shortfilm
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‘Wired’ is a multi-scene movie painted and animated in VR
Movies that have been painted and animated with a VR headset are nothing new. Most, however, are single scenes that loop like an animated GIF. The camera might move around, highlighting small details, but there isn't much of a story. Wired, meanwhile, is different. It's one of the first pieces of VR animation (that is, created inside VR) with multiple scenes and a discernible narrative. The gorgeous short follows a boy exploring a world that doesn't have wireless technology. He falls from a cable above some enormous skyscrapers, provoking nearby residents to look up and appreciate the sky. The film was created by a single person: Zeyu Ren, a design student and motion graphics artist in New York. He started the project after watching Alex's Sci-Fi World, a jaw-dropping loop created by Matt Schaefer with Oculus Quill, a Facebook-owned 3D painting and animation package. Intrigued, he started experimenting with the Rift headset owned by his college, the Rhode Island School of Design.
Google releases gorgeous VR short film 'Age of Sail'
Google Spotlight Stories has released its latest short, Age of Sail. Directed by Academy Award winner John Kahrs (Disney's Paperman short), it blends beautiful animation with the story of an old, lonely sailor, played by Ian McShane, who is adrift in the Atlantic Ocean in 1900. When he rescues a young woman (Cathy Ang), who fell overboard from a passing ship, his outlook changes to one of hope.
Giphy’s film festival turns GIFs into art
As I made my way into the Metrograph movie theater in New York City, I felt like I was attending a screening for the Tribeca Film Festival. There was a red carpet, people posing for professional photographers, an official film guide and, of course, drinks and popcorn. This isn't quite what I expected when I learned I'd be attending Giphy's first Film Fest. If that name sounds like an oxymoron, the event was a showcase of 118 videos of 18 seconds or less from five different categories: narrative, animated, stop-motion, experimental and wild card. Considering that most of my GIF consumption happens on a laptop or phone, I wasn't expecting this big a to-do.
Twitch will stream five short films and a Q&A by Neill Blomkamp
Neill Blomkamp, director of dystopian sci-fi epics District 9, Elysium and Chappie, will be live on Twitch tomorrow, April 11, showcasing five independent films made by his film studio, Oats Studios. After each of the short films -- Rakka, God, Zygote, Kapture and Firebase -- Blomkamp, his art director Rich Simpson and his VFX supervisor Chris Harvey will do a Q&A, where fans will have the opportunity to ask the team about its inspiration and, pertinent to the types of movies Blomkamp is known for, its logistics.
'Papers, Please' official short film recreates the game's bleak tone
The official Papers, Please short film has been a long time in coming, but it's finally here... and if you're a fan of the game's grim Soviet Bloc atmosphere, you're in for a treat. The 11-minute production includes plenty of nods to the title's nerve-wracking customs checks, such as the dread you feel when you're not quite sure you should have let someone through. It also touches on the game's underlying theme -- how do you maintain some shred of humanity in a job that's frequently heartless? Be sure to turn subtitles on, by the way, as the dialogue is appropriately Russian.
Schwarzenegger joins the sequel for internet cult classic 'Kung Fury'
David Sandberg's instant cult classic, Kung Fury is not only getting a full-length sequel, it's attracting big-name stars to the action comedy set in 1980's Miami. Today, the former Terminator and California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger joined the upcoming film.
'Nexus Dawn' explores story leading up to 'Blade Runner 2049'
Blade Runner 2049 picks up 30 years after the classic original movie, but what happened in the interim? Denis Villenueve, the sequel's director, tapped three creators to make short films exploring the events between the films. Watch the first one, 2036: Nexus Dawn, below:
Watch David Hasselhoff in an AI-scripted short film
Robots are slowly taking more and more jobs -- and soon, they'll come for the writers (gulp). That's the pitch behind director Oscar Sharp and AI researcher Ross Goodwin's short film It's No Game, in which an artificial intelligence swoops in during a Hollywood writer's strike to pen a script for the immortal David Hasselhoff. But the video is something of a meta rabbit hole itself, as all of the Hoff's dialogue was written by an AI called Benjamin, which was built to scribe an experimental short film last year. Whoa.
'Battleborn' turned gaming cinematics into high art
The best part of Battleborn is its prologue cinematic. That's not to say the game itself isn't any good -- in fact, it's a wonderful single- and multiplayer experience for the fantastical first-person-shooter crowd. However, the opening video is divine. It's evocative, rich and effortlessly cool, built on a base of smooth hip-hop and anime-inspired, neon-coated illustrations. When I think of Battleborn, my mind is immediately saturated in the cinematic's soulful rhythm. This is a new brand of video game artistry. As a game, Battleborn doesn't feature cartoon characters; it's a fully realized 3D experience from Gearbox, the creators of Borderlands. In the same vein as Borderlands, Battleborn is highly stylized, but it looks nothing like the opening cinematic. That was on purpose.
Watch the 'Star Fox Zero' animated short here at 6PM ET
Ahead of the launch of Star Fox Zero on Wii U, scheduled for April 22nd, Nintendo this week teased an animated short with ties to the game's story. Titled Star Fox Zero: The Battle Begins, the film will be premiering worldwide today at 6PM ET/3PM PT, featuring the fabled characters you've come to love from the franchise. You definitely won't want to miss it, so make sure you're tuned into Nintendo's stream at the times mentioned above -- link is right here.
Nintendo teases 'Star Fox Zero: The Battle Begins' animated film
This week, Star Fox Zero will finally make its debut on the Wii U, after being delayed last year. In celebration of that, Nintendo created an animated short called Star Fox Zero: The Battle Begins. The film was produced in collaboration with none other than Shigeru Miyamoto, as well as Production IG and WIT Studios. Its world premiere is streaming live on Wednesday, April 20th, just a couple days before the game hits Nintendo's latest console. In the meantime, enjoy the trailer, which features cameos from all your favorite members of the Star Fox squad.
Sony kicks off 'Makers & Gamers' docu-series with 'Journey'
Journey was not a financial success, but the PS3 game -- which takes players on a spiritual trip through a quixotic landscape -- is undeniably a masterpiece. Considering the deep impression it made on players, it's fitting that Sony is premiering its Makers & Gamers series with a documentary on the title. The short film details how Journey helped Sophia Ouellette deal with her father's death from cancer when she was 15. "I needed to tell the people who made it how their game has had such a big impact on me," she says.
See how InVisage's HDR sensor will improve smartphone filmmaking
It's been over five years since we heard from InVisage, a company developing a new kind of smartphone sensor with higher dynamic range and zero rolling shutter. It just produced a short film called Prix using a prototype chip to show exactly how the tech works. As a reminder, InVisage developed a photosensitive nano-coating it calls QuantumFilm that works differently than silicon. It claims that the material has "higher photosensitivity and electron sensitivity per pixel," which makes it react more like film than a typical CMOS sensor. It's also fast enough to instantly switch on and off, allowing the use of a global instead of a rolling shutter.
Future Panasonic G camera's 72Mbps movie-making prowess teased through speedy drama (video)
If Panasonic didn't have attention from movie producers before, it just might as of this week. Joining the quickly developing tradition of camera makers producing elaborate short movies as technology demos, the company has let cinematographer Philip Bloom wield (and tease) a "brand new G camera" to record Genesis, a fast-paced mini-drama showing a man's race to meet his love before it's too late. While Bloom can't talk much about the hardware in question until the 17th, he's allowed to confirm that the upcoming Micro Four Thirds body relies on a "superb" 72Mbps All-I codec for video -- letting it capture a sprint through the streets without the compression artifacts of the AVCHD format used by most mirrorless cameras. Panasonic's upcoming shooter also touts "much improved" results in the dark, Bloom says. It all sounds very tempting, especially if it turns out that Panasonic's inadvertent leaks are for the same camera we see in action here. The full movie is available after the break, and Bloom has the behind-the-scenes details at the source link.
The drama! The suspense! The Leeroy!
It may be the "all your base" of the WoW world, but the Leeroy Jenkins meme will always be with us. Recently, the Worldwide Film Festival asked three directors to reimagine some of the world's most notorious viral videos as short films, and Finn O'Hara chose the Leeroy Jenkins video for his. O'Hara's version of Leeroy Jenkins, featuring the raid members as bank robbers and Leeroy as, well, a Leeroy, is certainly faithful to the dialogue of the original. Sadly, O'Hara chose to leave out "At least I have chicken," but one could see how it wouldn't really fit in with the rest of the film. Another entrant of note is Jeff Chan's Charlie Bit My Finger, which will result in flashbacks for anyone who's ever been overrun by zombies in a first-person shooter and totally ruined the cuteness of the original. Interested in the wide world of machinima? We have new movies every weekday here on WoW Moviewatch! Have suggestions for machinima we ought to feature? Toss us an email at moviewatch@wowinsider.com.
The Theory uses tiny MicroVision projector to concoct even tinier police chase (video)
Looking like the ghost of Hot Wheels fantasies past, a new video short has beamed out of the minds at The Theory -- a production team that just happens to have a MicroVision pico projector. Called "Speed of Light", the mixed media film was made by projecting shots onto walls, floors and objects like laptops and then filming it with "no CGI trickery" added later, according to the team. Featuring a miniature Ford GT chased by a police car, helicopters, missiles and explosions, the pursuit was filmed with a Canon 5D MkII and HD MiniCam. To see if the little crook gets away with it, peel out to the video after the break.
Nikon D800 short lets you experience miracle of birth, motorcycles
Few experiences in life can match the miracle of birth, but sweet bikes and D-SLRs are probably right up there, right? Now you can experience all three in a six minute film. There are no doubt some good takeaways from "Joy Ride," which was shot using the newly announced Nikon D800, but the most important has to be the fact that some things just shouldn't be captured in HD. Video and an equally lengthy making-of after the break.
AT&T unearths Jim Henson's 1963 Robot short for Bell
AT&T has released some real gems from its videos archives over the past year, but it's truly outdone itself this week. It's dug up a rarely-seen short film titled Robot that Jim Henson made for Bell in 1963, which was intended to explain computers and data communications to business owners at "elite seminars." It does so with phrases like "Correction: the machine does not have a soul. It has no bothersome emotions. While mere mortals wallow in a sea of emotionalism, the machine is busy digesting vast oceans of information in a single, all-encompassing gulp." Enjoy.
Filmmaker says Motorola's Super Bowl ad bears some striking similarities to his short film
He's not going as far as to say that Motorola (or its ad agency) blatantly swiped his idea, but L.A.-based filmmaker Mike Sarrow thinks that the company's recent Super Bowl ad bears a few too many similarities to one of his short films to simply let slip by without a comment. That film, "Do Not Disconnect," was shot back in 2009 (and shopped around for a few years prior), and involves a world filled with "drones" wearing white earbuds who are oblivious to the real world around them and incapable of human interaction. Now, that in and of itself obviously isn't the most original of ideas, but Sarrow notes that there a few "striking" similarities beyond the general concept between the ad and his short film, particularly when it comes to the ending (which we won't spoil for you here). Adding a bit of meta-ness to the whole thing is the fact that Motorola's ad is of course a reference to Apple's famous "1984" commercial, and we all know Apple is no stranger to accusations that it's borrowed some ideas for its ads. Contrary to what you might think, however, Sarrow isn't seeking any compensation from Motorola (or even an attribution), he just wants people to see his film and make up their own mind. Judge for yourself after the break.
Assassin's Creed film contest announced
Ubisoft and the Independent Film Channel have announced today a short film contest for the upcoming Assassin's Creed release. The prize is an Xbox 360, a copy of Assassin's Creed (for the Xbox, natch) and $10,000, which must be the sweet spot for short film prize money because that's exactly how much Nintendo gave away for their recent Short Cuts contest. In addition, the short film will also be included in the Limited Edition release of the game and will also air on IFC in November to coincide with the game's November 9 release.According to the press release, the short film must be six minutes in length and "based on Assassin's Creed themes" -- whether or not this includes the hinted-but-unconfirmed science fiction twist is unknown. Aspiring filmmakers can submit their entries to the IFC Media Lab starting today. The press release also states that the winner will be announced on or before November 30, but since the game (and presumably the Limited Edition) is coming out up to three weeks before that, we're hoping a decision is made earlier.
