The Shaman came out in March. And now, after a profitable run at movie festivals, you may lastly see it for your self.
At seventeen minutes, The Shaman is a bit longer than many different shorts, however that’s to not its detriment. It simply contributes to the general sense that what you’re truly seeing is a full cinematic characteristic movie—which is smart, because it was initially conceived as one. Marco Kalantari (Ainoa) makes use of each second he has to full impact. Now we have would-building, efficient exposition, motion scenes, and a confrontation that’s all about willpower.
The premise is that a warfare is being waged–a conflict wherein shamans are used to go to the afterlife, so as to speak to the souls of the enemy’s conflict machines. A couple of minutes of dialog can deliver these souls over–a victory for the shamans. However in a battle with one among
them, a shaman will get a than he bargained for.
he highly acclaimed, blockbuster-style short film THE SHAMAN premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York in 2015. After that it ran successfully at numerous film festivals around the globe, including Los Angeles, London, San Diego and the DragonCon in Atlanta. The trailer turned into a viral sensation with over 4 million views.
The dark year 2204, in a world that has seen 73 years of continuous war. Recently mankind re-discovered the arts of Shamanism. The Shaman’s school of thought believes that every person or object has a soul. During battle Shamans step over into the Netherworld to find and convert the souls of their enemies’ giant battle machines. This tactic enables a single man to overcome an invincibly seeming steel monster.
This is the story of Joshua, a Shaman, who is sent on a mission to convert the soul of a giant battle colossus. He does not yet know that the soul is prepared for his coming and that the deadly psychological soul-to-soul confrontation in the Netherworld will be on eye level.
The Belgian non-governmental (NGO), non-profit organization APOPO has made it their incredibly admirable mission to train the highly intelligent African giant pouched rats aka HeroRATS to use their noses for such humanitarian purposes as expediently detecting bombs in post-conflict countries and detecting tuberculosis in developing countries, thus potentially saving the lives of thousands of people. The rats are trained from a young age and are rewarded through positive motivation.
APOPO trains the rats through operant conditioning, using a combination of a click sound and food rewarding. Training starts at the age of 4-5 weeks, with socialization. The young rats are weaned from their mothers and APOPO’s trainers begin socializing them to the sights, sounds, and textures of the human world. Once our rats are six weeks old, click training begins, where we teach the rats to associate a click sound with a food reward – usually banana or peanuts. After two weeks at this stage, the rats learn that click means food, and are now ready to be trained on a target scent. After these steps, our rats specialize in a target scent in either TNT for detecting landmines or TB for detecting TB in human sputum samples. After odor imprint, the complexity of their tasks gradually increases until they reach the final training stage where they have to do a blind test in order to be accredited.
As of this date, none of the HeroRATS have died in the line of duty and the trainers take special care to apply sunscreen to the rodents’ ears when they are working outside. Anyone wishing to contribute to APOPO can either donate directly or “adopt” a HeroRAT with an ongoing subscription.
KUNG FURY - FULL MOVIE
Autodesk Helps Fido Unleash Action-Packed VFX for "Kung Fury". Warning: Bad Language
| kung-fury | production
Following a successful Cannes Film Festival premiere, David Sandberg's 80s-inspired film Kung Fury makes its highly anticipated online debut this week. Kickstarter-funded by 17,000 backers, the 30-minute film follows a Miami-based kung fu cop as he time travels from the 80s to the 40s on a mission to take out Adolf Hitler - a plotline augmented by 399 over-the-top VFX shots delivered by a 46-person crew at Scandinavian VFX house Fido. Using Autodesk 3D modeling, animation and digital sculpting solutions, Fido created and refined dynamic 3D assets and scenes to bring Sandberg's 80's cop drama homage to life.
Throughout ?Kung Fury,? the story unfolds in three major environments: a street intersection, a police station interior and a huge steampunk-inspired Nazi hall. Fido created each environment digitally and then integrated the work with live action green screen footage of actors. Given trailer assets originally designed by Sandberg in 3ds Max, Fido transferred the files to in-house Maya workstations and used the assets as an aesthetic guideline to model, texture and refine the film?s environments, elements and main CG characters, including two robots, a Tyrannosaurus rex and an eagle. After finalizing VFX work and compositing, Fido?s crew then applied a specially designed filter to footage to achieve the VHS-reminiscent look that Sandberg envisioned.
?The movie is essentially a 30-minute VFX rollercoaster ride, so we had our work cut out for us, but having Maya as a pillar of our pipeline put us at ease. David also directs with a strong creative vision and deep understanding of VFX, so even though we faced some pretty crazy challenges, it really helped that he speaks the same language we do,? shared VFX Supervisor Cameron Scott. ? All our Autodesk tools were stable workhorses throughout production. Using Maya?s Alembic support, we were able to quickly transfer 3D assets between programs to work efficiently and meet David?s deadlines.?
?There are so many fun, crazy characters, environments and scenarios in ?Kung Fury? that VFX played a crucial role in the story. Because of my background in commercial production, I?m familiar with all the VFX tools and techniques, so I worked closely with Fido on the VFX,? said Sandberg. ?I?ve worked with Autodesk tools for a while now, and they?re some of the most best 3D modeling and animation tools out there. With outstanding creative talent like Fido behind the wheel of software like Maya, almost anything is possible, and that?s evident in the VFX they delivered for ?Kung Fury.??
About ?Kung Fury?
?Kung Fury? is an over-the-top Kickstarter-funded action comedy written and directed by David Sandberg with VFX by Fido. An 80s style action packed adventure, the film takes place in a variety of exotic locations, including Miami circa 1980s and Asgard and Germany circa 1940s, and features over-the-top characters like arcade-robots, dinosaurs, nazis, vikings, norse gods, mutants and a super kung fu-cop called Kung Fury. Sandberg completed the film in a little over a year with a strong vision and help from Kickstarter supporters, friends and family. The director is currently in talks with Hollywood producers to recreate the film as a full-length feature.
Credits:
Director and Writer: David Sandberg
Fido VFX crew:
VFX Supervisor: Cameron Scott
VFX Producer: Matilda Olsson
VFX Executive Producer: Claes Dietmann
VFX Production Manager: Anders Singstedt
Lead Lighting TDs: Johan Gabrielsson & Filip Orrby
Composting Leads: Daniel Norlund & Tomas Näslund
VFX Pre-Production Breakdown: Nils Lagergren, Kaj Steveman, Eva Åkergren
Pipeline Engineer: Erik Johansson
Systems Administrator: Thomas Eriksson
Asset Management: ftrack
VFX Artists: Alexander Eriksson, Anders Nyman, Cameron Scott, Carlos Correia, Chris Judkins, Daniel Norlund, David Enbom, David Nelin, Egil Eskilsson, Erika Johansson, Filip Orrby, Fredrik Höglin, Fredrik Olsson, Gustav Alexandersson, Janak Thakker, Joakim Eriksson, Joakim Olsson, Johan Gabrielsson, Jonas Lindfors, Jonas Manell, Jonathan Skifs, Karl Rydhe, Klas Trulsson, Kristian Livén, Kristian Rydberg, Kristian Zarins, Laura Andersen, Magnus Eriksson, Martin Borell, Mattias Sandelius, Mattias Snygg, Niklas Lundgren, Rickard Engqvist, Rodrigo Vivedes, Sandra Scholz, Staffan Linder, Stefan Lagerstam, Sven Ahlström, Teo Mathlein, Tomas Näslund, Viktor Andersson, Zebastian Lilja
[tweetmeme]Tonight’s edition of “Dark Wave”— the Sunday night celebration of the “darker side of classic alternative” on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave— featured music by The Sisters of Mercy, This Mortal Coil, Dif Juz, Revolting Cocks, Shriekback, Nash the Slash, Sex Gang Children, The Sound, Siouxsie and the Banshees, PiL, Coil and more.
“Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs founder/editor Matt Sebastian, airs every Sunday from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Eastern on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave (Channel 33). The most recent two episodes also are available as part of Sirius XM’s new On Demand service for online subscribers.
Finally, if you’ve got requests for future shows, drop ’em in the comments below.
Playlist: “Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs’ Matt Sebastian — 4/26/15
This Mortal Coil, “Drugs”
Killing Joke, “A New Day”
Front 242, “Circling Overhead”
Peter Murphy, “Final Solution”
The Cure, “Accuracy”
The Chameleons, “Inside Out”
Anne Clark, “Heaven”
Douglas J. McCarthy, “Move On”
Lords of Acid, “I Sit on Acid”
Christian Death, “Dogs”
Iron Curtain, “Shadow”
Moev, “Yeah, Whatever” (12-Inch Version)The Smiths, “Headmaster Ritual”
Abecedarians, “Misery of Cities”
The Jesus and Mary Chain, “Cherry Came Too”
Throwing Muses, “Saving Grace”
That Petrol Emotion, “It’s a Good Thing”
Love and Rockets, “Waiting for the Flood”
Leonard Cohen, “Everybody Knows”
Dif Juz, “No Motion”
Echo and the Bunnymen, “With a Hip”
Coil, “The Snow (Answers Come in Dreams II)”
Depeche Mode, “To Have and To Hold”
Public Image Ltd., “The Order of Death”
Revolting Cocks, “Crackin’ Up”
Ministry, “Revenge”
Nash the Slash, “Swing-Shift”
Siouxsie and the Banshees, “Song From the Edge of the World”
Flesh For Lulu, “Cat Burglar”
Joy Division, “The Only Mistake”
Sex Gang Children, “Guy Wonder”
Xmal Deutschland, “Incubus Succubus II”
The Sisters of Mercy, “Black Planet”
Passion Puppets, “Like Dust”
The Psychedelic Furs, “Sister Europe” (Peel Session)The Mission, “Stay With Me”
Bauhaus, “Fear of Dub”
Gary Numan, “A Dream of Siam”
Skinny Puppy, “Stairs and Flowers”
The Sound, “Sense of Purpose”
Shriekback, “Underwaterboys”
Balam and the Angel, “On the Run”
The Creatures, “Around the World”
