This blog will span over the course of Fall 2022 to document my progress in the VSFX406 Conceptual Development course.
Concept Variations
My 'something interesting' I brought to the first class was a figurine of a Moria Orc from Lord of the Rings by Peter Jackson. I decided for my story board to put him in two interesting situations...
In class, we brainstormed various concepts and played off one another's ideas until we came up with two notable stories.
Originally, the Moria Orc's debut was located in a half second clip in The Fellowship of the Ring, growling and leering at the fellowship in the mines of Moria just before the Balrog makes its presence known.
I expanded on the two more notable concepts.
Moria Orc as a cashier at Publix, probably in Florida
Moria Oratory Orc, belting "Ave Maria" in a colosseum
Observation Analysis
The professor provided a Watchlist for us to review and revisit. There has to be over 100 different movies on the list, I can hardly imagine the time and thought it took. I've gotten to take my pick at it the last couple of days, and so far, I've gotten through two and a half.
Oasis by Lee Chang-dong (2002)
Overall thoughts?
Certainly not your average love story, I'll tell you that. The film follows a young woman with cerebral palsy and her relationship with a mentally disabled man who just got out of jail for killing someone while drunk driving.
Between her wanting to have a chance at a normal relationship and him wanting the same, the lines start to blur, and you can sometimes see them as they imagine themselves to be when together. Despite what they're going through, the hardships they face as outcasts, and of course the whole part about him going to jail for A DRUNK DRIVING MANSLAUGHTER INCIDENT INVOLVING THE WOMAN'S FATHER, they still manage a bit of normalcy until they're finally separated.
What would I change?
It would be interesting to see how this would play out if this were some sort of online relationship, present-day. Online relationships have grown in popularity over the last several years with the worldwide social outreach the internet has provided us since its creation. It's only getting easier and easier to get into contact with someone all the way across the world, nonetheless, create and nurture relationships of some kind with them over things like similar interests, shared trauma, and even private fantasies.
I don't think it would be too far off to conceptualize two social outcasts forming a bond in a way no one else but them can understand over the internet... I'm just saying.
L'eclisse by Michelangelo Antonioni (1962)
Stalker by Andrei Tarkovsky (1979)
Moulin Rouge by John Huston (1952)
This one's for you, Joe....
8 minute TED Talk on the Stalker...
Studio 1 Idea Pitch
This is going to be a deeply personal project that I'm hoping reaches all sorts of people and purposefully makes them uncomfortable. I want them to be uncomfortable, I want it to stun them into silence. It's even going to be a bit metaphorical, I think.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwdUXS94yNk
Above is a reference video for the type of mood I'm going for. There's also going to be a lot of noise like in the video above, all of which allude to the feeling and progress of the story.
I was also given the wonderful idea to potentially film the scene where the monster-parent is stumbling and growling towards the child with a fish eye lens to accentuate the feeling of fear and anxiety.
https://youtu.be/HhsEKllL9iE
https://youtu.be/NqvbO7XN_DY
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