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| A life explained... |
You know those kids who used to come to birthdays with home-made presents because they couldn't afford to buy gifts?... I'm one of those kids... So when Andrew's 30th Birthday came about and I had nil funds to part, I decided to make him a video that would celebrate the momentous occasion... even though he'd have much preferred a voucher.
Originally, my plan was to do an Errol Morris/Borat style video which would include as many of his London based friends as I could find, and subject them each to an awkward barrage of questions. I'd done something similar at Waikato that people had laughed at, so I figured I could achieve the same in this attempt. I spent quite a while working on this concept but as I came ready to shoot, I gauged some resistance amongst his friends in their participation. Given my reputation, I'm sure they suspected I was up to something. After a further think, I decided it would also be too close in visual style to a talking heads video that had been cut for him from people overseas, so thought of other options.
Can't quite remember where the Jor-El/Fortress of Solitude/Superman idea came from. Think I was talking to my friend Kelley about what to do at the time, and then happened to remember a trailer I had always liked from the film Superman Returns. Featured here, it runs Brando's voice over against the Krypton theme in a nice little montage. I recalled the original Superman, where the man of steel has these schooling sessions with Brando (Jor-El) and thought I could replicate the mode in the same way for the birthday event.
I quickly began writing a script and storyline that would allow it all to make sense. My goal was to incorporate as much of Andrew's real life history as possible, so that the fantasy eventually created could conceivably be accepted in the jest of plausibility. The more tangible this could be with his own experiences, the greater the connection and effect. The biggest challenge I saw in this was the sell of me being his father from another world. The leverage I used to make this connection, was the fact that 90% of Andrew's friends (and his better half) are all Orientals. A claim that this was because he was naturally drawn to this race as they were genetically reminiscent to his indigenous species, would then be allowable. The transformation of his features to that of the more aggressive species on the planet (whites), was added to explain his current appearance, and was fair in a story sense, as his father would've evaluated that this would increase his chances of survival. Everything else in the narrative was based in truth on Andrew's life. For superpowers, I harked on his mathematical abilities and his good monkey impersonations. His employment with RBS in precise timing with the Global Financial Crisis was also convenient and gave me the chance to play with some irony. His friends were also included, along with his Ann-Nee + her 2D eye condition, and love for Roast Duck. With this the backbone of the story was complete.
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| Brando with Superbaby |
I quickly began writing a script and storyline that would allow it all to make sense. My goal was to incorporate as much of Andrew's real life history as possible, so that the fantasy eventually created could conceivably be accepted in the jest of plausibility. The more tangible this could be with his own experiences, the greater the connection and effect. The biggest challenge I saw in this was the sell of me being his father from another world. The leverage I used to make this connection, was the fact that 90% of Andrew's friends (and his better half) are all Orientals. A claim that this was because he was naturally drawn to this race as they were genetically reminiscent to his indigenous species, would then be allowable. The transformation of his features to that of the more aggressive species on the planet (whites), was added to explain his current appearance, and was fair in a story sense, as his father would've evaluated that this would increase his chances of survival. Everything else in the narrative was based in truth on Andrew's life. For superpowers, I harked on his mathematical abilities and his good monkey impersonations. His employment with RBS in precise timing with the Global Financial Crisis was also convenient and gave me the chance to play with some irony. His friends were also included, along with his Ann-Nee + her 2D eye condition, and love for Roast Duck. With this the backbone of the story was complete.
Filming was more challenging than I had anticipated. I toyed with the idea of setting up a green-screen so I could key out the background and perhaps play with captured footage somewhat, but equipment, resource and time put this beyond me. The next best option I decided was to wait till it was pitch black (sometime past midnight) and shoot myself at 0dB gain at f/16. With LED spots, I was able to light myself in such a way that it would appear I was engulfed in more or less complete darkness... rather than engulfed by the shit in my bedroom. I figured this would at least give me some flexibility when it came to edit and position framing.
Having no autocue, prompt, or ability to remember long monologues, I split the performance into chunks. I knew I could sneak in edits with 'transmission' cuts so I thought this would work okay. Again, didn't quite anticipate how hard it would be just to remember the chunks. Hashing take after take, I summoned all my zen to get through the script before my 60mins of tape stock (all I could afford) ran out, and before Ann Nee and Andrew returned home from their night out on the piss. The other frustration was that I had borrowed the only available tripod I had from a friend which happened to be the most useless/weak contraption ever devised for such purposes. Meant I think for something half the size of an iPhone, I struggled to balance it with the weight of my 3kg DVX102B. It lead to some inconsistency in framing but by the end I was pretty relieved just to get it done.
Didn't think there would be a huge amount of editing to begin with. In my vanity, I presumed that my close-up and genius writing would carry the piece through. Ten seconds into the first take I realised my Jor-El wasn't quite as captivating as Brando's and that I'd need to use all my tricks to sustain viewership. Even though I was proud of the raw footage I captured, I was always going to tinker with the footage. Initially it was to be a blue tint but when I first applied the effect, yellow was the colour selected and I quite liked it. It also made more sense being a race of 'yellows' that the colour for transmission be as such and so I stuck with it. I played with a few noise options and possibilities but because the footage wasn't keyed, none of it really worked. I added a bit of lighting to give the image a little more depth and was satisfied. The voice was next which I lowered a semitone or so before adding a bit of reverb to create a sense of one-to-one.
The additional stills and photos, I found on facebook and the web. There was no set method about what images I used or didn't, and tried to judge based on instinct. Wasn't completely happy with all my choices, and technically should've sought permission for some but my attitude is that if you put something on the web its a gift to the world. The image I was most happy with, was the Octopus Alien. This relates to a drifted piece of script at the end where I wanted to showcase human like insecurity from a being of supposed higher intelligence. Didn't really know what I was writing myself into when I thought it up, but the image I stumbled upon was perfect, and the expression on the creatures face, more so. The final touch was the adding of the Krypton theme music which I included as a personal homage being a fan, and to build a climax for the end.
So there it is, and without further to do... here it is.
Having no autocue, prompt, or ability to remember long monologues, I split the performance into chunks. I knew I could sneak in edits with 'transmission' cuts so I thought this would work okay. Again, didn't quite anticipate how hard it would be just to remember the chunks. Hashing take after take, I summoned all my zen to get through the script before my 60mins of tape stock (all I could afford) ran out, and before Ann Nee and Andrew returned home from their night out on the piss. The other frustration was that I had borrowed the only available tripod I had from a friend which happened to be the most useless/weak contraption ever devised for such purposes. Meant I think for something half the size of an iPhone, I struggled to balance it with the weight of my 3kg DVX102B. It lead to some inconsistency in framing but by the end I was pretty relieved just to get it done.
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| Raw footage, without tint. |
Didn't think there would be a huge amount of editing to begin with. In my vanity, I presumed that my close-up and genius writing would carry the piece through. Ten seconds into the first take I realised my Jor-El wasn't quite as captivating as Brando's and that I'd need to use all my tricks to sustain viewership. Even though I was proud of the raw footage I captured, I was always going to tinker with the footage. Initially it was to be a blue tint but when I first applied the effect, yellow was the colour selected and I quite liked it. It also made more sense being a race of 'yellows' that the colour for transmission be as such and so I stuck with it. I played with a few noise options and possibilities but because the footage wasn't keyed, none of it really worked. I added a bit of lighting to give the image a little more depth and was satisfied. The voice was next which I lowered a semitone or so before adding a bit of reverb to create a sense of one-to-one.
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| What you smiling about?... |
The additional stills and photos, I found on facebook and the web. There was no set method about what images I used or didn't, and tried to judge based on instinct. Wasn't completely happy with all my choices, and technically should've sought permission for some but my attitude is that if you put something on the web its a gift to the world. The image I was most happy with, was the Octopus Alien. This relates to a drifted piece of script at the end where I wanted to showcase human like insecurity from a being of supposed higher intelligence. Didn't really know what I was writing myself into when I thought it up, but the image I stumbled upon was perfect, and the expression on the creatures face, more so. The final touch was the adding of the Krypton theme music which I included as a personal homage being a fan, and to build a climax for the end.
So there it is, and without further to do... here it is.
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