Reel + School of the Future

[Devin Doyle]

Hello everyone, it's been a while since I've posted. It feels good to be back though. Here's two little bits of media that I'd appreciate if you had a look at, please let me know what you think about them/what could be improved.

> http://www.par-t-com.net/dd/qt.htm > my reel, this has actually been completed for several months, had to compile something to accompany my resume for internships.

> http://www.par-t-com.net/sotf.mov > "School of the Future (as told from 1953)" This is a litte project we came up with and shot in 2 hours for a contest. The premise was that it had to be 2 minutes max about your school in some way. While it only took 2 hours to shoot, it took countless more to matte out our actor (John) to apply that effect, good times!

Thanks for checking out the latest, all feedback is greatly appreciated!

[Robert Knecht Schmidt]

School of the Future--authentic feel, clever touches. Nice job.

With both clips, you've seemed to have made the common mistake of not bumping up the gamma for web distribution, so the clips will appear too dark unless the end user has his monitor brightness turned up to maximum. Try setting the gamma to 1.7 or 2.2 prior to encoding, and you'll guarantee that web viewers will be able to see all the detail in the shadows in your work.

[Devin Doyle]

Thanks for the web authoring tip Robert. I'm re-rendering copies of both right now!

[Gustavo Godinho]

Hey, AMAZING JOB!

I´ve got 2 questions:

First clip: How did you do that "moving stills" effect in the beggining of the clip.

Second clip: How did you perfectly isolate the "guy from the past" to apply the effect?

[Devin Doyle]

Hey Gustavo, thanks for the kind comments! In my reel my old room mate took a number of stills of our actors and I cut them all together in AE. Since they're all really high rez digi pics there's no problem sliding them around and increasing their size in the 720x480 frame w/o losing quality.

As for "School of the Future" I layed down 2 layers of the same footage in AE and applied Tinderbox's old film effect to the top layer. Then I did a really loose matte (if i had more time I would have done a tighter job) with a 30 pixel feather and subtracted the background, leaving the perfect DVX-100 footage around our "scientician." It took about 2 whole days of matting to get it all right, and if you saw the full rez version on an NTSC monitor it wouldn't look as hot, I was pressed for time. Anyway, I'm glad you enjoy it!

[Gustavo Godinho]

Devin, thank you for the information. A curious thing about that "moving still" effect I told you: it looks a little to some parts of "Like a Rolling Stone" clip, the Rolling Stones version, directed by Michel Gondry.

[Jim Lafferty]

Devin,

That's some great stuff you've got going on.

edit: just started reading the production details on your site.

Thanks for sharing,

- jim

p.s. ever seen The State?

[Trevor Trombley]

Nice work Devin

Btw have you been able to incorporate your Depth of Field adapter into any of your shoots?

The school of the future was really well made, I liked the 50's look on the actor while he was composited into the 2004 footage. Reminded me of the effect used in The ring when Samara comes out of the TV.

Good luck with future projects.

Trevor T

[Devin Doyle]

Jim, thanks for the encouragement! I have to shamelessly plug the latest film we just wrapped principal photography on: "Greasy Lake." The trailer can be found here:

> http://greasylake.par-t-com.net/greasy_trailer.mov

The compression is a bit harsh, and you may need to up the brightness on your monitor to catch the lowlight detail. Feedback is welcome!

Trevor, I haven't been able to do anything recently with the mini-50 since I've been working on "Greasy Lake." However, in my short "She Sits so Close" I used it on a number of shots. It can be found at:

> http://www.par-t-com.net/200c_feature.html

In the coming weeks I plan on shooting a test or short narrative using it. Seeing "Eternal Sunshine" for the second time motivated me to get out there and use some long lenses to get shallow DoF. I'll def. post that test up here as soon as its done. Thanks for your interest!

[Mikel Low]

Devin -

Beautiful work ... very clever and skillful edits. You are one talented individual and I look forward to seeing more of your work. I am hoping that in the near future when I am able to purchase the proper editting tools for my personal projects that I will be able to do the same. Thanks for sharing your art.

[Devin Doyle]

Mikel, thanks for the kind words. I think with a DVX-100P you're on the right track to shooting some great stuff. I love the DVX and have been lucky enough to borrow my buddy's for a lot of projects. Good luck with the site, looking forward to seeing what you put on it!