On the publicity trail for "Catch A Fire", I caught up with Philip Noyce this afternoon to show him Sanctuary so far and get some advice on next steps. Of course the DVD and TV in his room caused no end of grief (cutting off part of the screen) but I was feeling so relaxed this time around that I was able to simply laugh it off.
Someone told me recently to listen to the opinion of strangers the most because they have no agendas. The 12 minute cut clearly had less impact, even accounting for the missing VFX, than the comic version. The original idea is so exciting that the energy level doesn't match. Phillip was very encouraging though, honest in pointing out what didn't make sense and that it doesn't mean we have to throw away the linear, only need to think hard about how to present it in the best possible light. He'd clearly had been thinking about the project and had some pointed thoughts on how the performances didn't reflect the dynamism of the original animatic and thought that I should revisit my comic approach which he liked. He thought Blake's personality from the script came out more in the stills than in the performances "which would be a disaster if you were making a feature but you're not!".
"It's a matter of weeks before someone does this". We talked a lot about how to get the thing finished within available budget, about putting the film's best foot forward to attract re-mixing further funding. He had reservations about trying to "fix" the 12 minute cut and seemed far more interested in the idea of inserting it as fragments into the comic book structure (which ultimately is what I've been doing with Arkaos and the RIG). He got quite animated by the idea of dirtying it all up - and mucking about with the pristine print. He said straight out that the image quality of the plates is potentially even working against the project at this stage. It was a good reminder that the original idea was all about a re-mixable graphic novel.... which I have. Somewhere in between the comic and the lnear cut is where this is heading. "You can't market it as it stands as all these different things, you have to pull it all together".
It was a really positive session. Phillip seems to reckon that the idea is revolutionary and went to some pains to say that I've got all the elements now to finish the damn thing (my sentiment, not his!). He poo-poo'ed the suggestion that I needed to go to any expensive post production lengths, saying I had all the tools I needed on my own computer and that's how I should complete it. I didn't protest that none of my graphics cards have Pixel Shader 2.0 (I wanna Intel Mac!) but I take his point. This was always really about about homebrew.
Anyway, it was a good boost and I'm going to cut a new disk to take up to my MELT session in Sheffield on Thursday. "Unlike the Americans in Iraq", Phillip suggested a cut-and-run approach that paid more attention to what is working than trying to compete with regular linear work.
Westminister Uni have approve the submission we made in September for some further demo funding.
Here is the video produced.
Consider this a work-in-progress. Feedback to-date suggests it still isn't totally clear what we're doing.
First day back after my holiday and we're in discussions with a feature film producer on how to get the ball rolling for their re-mixable release! I'm happy. It's all starting to come together. I'm going to have my head down this next month getting modfilms.net ready for launch.