Music

This is the temp track I have so far. It was done by a Graduate student in the school of music at USC. It has elements which I like but still need to go through some revision. Mainly in the areas of pacing and instruments used.





note: due to the weird way in which blogger works, I have had to convert the audio file into a video for it to upload correctly, so don't worry if nothing appears on the video screen when you click play, its not supposed to show anything, but you should hear something..

The coming of the storm

Now comes the part of the film where things will take a turn toward the surreal. After setting things up with a more or less normal intro and 1st scene, we will soon get into the meat of the film and start exploring really different directions.

Here I present what comes right after what you just saw; the camera comes up and voila! a new cloudscape appears. Things seem normal at first but as you soon shall see, they are anything but.
This is not the final version by any means, and in fact I am working on a new one as we speak, but its enough to give you an idea about whats going on.

In addition there are some specific things which are still unresolved. Namely background and music. As far as music there is already a temp track which I will post soon and more stuff is in the works. As far as background for this scene.. its a more difficult question, but I will do a couple of tests and post whatever looks promising.

Scene test

Hey guys, this is an excerpt from the first scene you're all familiar with by now, but with new camera moves. Please let me know what you think, especially in terms of the camera, and try to ignore the other glitches like the sun and earth that still need work.
As always, brutal honesty is encouraged, expected and well received.

seeing as the rez here sucks, ill try posting a full rez version somewhere else later.

Techniques

I will talk a little about the techniques involved in making this film. This is a 3D computer animation film, using the computer to create realistic, or surrealistic, images which pull the viewer into the environment and suspend disbelief at the same time (read: not cheap).
All of the clouds and most of the environments are created using fluid effects within Maya and some other techniques which will be discussed later. This is a very time consuming process because, as everybody knows (or should know), fluid effects are very slow. And moreover, they are difficult to predict. This equals long hours at the computer with not much to show for it. However they are very powerful and when they do work they provide with very realistic results.
In the beginning of the film I am using mostly non-dynamic effects (read: fast), at a later date I will begin using dynamic effects, at which point it is difficult to know what will happen.
Below is a screen shot of what a scene looks like inside Maya, then how it looks rendered and finally composited with all its sister layers.

About the film

Halcyon is an abstract animated film in the visual music style. Although it takes inspiration from the likes of Oskar Fischinger, the Whitney brothers, Len Lyle and all the great abstract masters of the 20th century, it also tries to go off in new directions.

My purpose for this film is to create something of beauty, to shock the viewer, to present things that have not been seen before, to view things that have been seen before in a new light and to take the viewer on a journey he wont soon forget.

As far as the actual meat of the film, it can be simply described as 'flying through clouds', but I hope in the end it will become much, much more.