The "Life in a Day" Trailer

I tried to submit some videos for this movie, but never got a response. However, looking at the trailer here, I can see they got some really good stuff.

Coming to a theater in July 2011.

Star Wars Crawl Creator

Because you always wanted to... go to StarWars.com | Star Wars Crawl Creator.

You will thank me.

More About the HBO Opening Sequence

As a response to my recent post about the opening sequence on HBO, I got the following message from Arco1.

I see you discovered the HBO behind-the-scenes video.

It was a very ambitious intro and was said to be the most expensive and innovative concept at the time, especially for cable TV. History sidebar - HBO was one of the first cable-only networks, and also one of the first to provide something more between movies than just a billboard with Oh God! You Devil starts in 17 minutes 08 seconds.

The original promo was full of amazing effects from start to finish. I remember first seeing it at a trade show, maybe National Assoc. of Broadcasters convention. More amazing is the amount of effort it took to do what can now be done on the desktop in a few hours.

I remember one thing that caught everyone's attention was the light-burst. Today, that moire light pattern is easy to construct in something like Adobe After Effects. Of course, having to construct a miniature physical city or physical "HBO" is no longer necessary either. Numerous add-ons can provide 3D solids or metallic text complete with light glints and shimmer.

The intro seems to be a part of HBO's legacy. I notice they sometimes use the swoop-through-the-city in part of their current bumpers.

How's that for historical perspective and technical perspective?

How To: HBO '80s Opening Sequence

If you grew up in the '80s and if you had HBO, then you will recall the opening introduction described below.

Remember that '80s HBO intro where the camera went from a city apartment, through Alec Baldwin's Beetlejuice model, and into space, where the HBO logo was full of lasers? It was pretty great, even when viewed through my home's fuzzy, accidental HBO reception with the knowledge that it would just be followed by another showing of Oh God! You Devil.

Have you ever wondered how that intro montage was created? There is a behind-the-scenes video that you will want to see. Check out more details at I Watch Stuff.com.

Let's Enhance it! Video

Okay, this is funny. Certainly it might be possible to do this kind of enhancement in the 24^th century, but there are certain video enhancements that happen in movies that are just ridiculous. And this video makes that abundantly clear.

George Lucas in Love-- All Over Again

I've mentioned it before, but George Lucas in Love is one of those short but epic masterpieces of comedy gold that bears mentioning again. If you haven't seen it in a while (or at all) enjoy.

I ran into this again recently on Shamus Young's blog, where even he admits that it has been linked to hell and back, but sometimes you have to resurrect those old simple favorites. Shamus also links to his own 2006 script treatment of what Star Wars would have likely looked like had it come out in this decade rather than the '70s. The main point being that movie executives would take the script and try and 'sexy' it up a bit to make it the smash blockbuster that they really want. It's worth four and a half laughs.

It's arguable by some that the Star Wars films severely changed the movie industry and created the "blockbuster-or-bust" attitude prevalent today. Thereby making Shamus' joke all the more cyclical --and profound.

In A World With No Don LaFontaine…

You most likely wouldn't recognize this man's name or face. However, it's possible that with modern movie advertising, he has one of the most recognized VOICES in the world. Dan LaFontaine was the voice-over guy for almost every movie trailer I've ever seen in my entire life. He has a powerful deep voice with a unique character. On Tuesday of this week he died due to complications and illness. The movie trailers will never be the same.

Don LaFontaine Passes Away

Death Star over San Francisco // Current

This is one belongs under the "That's-No-Moon-That's-A-Space-Station" folder. As everyone knows, I like Star Wars quite a bit. But even I was a little bug-eyed to see these fan-made clips.

In case you can't tell, these are most likely your standard shots collected from home movies around San Francisco. But the effects have been seamlessly and pretty flawlessly added in. Check out the full video of the Death Star over San Francisco on Current.

Two Quick Movie Mentions: Iron Man and Indiana Jones

I wanted to quickly note that I've seen two really great films this summer and I wanted to mention my reactions briefly.

IRON MAN

Yeah, this one was surprisingly awesome and I think a lot of people reacted that way. Fans of Marvel Comics have had some ups and downs in the last several years with some good movies and some bad ones. From what I hear, the good has been outweighing the bad with their latest ventures because the powers that be in Hollywood finally decided to let Marvel have total control of their own films. Imagine that!

INDIANA JONES

Do I have to actually come out and say this one was great? Can't it just be a given? Some spectacular work went into this picture. It's not a hindrance to the plot at all that our beloved Indy is now much older. Nor is it a problem that we haven't known his whereabouts for nearly 20 years. In fact, it makes for some interesting character exposition how much he has aged and the fact that much of his adventuring life is supposedly behind him. Also, in the first 20 minutes enough hints are dropped about the intervening time period that you think Of course that's what he's been up to! There are a few surprises too and at the end of the first act there is a special effect BANG that you don't want to miss.

See these quickly before they leave the theaters!

Wired.com - Coolest Movie Metamorphoses

Here's a quick post about a cool article that came to me on Wired.com about the 12 greatest movie transformations in all time. Check out the full list along with shots of each creature in the Coolest Movie Metamorphoses, From Wolf Man to Hulk.

THE CUTTING EDGE: the magic of movie editing (pt1)

This is "Part 1 of a fantastic documentary about movie editing." The other parts of this are also possibly available on YouTube. This documentary gives the history of and an emphasis on the importance of EDITING as an art form and an important piece of any film-making.

TRAILER - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

I posted previously about Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. A new trailer has become available over the last week and I felt it needed to be shared.

• Indiana Jones Official Site
• Yahoo! Movies - Indiana Jones Trailer

Are you excited? Keep your eyes on this countdown timer or head to the link below to get it for your site.

Watch the Trailer on Yahoo! Movies

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

In movie news, the upcoming Indiana Jones film now has a title.

Read more about this at Star Wars.com.

Zombies! How-to Special FX on the Cheap

Here is a good tutorial on creating movie studio quality makeup effects for zombies in your movie projects.

High Tech Noon

I can't take credit for this joke, but here is proof that anything is cooler when you add lasers and photon shielding.

In case you didn't know (cuz I didn't) the original film was called High Noon. This parody was found via High Tech Noon @ Skip.Jenkins. Now go out and find your own favorite movie and add lasers and androids. Enjoy!

Tutorial: Create a Stop-Motion Animation Movie using Digital Camera or WebCam

Have you ever wanted to create a stop-motion video? You can create many effects with toys and stuffed animals. Kids love them because they are an easy way to tell imaginary stories. Here is a good tutorial on how to start creating stop animation short films.

Sometime back, I created a stop-motion animation film with the soft toys of my 2-year old son playing the lead roles. This 19 second movie was done using just a digital still camera (not video camcorder) and Windows Movie Maker

Read the full post at Digital Inspiration.

The Perfect Editing Station - Expert Help by PC Magazine

Jan Ozer at PC Magazine has an article on the perfect setup for video-editing.

Are you a filmmaker? Or a video enthusiast? Or the greatest thing to hit YouTube since that Star Wars kid? You've been editing video for a while, perhaps producing short films, training videos, or maybe even a wedding or two, and the only thing standing between you and an Independent Spirit award is the limitations of your current gear. It's time to jump-start your career with an upgrade.

The first step in your transformation into George Lucas is clear: You'll need a superfine digital camcorder. But once you've spent a cool thousand dollars on the latest and greatest from Sony, Samsung, or whichever manufacturer you favor, you've only just begun your journey from taking cute home movies to making great videos. That camera is only going to get you halfway. But that's why I'm here. I'll show you how to build an awesome editing station to take your video to the next level.

Read the full article at The Perfect Editing Station.

Unable to Load Archived Video

dnix71 asks:

For some as yet to be explained reason, none of my video stored on my hard drive will load into the editing software. This just began happening recently. Cannot even load sample stuff! CPU locks up and must be re-booted.

I have been using WinDVD creator for over a year without probs, tho I am aware of its shortcomings, it worked for me. I have attempted to load any video clip from my drive to Movie Maker and ShowBiz with the same results.

For the full post, please visit VideoHelp.com.

Dots on the Movie Screen

In older films and movies there were commonly dots or small flashes that appeared in the top-right of the screen. Up until yesterday, I thought these were simply glitches or dust motes. Then I read the following:

According to a list of Frequently Asked Questions originally created for the Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.movies, those dots are cue marks that let the projectionist know that it's time to change reels. Film reels generally range in length from 20 to 22 minutes, so there are several "changeovers" in a feature-length film.

Want to learn more? Go to I did not know that yesterday!.

World of Warcraft & Office Space Commercial

The following particular commercial has been making me laugh lately.

The concept is a familiar scene in a movie, Office Space, that almost has a minor cult following, and a familiar scene in this movie has been edited digitally to add scenes from the video game and the cardboard box and discs on the desk. It is pretty seemless. It's even more seemless than the DirectTV & Star Trek commercials and the ones like it that I also find funny.

It was bugging me each time I saw it, as I kept wondering which video game it was that Peter was originally playing. I found the movie and at about the 42 minute mark is when the scene appears and the character was originally playing one of my old favorites and there are cheetos on his desk instead of discs. Check out the quote from IMDb's Memorable Quotes from Office Space (1999) page.

[Peter is wearing shorts, sandals and a paisley shirt, with his feet up on his desk, munching chips and playing tetris on his computer]

Bill Lumbergh: So, Peter, what's happening? Aahh, now, are you going to go ahead and have those TPS reports for us this afternoon?

Peter Gibbons: No.

Bill Lumbergh: Ah. Yeah. So I guess we should probably go ahead and have a little talk. Hmm?

Peter Gibbons: Not right now, Lumbergh, I'm kinda busy. In fact, look, I'm gonna have to ask you to just go ahead and come back another time. I got a meeting with the Bobs in a couple of minutes.

Bill Lumbergh: I wasn't aware of a meeting with them.

Peter Gibbons: Yeah, they called me at home.

Classic..