Complexity

We're having a final rehearsal for Precedent tonight, and also going to take reference photos of the actors for the modellers. Also, I'll be filming the session, focusing on closeups. This gives me a couple of advantages to the production:

1) A perfect reference for lipsyncing and facial/head animating in Faceposer.
2) Additional reference for the modellers.
3) Ability to start editing and experimenting before anything is even shot.

Think of it like as pre-vis, but completely reversed.

I've once again resumed writing the second draft of OTSS 2 after a really really long hiatus. Funny how my creativity just comes and goes, months at a time.

Everyone says less is more. I agree. But some people translate that to simple is better. Personally I don't feel that at all. I take it as "don't show/tell everything". In other words, withhold information. You can make a world as epic and complex as Star Wars, and still get by with very little shown. As long as all of that is there, behind the scenes, in the writer or director's head, it'll show. And people will flock to their favorite fan forums and bicker at what they think the director had in mind. And then there are those who come up with ridicuous theories (that make sense), but is probably a couple hundred levels above what the director had originally intended... It's incredibly awesome how people interpret a single piece of art in their own twisted way.

In other news, I ordered a laptop (my first). Found a $750 off coupon online for the model I wanted, so I convinced myself that now was the time. It's a Dell Inspiron E1705, with a T2600 Core Duo processor. I actually wanted the XPS M1710, but with the parts I wanted it was $4000. Plus no coupon. With the coupon the Inspiron came out to $1700.

Seems like Machinima.com is quiet for the moment. It may seem like it's dying out, but it's just the forums. Since the last few months, the number of users visiting the site has doubled. I have confidence in the site and I try my best to make the site better with whatever limited power I have. Thus, some people's attitudes (still) really bother me. Don't really want to say more than that. Sometimes I wish people would just trust us and appreciate what we're trying to do for the community.

Make up your mind!

OK, so I decided not to go with the new computer... instead I'm going to wait until the Summer for the AMD AM2 processors. Meanwhile I'm looking to sell my current computer and get a nice laptop for the time being.

The rehearsal last week went pretty well, the actors were very good on their own and with a little bit of work we manged to get a nice balance and contrast between the two characters. I don't know how well the humor will play out on-screen, but at the rehearsal I just could not stop laughing. Funny stuff. As a comedy, Precedent is not necessarily like RvB where the humor comes from witty dialogue or plain insanity - Tony wrote this in a way where it could happen in real life. Sort of. Many of the lines were simply too long. One character has almost an entire page of non stop dialogue - although that might be great for a novel or play, I don't think it will work at all on the screen. I get depressed thinking how I'd set that up visually.

Unfortunately we had to cut some of the dialogue, but in a way where the major point is still there. After going through the new version several times I think we managed to get a nice pacing for the dialogue. More meat, less filler.

I haven't had the chance to work on the set design for a long time (machinima.com is eating away all my time), and as you probably expected this is going to take a little more than two months to complete. Still, we have good members on board our team and we're definitely going to finish it sooner than later.