Initial Ideas / Notes :
Initial idea one is the story of two people making a journey to each other throughout Glasgow, with footage of both journeys overlapping or intertwining.
Idea two is normal footage of people around Glasgow walking around but different sizes, colours, speeds. The normal sights of Glasgow made weird and wonderful.
Idea Three is playing with the idea of different aspect ratios within one video/screen. One story told from behind multiple different screens.
Conscious of Time :
As the project is only two weeks, and it’s already Wednesday, I want to nail down the concept as quickly as possible so that I have plenty of time to get the footage I’m happy with and then have time to make sure the video has polish to it.
Effects with a good level of polish obviously add to their credibility and believability. And when doing something odd based on the real world, a certain degree of believability is vital.
Normal made magical :
I’ve decided to go with the change in size idea for my project as it can be the most effective. It is a pretty simple idea, but I think if done well, it can be the most effective of the ideas I had.
With personal evaluation, the changing size idea excites me the most about the project, and I think that’s an important consideration.
Inspiration :
The BBC Sounds trailer, shown at the project launch, shows how effects can be used to make the real world more amazing and magical. I really like that aspect of it—subverting expectations or the natural world while still telling a story or message.
The music video for ‘Why’s this dealer?’ by Niko B also shows this aesthetic of weird or magical things happening in the real world, again with a story or narrative that would only be as clear with the effects.
Again, I am looking at music videos that have used special effects to create something magical out of the routine mundane.
Rómulo Celdrán
Looking at the work of Rómulo Celdrán, who makes replicas of everyday objects he interacts with and blows them up. When these everyday objects get to this size, they almost take on a sculptural nature even though they are nearly exact replicas of ordinary objects.
Proof of Concept :
Above are two quick mock-ups of the concept for the video. I’m just testing out the visuals of how ordinary everyday people and vehicles will look moving around Glasgow.
From my iPhone :
Even as I mindlessly scroll through my phone, the algorithm helps me return to work on this project between the reposted TikToks and the Family Guy clips.
Even in this clip, I can see the joy and wonder these oversized items bring to this creator. I’m sure other attendees at the con share this excitement.
Points to focus on :
After the proof of concept tests there is a number of things that I’ve noticed :
The size might need to be smaller to create a meaningful space for the larger object to work within. If they are too big, they’ll be in and out of frame in a second, so if they are smaller, the viewer will have more of a chance to see them and enjoy the juxtaposition of small to big.
Does there have to be a narrative of the minute video? If so, what is the narrative of that video? An insert character for the audience to relate to that is the only person in Glasgow noticing all the weird stuff happening along with them?
Planning shots :
If I plan to shoot correctly, I can complete all the shooting in one day and then use the rest of the time to work on my After Effects skills and make the footage believable.
To Do List :
Select 3 different elements from 3 different sources and combine to make a new composite, i.e. a background, a moving object (realistic or 3d model) and a human element.
- background of Glasgow
- moving objects (realistic) being the people and vehicles of Glasgow
- the human element of the people of Glasgow shown in the video
1 minute long duration minimum. For the duration of 1 minute, I can break it up into 2 ways :
- I can have 3 scenes of the city and a different element is changed in each scene which gives me 20 seconds each scene
- Or I have have 4 different locations from around of Glasgow that will break it down to 15 seconds per scene.
Allowing a couple of seconds at the start and end of the video for a fade in and fade out with a title.
What do I need to shoot ? :
- 4 or 5 scenes of Glasgows Cityscapes that show clear movement and busy life 30 seconds to allow for editing.
- 4 or 5 upclose scenes of people, vehicles or animals that can be blown up to scale with a clear left to right movement ( or diagonal left to diagonal right).
- Possibly 1 or 2 etablishing shots of identifiable Glasgow scenes or Landmarks for title and end.
All HQ to survive the upscaling or down scaling, all on the same day, around the same time as to keep lighting similiar.
Future Ideas :
I think these ideas are good but maybe a bit late in the game for this project.
Idea : fistfull of dollers/ block blur effect/tarentino esque copy of wester effects, snap zooms close up and hard line blurs.
Instead of the standard close up used in cinema or the focus blur with a soft feathering on the edges, I want to do a hard seperation between clear and blury.
Idea : Tekken 3 fighters in the real world.
Idea : james bond title sequence effect
Idea : mirroring image of city and nature double exposure together on the one footage. but both camera movements are the same essentially tying them both together.
Having an element of the city blocked out with mirrored footage of nature but mirrored camera movement so that as if they are occupying the same space but just at different times.
To Remember :
note : adjustment layer over all footage at the end to tie it together
At the end of production when all the effects are finished and the footage is as close as possibke in it raw output, tie it together visually with a adjustment layer over the finished product
note : jigsaw effect to immitate a lower qualioty image that then ties the two levels of the footage together. (mosaic mask)
If the footage is two different qualities and the difference is obvious, tie the footage together by using the jigsaw effect on the lower quality footage immitating a low res look.
note : consider the movement of the footage and how that effects the footage
When recording footage, imagine how that footage will be used or how the effects applied to it might follow a direction, or may benefit from a direction.
Trying to Plan :
If I have a plan of what I need to shoot then I won’t just be wondering around aimlessly and the footage will all be pretty similiar in lighting and conditions… weather permitting.
I have an idea of what I was wanting to shoot on that day but the weather didnt hold up for too long, the busy streets got considerably less busy when the rain started. Its almost as if people dont want to be out in the rain.
In all honesty the plan went quickly out the window for some reason but with that I decided that I would keep an eye out for shots that would have the framing I was looking for or the enviroment I was thinking.
Out Filming :
Camera in hand, tripod under the arm, jack white album on in my ears, I set out in Glasgow to get the footage I needed; I had some of it planned, but I thought it would be better if I just tried and discover shots when I’m out and about.
When I was out I got some shots I wouldnt have thought of but also discovered that with the time contraints and equipment I have, the upclose shots I was wanting to get will either need to be done with my phone or I change my idea slightly.
After thinking that getting the footage I want wont be possible I started to consider other methods and other footage I could use to in its place and with listening to the Jack White album ‘No Name’ on it was making me think primal or of animals , so then the image of these normal city with the image of animals or fish moving through the city appeals to me and the footage can be found easier in the scale I’m looking for.
Change of Plans :
So as I couldn’t get the up close footage of Glasgow that I was looking for. I went with Gillians suggestion and looked at Adobe Stock footage, downloading a variation of animals to then bring them into the footage ive filmed in the city.
Example of stock footage fish that I was trying to find an excuse to use but the transparent fins where too much.
Below is some notes of my process when I wasnt having the most luck and then expanding on those notes after the fact when I can take a better look at them :
its crashed and i lost a good chunck after trying to brute force it
At the start of the tracking I had done a few of the animals but as I hadnt yet went through the setting troubles and figured out how to make After Effects less distructive it crashed and I had lost a good chunk of my work meaning I had to do the roto brush again.
I tried to force it to preview one HD rotobrushed preview at a time and it crashed on the last couple of frames.
I learned that solid contained shapes are best to roto brush
Also as I did more of the roto brushing I learned that the smaller difficult areas on this footage will obviously be more difficult. I then changed the footage to more solid animals with clearly defined shapes and movements.
I learned that land animals are worse to roto brush onto existing footage because they actully have to stand on something
After changing my animals footage I learned that any animal that was making contact with the floor would be another layer of difficulty, where they are making contact with the ground looks too fake and amateur.
my laptop was struggling during the entire thing
During this entire process of rotobrushing and assembling my footage I learned that to save some processing power, and in turn my laptop, I had to change the perview settings to as low as it could go (quarter), to assign more ram to After Effects (7.5 gigs of RAM of my total 8 gigs of RAM) and to break it apart into managable chunks of my laptop and then assemble it again in After Effects before rendering it out.
i have became a master at the roto brush tool / fine detail brush tool in after effects because ive done the same thing over and over again
As you can probably tell from this lack of modesty I was going a bit mad after doing the roto brushing/ fine detail brushing a number of times and having to the same footage a number of times but because of this I found an efficent workflow and key shortcuts when doing roto scoping.
Id actully like to use it again when doing more work on the school of fish potential project.
Comp in a Comp :
To save my laptop I’m separating the footage into separate scenes, rendering them out with the Media Encoder and then putting them back into After Effects to edit them together and to add a fitting soundtrack.
The Music can Change it :
Porcelain was in my head for it because of the two main elements of the track, the steady drums being the street and the normal life and the strings and vocals being the sea life floating above.
Nude has always gave me this feeling of being underwater so the connection again being a sealife with this one.
Feel it all around initially gave me that same ocean feel as the others did but in a lighter tone. But as I was looking for the video on Youtube to put here I found another version.
Excuse the visuals of this video sorry.
The same song, Feel it all around by Washed Out but slowed down with added reverb give it an even dreamier spaced out feel which i think might work well with the underwater visuals.
After going down the rabbit hole of slow and reverb songs I found veridis Quo (slow and reverb) that has that feeling I’m looking for, a magical wonder that still fits within the city scape.
The song has a solid minute at the very start that I’m going to use, it does start to ramp up at the end of that minute though and it makes me want to make a longer video but I’m just capping it at a minute.
Trust the Process :
With all the footage rendered out, I now want to bring it back into After Effects to bring it together for a final composition and to add some effects:
- To start and end the video I’ve put a fade in and out of black at either end as so not start and end so abruptly and fading the music at the same time as the black to gently lead into the video as well to set and maintain the light relaxed tone.
- Using the camera lens blur effect on an adjustment layer I made the transition between each scene, I felt that the adjustment of focus will again be easier on the eyes and tone as not to just cut to the next shot.
- And over each scene in an auto colour correction, auto levels and auto contrast just to tie the scene and the imported fish a little bit more together. I could have went deeper into it but I enjoyed some contrast between the normal streets and the vibrant sealife.
With the visual elements i wanted to really soften them and continue the feel of the entire thing (as ive probably said too many times at this point).
Final : Magic in the Mundane
Taking it further:
I really love the visuals of the school of fish and would love to do another video with only images of schools of fish moving throughout a city scape.
I really like the combo of the school of fish, the solid rigidity of the city and the music that has elements that mirror both the rigidity and the flowing natural patterns of the fish.
Evaluation :
During this project I did have to be adaptable, be that becuase I couldnt get the exact footage I was looking for or hardware restriction of my laptop. I had to exhibit my ability to take it on the chin and keep going.
My main technical take away from this project is my confidence with the rotobrush, after having to do it a few times I’m quite happy to use it and would like to take my skills further, even footage in my final piece could be better and if given the opportunity I would do it more.
I could have been more open to other ideas, i was so bogged down with the one concept and might have made my life easier if i did a simpler idea
A personal criticism I have is that I might have locked in my concept too soon, yes the project is only two weeks but maybe given another day or a wider scope I could have came up with something more abstract or inspired. I am happy with the final visuals but think there is more potential for it either to be more abstract and stylised or more honed in and focused.
In future i could first look into the software to see what can be done and then maybe let that infrom my decisions/ process/ workflow.
In this project I was driven by my concept and then had to work around/against the software to make it work. This process did have its own interesting workflow and outputs but I wonder what I would have come up with if I had looked more into After Effects and let that inform my creative process.
Nicholas McLaughlin Blog 
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