Mi, RoBoT

[Beat Takeshi]

Hi guys,
Here is my and MsManhattan's little submission for your entertainment.
Enjoy!

EDIT:: Im posting some screenies until the short gets put up.

http://www.puffinfilms.com/DVXuser/Sci_Fi/Mi_RoBoTtitle.jpg


http://www.puffinfilms.com/DVXuser/Sci_Fi/Mi_RoBoT03.jpg


http://www.puffinfilms.com/DVXuser/Sci_Fi/Mi_RoBoT02.jpg


http://www.puffinfilms.com/DVXuser/Sci_Fi/Mi_RoBoT01.jpg

[MsManhattan]

I just wanted to give Aram credit for all the heavy-lifting on our submission. We co-wrote it and mapped out all the shots and edits in advance. I conferred with him remotely on the shoot and the editing details, but he did all the hands-on work on this one while I was away over the Christmas holidays (see, sometimes it's good to be the producer...). Also, kudos to Chris Hurn on the score -- thanks, Chris! Finally, thanks to Jessie's Deli on Atlantic Ave. in Brooklyn for the location shoot; to Aram's daughters for their acting; and to his brother-in-law, Pat Ricca, for his uncredited cameo...

[Beat Takeshi]

errrrrr...it seems thats our submission got lost or something. I re-uploaded a wmv file so hopefully you guys can check it out soon.

[Jared Meyer]

I couldn't find your short anywhere...Has it not been uploaded yet?

[Jared Meyer]

Never mind...we posted at the same time. Good luck!

[J.R. Hudson]

Where is this film ? I cannot find it

[Beat Takeshi]

its not there yet i guess. I saw a post by Jarred asking if anyones was missing and left an FTP open so I uploaded a wmv file to it a little while ago. Hopefully when he gets back it will go up.

[J.R. Hudson]

`I'll be here !

[Blaine]

Me, too. I'm looking forward to it. http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/images/smilies/thumbsup.gif

[Beat Takeshi]

Well... by judging the few I have seen so far. Im feeling inferior right now. :(

[Blaine]

I just finished watching this so I'm posting without a great deal of thought. It took me a while to warm up to the story but I did. The cinematography was great...until you go to the convenience store. I'm not sure what you were using but I found the different layers of focus a bit distracting. It seemed that sections of the frame were out of focus but it didn't seem like straight DOF.

The shots in the girls' house were beautiful.

[Jimmy John Worley]

Wow, looks really cool. I like the way you shoot stuff.

[Shawn Murphy]

really liked the cinematography, nice colors and lighting.

[Beat Takeshi]

Thanks guys.
Blain, the store scene was hand rotoscoped to give it a stylized look. Its kind of distracting but the store as a background is soo busy with all the products and stuff. I just thought it would "soften" the blow a little with some suedo DOF.

[Kaz]

Cool flick, Aram!
I agree with everyone here so far.

Man, do I wish I had one of those controllers when I was a kid.

[BrianV]

Dug the premise, and I could... relate? Yeah, like Kaz said, I wish I had one of those controllers back in the day.

:)

[arielman]

Aram .. this was very , very good .
The opening scene I think set up this short as to what was to come . The shot of Olivia's Sister(?) in the room with the robots was Nice . I liked the way you did this .I also liked the shot of the Rock em Sock em Robots , well I think that's what they were , been a long time .lol.
The 2 girls did an excellent job here ..Kudos to them .
The ending was a total surprise . WOW!!! not only was this a SCI-FI but a great story as well .The music was right on the money.
Ian

[Brandon Rice]

Hey Aram!
Just watched this one a bit ago, and really liked it! Really cool simple story... really tragic too (in a great way). Loved the naturalistic lighting and cinematography. Also loved how you got the HVX shirt in there ;) hehe. I thought the acting sold fine for this piece, it didn't require a lot of diversity. Overall, very well done film! It will be in my top 10 list for sure!!

[Beat Takeshi]

Thanks guys. Im glad you are liking it because yeah, its a really simple story because it was just me and the kids shooting since MsManhattan was away. Luckily we hammered out the shot list so it was a fast shoot.
I knew I wouldnt have time to do anything like your stories.
Here are some small things I wanted to point out just because they are subtle.
The table scene where shes building the remote, thats not a table. That was a piece of wood on top of a bed in a small room. She was sitting as still as she could so not to bounce the bed and I hid the headboard with the Japanese folding wall which shows up also in the morning scene.
The morning scene with the cat, that was shot 2am and it was dark out. I had to make it look like morning since that was the last day before editing that I had. Lighting tricks did that one. I dont think I had to CC that shot.
I had to hide all the times my younger daughter was laughing. In the store her head is always down because she was giggling her ass off. The crying scene is where I lost my temper a little. :( The 3 of us sat in that store for a few hours because it was a hell of a lot busier than expected Chrismas day. We would get one take and a crowd would come in and we would have to hide in the back until they were gone each time.
The cat... the cat was thrown in to have a reason for a smile on her face when she "woke up" because that was another time she was giggling.
Yup, they didnt have to act too much since thats how they act in real life so I guess it was easy to sell. :)
The truck scene, man... it took so long for a damn truck to come along. I originally shot that on a big street but the angle wasnt right when I truck came because I wasnt about to stand out in the middle of a big street just for a shot.
So i moved to that side street. By the time a truck came along cars had moved people was standing in the background etc. I had to hand roto out most of it to make the 2 scenes fit.
I like this story and I am going to redo this one the way it should be done. Too bad I just saw an Adam Sandler trailer for a movie where he has a remote that controls everything around him so its not feeling very original now.

[Norm Sanders]

Aram, I realized that I'd not seen this film yet, as it wasn't in my initial list of downloads. I went back and searched for it, as I really wanted to see your film.

Glad I did.

The FX that you had were spot on. I also really enjoyed the titling. Did Chris do the pop/rock song as well?? Cool if he did (I've not read the above posts, maybe you answered that already)!

The lighting and camera work in here were also very nice.

I felt that the animation of the sister/robot dragged on, and the building of the remote control could have been shortened some as well ... both of which would have allowed more time for actual STORY and perhaps some ramifications of her actions (sister getting hit by the truck) and her emotions through it ... really could have ended on a very powerful note. Don't get me wrong, there's still a gut wrenching feeling seeing a family member put in harms way like that, especially if we had something to do with it, but a little more closure (something else) would have been nice.

The only other critique would have been when she was trying to get her sister to respond, and all I really saw was her wiggling around in the shop owners hands, and/or him just shaking her. More dramatic movement/interaction could have been called for, and that could have been shaved down as well, to allow for more story.

Otherwise, I enjoyed this, and really love seeing film makers involve their family in stuff ... which when it's all said and done, that's what matters most. Family.

[Norm Sanders]

Aram, just read your post above (none of the others though - short on time), and don't worry about that Sandler flick. From what I saw in the trailer it has more to do with controling time/elements than it does the specific people (i.e. he misses out on his kids' lifes, etc. because he lets time slip away to "get things done").

Also, I understand about frustration, but BOY that crying shot paid off ... it said SO much ... like she wanted to be able to control her self & get out of there, but she was a captive slave to her sister's remote/wishes. Very cool.

And you can't feel TOO badly about it, as I see you quicly picked up the camera to film the tears. :)

[Beat Takeshi]

Envision,
Thanks for the comments. :)
Lordz of Brooklyn did that song but I edited it a little.
I am lost when you say animation...
The building of the remote. I thought it might be a little long but I wanted to make sure people got that she was building it since it was a key scene. Im guessing the chip on her forehead came across since no one mentioned it. I wanted it and her eyes to glow for a sec when she first gets controlled in the bedroom.
The store scene. Yeah, its supposed to be her trying to break free because her sister is frantically controlling her but it just didnt work. I think about when I redo this what to do to make it better. It definitly needs to look like shes pulling away from him but hes holding on tight. I will have to do some tests. Plus her giggling was getting out of hand :) It was SOOOOOO hard to get her to stop. Plus the guy that owns the store knows her well and he kept joking around.. it was fun except for the amount of people that kept coming in.
Im really glad you understood her crying, thats EXACTLY what I was trying to convey. She normally would never do something like that but she has no choice and cant even speak up for herself. I think the reshoot I will have the owner saying hi to her and being really friendly but she doenst say anything.
Oh, thats another scene that got cut, her sister making her say things she didnt want to sort of in a terets way.


The ending. Yeah, I wanted her to get up and scream her name in slow motion but it just wasnt coming across. She was scared to scream outside so she did it silent like but it just wasnt feeling real. That wasnt actually going to be the ending. Here are the two endings i wanted to play with.
1. after the fade to black and we hear the screeching of the truck we fade back up to her on the ground with another kid her age on top getting up asking if shes ok. She says yes and rips the chip off her head. She looks at her sister with the glare from hell and turns to the boy and says thanks and gives him a hug. Shes asks his name and he says Kent, Clark kent... fade to black.
I didnt do this because of possible copyright issues so i though of other ways but they just didnt have the same impact.

ending 2. after the fade to black we fade back up again to a dolly overehead shot of the street and we get to the girl and see shes been hit but as we dolly across her body we start to see pieces of robotic parts all over. Her head turns to her sister and says "see what you did, mom is going to kick your ass now."
I thought that had a great twist and impact but timewise impossible for this contest and with the project I am on now.

Thanks for your input dude!!!

[arielman]

Hi Aram
Just read your last 2 post .
Thanks for offering a look in how you made this short .
I didn't realize the girls were your daughters and I'm glad this was a family affair . My kids wanted to involved as well with mine and I think that is GREAT!!

I think the ending you had was right on!! I can't picture another ending this one was right .

I have'nt seen Adam Sandlers trailer as of yet . Still yours was very good .

Again Thanks for the look inside of your short and good luck.
Ian

[Dahopafilms]

Aram,

I've now watched your short a couple of times and really thought many aspects were excellent.

Good stuff first.

The lighting and camera work were terrific. The shot on the stairs. The girl assembling her controller. The morning scene with the cat. All very different shots requiring different skills and techniques and each one pulled off beautifully.

The story itself was fun and very appealing to a wide audience. I'd bet most people would imagine themselves in the position of the "controller" rather than the "controllee". A nice, appealing concept.

The girl's tears in the grocery worked well too - she was in there but couldn't control her movements and must have been dying inside. Those tears told a huge story in and of themselves.

I liked the scoring work. I think you derived your music from the same licenced source as I did for my short, but you obviously put more effort into your scoring through a remix. Very talented and I think it really boosted your story very well.

I thought the ending ("girl meets truck") was fitting and hit hard. Nice job on your effects work on that scene. A very good ending.

Bad stuff next (and this is hard for me, in this case).

Sorry, but I never bought the acting of the girl who was being controlled from the second she became a robot in the bedroom. I just never believed it (and it wasn't the story I failed to buy, it was the presentation) - and I really wanted to. Everything else worked for me, except this one element. And I know it was a family project but that doesn't take away from the fact that I respect this piece so much that failing to point out this one (for me, big) problem would have been disrespectful to you. Of course, you won't pass that comment on to your daughter.

Otherwise, I though this was a great story and beautifully presented. More, please.

I am now going to go sit in a corner and feel shame for criticizing a little girl's acting.

[Beat Takeshi]

Hey Dahopa, she read the post and ran off crying and now she never wants to act in anything again and all her hopes and dreams are shattered.








Just kidding... The re-shoot of this will definitly take care of that aspect. I think the next time around she will be less giggly since she has seen the final output of our little ghetto shoot. It was hard and I had to be REALLY patient to get the shots I got. You have to admit though, her opening dialog was good. They both act that way for real.

Thanks for the compliments!
I havnt seen your short yet but the only music from that program is the store scene. The rest Chis Hurn did and I think he did a good job for a last minute beg. I originally asked him to work on the other Sci-Fi flick i was going to do with DVXnerd but that fell through and figured if I can get the time to shoot something I will have him score it even if its not so good of a shoot.

Arielman,
Yeah i am trying to get them into film making and keep asking my older daughter to start a film club in her highschool since shes the vice president of the student union of her grade. It would be cool if she started it and it survived until she was an old woman and she could take her grandkids there and say she started it. :)
I have a dark story i want to shoot and one, if not both, will have some part in it weather its in front or behind the camera.

[ChrisHurn]

Just wanted to pop in and say congratulations on the film. I enjoyed it a lot - nice ending. :)

Yeah, it was a last minute scoring job, I pretty much only had the one day to work on it, given the deadline was right round the corner and I still had to work on other shorts...haha, I remember that was a busy weekend. The store music isn't mine, I left it alone.

Congratulations again.

-Chris

[Beat Takeshi]

Oh .. edit... the song when she is building the remote is the Lordz of Brooklyn.
www.lordzofbrooklyn.com
Thanks Chris for fitting me in. Some more stuff coming down the pipe in a few.

[THX-1138]

You are high up there in the best score catagory that's for sure.

You know what you're doing that's obvious so I'll just speek to the things that cought my eye.

Building the robot scene.

The sceen where she's building the robot starts with dolly/zoom out sort of thing and then continues with dollys cu's and pans and tilts all from the same angle. Facing the girl. I would have liked to see some other angles cut into that montage. Also, it could have been shorter.

Color Corection

That might have been too heavy handed for my taste. It might just be the contrast of the "looks" from apt interior to int of store were too drastic or maybe too styalized. It's hard to articulate this one....it just bugged me. Maybe they just looked to Magic-Bullet-ey to me. Sorry for being ambiguous and critiqing CCing on windows media fils is dangetous anyway. That just struck me enough to comment.

thanks for the entry,

Kip Kubin

[Dahopafilms]

Hey Dahopa, she read the post and ran off crying and now she never wants to act in anything again and all her hopes and dreams are shattered.

Just kidding... The re-shoot of this will definitly take care of that aspect. I think the next time around she will be less giggly since she has seen the final output of our little ghetto shoot. It was hard and I had to be REALLY patient to get the shots I got. You have to admit though, her opening dialog was good. They both act that way for real.

Thanks for the compliments!
I havnt seen your short yet but the only music from that program is the store scene. The rest Chis Hurn did and I think he did a good job for a last minute beg. I originally asked him to work on the other Sci-Fi flick i was going to do with DVXnerd but that fell through and figured if I can get the time to shoot something I will have him score it even if its not so good of a shoot. ...

Your daughter can clearly act (given the "before-I-turn-into-a-robot" scenes). Undoubtedly, all in all, I am sure that you would still prefer to use her in your projects rather than some "pro".

And I better get Chris involved in my scoring next time because he really did a great job and, in the grocery scene, markedly improved on a pretty good existing product.

Thanks again.

[Beat Takeshi]

Your daughter can clearly act (given the "before-I-turn-into-a-robot" scenes). Undoubtedly, all in all, I am sure that you would still prefer to use her in your projects rather than some "pro".
Thanks again.

I definitly would use her in the thought that I will be making her one of those "pros" eventually from experience plus you just cant beat being around family and having fun. Of course if I were getting paid for the gig I would have to audition for the "right" fit. I think the next Fest we have we are going to bust out the big guns and really put something big together.

THX..
No magic bullet anywhere on this. Its all hand done. I do see where some of the color correction is a little harsh but yeah, its on purpose. I wanted mucho contrast in the look. I had a bunch of other shots of her building the remote at different angles but they just didnt seem to fit. I tried them in there too. There was just something more organic with the same basic angle. Some of the shots are actually nicer but they just didnt fit the edit.

Thanks guys for the compliments. :)

[EditPhish]

Aram,

Hello my fellow NYer -- sorry to be late in commenting, but you're close to last on my list ;)

Okay... so I really liked the scene where the older sister is building the robot remote control... though at the end the Rock'm Sock'm Robots shot felt out of sync... out of place.

You had a few bad jump cuts... two examples... in the scene where she's building the remote, at the beginning, when she goes to turn on the iPod... bad jump cut there. Also in the scene where the younger sister is waking up and holding the cat... bad jump cut there.

In general your lighting was good... only problem that struck me was when the younger sister was waking up... too much backlight, not enough light on her face.

Overall I really liked your concept... but it ended very dark... Call me corny, but I think I would have enjoyed it more if it ended with the big sister being redeemed... but really, that just comes down to personal taste. I don't always need a feel-good ending, but in the case of these two sisters, I hoped for it.


Thanks so much for sharing it... good job!

[Beat Takeshi]

Hey editfish, in posts up top i talk about the endings that were supposed to be.
Yeah, the cat jump cut is a forced edit because she started laughing and I didnt get enugh takes. It was 2 am when we shot that and I was trying to get her to sleep. I had to fake it like it was morning by the over exposing and stuff. It was actually dark as hell in there. The rockem robots was of course just to give that idea again of control. They were supposed to be on the table next to her but just didnt look right so I did a quick shot of them for a cutaway.
Thanks for the comments.

[EditPhish]

Hi Aram,

I think we're mixed up on one jump cut (maybe?)... the rock'm sock'm wasn't a bad jump cut... just seemed out of place to me (but thanks for the explanation)... the bad jump cut I was referring to is when she turns on the ipod (at the beginning of that scene).

Totally appreciate the working with your kids thing ;) -- It's a LOT of fun, but they aren't always the easiest to work with, especially when young. I've got lots of movies (and more outtakes than movies) to prove that, LOL

I scrolled up to read your alternate endings and like both ideas :) Sorry I missed them before.

[Beat Takeshi]

Hi Editphish, Did i post some garble? :)
um the jump cuts at the idog and the cat. yeah I know what you mean with the cat. I was hoping it was unnoticable and the idog cut, well I thought that was one i could get away with but i do see what you are talking about.
An editphish I am not :)
I actually HATE editing. You want to edit for me?


PS. I finally can sit down and start watching the fest films with full focus. :)

[EditPhish]

LOL Aram... see, my husband (JTyner) doesn't really like editing either, which I guess is why we make a good team LOL... considering we are starting to form a LIST of shorts we want to do now, I have a feeling my schedule is going to be pretty booked. Assuming when you said MsManhatten you meant your wife, maybe you could teach her ;)

[Beat Takeshi]

Heh, no shes not my wife. We have alot of history together though. We have this hard to explain relationship but it works great. She is the producer and writer of the team so editing would take away from that. We just finished editing a pilot and I think its time to have someone else do the editing. I cant stand it most of the time and forget what the story lines are and stuff like that. I seem to forget the big picture also when editing because I get caught up in the small technical things.
All 4 of us, well... actually 6 of us should get together for a dinner. Jdanstan is moving to park slope with his girl also and im hoping to get together with them.

[EditPhish]

Aram... cool that she's involved with your team... and a pilot sounds ambitious and way beyond anything we're ready for, LOL! Very cool!

I saw there was some mention of a NYC "meet" going on soon... JTyner and I would like to try to make that so I'll go over and refresh myself on the details... do I remember correctly that you were going to speak somewhere? We are actually outside the city (on LI) but only a short train or car ride away.

[Beat Takeshi]

Im going to speak? HELL NO, I be a mumbling mofo. Especially when im nervous. I can do sign language though without stuttering. I think the meeting is the first or second week of March. I have to go and check myself.
The pilot was very ambitious I guess, it was one of those things that you dont plan to do but it just happens. After a long year of development we are finished and its been a rough road. Maybe we will show it at the meeting. But... i would have to check with my producer first. :)

[EditPhish]

Hey, I give you props for being so focused... we haven't quite achieved that yet with filmmaking, LOL

I went over and checked and saw I had you confused with someone else ;) -- We'll try to be at the meet for sure

[Beat Takeshi]

HAHA, so im not the big hairy cockeyed freak that you thought I was. Thats ok, I just saw you were not the bucktoothed tranny I thought you were. I had you confused with someone else. :)
Well, i dont know if it can be called a film making achievment because its a reality kids thing. There is no such thing as cinematography in it at all.
The focus comes from working in a corporate environment for the first time and hating every single second of it. If I were happy where i worked I probably would have never gotten off my butt for something this involved. I think that should be a requirement for anyone that has a dream. Go work for corporate america to get that real inner drive to get the hell out and do what you want and love.

[EditPhish]

Or, do what I do... work in the advertising/marketing/design field and always be on a deadline... that'll get ya focused, REAL fast. I think our lack of focus comes from the need/want for instant gratification... we've had to learn that you shouldn't write, shoot, edit and score a movie in one weekend ;)

[Beat Takeshi]

HAHA, thats for sure. We did that this year, we entered the brooklyn midnight run 24hour film contest. It was boot camp but fun and we are going to do it again.
Are you freelance or work for an agency?

[EditPhish]

both ;) -- I do freelance work, I also subcontract for an agency, and I work full-time for an in-house corporate "agency". I love it... have been doing it a long time now.

We've been thinking about doing one of those 24 hour fests... I'd be interested to hear more about the Brooklyn one... or a link to more info if you'd like to share ;)

but on that note I do have to hit the sack... work tomorrow, but at least only 1/2 day ;)

[Z B Brox]

I really enjoyed the scene creating the device, right down to the way the audio started out an internal feature of the scene and became an external soundtrack. Really neat looking scene, fun to watch.

Like some others, though, I got a little less interested when the device got put into use. The movie looked less cinematic, and my sympathies for the characters were suddenly reversed. (I really didn't want to feel sorry for the snotty younger girl, but, alas ;) I thought the acting was pretty good, on the whole, and it's a nice wish fulfillment idea, too.

Really enjoyed the film, thanks!

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

Ok sorry it took me so long to see this and comment:

This was very charming movie -- lots of great lighting and the assembly scene was shot really really well. Some of the angles and stuff other places reminded me of Robert Rodriguez's short Bed Head -- cool. Shooting off the theft mirror was inspired.

Dings -- a lot of the editing could be tightened up -- assembly scene -- whlie absolutley gogeous should probably be a third as long. -- also editing should be a lot tighter in the getting caught out / running into the truck scene. Eveyone's pulse is quickening there - the store owner, the older sister, the younger sister and the pacing of the editing should reflcet that -- also, then when you have the reaction shot of the older sister it will have more payoff.
Final ding - Acting a little forced at times.

I really enjoyed wathcing this -- the look and setups were great -- also liked teh way you used current technologies and presented them in a way that scemed scifi.

Awesome ...

OK getting in a UHAUL to drive 13 -15 hours, but had to check y'all out before I had no hispeed for a while/ voting closes.

later

[iSTy]

Clear picture although wasn't impressed with the acting. Good concept, although the shopkeeper accused the girl of shoplifting before she had even got as far as the door. Didn't like the music that much. But I did like the idea.

[Beat Takeshi]

Thanks for the comments guys. Yeah, it seems that the building of the remote went on a little long for some. I can definitly tighten it up. I think it went on for that long because of the mix I made of the music and I wasnt thinking about how long it felt watching it.

The part where he is accusing her of stealing is forced I didnt think about it when shooting but after I got home I thought dang, I should have had her go out the door.

Brox, the change in look was because I shot that store scene before the rest of it and it was on Christmas day. Just wanted to get the shots and get out but the store was super busy for some reason that day. It was very fustrating sitting there waiting for people to clear out.

hey Jack, look forward to meeting you and the wifey. Have a safe trip down and congratulations on your placing.