This is our green screen set-up for one of the projects we just shot. We were shooting some different pieces of fabric swooshing across the camera to use as transitions. It turned out great and we’re really excited about how much these transitions will add to the final product.

Until now. Read on to see what changed my mind.

I had heard how on indie films people had used a green or blue screen outdoors. This supposedly had the advantage of even lighting without any real work. I’d always wanted to try it, but I had no frame and I couldn’t think of anywhere else to hang the screen.

My dad came to the rescue last week with a great idea: Grab a few clamps and hang the blue screen from the gutter on our house. Hanging the screen in front of the garage door ensured enough room to back off for a wide shot.

I hurried outside to try it. The day was pretty windy, so the screen was constantly in motion. This is unfortunate, since that messed up the key a little. But still, I got results at least as good as those in iSundae II with about ten minutes of work. Compare that to the hours I spent on a single shot for iSundae II!

Here’s my test video:

I’m looking forward to seeing what I can do when the wind isn’t ruining my shot!

By the way, on the subject of chroma keying, I’ve been messing around with the demo of DVmatte Blast recently. It does a very nice job!

Believe me, after twenty minutes of acting under two-thousand watts of light (and more than five yards of velvet) you feel like you’re flying, and it’s not a pleasant sensation.

Staying cheerful and hydrated during the Flying Machine Sequence was one of the hardest and most personally challenging things I did during the production of iSundae II. The staying cheerful part especially. Bad attitudes can spread like wildfire on the best of days, and filming in a tight area just makes them spread faster. I think the extra effort showed as Gwenanda getting steadily crazier. We got quite a few outtakes and “behind the scenes” clips. I guess those made up, in a small way, for the difficulties.

The room we were filming in would have been a great size if we had taken all the furniture out, but that wasn’t really practical. So all seven of us crammed in between the couches, television, speakers, bookcases, recliner, and foosball table. Us, and two of our biggest production lights. When you get that many heat-producing bodies in that size of an area, things warm up really quick. With the lights it was just awful. Oh, and then we lost about three feet off of one end of the room because the weather-balloon of a blue screen had to hang a ways out from the wall. But somehow we all crammed in there and made it to filming.

As soon as you can get over not being able to see much and the vague feeling that you’re in a giant microwave, filming with the big lights isn’t too bad. I’m here to testify that you can get used to it! Just make sure that none of your costume fabrics are flammable.

Acting for this scene was easy. We actually got to sit down almost the entire time! We faced the flying machine left, and said our lines. We faced the machine toward the camera, and said our lines. We turned to the right, and said our lines. You get the basic idea. And you’d think we would know our lines really well by the end of the first two times through, but you’re reckoning without the heat. And it didn’t help that as we got more loopy, things seemed more funny.

All in all it was a . . . good experience. I now know how to survive under all that velvet. You don’t think about it, and try to help everyone else forget that we’re presenting a passable imitation of baked trout. And it did pay off. We got some great footage and ended up having fun.

Here’s a video of some of the craziness from the flying machine filming day:

Behind the Scenes of the Flying Machine from Phantom Moose Films on Vimeo.

So, how do you make a floating head?

We solved this by having me wear a large green box that came down to my waist and got in the way of every gesture I instinctively wanted to make. It was quite a task to try to help Ruth set up microphones when I couldn’t move my arms at all.

How does Malfhok carry stuff?

Far into the writing of iSundae, we encountered a difficulty. We had given Malfhok a Book of Knowledge, but no way to carry it. We thought of two remedies. A: We could make it float with him. B: A podium would appear in a puff of smoke whenever he needed the book.

We settled on option A, as it was much easier.

Floating up and down.

The script called for Malfhok to float up or down in a few places. Depending on the height of the float, I either rose from a squatting position, or stepped off a stool. I preferred the first method, as the second could result in some nasty accidents.

That’s only three things we ran into!