more honest and honourable than most of his fellow humans. His personality contains the genetic seeds of some of George R.R.'s other characters - in my mind he appears as Varys, perhaps due to the intelligence and the curious interweaving of deviousness and honour, but he also has Ned Stark's determination and is capable of breaking one of his beloved cats' necks as a mercy when it becomes infected.

The stories presented here are fun and inventive. They're also well thought out, although somewhat over-moralistic, not unlike much Golden Age sci-fi. The central theme is power and its' many abuses, something that crops up once or twice in Game Of Thrones too.

Work in progress: Viking Mural

The Sci-Fi Gene has been quiet these past few weeks but the beat goes on... work continues on Reply To All and other projects.

Viking mural - a background detail that will shortly appear in an animation...

...and part of the score for the same animation, composed in MuseScore.

"Reply To All" Post Production

Work continues on "Reply To All" - following the live shoot we've had two voiceover recording sessions and I've been working with our editor Oliver Cross on the rough cut. Watch out for more detailed updates on the Caramie Films website and facebook page very soon.

Work In Progress: County Hall

A mechanical County Hall - now just one more landmark to add.

[produced in Blender 2.68]

Work In Progress: Westminster Bridge

Now with added bridge.

[Produced in Blender 2.68]

Work In Progress: Westminster

Not sure where I'm going with this yet, exactly, but have a Game Of Thrones-ified model of Westminster Palace...

[produced in Blender 2.68]

Crowdsourcing Part II: Wake Me Up Before You Go Go

Some more thoughts about crowdsourcing, based on my experience as part of the “Reply To All” campaign team, my first experience of Kickstarter fundraising. This is part II - you can read part I of this article here.

Get All The Money

Fourth lesson: remember that you will not get all the money to spend on your project. Even if successful, a percentage is paid to the crowdsourcing website, and another large bite will be needed to pay for the rewards.

You Are A Filmmaker, Damn It!

Fifth lesson: Use your talents for the campaign. You are a filmmaker, damn it! (unless you are something else) and I’m fairly sure a Kickstarter campaign video is a kind of film. So produce it like a film – write a script, use locations wisely, rehearse, shoot in decent quality with good lighting and sound, and pay attention to editing and post-production. We had lots of lovely feedback about our campaign video in particular.

If you are not a filmmaker but, say, a graphic artist or musician – the same applies, make sure you incorporate your own artwork or music into your campaign, and give it the best production value you can.

Dive Straight In

Final lesson: before you dive straight in, I would recommend studying successful campaigns, particularly for similar projects. Follow or back one or two interesting-looking projects yourself so you get a feel for the process, and watch plenty of videos before making yours. We learnt a lot, particularly about choices of reward, and the importance of keeping the updates flowing, from other short film campaigns.

Thanks to our backers, we’ve already been able to shoot “Reply To All” at a standard that wouldn’t otherwise have been possible, and I can't wait to see the final result once the edit is complete. As director I found that the involvement of backers was a great motivator when we were under pressure, I felt I wanted to  keep going and create something worthy of all the support.

Crowdfunding is definitely an option for funding an artistic project provided you have the stamina and organization. There’s very little to lose and everything to gain. However at time of writing the Kickstarter success rate is about 43% (up to date figure here) so a Plan B is a good idea – despite all the hard work we put into achieving our result I know luck also played a part.

You can find out about “Reply To All” on the Caramie Productions website or Facebook page.

A Game Of Hobbits [Review: The Desolation Of Smaug]

If only The Hobbit had been written by that other fantasy writer with the initials R.R.

Just as with An Unexpected Journey the expansion from short young adult novel to blockbuster trilogy leads to pacing problems, particularly action sequences that continue for much too long, even though beautifully shot and choreographed with plenty of humour – the barrel ride is so good the length is almost forgiveable. It doesn’t help that no-one important is in real peril, we know the main characters will all survive at least until the next film, a criticism that doesn’t tend to get levelled at the work of the other R.R. quite so often.

Another problem for R.R. but not for R.R. is gender balance: I commented on the absence of female roles in An Unexpected Journey and it seems Peter Jackson heard my cries of pain.

A romantic side-plot has been pulled from thin air in order to give an interesting role to Evangeline Lilly as warrior elf Tauriel. This jars with my memories of the novel but I am thankful: there is such a thing as being too faithful to the source.

Even if it drags in places, The Desolation Of Smaug is more enjoyable than An Unexpected Journey. Both films feature outstanding performances from the all-star cast which now includes Evangeline Lilly, Benedict Cumberbatch as a distinctly Sherlock-like dragon, and a bizarre but highly amusing cameo by Stephen Fry.

Incidentally I should stress that I saw The Desolation Of Smaug in 3D/24FPS so I cannot comment on the additional frames included in the HFR version which could well take the film in a whole different direction.

Crowdsourcing Part I: Get Your Kicks On Route 66

Some reflections on raising money through crowdsourcing, following the successful “Reply To All” Kickstarter campaign. I've been asked several times how we did it and I have to say I'm no expert, this is my first campaign, and these are just my thoughts and opinions. You can also find out more about “Reply To All” on the Caramie Productions website and Facebook page and I will continue to post updates on the production here.

Free Money From Strangers

First lesson: Kickstarter is not a way to get free money from strangers. Unless you already have a global brand or are lucky enough to go viral, you will be raising money by approaching people and asking them to give you stuff, just like any other form of fundraising: mostly this will be friends, family and colleagues and you will need to campaign hard through all your online or offline social networks.

And by hard I mean hard. I thought I was working hard until I saw the dedication some of my team-mates were putting in. Being part of a team will work in your favour – you will have more social contacts, and you will be able to push each other to succeed. We finished with 103 backers most of whom are known to at least one team member.

Watch The Money Roll In

Second lesson: you can’t just post your video then sit back and watch the money roll in. The aim is to engage with your backers and keep them up to date with your progress. We posted updates (text, written, photo or video) every few days. The campaign was planned in advance although we also updated on some events, such as the casting process, as they happened.

Hundreds Or Thousands Of Pounds

Third lesson: most backers will not sign up for rewards costing hundreds or thousands of pounds. Our high end rewards such as signed art materials, VIP screening tickets, being included in the film as an animation, and producer credits were of interest to a few backers - it's certainly worth offering these premium rewards, but it’s probably best to assume you will do most of your fundraising through lower level rewards. Most backers do want some level of access to your finished project, in our case digital download or DVD, and we had good take-up on coffee mugs. Everyone seems to like coffee mugs.

To be continued…

Work in progress: Fearful Symmetree

Two background frames from the background for an animated sequence. Trees were generated using the Sapling add-on, bark is a combination of several procedural textures. Produced in Blender 2.68

Reply To All Production Weekend - Update 3

Job done! (for now...) We wrapped the Reply To All shoot on Sunday evening after two full-on days in a hotel suite in Richmond. The biggest challenges were the time pressure - we had a lot of material to get through and it was a constant battle to get everything done while there was still enough daylight, and the continuity issues: our heroine Becki accumulates damage of sorts throughout the film so her appearance had to be right for each scene.

Actress Tracey Pickup prepares for a tricky POV shot

High points of the weekend were several difficult shots we managed to pull off, some in the original plan, others improvised on the day. A low point was on day two where, running out of time to complete the shot list I found myself demanding that Nick, the scriptwriter, come up with a shorter re-write of one scene on the fly. He came through - we completed the shoot and the rest will soon be cinematic history. Having the writer stay on as an integral member of the production crew is worthwhile even if it's not the Hollywood way...

DOP Oliver Cross sets up for a dolly shot. The Indie Dolly system seen here is far superior to my own homemade version (description here and here, tracking demo here). 

I'll post more thoughts and pictures from this shoot soon, and watch for more news on the Caramie website too. Meanwhile production continues - the next step is the voice-over recording session, then animation and editing will be taking place over the next few weeks and months. Thanks again to all the backers who made this production possible.

Reply To All Production Weekend - Update 2

On my way home from first day of shooting. It's been a challenge, we've achieved a lot today and I'm particularly happy with some of the shots we've had to improvise. However there's still a lot to do and we will have to pick up the pace on day 2 if we're going to complete the shot list. I'm exhausted right now but will post more tomorrow.

Reply To All Production Weekend - Update 1

With thanks to all our lovely Kickstarter backers, Reply To All goes into full production this weekend - our hotel-room shoot starts early tomorrow morning. We're as ready as we can be - we held a productive rehearsal earlier this week, and since then I've been busy finalising the shot list. Really looking forward to directing with an extremely talented cast and crew. I'll post more updates as we go. In the meantime there's more about this film, and others in the pipeline, over at the Caramie Productions website.