Thursday, July 2, 2009

Set Progress



I am almost done with the sets. There are only two of them this time, but the apartment set is very detailed so it is taking me a bunch of time to do. I am still waiting on some miniature items to arrive from ebay(cork bottle jars and a small persian rug as well as some other accessories). I have finished all the main pieces, so now I just need to clutter it up and fill it with piles of stuff.

This is the main part of the flower field, I painted brown paint, then hot glued all these flowers in. This is where the main action will take place, but there will be more grass and flowers surrounding this board that will have lots of real wheatgrass that goes into the horizon.


the backdrop. Originally I wanted it all yellow, like in that painting that inspired the feeling and colors of the video, but now I think I want a light blending of teal in it as well to bring the teal into the sky. More of a teal tint to an orangy yellow sunset sky.


Great little aside... I have massive amounts of this pink, firm, yet spongey, foam that I got for free when I bought an old 1990's Super Soaker on Amazon Marketplace last month. It was used instead of packing peanuts. each block is about 1"x 4" x 2" , so I have used it in several instances to glue together and carve into things. Here I am using it in conjunction with cardboard to make a couch.




Before I hot glued the hardwood floor panels, I spray glued a piece of thick paper to the wood table. I did this so I can reuse the wood table in the future, but still have the set floor sturdily joined to the table..


the flowers before I added brown paint. If I was smart I would have painted it first. I somehow thought once I glued the grass down I wouldn't see blaring white. Ah the things you learn.


hardwood floor. Now to make these floors, I went to the habitat for humanity re-store store and bought some wood blinds for 3 dollars. they were easy to cut up into smaller pieces and I kept some of them whole to make the close up floor. I stained them a darker brown.


The close up floor. Looks black in this pic, but it's brown


Cheap baseboard and wall molding? Buy a bunch of plastic frames at the 99 cent store and cut them up.


I just plopped him down to see what it would look like. I definitely would not have the lighting be so flat in the real video.


drove my car around the corner to an overgrown sidewalk and did a little weeding. I have a bag full of this stuff which I am hot glueing between the fake flowers and on the ground so it looks less manicured and more wild.














The apartment is coming along, still needs more stuff, it is too clean rigt now.


I bought a little baggy full of little animals, spray painted them gold and am putting them around the room.


PLOT
Here is a more concrete plot to the video (Howard, this can still be changed within the parameters of the sets if you want within the next week, so if you want to add some specific moment or other in here, mention it now :)

The video starts out in a close up aerial shot of empty hardwood floors, a bunch of items(buttons, paper, pens, tissue etc) come together to formulate a picture of the string man's face, the image turns into a real life image of him sitting on the couch of Isadora's abode. You see he is surrounded by all of her oddball things(golden rabbit statues, string of pearls hanging from the ceiling, piles of collections and papers). He looks a little uncomfortable and concerned looking at all of the items. Isadora, across the room getting them a snack from the kitchen. While I imagine that they have been together for a long time, this is the first time he has been to her apartment in a long long time, if ever.

Isadora notices that String man is looking out of place and this is when she grabs the pile of items from the table and leads string man to the empty spot on the floor. When the items formulate the image of them in the meadow of flowers, it is a memory of the time that they first met - Isadora was picking flowers and String man was playing his guitar. Isadora is wearing her teal skirt to signify that it is a different time, and of course everything is a little extra saturated in her memory. They seem really happy.
The final image of them transitions back into the collage of items on the floor. Isadora's hand reaches out and grabs a crusty, dried up flower from the pile and holds it close to her. Even though it's just a flower, it means a lot to her as a memory of a time she really cherished.

String man, while understanding the importance, thinks that she's gone a bit overboard to the point where she isn't embracing the moment because she is too concerned with collecting her memories and putting them on a pedestal.

He tries to take the flower from her to have a moment with her but she is too occupied with her things and feels hurt that he doesn't seem to understand. After looking around a little more he goes over to her and ask to take her hand. He ties some fabric across her eyes and leads her off screen.

The next shot is a close up of her face with the blindfold, we see his hands remove the blind fold and her eyes light up, pulling out we see that he has taken her back to the flower field that they first met in. She, begins to look around the field and begins to pick a flower when String man stops her, pulls her to him - wanting her to spend the moment with him and not trying to collect more tokens. For the first time in the video since the memory she really looks at him.

And that's how it ends. They way I figure it, him taking her to the field is his way of meeting her halfway in appreciating the sentimental value of her memories, but he just wants her to remember that she needs to live in the moment. It's a bit of a problem that I deal with myself... being a photographer I obsessively take pictures of things, worried that one day I will forget something, but sometimes I live a whole day or event behind the lens and forget to actually enjoy it.

Within the main plot, there will be several times where we ct back to the spot on the floor where all sorts of items will come to life and dance around on the floor, corresponding to the items mentioned in the lyrics that he finds throughout the apartment.

Off I go!

2 comments:

  1. I am truly amazed at the amount of work you get done in such a short period of time! Incredible!!

    Everything looks super cool. I love the couch.

    Good luck and keep up the awesome pace you got going...you're on a roll!

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  2. Speed of light move over, Vanessa is coming through. So fast! You make me feel like a slacker! Haha keep it up.

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