“Sharkbiter” Update 2012 May 13
May 13, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
After a week or so on other projects, I got back to work on the Sharkbiter video I did with Xtranormal.
When I left off, I had created several versions of the video from different angles. This week I reviewed them in detail. I printed a copy of the script and made notes as I watched.
The first thing I looked for was pronunciation problems. A common problem with artificial voices is that they have trouble with some words. I tried to fix those with changes to the spelling. I wasn’t very successful with that. Other times I rewrote the line to avoid the problem word. Strangely enough, I found that while one voice would have trouble with a word, the other one wouldn’t. In a few cases, I could shift the phrase from one character to the other.
My next goal was to revise the script. I found that it really helped to watch the video. It made it much easier to spot problems with the dialogue. So much so, that I think I’d like to use the program with all my script writing. I’m not sure exactly why it helps. In the past, I’ve found text to voice software was useful when proofreading.
Sometimes I find it difficult to rewrite a script, but this time it was much easier. Often I’m reluctant to make changes. After I watched the video, I think it was easier to decide that the dialogue needed to change.
A third goal was to revise the expressions and gestures. Xtranormal allows you to make the character to express some emotion and make some gestures. There are only six facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness and surprise), which does limit you. There are almost 80 gestures, which gives me a little more flexibility.
The facial expressions allow you to change the intensity of the emotion. I found that most of the time I set the intensity too high and needed to dial them back. The gestures don’t allow you to change the intensity, although sometimes I was able to substitute a less intense gesture.
I also found I needed to change the timing of gestures and expressions. This is a bit of a trial and error process. I expect that after more experience I should be able to get it right the first time.
In the previous version, I had one camera angle for the whole video. This time I put in over the shoulder shots and close ups. I had planned to do several versions with different angles, then edit them in Premiere Pro, but I learned a few tricks over the course of the week and decided to go with what I could do in Xtranormal.
I rewrote the script, and then revised the Xtranormal input. Finally, I output a new video. I experimented with different output formats. When I tried before, I couldn’t import the AVI file into Premiere Pro. I still had that problem. I was able to work with the AVI file with Encore, Windows Media Player and Windows Movie Maker. I found that I could import the WMV files from Xtranormal into Premiere Pro. I used Premiere Pro to add the titles.
Next week I’ll review the new video and make more changes. I’m not sure how many versions I want to make before I decide to go with what I have.
The “Real” Third Man
May 6, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
I watched a documentary on YouTube called Shadowing the Third Man about the movie The Third Man. The person who posted the version I watched took it down. However, I found another version http://youtu.be/q6zLJrfoKyQ
I became a fan of the film many years ago. I enjoyed learning some of the stories behind the film.
I particularly liked some of the technical aspects of the film. The lights they used inspired many shots. They were very large and threw impressive shadows on the walls. Since Orson Welles wasn’t always available, they used a lot of shots of shadows on the walls to give the impression he was there.
One interesting tidbit was the origin of the name Harry Lime. Lime is a shade of the colour green, which is likely a reference to the author of the story, Graham Greene. The first name, Harry, refers to Greene’s good friend Harold “Harry” Philby, better known as Kim Philby the Russian double agent. Ironically, a dozen years later, when Philby defected to Russia, people called him the “third man” in the Cambridge spy ring.
I was also surprised to learn that many of the small parts in the film, such as the caretaker, were famous Austrian actors.
When I read the script years ago, I was surprised to see that originally they said Holly Martens was a Canadian. That would imply that Harry Lime was also a Canadian. I’m glad they changed that in the film.
The impression I got from the documentary was how so many elements of the film came about by chance and luck. I’m a little skeptical about that. I suspect they exaggerated a little there.
The Orville Sharkbiter Interview Video – Progress Report 2012 April 29
April 29, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
With the help of the Xtranormal support team, I got the Xtranormal Desktop program to work. Apparently, when I first installed it, the text to voice software didn’t install properly. After I reinstalled it properly, everything was hunky dory.
I completed an initial version of The Orville Sharkbiter Interview video done. As I mentioned I developed the script from my short story Book Review: Sharkbiter – The Secret to Success http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/book-review-sharkbiter-the-secret-to-success/ . I still have some work to do on it.
There are some weird pronunciations for some of the words. They suggest you misspell the word to make it come out right. . I fixed problem with the word “ganged” by spelling it as “gang’d”. Several attempts with other words have been less successful. I notice that when one voice has a problem with a word, the other voice doesn’t.
In a previous job, the person in the next cubicle was responsible for an automatic radio system that used a text to speech program similar to what Xtranormal uses. She would fiddle with the spelling for hours to get the pronunciation right. After a while, she got to know the tricks that made it easier.
The software allows you to change camera angles throughout the video, but I had some difficulty with that. I think I know how to do it now. Nevertheless, I decided to stick to one camera angle through the whole thing until I was happy with the voices and acting. I’ll add in other angles later. One option I like is to output several versions of video taken from different angles, then use Premiere Pro to edit it the same way I’d do any other video.
It isn’t as if the animations are great actors, although, for the most part, they are better than I am. The program does allow you to specify some facial expressions and some gestures. I did some of those and I think it does improve the video, so I want to add some more. Many of the gestures are really over the top, which limits me a bit.
If all goes well, I should have the video wrapped up and posted next week. I have other commitments Monday and Tuesday, so it’ll be Wednesday until I can work on it again.
Orville Sharkbiter, Xtranormal and Animated Storyboards
April 22, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
A while back, I came across a program called Xtranormal (www.xtranormal.com) that allows you to create animated videos by just typing in dialog. I’ve seen a lot of short videos on YouTube that used the program. This week I decided to try it out.
I converted my short story Book Review: Sharkbiter – The Secret to Success into a script. The story is a satire of some of the get-rich-quick books that people write. I wrote it in the form of a fake book review. For the movie version, I converted it into a mock TV interview. It was relatively easy to rewrite.
I came up with the idea for the character Orville Sharkbiter when I did Line of Taxis (www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/filmlist/line-of-taxis). I used him as a minor character in the movie, but changed his name to Orville Stark-Leiter. He is the proverbial greedy “boss from hell”. I’ve played around with story ideas for him ever since. It only took me 14 years to get the story done.
I did a first version of the script with the on-line version of Xtranormal and I was happy with how it turned out. The desktop version is more powerful, so I want to use that. I ran into trouble with the desktop program however. The support people have been very helpful and I hope to get it to work next week.
The program is free, but you need to pay for assets, such as sets, actors, and voices. You don’t need to pay to create the video, but you can’t save the video to show or post it anywhere until you do. I bought some assets with the money in my PayPal account that I got from my on-line sales.
My long-term goal is to use the program to animated storyboards of my film scripts. I feel that my scripts are a bit too talky and I thought that animated storyboards would help me visualize how the final film will turn out. At the start of the year, one of the goals I set was to try this with my short story The Crying Woman (www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/the-crying-woman/). It would run something like 40 minutes. The Sharkbiter video will run about 10 minutes.
If the Sharkbiter video turns out OK, I’ll do The Crying Woman next.
Edgar Rice Burroughs, John Carter, and Formula Writing
April 15, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
I read all of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars books back when I was in junior high and senior high school. After I read them, I kept them for many years (30 years plus). I had all the Tarzan books too. It was only a few years ago that I got rid of them all.
When John Carter (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401729/) came out, I got the yen to reread them. As I often say, I only get rid of things that I want to use later. I didn’t want to buy new copies to read and while some of them were available from the library, I didn’t really want to sign them out. The early books are in the public domain now and I could download them from Project Gutenberg http://www.gutenberg.org/ , but I was too lazy, so I downloaded the audio versions of three books from http://librivox.org/.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but from what I’ve read it sounds like they mashed together the first three books. The main villain in the movie doesn’t show up until the second book. Some of the changes appear to make in easier for modern audiences to identify with the characters.
Of course, part of my reason why I reread the books was to see if I could gain a better understanding of how to put together a story. The Princess of Mars was the first novel that Burroughs wrote. I suspect that he studied other works before he did this story. In one article about him, they note that he used of a variety of charts when he wrote. The use of charts says to me that he had a formula he followed in his stories.
Some others have noted that the first three Mars books have pretty much the same plot, with John Carter in search of Dejah Thoris. The details of the search vary, but the goal remains the same.
Last year I studied the formula used by Lester Dent, who wrote the Doc Savage books. I could see some similarities with Burroughs’ work. Dent says you need to have the hero get into a fight every 1,500 words. In Princess of Mars, the hero gets into trouble about every 2,600 words, although this varies from one chapter to the next. It isn’t always a fight. In one case, it is a rejection from Dejah Thoris.
I have a few of observations about the book. First is that the hero has a clear goal (Dejah Thoris) throughout most of the book. While in pursuit of that goal, he runs into one crisis after another. Even while he struggles through each crisis, he thinks constantly about Dejah Thoris. Many times he gets frustrated because a crisis diverts him from his main goal.
The second point is that each chapter ends with the onset of the next problem the hero must overcome. After he has just triumphed over one foe, the next one taps in on the shoulder. The poor guy hardly gets a chance to breathe. I’ve read elsewhere that this is a well-known technique to make a book a page-turner. The hero can take a break in the middle of a crisis, but never after a crisis has passed.
The third is how lucky the hero is. For example: Dejah Thoris just happens to be in the air fleet that the Tharks attack. Dejah Thoris just happens to be on the ship that gets shot down. Dejah Thoris just happens to be the only survivor. Just by accident he is always in the right place at the right time. I didn’t notice this when I first read the story long ago, and didn’t notice it this time until I thought over the stories later. It reminded me of an incident I had in a script I wrote. The incident was a direct description of something that happened to me several times. Several readers criticised it as implausible. Maybe implausibility isn’t quite as important a problem as some people think.
The projects I have are nothing like the interplanetary adventure/love story that Burroughs wrote, but I can see how I can use some of his techniques in my stories.
Amazon Studios, “Orville Sharkbiter” and “Bright Freedom”
April 8, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
It was a little bit of everything this last week. At least I made a little progress here and there.
Amazon Studios
Back in 2010, I submitted my script The Doorman’s Sacrifice to Amazon Studios. It didn’t get much interest or feedback. I lost interest in the whole thing. This week I got a note that they’d changed their rules. Initially you had to agree that you gave them an option on the script that lasted for a year and a half. If they wanted to, they could extend the option, but they would pay you for that.
The rule change was to reduce the initial year and a half option to 45 days. They also now allow you to delete the script after the option expires. I decided to delete my script. While they had an option on the script, I couldn’t really do anything else with it. Now I can. Not sure what. I can’t have all my projects on the front burner.
Bright Freedom
I only worked on Bright Freedom for a couple days this week. I still kept it to about one hour each day, so it was a tad over 2 hours I wrote. That got me about 1,800 words. That brings me close to 4,800. Altogether, I think I am almost a fifth of the way through.
I am not too happy with my writing though. It seems like I use the same phrases over and over. It will need a fair bit of rewriting to fix that. I need to talk to some people to see if the basics of the plot are realistic. I suppose I should clean it up as much as I can before I have other people read it. On the other hand, if the plot makes no sense, then that effort would be wasted.
Orville Sharkbiter
I’ve been trying out some Google AdWords to promote my Orville Sharkbiter story. I got some free ad credits a while ago and thought I’d experiment a bit. I did a fair bit of analysis of the statistics AdWords produces. I don’t seem to have much difficulty getting people to click the ad, but if the campaign is to work, I need them to share the page. That hasn’t happened. Yet.
I read a book a short time ago called Made to Stick about how to create viral messages. I used some of the ideas to develop some Ads, but I’m afraid to use them. Some people might find them misleading, and get angry with me. It is not just a mater of attracting people, but it has to be the right kind of people.
Committed to Write (Bright Freedom)
April 1, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
I have a bunch of writing projects strewn about undone, so last week I set a goal that I would devote an hour per day writing. I managed to keep it until Thursday. I hope to do better this week.
I wanted to rewrite the Bright Freedom script I wrote into a novel, but hadn’t decided when I would do that. I started on it this week. I got about 2,800 words done. I think it will end up at about 28,000 words, which would make it a novella rather than a novel.
There are some problems with the story and it will need some rewrites. I find that my rewrite still sounds like script directions and not description. In a script you don’t normally describe what people look like, or dress, or behave. You leave that for the actors to develop. In a novella, you can use those descriptions to make the characters more real. It can also be used to create mood. In what I’ve done so far, I haven’t done much of that.
I still need to do some background research on the story. Are the characters believable? I don’t want them to be stereotypes, and, most assuredly, I don’t want them to be offensive stereotypes. I need to find people who have had similar life experiences and get their feedback. I thought that it would be easier if I had a story they could read.
The main character is a woman from a foreign country. I’ve never been a woman. I have visited other countries, but never emigrated to one. While I try to put myself in that mindset, it would be foolhardy of me to assume that I’ve got it right.
At my one hour a day pace, it would take me six weeks to finish the initial rewrite. I expect that I will hit the wall at some points where what I have in the script just isn’t what I want. Part of me wants to just do a straight conversion, while another part wants to rewrite as I go along.
We’ll see how it goes next week.
“My Most Difficult Case” Update – 2012 March 25
March 25, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
After a long (too long) delay I am back to work on My Most Difficult Case. I hadn’t done any work on it since last October. I wasn’t even sure what I had to do. I was glad to find that I made some notes back then. The major piece of work left to do is the sound track. Thanks to some good advice from Patrick Aull, I solved the problem I had with noise on the sound from the set.
I didn’t work on the sound this week though. Instead, I tried to modify a couple of brief shots in the film. They are the shots where the killer stalks and kills his victim. These two shots were very difficult to get. I had to shoot them three times before I got something I could use.
The problem with them is that you can see some of the pictures on the wall in the background. If I want to sell the film to a commercial network, I need to get releases for the picture. I tried to find out who owned the rights to the pictures, but got nowhere. I don’t see any way I can hope to get releases for them.
I could likely cut the shots out and not affect the film much. However, after all that trouble I went through to get the shots, I find it hard to just toss them.
I tried several times before to use a garbage key to create a composite to cover up the pictures. I did that successfully with another shot in the film. I didn’t have the same success with these shots. I tried a difference matte this time. From what I read, it should have worked, but it didn’t. I think it was partly because I had a monochrome image and it needed some color to identify the differences. Also, since it was a transfer from film, the grain meant that each pixel would change slightly from frame to frame.
I went back to a garbage key. I reviewed all my takes and found ones where the actors didn’t block out the pictures. This resulted in slightly shorter shots. I am not quite done yet. In the middle of one of the shots, the camera shifts a little and you can see where I covered up the pictures. I think I can fix that without too much trouble.
I was disappointed that the alternative takes were not as dramatic as the originals. I have something I can use now, but I still want to experiment some more and see if I can get a better result. The sound track is the priority now.
What Next?
March 18, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
I got some nice comments from people about the award Contingency won at the festival last weekend. It was all very gratifying. Some people suggested I get it into other festivals, but I can’t think of any other festivals where I could submit it. Since the film is focussed on the $100 Festival, other festivals might not see it as appropriate.
I still want to get the film converted to video so more people can see it. Other than that, I am pretty much done with this film and it is time to move on to other projects. I am not sure what to do next.
I had a look at the blog post I did on my 2012 goals. My next top priority should be to finish My Most Difficult Case. It has been quite a while since I did anything on that, so I’m not sure just exactly where I left it. I need to set aside some time to review where I am on this project.
I know I have to finish the sound, but I want to make some minor changes to the images. In a couple of shots, you can see pictures on the wall. It looks like it’s unlikely that I can get releases for them, since I can’t even identify who owns the rights to them. One has a note about the organization that created it, but the organization doesn’t exist anymore. The other has no information about who created it. If I want to distribute the film, I think I’ll need to cover them up somehow. I tried that before, without much success.
I want to redo Some Days . . ., but I think I’ll do it later this year. It needs a lot of patience to do properly.
I published an article I wrote about “Conversational Films” and a blog post about my transportation planning story this week. I’d started them earlier, but dropped them so I could concentrate on Contingency. In my 2012 goals, I said that I wouldn’t do any more articles that were unrelated to my film or story projects. I had come up with several ideas, but I think I better drop those and concentrate on my film and story work.
Issues in Transportation Planning #6: The Stick and The Map
March 15, 2012 by James Morison · Leave a Comment
Over the years, I came to believe that people held two very different views of transportation models. I call these views The Stick and The Map.
My goal is to write a fictional book or make a movie about transportation planning. My interest is not to advocate one or the other view, but to use the conflict to drive my story. That isn’t to say that that I do not have strong opinions about the right way to view a model.
The Stick and the Map
One view is the stick model. In this view, people see the model as a stick or weapon. It is something they can use to attack people. In this way, they hope to force others into agreement with them.
The other view is the map model. In this view, my view, people see the model as a map. A model, like a map, provides a simplified view of the lay of the land. In the case of a map it is the real land, while in the case of a model, it is a metaphorical land of the future.
These two views are in conflict.
Stick Models
Stick modellers want the model to make the decisions. To be effective as a weapon, the forecasts it produces must be unquestioned. If there is any doubt about the validity of the model, it has failed.
Stick modellers add more and more features to the model so that no one can say they have missed something. This approach will not work. The more complicated the model, the harder it is to understand. People will not trust a model they can’t understand. In the end, stick modellers will always miss some important factor, so they can never make a model that no one can question.
Map Models
Map modellers want the model to help them and others understand the implications of the decisions they must make. Map modellers accept that the model isn’t reality, but it can help them and others understand the real world. Map modellers may even deliberately leave things out of a model if it helps them better inform the decision at hand. They believe that credibility lies with the modeller, not with the model.
When you think of the model as a map, you change how you use it. Map modellers use the model to explore possible futures. They learn to recognize problems and opportunities when they arise in the real world.
They also recognize that the model is not the only tool they will need. When you go for a drive, no map can be a substitute for looking out of your front window as you go down the road. If you don’t know where you are, a map isn’t much help. In the same way, no model can be a substitute for a monitoring program. Every now and then, you need to have a reality check.
The Nature of the Conflict
Stick modellers are afraid of map modellers, because of their openness about the shortcomings of transportation models. This is a threat to stick modellers. The map modeller’s insistence on monitoring is an anathema to stick modellers.
Map modellers are disdainful of stick modellers. Where the stick modeller believes they have a big stick, the map modeller sees only a rolled up map. A rolled up map isn’t a very impressive or effective weapon, and it isn’t much use as a map either.
Story Conflict
Since these two views are often subconscious, the people in conflict would not necessarily understand why they are in conflict. None of the characters could address it directly, since they would be unaware of it. People will see it as a personal conflict, which would lead them to discount the importance of the conflict.
In a story, we want to have the hero resolve the conflict. Since I never found a way to resolve this conflict when I worked as a transportation planner, it is hard for me to imagine how it can be resolved in a story. In my experience, stick modellers do not like to discuss what they see as an esoteric philosophical point. On the other hand, in a fictional story I can create a wish fulfilment fantasy where I solve a problem that I couldn’t in real life.
An analogy helps to understand the complex. However, like a model, any analogy has its limits. The analogy of the stick and the map does not capture the full complexity of transportation models. When I write a story though, I can use poetic license to ignore some of the complications.
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