Experimental film- 'Fracturing Time' Ideas

Initial Ideas

Learning from research i had done for my essay on perspective, i was interested to see how i could develop further, the idea of how perspective effects our concept of time. My mind immediately went to the stair scene in the film 'Labyrinth', part of which i covered in my essay. No concept of time is present in this scene, as the protagonist is stuck in a room filled with 'seemingly impossible architecture'. The stairs are leading from all directions so you lose the knowledge of what is up and what is down. 

Labyrinth 'Within You' scene

Inspired by Escher's painting 'Relativity' i thought it'd be amazing if i could try and re-create that space. I had watched a few films that involved miniatures so thought that i could make my own miniature and manipulate the image to make it look realistic, as building life-size stairs would prove to be impossible for a weekly project. I wanted to experiment with making a small space where time just seemed non-existent but wasn't really sure how to go about this. 

M.C.Escher 'Relativity' 

I did attempt to make my own mini staircases out of card so i could create a little world from there. I even followed a YouTube tutorial on how to make model staircases:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDMF7N4WPqo

The process was very time consuming so i brainstormed some other ideas.

I had some little cut outs of buildings in Amsterdam so decided that i could create a little 3 dimensional world using those and play around with the perspective. I didn't know how to make that possible without sticking them to the wall at an angle which i couldn't do as i didn't want to take off the paint. So, i decided to improvise and build around something already suspended; my lamp. This was also a source of light and created shadows when i held the buildings up close to it which created more of an atmosphere and depth. I didn't have any string so ended up piecing it together with headphones. A very DIY situation. The light was very intense so i decided to soften it by cutting a piece of yellow card to fit. I just begun to arrange them in a jumbled order to create a kind of small-scale dimension. Getting them to stay put was a challenge in itself as, when one fell, all of them fell.  

When i took photos, the background was too busy and the illusion of a different dimension wasn't coming across, i decided to make a box to put around the lamp to contain the light and create a space. I made this simply and quickly out of card. (below)

Yellow card to soften the light (below).

I ended up using washy tape to help hold it all together as i was doing this late at night so didn't have the time to run our for resources. It was one of those situations where i'd fallen half asleep and then had a sudden idea. 

I was restricted on how i could angle and hang the buildings as I had to use each one to hang the other. They became more like a chain and the rest was down to how i angled my phone camera.

I tried a little test shot but realised that there was still open space at the top that i'd forgotten about. 

I quickly fixed that by cutting out another bit of card to cover the blank space and help to contain the light. (shown above and below)

It improved the outcome slightly as the colour palette was now matching, however, there was still a little spill of light ruining the effect of a completely different space. I knew that it wasn't going to be perfect as it was a last minute burst of inspiration and just a bit of fun to get me motivated but i still wanted to make it as good as it could be/as believable as it could be.

For example, Blade Runner  (shown below) used an immensely detailed miniature to create the illusion of this other world. Of course a lot of the magic is completed through rigorous post-production edits but the basis of it all lies within the miniature sets devised by the arts department. In many ways, it's more accessible and versatile than location shooting because you're in complete control of the image. It's a more strenuous process but the results are mind-blowing. I think the thing that excites me about miniatures are the endless creative possibilities involved in creating one. Obviously a miniature is the king of manipulation, as it depicts a space far bigger than it actually is in real life. Therefore, this classic manipulation of space and time was something i has to explore.

As i didn't have a production team and just had my bedroom, i decided to focus on creating a space in which the audience wouldn't be able to know where they were or where, in relation to the space, the camera was. The outcome doesn't look very professional and the lighting isn't ideal because of the time of night, but i simply wanted to play around with the theme of space and time and the manipulation of that. I feel like it would be difficult to guess, without any context, that this little world was created around my bedroom lamp. It temporarily became a little time capsule.

Towards the end, I almost liked the accidental little spill of light coming through the top. It's almost a tease to the audience. The possibility of breaking past this odd little space and out into a brighter, new one. I also just wanted to take a series of photographs for this instead of film it as i simply wanted a sense of how i could construct little miniatures. I could then use these as a reference if i wanted to develop the miniature idea in future.

I think the construction of a believable miniature takes a lot of time and concentration so, after this little experiment, i probably won't pursue it for the weekly project as i won't be able to execute it properly with the time available. However, I will use the research collected and the experimentation done to pursue it at a later date when i have more time. I think the use of miniatures in film is definitely something that interests me and it links very well to the theme of manipulating time. Ironically, i just need more time :)

Examples of films that used miniature effects:

Titanic

The completed 1/20th scale model for the boat was 44.5 feet in length and was used for most of the shots of the ship, most notably, the sailing of the Titanic on the open seas.  The use of the miniature was one of the factors that made this film so remarkable and revolutionary for its time. This model was, at the time, the most accurate and detailed ever made.

Inception

Christopher Nolan's 'Inception' depicts a dream world anyway, despite the added illusion of the miniature used for the explosion of the hospital on top of a snowy mountain. The use of this just adds to the utter manipulation this film entails. Reality becomes a figment of ones imagination through it all. They used 2200 pounds of salt to cover the mountain and buildings. It took several takes until Nolan was truly satisfied but, again, this is possible because a miniature is re-build able. It would be unacceptable to go and blow up a real hospital 5 times but, a miniature gives a director that flexibility.

Casino Royal

The sinking Palazzo was created in a studio with a mix of CGI (the blue screen) and intricate model work. They constructed a 1:3 scale replica of the buildings which were then composited into the scene through the use of CGI.

Grand Budapest Hotel

This film has been notably praised on its use of beautifully constructed miniatures used in the majority of the film. Wes Anderson decided to use miniature models to represent the hotel's exteriors. Anderson said that "audiences tend to recognise what is artificial, whether in computer-generated effects or otherwise", and that gave him liberty to use models. The model itself was 9 feet tall.

Green Screen

We had a green screen workshop with Anne where we used a set up of lights to create an accurate depiction of the model facing the sun in space. We worked hard to get the intensity of light and the placing of it just right to create that illusion. We also learn how to composite this into the scene. I hope to get more confident in the use of the green screen to then have the confidence to commit to a miniature. 

This is a similar template to the one we were going to use to place the model in. We also had to get him in the right position in relation to the frame.