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June 8, 2009
What’s up with me?
Hello hello! Sorry I haven’t updated this blog in a while. I want to start writing here regularly.
There’s a lot going on in my life right now. Production for “En Route” went really well! We shot in Savannah over four weekends during the last month of school.
Here’s a sample frame from the raw footage, at 2k:
...and this is half-res.
On the last day of the quarter I was awarded “Best Undergraduate Visual Effects” at my school’s film award ceremony (the “SCADEMY’s) for the work I did for “The Observation of Jonathan Rhode”. It was a huge honor, and a complete surprise. I literally only did one shot for the entire film. (I spent some serious time on it, for sure, but still… I wonder if the judges knew that.)
So! I officially finished my junior year in college and now I’m back in Maryland for a brief respite. In less than a week I’m planning on driving back to Savannah to dive into post-production for En Route. I’ve gotten a late start on the edit but I intend to devote myself fully to it in the next couple weeks.
In other news, I have this thing called “Infectious Mononucleosis”, known more conversationally as ‘mono’ or ‘glandular fever’, depending on where you’re from. I have a fairly mild case of it, thankfully, but that’s what I’ll blame my disappointing progress on.
I installed Ubuntu Linux on my machine! Scary intimidating. Don’t know the first thing about the command line, and I’m having a frustrating time with basic things like figuring out how to switch keyboard layouts on the fly and get my display resolution correct… but I think I’m gonna like it. My inner geek has been neglected for too long now anyway.
Aaannddd….
DURIAN!
This too is no longer news, but it’s so exciting it needs a dramatic introduction. I’ve been asked to direct the next Blender Open Movie project at the Blender Institute in Amsterdam!
I won’t post too much about it now because very little about the project has been defined.
But we’ve already got a fantastic core team, with concept artist David Revoy, renowned Dutch comic book author Martin Lodewijk, incredibly talented software developer Brecht van Lommel, composer Jan Morgenstern and of course the remarkable Ton Roosendaal, lead developer of Blender and head of the Blender Foundation.
Submissions for other artist positions ends in just a couple days and I’m confident we’re gonna put together an awesome team for this project. Alright, that’s enough superlatives for this paragraph…
I’m super excited. If you aren’t familiar with Blender’s open movies, check out the first two projects: Elephants Dream and Big Buck Bunny.
Really phenomenal works, and the films were created almost entirely with open source software.
Production starts in September and will last 6-8 months, so if everything works out I’ll be in Amsterdam in less than four months! Be sure to follow the progress of the project at durian.blender.org.
Alrighty. That was an epic post. Time to get back to work!
–Colin
Oh wow, quite an amount of updates you’ve got here.
Congratulations for the award! It sounds really nice.
I’m excited to hear about Durian. I’ve followed the evolution of Orange and Peach all the way (I believe
), and I’m very anxious as to hear any info on this new project!
Awesome! Congrats about durian. I’m sure you’ll do a great job.
I can’t wait to see the outcome of those projects!!
@”The Observation of Jonathan Rhode” – is the whole film online somewhere?
Hope you’re better soon, it can be really depressing when you’re sick and have a head full of ideas.
Thanks a lot, guys! Really appreciate it.
@Sophia- Regarding my friend’s film, “The Observation of Jonathan Rhode”, it’s not online at the moment, probably because he intends to submit it to festivals and such. But hopefully he intends to put it online at some point… I haven’t talked to him about it. I was able to see the film a couple weeks ago, it was intense!
Hey Colin,
Good to hear you were asked to direct on Durian…
Greetz from The Netherlands!
Ricardo
Just one correction: the first blender open movie is Elephants Dream, not Elephant’s Dream. It’s odd, I know.
bbjam – Hah, thanks for the correction! I should’a known that. It is odd, heh- changes the way I hear the title.
Congrats on all your work man! Totally lookin’ forward to En Route and I’m especially excited to see you joining the Durian team. Good luck!
heh and good luck with Ubuntu too! I’ve been using it for probably two or three years, great system! I’m sure you’ll have fun with it
I just read on durian.blender.org that you’re looking for choreographers etc.
I don’t know what you have in mind but I do Parkour and Freerunning and I guess I could contact some “professionals” in Germany.
Sophia Maria
hey ya’ll congrats again colin on the shot from The Observation of Johnathan Rhode, looks amazing. for those who are asking about the film i intend to submit to a variety of festivals that will not allow me to post it quite yet. the website is under construction and can be seen there soon!
also i plan on making another short this fall.
all best
michael boyle
Why were you changing your keyboard layout?
@Michael Boyle – Thanks dude, let me know when you’ve got the website up.
@Cory Taylor – I actually type in “dvorak”, which is a completely different keyboard layout from “qwerty”.
I switched when I was in middle school, it’s a bit more efficient.
–Colin
Blender, it will soon rule the VFX world. Sounds awesome! Can’t wait!
Wait, really? Nobody’s made a comment about the Mono yet?
I mean, it’s common knowledge that it’s a “kissing sickness,” although I guess TECHNICALLY you can get it from sharing drinks or something.
So who’s the lucky gal, Colin? Or… unlucky if she has mono.
Hahah
Hey! You’re the guy who proposed too Audrey!
PS: Yes! One of my childhood heroes is working on Durian!
Colin!!! That’s great news. I’ll be following the project.
Tony
Wow, asked to direct Durian? Dude that is awesome. Great choice for Blender and great opportunity for you. Can’t wait to see it now. Thanks for the tuts on Icarus again.