when reality becomes fantasy

Imagine a future where there isn't a way to shoot photography of glaciers, or to shoot in hawaii, or Thailand? Where almost every environment has to be matte painted because everything has to be shot on a soundstage?

We call real environments that exist but need to be faked "invisible matte paintings".

I was reading No Impact Man's blog today and it got me thinking about this. There's alot we can do to lower our footprint on this earth. Here's a few low impact ideas that my wife and I have used:

• Use glass. The benefits are that you're not exposing yourself to BPA and not contributing to the rising cost of oil. Plastic is made from petroleum. Any time we buy something to drink at a restaurant or fast food joint we try to get something in glass that has a wide mouth. SoBe bottles make for great waterbottles. POM jars are great glasses, so are mason jars.
• Shop more frequently at the grocery store and but buy less. That way you won't waste alot of food. Use cloth bags instead of plastic ones to carry your groceries around in too.
• Keep the tabs off of pop cans, and then give them to a kid who's school who will use them to recycle and trade for cash. It's a little thing but can add up quickly and "can" (pardun the pun) make a little kid's day.

I would hate the day that everything becomes a "fantasy matte painting" because so much of what we find beautiful, no longer exists.

The Greatest Adventure

UPDATE: Songza song removed...sorry!

Thank you Glen Yarbrough

The Pass update

My recent update to "the pass" matte painting. Still not finished yet but I've made some great strides. 

Happy Father's day VFXers!

If you are living your dream, working in visual effects/film. Then you have given your child one of the most important things they can have...a positive role model.

Someday your child can look at your career and say, my father followed his dreams and shot for the stars, I know that I can too.

Here's a big salute to you.

Big inspiration

My favorite scene from 3 Amigos. Just couldn't help myself...had to post it. It's too good not to.

Yes. This scene is a big inspiration for a project that is waiting in the wings.

Progress check!

Here are the updates from my "demo reel" work

Yo Momma

Bryan Woods has started a brushfire of "Yo Momma" jokes over at VFX Talk, and since I check for new posts inside my Google Reader, I couldn't help but see it and smile. I quickly chimed in with a Joke of my own. 

"Man, Yo Mamma so fat, we was talkin about node noodles and she grabbed a bowl."

One of my favorite VFX blogs has joined in with:

"Yo Momma so fat she broke my clipping plane!"

Seriously that one made me laugh out loud.

Hack has posted a news post on his blog about the "event" here.

I love the photo of that bear. I seriously would have never thought that anyone could have found a more fitting photo.

Woot! He fav'd mine. 

accentuate the negative

Zoic is famous for faking it and adding to the realism of shots.  The camera movements in Cloverfield were built off of it. You see it more and more in matte paintings. 

Sloppy camera movement. Despite sounding bad it can make a shot look more "real".  

My good buddy Cliff Berry  suggested that I ditch the stabilize nodes and go for a more "handheld" look. 

So I did. 

CGTalk2

Again, this is just a garbage composite, but I wanted to re-comp this and see how it looks. It desperately needs some motion blur to match the original footage's blur, but I'll work on that later. It's back to work on my "coastal city" and "road to hell" matte paintings

Dreaming

I've been trying to think realistically about films or properties that I might get to work on.

Typically, matte painters get their start working on sequels to big franchises. Dylan Cole was lucky enough to start with Time Machine so there is the ability to get started on a "smaller" (relative) production.

So here's my list. This is what I would love to be working on or after 2010.

• Terminator 6 (Terminator 4 is currently in production)
• Avatar 2 (Avatar to be released in 2009. And if anyone knows me ...they know that I have been looking forward to this film since 2005)
• A Lucasfilm property involving fantasy elements...Like Willow
• Any video game (or FILM!?) involving Ragnar Tornquist
  
• A Dirk Pitt film (Preferably starring Matthew McConaughey)
• A sequel to The Chronicles of Riddick
• James Bond 24
• The next Serenity/Firefly movie (Please Joss!?)
• The He-Man film
• Iron Man 3
• Unbreakable 2 (please?!)
  
• Hellboy 3
• The Hobbit 2
• GI Joe 2
  
• The Flash
• Lord Baltimore (Based off of Baltimore, or the Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire) (I would also want to assist witht the concept art and art direction on this film)

There's more but I can't think of them at the moment.