DEVELOPING ACROSS THE SCREEN
Animation and the Industry
TEDIOUS TRANSITIONS
Pleasing Fans: Books to Movies
WORKING IN THE SPOTLIGHT
The Grit Behind the Glory
THE NEXT HOLLYWOOD See High School Students Discover Another World
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Don’t forget a single moment
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THE 2013 MOVIE SEASON the harsh truth of what people think about last year’s movies
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BY GABE ALVAREZ
BOOKS, CAMERA, ACTION! how fans react to movie adaptations of their favorite books BY RUTH EDISON
WHO’S THE GREATEST?
analyses and biographies of the best villains of all time
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BY RUTH EDISON
PRODUCING OUR NEXT FILMMAKERS highschoolers experimenting with and discovering film BY AMIR DOWNING
BEHIND THE ANIMATIONS
the mechanics behind the dancing images on your screen BY AMIR DOWNING
THE FUTURE HAS ARRIVED the effect of animation on the changing world around us BY GABE ALVAREZ
HEROES’ JOURNEY
a timeline of the Tesseract in “Thor” and “Captain America”
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CONTENTS
BY EVELYN BURD
OFF THE PAGE AND ONTO THE STAGE a story illustrating the difficulites of living in the spotlight BY EVELYN BURD
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THE PRODUCERS
PHOTOS BY NICA LASATER
EVELYN BURD FAVORITE MOVIE - TITANIC Evelyn Burd has lived in the same house for her entire life. She has shot many little films with her friends around the the neighborhood, and utilized the “slo-mo” feature many times. Her favorite actor is and always will be the famed Leonardo DiCaprio. She went to an all girls school for two years and had to adjust to the crude humor of boys again at the start of high school. She enjoys writing, and throughout the semester has been teased for her flowery words. Creating a magazine with a seriously OCD group has been a trying process, but didn’t end up being that bad (and actually kind of fun), and has led to a product that she is proud of.
GABE ALVAREZ FAVORITE MOVIE - THE USUAL SUSPECTS Gabe is a native Texan, but is half Puerto Rican. He enjoys spending his free time watching soccer as well as playing competitively for both his club and school teams. He has recently discovered a love for movies and movie-making, and is a part of LASA’s Audio Video Production class. He has acted in, produced and edited several short films, and hopes to one day be a part of a professional feature film crew or cast. Every week, the Alvarez family gets together and watches a movie; however, most of the time is usually spent choosing the movie. Gabe doesn’t know what he wants to do when he grows up, but he hopes there will still be time for film.
RUTH EDISON FAVORITE MOVIE - THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE Ruth Edison has always lived in Texas, and has traveled to many states in the U.S., as well as taking exciting excursions to France and India. She loves to read and considers it to be a hobby on the verge of becoming full-time obsession. Her favorite books are the “Divergent” trilogy and the “Mortal Instruments” series, and she also enjoys singing. She participated in choir from fourth to eighth grade, and performed a solo in her final year with the group. She is an ardent “Star Wars” fan and has even read book adaptations of the movies. She enjoys watching movies that are produced from her favorite books, as well as adventure films.
AMIR DOWNING FAVORITE MOVIE - DJANGO UNCHAINED Austin-native Amir Downing is an aspiring mechanical engineer who spends his free time working with his school’s robotics team as a designer, builder and marketing chief. In addition, he enjoys playing classical guitar. He also does some light reading about string theory and quantum mechanics when he has the time. Amir has enjoyed watching movies since elementary school and has also been an avid follower of the film industry and its major developments. He especially enjoys the work of directors Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino; movies such as “Pulp Fiction,” “Django Unchained” and “The Departed” are among his favorites.
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letter from the editors
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start young, taking film classes and summer camps, learning the filmmaking technique at an early age, whereas others have no clue of the sheer quantity of work that goes into a production. So we delved into LASA’s Audio Video Production course to provide insight on this branch of filmmaking. Once we decided to learn more, we realized that there was no end to what we could discover, because the depth of the film industry is limitless. The topic of film seemed too broad at first; we thought that there would be too much information for us to choose specific elements to focus on. But once we started choosing topics for our articles, researching and writing, we realized just how specific it can get. And in a way, this made our magazine special, because in the broad topic, we were able to choose specific stories that interested us individually and what we believe will appeal to others as well. We hope you enjoy.
Evelyn Burd
Gabe Alvarez
Amir Downing
Ruth Edison
—The Editors
PHOTO BY NICA LASATER
We all enjoy a good film production. Who doesn’t like curling up on a couch with pillows and blankets, a bowl of popcorn in hand to watch actors put on a show, or animations dance across a screen? But we realized that we didn’t know about the actual work that goes on behind the screen. There were so many questions that we couldn’t answer. What’s the life of an actor actually like? How are animations made? What’s really better, the book or the movie? We thought, if we could find these answers, we would enjoy watching films more. If you’re aware of the hard work that goes into a production, if you understand what people do to succeed, you can appreciate the medium better. We figured that we couldn’t be the only ones that didn’t have the answers to some of these questions, so we decided to answer them throughout this magazine. In addition to these questions, we wanted to to tell the story of our high school’s own filmmaking class. Some students
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by GABE ALVAREZ
Out of the 686 movies released in 2013, some left us laughing, some made us cry, and some even caused us to cringe. But, only 10 have made our list. With help from Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, IMDB and various editors’ reviews, Final Cut has crafted the ultimate inventory of the very best and worst movies of 2013. PHOTO BY COLUMBIA PICTURES
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“A missed opportunity.” - James Bernardinelli, ReelViews “There is no depth to the piece and, while it might be asking too much of any film to show the ‘real’ Jobs, it barely hints at the complexity of his ambitions and emotions.” - Charlie McCollum, San Jose News
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“This is pretty silly stuff, Twilite if you will, but played with...no discernible humor and minimal excitement.” - Tom Charity, CNN.com “[A] bizarre Saturday Night Live sketch about a girl with a bratty alien inside her.” - Owen Gliebermann, Entertainment Weekly
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“R.I.P.D. is a dud that squanders a decent cast and succeeds neither as the comedy nor the action film it purports to be.” - Stephanie Merry, Washington Post “It’s a predictable and cliché filled soap opera mess played straight with an afterlife gimmick.” - Robert Kojder, What Culture
THE WORST MOVIE OF 2013
“It’s another pointless romp through Sandlerland — where the women are buxom, the kids have catch-phrases and the jokes are below average.” - Roger Moore, Movie Nation “Even as temporary visitors, the audience can feel IQ points slipping away.” - Claudia Puig, USA Today
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“The futuristic production design is blandly generic, the special effects, props and costumes cheap and slapdash-looking.” - Michael Sullivan, Washingon Post
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“Largely free of Sandler’s usual schmaltz and lame romance, it’s pure plotless... bizarre and inept in a way that’s fascinating without ever being all that funny.” - Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, The A.V. Club “So, what happens in Grown Ups 2? Almost absolutely nothing.” - Robbie Collin, The Telegraph
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“The movie lurches from one gross-out scene to another, flipping the bird at continuity and logic. It honestly seems as if Sandler and his team descended on a random suburb, halfheartedly improvising and moving on when they got bored.” - Sara Stewart, New York Post
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“Nebraska is a film of raw beauty and great humanity.” - Claudia Puig, USA Today
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“Captain Phillips is such an impressive dramatic achievement that it comes as a shock when it gets even better, during a devastating final scene in which Hanks... dismantles Hollywood notions of macho heroism in one shattering, virtually wordless sequence.” - Ann Hornaday, Washington Post
“Shot in beautiful tones of black and white (and silver and gray), Nebraska is steeped in nostalgia, regret and bittersweet moments. Yet it’s also a pitchperfect cinematic poem about the times we live in.” - Richard Roeper, Chicago Sun-Times
THE BEST MOVIE OF 2013 PHOTO BY WARNER BROS
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“The whole movie, a feast of ensemble wiles and stunning hair, is juicy, funny and alive.” - Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune
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“An infectious blast of funky jazz played by a terrific cast and a director at the top of their respective games.” - David Rooney, Hollywood Reporter
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“Movie audiences have never been presented with anything quite like the intertwined beauty and savagery of 12 Years a Slave.” - Joe Morgenstern, Chicago Sun-Times “One of the best and most courageous films of the year.” - Calvin Wilson, St Louis Post-Dispatch
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“Believe the hype: Gravity is as jaw-droppingly spectacular as you’ve heard - magnificent from a technical perspective but also a marvel of controlled acting and precise tone.” - Christy Lemire, Los Angeles Film Critics Association “Gravity, a weightless ballet and a cold-sweat nightmare, intimates mystery and profundity, with that mixture of beauty and terror that the Romantics called the sublime.” - Liam Lacey, Globe and Mall SPRING 2014
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From words on a page, To people on screen, Live the action.
In theaters March 21, 2014
PHOTO BY: RUTH EDISON
Books. Camera. Action. A inside look at the fans of books going to the big screen. story by : RUTH EDISON
The center of the article and some of the biggest stars in teen literacy history. (from left to right) “Divergent” by Veronica Roth, “Ender’s Game” by Orson Scott Card, and “Catching Fire” by Suzanne Collins.
Fire”, “Divergent”, and “Ender’s Game.” Some hard-core fans seem a little distraught about this book-to-movie concept. “... the worst part is going to be that all these people are just going to be in love with the movie and its like ‘You didn’t read the book, so you can’t love the movie and say that its like the book without even reading the book first.’ Thats like the most irritating thing,” said Madison Ebest, one of these hardcore, die-hard fans. She, too is a freshman at LASA high school. She loves books and the concepts of the movie adaptations, but is very particular to even the most minor details. She reads avidly and fangirls with her friends. This includes getting excited over the cast, keeping up with and talking about the latest movie news, and getting super excited over the idea of a movie adaptation or just a book in general. She’s seen the latest trailers and counts down the days to the movie releases. The other side to
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the day that she’s been waiting for. Jessica Gitre sits in a dark theater, her eager hands gripping the handles of her seat, as she waits for the clock to strike midnight, and for the fast paced ads to fade into the much anticipated film. “I love, love, love, you can edit out those first 2 loves, watching movies. Its one of my favorite pastimes because I really enjoy seeing how actors portray characters, especially ones that I already know from books.” said Gitre, a freshman at LASA High School. Movies are bringing more fame to books than ever before. Some people go straight to the theaters, while others take the time to read the book first. Books have fandoms and bloodthirsty, die-hard fans. The presence of book fandoms even seem to start rivaling the amount of television fandoms, and seem almost as common. A lot of these books happen to be dystopian and fantasy novels, most recently the “Hunger Games: Catching t is finally
A scene from “Ender’s Game” of Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) speaking to Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield)
PHOTO BY: RUTH EDISON
her and other fangirls is that they can never enjoy the movies the same way as others. The fan population that began with the books or pre movie fans seem to be in the hype, but hanging back, bogged down with the issues
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...the whole idea behind Bean is that he’s better than Ender, but he kind of looks up to him, he’s like “oh that’s the person that you want to be” kind of and being in the same launch group and having that same camaraderie from the start isn’t really the idea that Orson Scott Card had in the first place.
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My Interviewees: (left to right) Mara Eccles, Jessica Gitre, and Madison Ebest, hang out with the books, expressing their love for them.
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like characters left out, a poor casting job, and an inaccurate plot. The subject of some of the problems with the films is edited or left-out scenes. Another issue addressed by Ebest and Gitre was the cast and characters that have been added or left out of the films. They seemed to take these things
PHOTO BY: SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT
A movie still from “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire” picturing Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and her sister Prim (Willow Shields).
way the actors portrayed the characters. I think they did a great job with that. I really enjoyed how the directors thought of the scenes much more than the adaptation of the first book, the ‘Hunger Games’. I think this new director Francis Lawrence did a much better job of incorporating elements from the books and I found that amazing” said Gitre. She dedicated a spring break at her aunt and uncle’s house in Colorado to reading the series. She admits that her relatives saw almost none of her during the trip, because she was so engrossed in reading. This is how Gitre describes the somewhat beginning of her book craze.
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The movie “Divergent” has Ebest and Gitre who have seen the movie at a delicate standpoint. Both agreed that while the movie had many flaws, they both enjoyed and loved the it. Some pre-movie fans however have a different view of the film’s release. They were uneasy about age discrepancies, plot issues, and the cast. An issue is that the lead male character of the film is going to have a Brittish accent. This fact about his accent seemed to bother Gitre in particular. “...yeah, Theo James. I really hope he’ll be good, but I’m kinda hesitant about the whole British thing PHOTO BY: SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT
seriously, dumping all the blame on the creators of the films. “I can understand leaving out minor parts and pieces, but when you leave out symbolic things that happened in the books and you take them out of the movie, then it's kind of like you’ve lost a lot of the symbolism in the adaptation.” Gitre said. She seems to feel a little for the directors unlike others like Ebest and LASA freshman Mara Eccles. For example, Eccles seemed more than a little passionate about the absence of the character Uriah in the “Divergent” movie.“Then Uriah, just flippin’ put him in the movie. I mean so what you’re gonna pay someone a little more than you wanted to, because they’re gonna play Uriah. Live with it. Uriah!” said Eccles. Even with this idea of how fans view the directors, Ebest, Eccles, and Gitre were enraged when the ages of characters are changed. “You know how you imagine the characters and sometimes they come up with someone who’s kind of say 24 and kinda hot, but not as hot as you imagined an 18-year-old to be. That’s gonna ruin it when I read the book again, because you know, I’m gonna read the book again. So it makes you nervous to see the movie.” Eccles said. This is a problem for her, because while she has been waiting for the movie so long, she doesn’t want to ruin her mental picture of the characters. This creates some hesitancy for her when she considers seeing the movie or not. “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire” has especially been a success to Gitre, Eccles, and Ebest. “...I really liked the
“
You know how you imagine the characters and sometimes they come up with someone who’s kind of like say twenty-four and kinda hot, but not as hot as you imagined an eighteen year old to be. That’s gonna ruin it when I read the book again, because you know, I’m gonna read the book again. So, it makes you kinda nervous to see the movie...
A scene from “Divergent” of Tori Wu (Maggie Q) preparing Tris Prior (Shailene Woodley) for the Aptitude test.
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PHOTO BY: SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT
(left) This is a still from the “Divergent” movie. (right) This is a propaganda poster for the movie “Ender’s Game.”
PHOTO BY: SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT
because, of there’s still that reminiscence of his accent which kind of bugs me because Tobias is totally not anything like that.” While Gitre seemed a little unsettled by this change, she still seemed excited about the movie. For “Ender’s Game”, neither Eccles and Gitre had not seen it, but they had seen the trailer and commented that the movie was not like the book. Gitre mentioned the hint of a possible romance and some discrepancies with a character being closer to the protagonist than in the movie. “... the whole idea behind Bean is that he’s better than Ender, but he kind of looks up to him, he’s like ‘oh that’s person that you want to be’ and being in the same launch group and having that same camaraderie from the start isn’t really the idea that Orson Scott Card had in the first place,” Gitre said.The cast was speckled with
popular actors and actresses. Harrison Ford, Viola Davis, Ben Kingsley, and Abigail Breslin all are some of the names that many people recognize or know so people are more interested when they hear that they are starring in the film. Movies from books are a huge success as of late and have fans tripping over themselves with excitement for the upcoming releases. The pre-movie fans have a journey ahead of them that includes surviving the release and all the excitement that follows. As for up and coming fans, who have just rushed to read the popular novel, they will hopefully enjoy the movie and enter the fandom. Last of all, to all the non-reader viewers, enjoy the experience of watching the movie stress-free. Until then, there’s still time to pick up the book and enter the craze. PHOTO BY: ADMIN ARTHAWALL
The poster for the poplar movie, “Catching Fire”, the second installment of the “Hunger Games movies.
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Theo James, the actor that plays the beloved Four in the “Divergent movie, whose casting has Ebest, Eccles, and Gitre on edge.
PHOTO BY: GAGE SKIDMORE
July 24-27 2014 San Diego Convention Center 111 W. Harbor Dr., San Diego, CA 92101
Special Guests Include: Veronica Roth, Jim Steranko, Neal Adams, Kelley Jones, and Dan Slott
Who’s the Greatest? by RUTH EDISON
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The Wicked Witch of the West movie: The Wizard of Oz
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Darth Vader movie: Star Wars
Darth Vader is the prime villain in the original Star Wars trilogy: A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. Played by David Prowse and voiced by James Earl Jones, Vader is seen as a ruthless, emotionless villain whom no one questions or disappoints. The penalty is death.
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A Nazi commandant of the Plaszow death camp, Amon Goeth, played by Ralph Fiennes, is reminder of the good old baddies. Both a psychopath and a heartless monster that shoots Jews for target practice and expresses hatred toward his female Jewish maid, Amon Goeth is a reminder of some of the not so fictional types of villains in world history.
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Amon Goeth movie: Schindler’s List
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Complete with an evil cackle that hasn’t been topped, the Wicked Witch of the West has audiences shivering with fear, and terrifying children. Played by Margaret Hamilton, she threatens horrible fates to the Scarecrow, and Tin Man. She sees all with her magic crystal ball and commands an army of flying monkeys. Just make to get her wet.
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“Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest one of all?” Everyone is familiar with this well known quote, but what’s the catch? Who said the quote? It was none other than the Evil Queen from “Snow White”, the villain of the first animated Disney film. Why would anyone remember the words of a villain? That’s just it. No matter how much a movie revolves around a central protagonist, the villain is always the center of attention. A popular example is Darth Vader who is seen as the central icon of “Star Wars” even though he is a villain. Lots of people love the villains. Who are the best villains of all time? According to hollywood.com, xfinity.com, Time Magazine and Sam Moore on whatculture. com, here are some of the top villains featured on at least two of the sites!
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The Joker movie: The Dark Knight
“Why so serious?” Here is the Joker, the arch nemesis of beloved superhero, Batman. He is played by Heath Ledger in “The Dark Knight” he wants nothing, but “...to see the world burn.” Cruel and terrifying, he strikes terror even with the colorful face of a clown. Why are clowns scary to some people? Maybe you should ask the Joker.
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The Terminator movie: The Terminator
He’s a man that’s a machine. Played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, he goes back to the year 1984 to reverse history. He is pure evil while shooting women and laying waste to police stations. The Terminator’s mission is to perform an abortion of a woman who is said to give birth to the Savior.
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Our Favorite Villain
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Talk about a dual personality! Lecter, played by Anthony Hopkins, both helps the FBI in catching a serial killer like a good guy, and eats people, revealing his darker side. Even with only about sixteen minutes on the screen, Lecter still manages to be found at the top with a bloody-chilling vengeance.
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Hannibal Lector movie: Silence of the Lambs
Hans Gruber movie: Die Hard
Complete with a suit, the European terrorist played by Alan Rickman seems to have no motives except money, in this case, about $600 million. He is ruthless no matter his motives and is complete with mockery of the American culture.
The Shark movie: JAWS
Here it comes! The most amusing of all our villains yet! The only one of our villains that is an animal, or should we say ‘robot’. The star of the movie JAWS is played by a mechanical shark that terrorizes people and seems to be more frightening when it is unseen. SPRING 2014
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Everybody Makes It Until They Don’t
producing our next filmmakers A Look into High-School Filmmaking story and photos by AMIR DOWNING
AVP students (from left) Gabe Alvarez, Ceci Gould, Spencer Ward, Ellie Pepperell, and Matthew Williamson film in LASA’s hallways.
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point towards a carefully staged scene housing costumed actors and extras that set themselves for the next take. The actors look over scripts and quietly recite lines to themselves, making sure they’re absolutely perfect. Behind the camera people line up the shot to capture all elements of the set, every actor, every extra and every prop. The director calls “Quiet on the set!” and everyone comes to a silence. The actors align themselves in front of the camera as a boom mic hovers above them just out of frame. “Roll audio,” is called, followed by “Roll camera,” and the snap of the clapperboard. Finally, the director calls “Action!” and the scene comes alive. Extras begin moving in the background and actors step into their carefully designed roles as they recite lines with expert precision. This is the highschool class Audio Video Production (AVP), which teaches students their way around a camera and how to go through the process of making a movie. Alex Shultz, a Senior at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy (LASA) in Austin, Texas sits in the dimly-lit AVP classroom with students on all sides. They work on scripts, draw storyboards and edit footage in near-silence as he describes his three-year experience with the class. “It definitely made [film] more real and brought it down to earth. When I was looking at it before, I was looking at it in a more abstract, mise en scène sort of way, and in this class, its more pragmatic.” Students like Shultz walk in to AVP with little to no knowledge of the process behind a production and walk out knowing the technical aspects of moviemaking such as how to form a series of ameras and lights
Students (from left) Demaree Rios and Gwyneth Ramsey record background audio in LASA’s library.
shots, record audio and edit raw footage into a polished film as well as the creative elements of the process such as how to design three-dimensional characters, develop stories and write scripts. “The simple goal of the course is to make students visual storytellers,” said Vanessa Mokry, the AVP teacher at LASA. The class follows a structure that formally teaches these topics to students while also providing them with time to learn individually. “I show them how to
Students (from left) Ellie Peperell, Matthew Williamson, and Ian Golliher in the AVP classroom.
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express themselves with a camera and how to structure a satisfying story,” Mokry said. She focuses heavily on teaching the production process, which is broken down into three fundamental phases: pre-production, production and postproduction. In pre-production, students create characters, write scripts, draft storyboards and plan shots in order to fully create the film’s tone. These elements are then realized in the production phase, which consists of filming. The raw footage is finally polished in post-production through extensive editing that compiles the shots into a working movie, improves lighting and sharpens audio. This process is conveyed through lecture as well as hands-on experience from projects where students produce a short film in its entirety. For example, students were required to create a commercial that had a clear beginning, middle and end; meaning there is the setup of a conflict followed by a depiction of how characters deal with the conflict leading to an ultimate resolution. “My group made an ad for a paper towel business, Tovagliolo, which was ‘The Mafia’s choice for tough messes!’ It came
Level-one AVP Students (from left) Gabe Alvarez and Ian Golliher sift through multiple takes as they compile a movie project in Final Cut Pro.
out really well…because as a group we really came together and did our jobs well,” said Ian Golliher, a LASA Freshman currently taking a level-one AVP class. The ad begins by showing a dinner table covered in what appears to be juice, wine or some other red liquid, and then shows the protagonist, played by Golliher, cleaning up the mess with Tovagliolo paper towels. In the final seconds of the ad, Golliher turns to the camera, says the tagline and leans down to reveal a dead girl, the true source of the mess. “Character and a distinct visual style always make films stand out,” Mokry said. She describes some of the better student films she has seen, pointing to “The Benefactress,” a movie that chronicles the struggle behind being a seamstress for a school play. The protagonist’s toil of constantly having to redesign and remake costumes for actors that never appreciate her work is depicted through a series of independent scenes that culminate into a well-shot and relatable film. Mokry also describes “Chair Love: Some Strings
Attached,” a movie with a feel-good tone that makes you identify with a common plastic chair on its silent quest for love. The title comes from how students made the chairs move on camera; they attached strings to the chair legs and pulled it from place to place.
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AVP definitely has made me consider jobs in the industry. It isn’t an easy business but every aspect of creating a film is really fun.
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The ability to make a viewer sympathize with the everyday plastic chair epitomizes how the direct experience these projects provide helps students learn how to make unique and thoughtful films using the established production process. “If you want to be the auteur of your own production, you’re going to learn about
every step of the production process...you learn that if you don’t do this thing, or you don’t plan for this thing, it’s going to get all messed up and you’re not going to be able to finish it,” Shultz said. In addition to an in-depth teaching of the production process, students are shown the tenets of storytelling required by almost all films, including the need for conflict. “You need some reason for the viewer to be interested, and that conflict needs to be resolved,” Shultz said. Students are also taught the formula for depicting this conflict on screen. “We learn the best way to get your story across to the viewer,” Golliher said. “The inciting incident, the rising action, the climax and then a resolution,” Shultz describes as the best way “to get your cool ideas to adhere to a basic dramatic structure…and when your stories don’t have those, they’re not really working.” The immersion in the filmmaking process that AVP provides changes the way students view the medium. “I’m much more analytical even while I’m enjoying a SPRING 2014
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movie. AVP really teaches you to become the critic even if you’re like me and prefer the entertainment side. I can now enjoy both aspects,” Golliher said. “[The class] has made me respect movie production and now I can see it through a new lens. I’m the type to only watch movies for enjoyment, but because of AVP I can now critique and learn from movies while watching for fun.” However, there can be a less positive side to this new lens. “If I’m watching a movie and I see something hackneyed or trite that I realize is really easy to do and is pretty lazy and I think, ‘Well I could do that without trying very hard,’ then I immediately just get taken out of the film and am just pulled away from the story and it immediately becomes terrible,” Shultz said. “It just raises my standards of a film if I want to enjoy it.” The knowledge that students gain in the class has the capacity to affect them in multiple ways. Presently, Shultz
Level-one AVP Student Clay Cortez
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has a part-time job at an Austin film equipment store, Mopac Media, where he rents film equipment to filmmakers. “As a technical thing the skills I’ve learned here have helped with the part-time job.” In addition to affecting students in the present, the class can impact their career aspirations. “AVP definitely has made me consider jobs in the industry. It isn’t an easy business but every aspect of creating a film is really fun,” Golliher said.
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You learn how much you really care about filmmaking.
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Seeing as film is a laborious career path with little guarantee of success, students have to learn how to manage their expectations. “I see a lot of independent filmmakers come in, and I think that this class has taught me that you’re not going to be an industry filmmaker. You’re
builds an island
landscape
definitely not going to direct something that will go to a nationwide theater...I’ve learned not to get my hopes up and I’ve learned to be satisfied and to be aware that if I have a filmmaking career it’s going to be a purely independent one; low key and low budget,” Schultz said. “You need to find satisfaction in the films that you make just at a personal level. You can’t wait on recognition from a festival, you can’t wait on recognition from a nationwide audience, you have to be satisfied with it yourself.” The class has taught students how to be proficient in production while also giving them hands-on practice with the formula. This knowledge can leave a lasting impact on it students like Shultz and Golliher. “You learn how much you really care about filmmaking and how much time you’re willing to put into it and how much of a passion you have for it.” Shultz said. “You learn how much you care.”
in the 3D-modeling software “Blender” to use in an animation project.
Better Image Better Sound Better Experience
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PHOTO LICENSE creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/
behind the animations by AMIR DOWNING
ANIMATION:
Fundamentally defined as creating the illusion of continuous motion through static shapes, animation ranges anywhere from hand-drawn flipbooks to entire films created on a computer. In the film industry, creating movies, effects and environments digitally is becoming ever more pervasive as the images become more life-like. But how is this done? The process is complex in practice, using a wide range of programs for modeling characters and their environments, developing algorithms to define how objects move and rendering the images to a pristine quality, but rather simple to conceptualize. Using information from Dreamworks Studios, Smith Micro Software and Pratik Gulati from the Tuts+ Network, the process can be broken down into three main phases, pre-production, production and post production. These phases carry the user from the script to the editing, transversing steps such as character design, modeling and sound engineering. Lets see how they pan out:
duction ro P 1. script: 2. storyboards: e-
Pr
Every story begins with a script. The script is the foundation for everything that will eventually be done in the animation process. The fundamental elements of a movie, such as the characters, scenes and dialogue, are developed when a script is written.
Storyboards are hand-drawn visuals that illustrate the shots that will ultimately comprise a movie. In this context, storyboards effectively provide a list of what needs to be animated while also finalizing a movie’s shots, story and scene progression.
1 PHOTO BY IKARUS14
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3. characters:
The characters are going to take up a large portion of the screen-time, so they need to be precisely designed. This is done with model sheets that consist of drawings of a character in every pose, making every expression they will potentially take in the final product.
2 PHOTO BY ANN
animatics:
Creating animatics is the first digital step in the process. This is where scenes are fully laid out in mock-ups that depict characters and other objects moving about in their environments. Animatics also incorporate audio and show how visual effects will incorporate into the final shot.
3 PHOTO BY DAVECKO
Production
1. modeling:
The first step of production is to create digital models of all the characters, costumes, environments and props that will be in the movie. Animators start by building a skeleton that defines an object’s moving parts and then build outwards, creating an element’s tangible sections.
2. rigging:
Using the model’s skeleton, a “rigger” will create an extensive set of controls for the object, allowing it to move in any way imaginable. A rigger also determines how realistic a movement will be by defining how a character’s muscles, fat and clothes will deform along with a motion.
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3. texturing:
Now that a model has been created and given the ability to move, animators can develop its outward appearance through texturing. Applying textures truly makes an object come to life as it is taken beyond having basic flesh by being given its final exterior make-up.
2 PHOTO BY GEIERUNITED
lighting:
Lighting artists digitally create a tone for the film. They design how light will interact with models and textures as they move through an environment as well as the appearance of the light itself; this can determine the emotions a movie evokes as well as its overall mood.
3 PHOTO BY ANGELA GUENETTE
PHOTO BY MAXIMILIAN SCHÖNHERR
Animate
Using all of the textured models, rigging controls and lighting design, the movie can finally come to life. Character models are placed into their environments and made to move with rigging controls. Animators spend countless hours creating each individual frame of film, taking notice of every detail from pupil dilation to tail-wagging. The final result of this step is a fleshed out film that needs only effects and editing to be complete.
1. effects:
Anything that moves but isn’t a modeled object is an effect. This includes leaves blowing in the wind, explosions, rain and even footprints. These small details give the movie a realistic appearance; without effects, only characters moving on-screen are seen.
1 PHOTO BY SAMEBOAT
2. render:
Rendering is done completely autonomously and gives the film its final, crystal-clear look. Programs go about doing this in many ways, using a multitude of algorithms, but all have a similar effect, creating a good-looking movie.
2 PHOTO BY GILLES TRAN
Post-Productio n 3. sound: compile: Three things happen in this stage: audio is recorded from actors and put into the film, sound effects are added and a score is incorporated. All three are mixed together so when laid on top of one another they are perfectly timed with the animation.
In the final step, all the shots are put together, unnecessary scenes are removed and transitions are added to create a seamless final product. This produces a movie’s final cut, which is ultimately exported and can then be shared to the whole world.
3 PHOTO BY DELAYLINE
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the future has arrived How Animation Is Changing the Way We Tell Stories story by GABE ALVAREZ
P
Animation is home to 38 creative minds. Every day, its animators come to work and create art. The walls are covered with posters, images and shelves overflowing with action figures. The desks are hidden under piles of sketches, storyboards and animatics. The computer screens are bright and full of innovative designs. All over the world, studios like Powerhouse are changing the way we tell stories. owerhouse
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“Certainly, animation is boundless,” said Geoff Marslett, a director, animator, and professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Animation is an evolving process. Animators and directors are constantly coming up with new ways of creating visuals, and the applications of these processes are growing as fast as they can be designed. For the film industry, animation has become a tool to help
tell stories that would normally be too complex to produce. The industries of film and animation have become increasingly intertwined as computergenerated graphics and 3D modeling have improved. The possibilities of animation are unlimited. “I think the biggest thing we’ll see is continuing blurring lines between animation and live action, they just become one thing,” Marslett said. There
PHOTO BY SWERVE PICTURES
The nature of the viewer is rapidly changing as a response to new and increased amounts of technology in communities and households. “An audience is used to seeing more and more complex things, just as a way of life. Little kids are seeing multimillion-dollar projects growing up, so when they go to consume content they, by default, expect multimillion-dollar budgets and types of things that look like that,” Winters said. The viewer has become so accustomed to seeing special effects in the movies they watch that they have begun to notice the absence of these special effects. “I don’t think they get to the end of a movie and go, ‘Oh, I wish it had more special effects,’ but I think they do get to the end of a movie and feel they just watched something very different. They’ll often refer to it as a indie film or a lo-fi film,” Marslett said. The heavy prevalence has certainly had an effect on the film industry; however, whether it is positive or negative is debatable. “Animation has given us freedom to take what would otherwise be a live story and put anything up on the screen. And because of that, sometimes people don’t find a story as easy to digest without a bunch of spectacular visuals...if
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An audience is used to seeing more and more complex things, just as a way of life.
Geoff Marslett’s animation technique allows him to film live actors and composite them into an animated world.
is an underlying reason behind this integration, claimed Marslett. “Audiences tend now to expect a certain amount of what films think of as technical prowess, but usually involves a certain amount of animation and polish for films,” he said. Matt Winters, the founding managing director at Austin Visuals, held a similar view. “It’s affecting the way films are made because people are being entertained by things that are more complex to make.”
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[computer-generated graphics] come in instead of a good story, I think they’re sort of useless,” argued Marslett. Brad Graeber, CEO of Powerhouse Animation, held a different opinion on the issue. “[In animation], our canvas is completely blank...you’re only limited by what you can design and draw. In live action, you’re limited to what you can physically put in front of the camera, and then what you can build upon that inside of Maya and other 3D softwares and things like that,” Graeber said. A look into the process of animation is helpful to understanding how computergenerated effects change films. Winters elaborated on the initial stages of the process. “We basically gather all the ideas, whatever it is going to be...after you gather all the ideas for what you want, you come up with reference. [You] do a little
research on other things that have been created in a similar style, and sometimes that comes from YouTube, Vimeo, or Google Images. The next step, after you have reference for what you want and you have a scope of what it will be, you go to storyboards,” he said. Storyboards are an organizational tool for animators in the form of still images, sequenced to show the main actions of the characters in each scene. Almost all live action films start off in storyboard form, another example of a crossover between the industries. After the storyboards are completed, “[the] storyboard gets turned into an animatic, which is just storyboards, just timed to audio,” added Graeber. “You will also, in that mix, also make up an asset list once you lock down storyboards. The asset list is important because after the storyboards are locked in, you need to know, okay, how many chairs, how many objects are going to be in this animation? If the animation is a minute long, you have to know, oh, there are a hundred objects that need to be made, and how much time does it take to make that and who is there to make that?” explained Winters. Animators are often referred to as artists, and they begin creating assets after the list is completed. “We get however many artists involved, depending on the complexity of the project,” Winters said. The length of time that the artists have to spend on any given object varies significantly. “Sometimes a specialist can make five to 10 objects and hour, or if it’s a every custom complex object, it may take them a week, it just depends,” Winters said. After all of the planning is done, the story starts to come together. “Key frames happen first, which is the main poses of that scene, in each individual scene, which is usually done by the lead animator. After the keys are done, then it’s rough animation, where all of the in-betweens get done, in-betweens being the drawings between the key drawings,” Graeber said. Rough animation is a very important stage in the process. Willis Bulliner, an animator at Powerhouse, elaborated on the beauty of the step. “My favorite part... is the initial rough stage, when you’re trying to figure out exactly what is going to happen in that scene...say you have 30 seconds to do that in, you have 30 seconds SPRING 2014
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PHOTO BY SWERVE PICTURES PHOTO BY SWERVE PICTURES
Marslett directed and animated “MARS,” a featurelength movie that utilizes both live action and animation. PHOTO BY POWERHOUSE
Between frames, Marslett increases the amount of computer processing and interpolation for color, which gives the frames a realistic yet dreamy appearance. This process is called rotoscoping.
Powerhouse produces many different types of animation using individualized techniques.
With animation becoming more realistic, the industries will be continue to be increasingly integrated. “The live action industry is now getting to the point now where much of it is animated,” said Bulliner. This trend is blurring lines and making the distinctions between an animated film and a live action film very
fine. “You end up getting things like ‘The Avengers,’ where, is it live action or is it animated? It’s hard to say, in many ways, because there are very few shots in it that film that aren’t animated. And ‘Gravity,’ it’s essentially an animated film. There’s not a single frame of that movie that’s just live action, but it’s still kind of a live action film,” said Marslett. Certainly, animation will continue to change the way we tell stories and make movies. Graeber knows that that animators’ only restriction is their own creativity. “There’s no limit to what you can do in animation.”
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“
You’re able to start from nothing and create whatever the heck you want.
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PHOTO BY POWERHOUSE ANIMATION
to play around with.” Rough animation gives the animators creative freedom and truly brings the story to life. After the story has been crafted, it gets touched up. “It goes to compositing, where the backgrounds and the animation itself, the cleaned up animation, get put together, and we’ll do lighting effects and all that stuff in After Effects,” said Graeber. The timeframe of the entire process is extremely variable. “Say we’ll have a minute of animation. It may take anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months to do all that minute of animation, just depending on how complicated it is,” said Bulliner. The process and the technology behind animation give the medium a unique ability in the film industry, explained Graeber. “You’re able to start from nothing and create whatever the heck you want.” This fact has been the defining characteristic of the evolving method of filmmaking and storytelling. The future of animation is very exciting. A shift in the demographic towards the younger generation is likely. “It’s just so accessible to everybody now...I see younger people being more familiar with what it takes to do animation and having more experience with it,” Graeber said. Animation will evolve on the technical side as well. “I also think we’ll see animation continue to get more and more realistic,” Marslett said.
At Powerhouse, all of the nearly-completed animations are touched up and finished in Adobe After Effects.
We’ve come a long way.
Apple PHOTO BY BILBY
400yr BTE › Odin gets the Casket
The Tesseract is left on Earth by Odin.
533yr ATE › Norway steals the Tesseract when Schmidt invades Tonsberg.
Heroes’ Journey
536yr ATE › The suborbital bomber is crashed into the Arctic with Captain America
by EVELYN BURD
Many readers have gotten lost in the intertwined plot lines of the famed Marvel and wished they had a time line to reference during the story. Here you can explore the plots of “Thor” and “Captain America” up to the start of “The Avengers” in a simple time line to clear things up. Everything was collected from marvel.com and Andrew Norfolk, who manages a site that intertwines the lives of the Avengers. Not only can you see how the plots work together, but you can see short descriptions of characters to help to visualize the story better. BTE- Before Tesseract on Earth ATE- After Tesseract on Earth
600yr 9m 8d ATE › After Thor has left Earth and returned to Asgard, the Tesseract is worked with on Earth by scientists (specifically Dr. Erik Selvig) in project P.E.G.A.S.U.S.
600yr 9m 5d ATE › Thor fights the Destroyer and then pledges to protect Earth, then he fights Loki.
601 yr 7m 9d ATE › Captain America’s body preserved in ice is discovered at his crash site in the Arctic by a Russian oil team and then excavated by SHIELD.
601yr 7m 10d ATE › SHIELD continues working on the Tesseract. Barton joins Selvig in the work on the
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600yr 9m 4d ATE › Thor decides to raid the SHIELD camp and is interrogated by Coulson.
THOR Eye Color: Blue Hair Color: Blond Height: 6’6” Weight: 640 lbs. PHOTO BY AVENGERS ALLIANCE WIKI
601yr 7m 17d ATE › Loki uses the Tesseract to transport to Earth, and arrives at SHIELD headquarters.
600yr 9m 2d ATE › Thor is coronated on his home planet of Asgard.
600yr 9m 2d ATE › Thor takes a crew and leaves Asgard to take over Jotunheim.
BLACK WIDOW Eye Color: Blue Hair Color: Red-auburn Height: 5’7” Weight: 131 lbs. PHOTO BY MARVELMOVIES WIKI
RED SKULL (original body) Eye Color: Blue Hair Color: Red tinted blond Height: 6’1” Weight: 195 lbs. PHOTO BY WALLPAPER ABYSS
600yr 9m 3d ATE › Odin comes to Thor and crew and then banishes Thor to Earth.
600yr 9m 3d ATE › Loki discovers that he is the son of the Frost Giant King and is heir to a throne, which begins to fill his mind.
CAPTAIN AMERICA Eye Color: Blue Hair Color: Blond Height: 6’2” Weight: 220 lbs. PHOTO BY MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE WIKI
NICK FURY Eye Color: Brown Hair Color: Brown with white Height: 6’1” Weight: 221 lbs. PHOTO BY SILVER2012
601yr 7m 20d ATE › Rogers, Banner and Stark have been gathered to assemble the Avengers. Thor arrives and agrees to join the team in order to defeat Loki and get Tesseract back.
MARVEL
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THE FULL MOVIE EXPERIENCE
PHOTO BY IAN MUTTOO
How Actors Work to be Successful story by EVELYN BURD
This is the Theatre Royal, Brighton in Brighton, England where musicals andSPRING plays are toured. 2014 33
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in the morning about an hour before your alarm goes off. But you can’t fall back asleep. You might as well roll out of bed now. You get up and drag yourself to the shower, where you plan to steam in the hot water. However, your peaceful plans are interrupted by the anxiety rising up inside of you. Words are floating through your mind and you find yourself rehearsing the monologue yet again. You turn the water off, and step out of the shower. Staring at yourself in the mirror, you wonder if you’re the right type. If you’re what they’re looking for. Suddenly you find yourself sucking in your stomach, wishing that you looked different. Now you don’t want to go to the audition, but you know you have to. You need the job. You wish you could just take a break sometimes. You start to wish that you had chosen something else. Anything else. Actors struggle and fight to become household names. For Lucien Douglas, head of Acting at University of Texas at Austin, it was always a lot of hard work and stress that he put into auditions and getting cast for roles. Auditions take a lot of prep work and mental attention, and getting known through auditions is the
PHOTO BY RALPH DAILY
Actors prepare for a bow to the audience after a live theatre performance.
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PHOTO BY BEATRICE MURCH
ou wake up
For auditions, it is possible that an actor will have to audition in a near empty theater such as this, only performing for a casting or artistic director.
only way to get work in the acting world. Due to the fact that there are a lot of steps to the audition process, some actors never get out of their small towns. There are many different ways of measuring success, and some actors feel that they are successful without becoming known by name all over the country. The first step to becoming famous is going to an audition. “Auditions are always traumatic. They’re very anxietyproducing, because you only have a couple of minutes, and you want to make a good impression and you want to let the people auditioning you know all the things you can do. But you’ve only got two minutes, and you’re gonna come in and do a monologue, or you’re gonna read from the play they’re auditioning you for, or the film, and you just have to trust that, that’s enough,” Douglas said. He grew up in Connecticut, where he first became interested in drama in high school. He has been teaching acting classes since 1976, and has a lot of experience acting himself. Douglas says auditions can be a great amount of hard work. There can be a lot riding on how well an actor does, and whether or not they get the job. Sometimes at auditions the actor is doomed before
they even walk through the door. If the casting director is looking for a large man with lots of muscles and darker skin, and one of the actors auditioning is a skinny, lanky, pale man, he is not likely to get the part. Even if he is the best actor the director has seen. “Actors are looked at as types. You’re a leading man, or you’re a leading lady, supporting man or supporting lady, ingenue, juvenile, a character person. We’re all types because of our individual personalities, and then just our physical selves, our height, our weight, the color of our hair, the shape of
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You want to let the people auditioning you know all the things you can do. But you’ve only got two minutes, and you’re gonna come in and do a monologue... and you just have to trust that that’s enough.
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PHOTO BY MATT H WADE
Lucien Douglas acted in many plays and musicals on Broadway during his time in New York City, some of which are advertised here.
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I’ve had auditions where, ‘Oh I wish I could do that again, I can do so much better,’ and I get the part.
PHOTO BY JORGE ROYAN
our bodies,” Douglas said. Being classified as a type is only one of the many reasons he says that auditions are stressful. On top of how an actor looks and what presence they have, audition outcomes can be very unpredictable. “I’ve had great, great, great auditions, where I didn’t get the role, and I’ve had mediocre and poor auditions where I did get the role. A lot of times I’ve had an audition where, ‘Oh, I wish I could do that again, I can do so much better’ and then I get the part,” said Ken Webster, the artistic and executive director at Hyde Park Theatre in Austin. Walking into an audition as an actor, you never know what you’re going to be asked to do. As Webster said, not knowing what to expect makes the experience all the more trying. Even though auditions can be emotionally taxing, an actor has to audition if they want to get acting jobs. Because of this, actors end up auditioning all the time. “Actors audition a lot, you’re always auditioning for plays or movies or TV shows or staged greetings of plays, workshop productions, productions you get paid for, productions you don’t get paid for, commercials, voice overs, the list is endless,” Douglas said. Not only do
actors rely on auditions, but most have to rely on agents to get jobs, too. “You really need an agent because those folks have more money and they want people that they can rely on, who are professionals,” said Jason Phelps, a local actor and school teacher. Many actors rely heavily on agents, and agents can be very crucial. “When I quit my consulting job, I decided I needed an agent if I was going to make my living from doing acting, I was going to have to do more on camera auditions,” Webster said. Just because an actor has an agent however, doesn’t mean that it’s easy to get jobs. “There’s not enough jobs to go around. And there are a lot of talented people. The competition is fierce. There are never any guarantees,” Douglas said. He also said, however, that actors continue to persevere and work hard, even if it’s not easy. “And the ones I think that tend to be successful are the ones who get the preparation they need. The education and the training, and then they just go after with full force. They don’t give up. They just keep goin’ after it,” Douglas said. Nonetheless, some actors strive for goals
The Vienna Opera House crew in Austria preparing a set for a musical theatre performance.
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PHOTO BY JACOTEN
A Focusrite (an audio equipment company) console where voice-over films and other audio productions are recorded.
that don’t have to be simply making it as a Hollywood Star. “What is success? Some people I know have gotten parts in movies and on TV shows. And, that, you know, that's their version of success. Other people might get a part in a musical and tour around the country and around the world with it. And then other people, you know they work in Austin all the time. And for them that's really successful,” Phelps said. There are versions of success that some might not have thought about. “I’m not a household name, but I’m pretty well known in Austin, and I can make a living, and because the size of [Hyde Park] theater’s so small, I don’t have to do plays that are real commercial, that don’t interest me. I can do interesting scripts,” Webster said. No matter what your definition of success is, for some success takes time. “And, gosh, I mean, [how long it takes to get successful] could
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be anywhere from like 10 years, which is pretty quick, to 30 years,” Phelps said. Through all those years, doubt can start to creep in, and an actor can start to think they chose the wrong career. “But if you like acting but you have a great talent for… I don’t know… Marketing, communication arts, medicine, science, computer sciences, technology, engineering, then it might be safer for you to go down [the alternative] path,” Douglas said. It can be tempting to change paths because there is so little guarantee for money in the acting world. “I was a drama major at the University of Houston, ever so briefly, but then I panicked and decided I’d never make any money doing theatre, so I became a radio television and film major,” Webster said. He had a good PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER DURANT
An empty stage, much like the small local theaters that small town actors like Jason Phelps and Ken Webster act in.
reason to panic too; many people have difficulty making money in the business. “[The
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Other people work in Austin all the time. And for them that’s really successful.
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theater director] hired me to run the theater for a whopping fifty dollars a week,” said Webster. Due to this, many actors have more than one job. “From ‘89 to ‘97, I worked as a political consultant, and I continued to do theatre, but my main source of income was working in politics,” said Webster. Webster isn’t the only actor who has had more than one job. As Phelps said, sometimes other jobs can hold actors back from the acting world. “But because I'm a school teacher, I can't go on auditions all the time,” Phelps said. Even though lots of actors have pointed out that acting takes a lot of dedication, actors keep at it all the time. They love it. Despite the very low possibility of earning a high income, despite the buckets of stress that come with it. Despite no guarantees and little control, actors continue. As Douglas puts it, “When you do get to work, it’s like anything you love doing, it’s just is a wonderful high, and there’s not enough jobs to go around, to satisfy all actors. It’s a crazy business to go into, but as they say, when you do get to work, you’re truly blessed and it’s the greatest feeling in the world.”
HONE YOUR SKILLS
PHOTO BY AMADSCIENTIST
ON DVD NOMINATED FOR 5 OSCARS
INCLUDING BEST PICTURE
CHANGING TELEVISION SINCE 1985
PHOTO BY JOHN ATHERTON
A NEW DOMINANCE IS HERE
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