This is a piece I executive produced (along with Lt. Col. Bob Grass and Shanon Glezen) for the Marine Corps Mobilization Command (MOBCOM). The goal of the piece is to help further educate Marines, Sailors, and their families about the Return and Reunion process associated with being an involuntary recalled reservist.
Jacob, Dominic, and Ciani from Whirlwind Action came by the studio to discus an upcoming project. Bill had the RED ONE set up on the stage, so of course we had to see some moves in 120 frames per second!
A few caveats about this footage: we just turned on whatever lights happened to be set up, so the image is under lit (the RED was set to 1000 ISO), and if anyone ever sent me video like this and asked me to key it, I would beat them over the head with a KinoFlo.
Bill Heffley picked up one of the HVX200s again to experiment with some in-camera painting and focus. The music is from the NiN Ghost album and the talent is stage manager Michael Callahan.
This summer Groovy Like a Movie worked with a group of students from San Diego’s Monarch School. This is one of the two short films produced, shot and edited by the students. Starring Joy Hillrigel and Josh McRae.
This summer Groovy Like a Movie worked with a group of students from San Diego’s Monarch School. This is one of the two short films produced, shot and edited by the students. Starring Joy Hillrigel and Josh McRae.
One of the advantages of video is it’s ability to help explain extremely complex concepts. Below is a movie from Semiconductor Films, which shows us visually how magnetic fields interact with the world around them. Had you just listened to the physicists describe the interactions, you’d be completely lost (unless you were a physicist yourself), but having the visuals makes it much more clear.
As an added bonus, the filmmakers incorporated actual VLF audio recordings as sound design elements. This sound design drives the visuals and ultimately creates a stunning, hyper-real mini-documentary.
And if you’re expecting a post about Will Smith saving the galaxy, stop here.
However, the following is an amazing animation by Chris Koelle based entirely on the memoirs of Army Specialist Colby Buzzell from his time in the Middle East.
It may be the most intense and “real,” 4 minutes and 30 seconds of your day.
“Men In Black”
What I dig most about this is how well it blends the two worlds of the graphic novel and filmmaking. I mean, flipping through a well done comic book is pretty much like looking at storyboards…but what Koelle found was the “subtext” in each image; what needs to be in focus, what do we “dolly” in, how would the camera move in this shot if bullets suddenly start flying around in the frame, and how does that effect the narrative?
But I also appreciate the poignancy of the work…it’s not this baroque, Michael Bay action flick shot on a soundstage in 35mm. Such a strategy would romanticize these experiences—which I think in some sections the artist resorted to strategies used in these kinds of films (at one point he even uses the patented Michael Bay “time-remapped camera pan as the world explodes around you”).
While the “comic book” aesthetic has worked before for other wartime / apocalyptic stories, being based on actual memoirs makes the visuals feel less like a comic book and more like something Specialist Buzzell could’ve sketched beside his journal, that suddenly sprung to life and began careening out of control in cadence with the war around him.