I got the idea for 'eggs' from a short story I read years ago, from a book called Oriental Tales of Terror, one of those super-cheap anthologies that I think I picked up from a car-boot sale or a junk shop. I haven't read it in years, although I think the book is kicking around somewhere in my still unpacked moving boxes. All I really remember is the faceless thing, and how much it freaked me out.
I did some googling the other day, and rediscovered some of the folkloric stories of the Faceless Ghost. The original story of the faceless ghost (Noppera-Bo) is spookily similar to the one I've just written, and I don't mind that, as I think that as it's a retelling of an old story, it fixes it in a tradition of storytelling and film-making (reading it back, it's very J-Horror), and because of that it informs the way I'll approach making, telling and designing the film. I just got The Ghost of Mae Nak on DVD, a retelling of a classic Thai ghost tale. I like these kind of Horrors, I think there's something that sticks in your mind about them, as they feel ancient, heartbreaking and invite lots of psychological ideas about memory. They are often kind of romantic in a way, too, and I think that adds to the appeal. I prefer that kind of horror in many ways to slashers or maniac chainsaw killers, they stay with me longer, and they also scare me more.
I'm thinking that I may go for live action for eggs, rather than animation. The more I visualise it, I'm thinking of places I know - the beach, caravan and cafe in the film are all, in my head, based on very specific locations, and I think that maybe it makes more sense to use those locations, although as there is quite a bit of destruction in the story, I'm not sure how I'd pull it off on my 0p budget. Maybe I should just do it and worry about the arson conviction later.
I've spent most of today writing an outline for a new horror cartoon called 'eggs'. A while ago, me, Steve, Chris and John started to talk about making a portmanteau horror, basically an excuse for us to make some shorts together, and find a way to package them as a whole.
I've had an idea for some time about a little horror film called 'eggs', so when I came downstairs this morning to discover that all but one of the eggs I had had burst in the carton, I knew that if I didn't write the outline today, I would surely die, or at least become possessed by some unspeakable horror. I just wished that it had been a nicer omen, because I really wanted eggs for breakfast, but that's how horror works, it's no respecter of dietary regimes. Unless it's brains.
I'm a bit worried about the idea of a horror cartoon. In live action, despite the effects involved, we can sympathise with the characters that are being 'horrored', because they're like us, and they live in a real world, so the anomaly that visits them is out of the ordinary, and therefore scary (even in a made up place, like a spaceship, we understand the physicality of the world. In a made up environment in a cartoon, everything is an 'effect', so perhaps we don't feel as creeped out as we would if we watched a real person being scared... I don't know, and as I'm writing this, I'm going 'ah but what about thingy'. A few weeks ago, I saw the Pearce Sisters by Luis Cook, which has just won an award at the British Animation Awards and a BAFTA. I think it works as horror, it's grim and beautifully made, have a look...
I just ordered my new computer this week, so I can work on these new films at home. I'm well excited, and can't wait to get started on them. As i was writing the eggs outline, I kept thinking 'How the hell am I going to make that work?'. I've got a feeling that that thought will be bouncing around my head for a good few months...
Whilst feeling vaguely apocalyptic following last nights earthquake, I embraced my insomnia and decided to check out a link on the SL education mailing list. It linked to this incredible video, a virtual reality head tracker made with a Wii Remote. I love the world of Wii, and there's lots of discussions about how it might be used/hacked to create or augment with virtual spaces/games environments.
Just before Xmas, I made a nativity film for Broadway Media Centre in Nottingham. I've been making little Xmas projects for them for a few years now, it's like a self imposed commissioning project, and sometimes I fear that I'll turn into some kind of weird Xmas guy who celebrates Xmas every day for no reward apart from some kind of 'and finally' segment on the local news.
I really wanted to make a straightforward nativity, like an infant school one, but with cute Playmobil style characters. I really wanted to make it as un-dark as possible - I think it's easy to get on the case of Xmas, and be cynical about how it's all just commercial, and start going on about how we all forget the true meaning of Xmas (I'm not even sure there is a true meaning), but I do feel it's a magical time, regardless of whether I celebrate it in a secular way or not. I think the nativity and the Christian message is just a part of it. While I was making it, I got in contact with Gaia and Luna, two kids from Italy who make music with their dad. We'd used a track of theirs for our student showreel at work, and I wanted to put it on the net, so I wrote to them to ask if we could, and having watched the showreel, they asked if we'd be interested in working on something for their upcoming Xmas single. I suggesed the nativity and sent them some screenshots, and they agreed, which was brilliant, as it gave me something to cut to, and the film a life beyond the single venue it was made for. I think it also helped me to fix the tone of the film, in that it was a hope filled child's pop song which perfectly suited the feel of the film. You can have a look if you like;
A few years ago I got a Playmobil nativity set, and used it in a stop motion workshop at Uni, and since then, the idea of creating the piece has picked away at the back of my mind. I've also been learning Maya, and thought this film would be a good way to try to bring some of those things together. The title 'Vertep' is a Russian/Ukranian word which means a puppet theatre which depicts the nativity.
At the time, I had started making another film with Andy at work, but had to shelve it while I made this one. We've started again on it, and I'm kind of glad it got put back because I learned a hell of a lot on the Vertep project, and I think this new film will be all the better for it. We've spent a lot of time discussing the look of the sets and interiors in the film, and becoming fixated on nasty bus-stops, mini busses and the hallways of dingy multi-occupancy flats, bringing back grim memories of student flats and the piss-stinking bus shelters and soul sucking urban design of 80s/90's Coventry and Preston. Happy days!
Here's some pics of work in progress;
Last term, I taught on a Virtual Performance module with MA English and Drama, and as well as focussing on softwares like Maya, Motion Capture and Motion Builder, I spent quite a lot of time with them in Second Life. I hadn't been into SL for some time, but was keen to work with them in there, as I think it speaks inherently to performance in terms of liveness and presence, and I was keen to look at ideas around actors/performers as avatar, the first/third person performer, and to play around with the idea of site specific online performance, and the idea (to mis-quote Sue Thomas) that 'fiction is rendered impotent in a space which is essentially made up anyway'. It was a successful term I think, leading to a potential new collaboration between School of Art and Design, English and Drama and Engineering which will enable us to buy an island and develop longer projects in there.
In looking around, I've been excited to see the growth in education-based projects in-world, and I'm excited by the increasing links between SL and Web 2.0 technologies. I'm keen that once we buy the island, the students who use the space will document their adventures in world, and perhaps begin to develop new creative projects which link together the web, Second Life and 'real life'...
