<Projects
HIKE (2021)
Writer/Director/Actor/Animator/Editor: Josh Lange
Time on project: August-September 2021
HIKE (2021)
Writer/Director/Actor/Animator/Editor: Josh Lange
Time on project: August-September 2021
On Tuesday I scheduled one final Zoom review with Brian. It was great to have another chance to talk 1:1 with him after first working together four years earlier on Bright. I had always respected him and I was really proud of how he shaped his career since then. I knew that the best shot my film had at reaching its potential meant getting any notes I could from him. He had strong preferences on the camerawork in the first act, including two new close-ups that would require adding more facial animation polish--the toughest thing to do. He also let me know that even thought the film festival was Friday, I could continue polishing my short for another week and he could update my film on the Vimeo page with the version 2, which was music to my ears.
As a fun surprise, Ultan asked if I could help with reading some lives as an announcer for the ending of his film. Knowing I had some extended time to continue working, it made it easier to say yes. The line was a lot of fun, so I gave it four takes and he ran with it in his final film.
On Thursday Vani freed up for a Slack call and we chatted about ideas for the finale. She always had a great handle on what the story's journey should be about, and what it should feel like at the end. Her ideas to add more shots in the zombie falling beat led to lots of laughs when the final cut came together for the film festival.
A word about the fellowship's feeling of community: what might have been the most remarkable aspect to the whole experience was how connected and supportive the collection of instructors, mentors, and fellows was for one another. We were put into a pressure-cooker with people we'd never met before, and by the end it felt like everyone had my back. Part of
Highest peak
Most fulfilling moment:
Seeing my kids play around with the Metahuman characters and working with them during the voice recordings.
Lessons and advice:
When directing child actors. This video about directing children also helped me a lot.
Enjoy the journey!
Keep the story in the driver's seat
Get as much feedback as you can.
Handling sound effects was my other Vancouver Film School roommate and director of The Devil Show, John Thordarson.
As a fun surprise, Ultan asked if I could help with reading some lives as an announcer for the ending of his film. Knowing I had some extended time to continue working, it made it easier to say yes. The line was a lot of fun, so I gave it four takes and he ran with it in his final film.
On Thursday Vani freed up for a Slack call and we chatted about ideas for the finale. She always had a great handle on what the story's journey should be about, and what it should feel like at the end. Her ideas to add more shots in the zombie falling beat led to lots of laughs when the final cut came together for the film festival.
A word about the fellowship's feeling of community: what might have been the most remarkable aspect to the whole experience was how connected and supportive the collection of instructors, mentors, and fellows was for one another. We were put into a pressure-cooker with people we'd never met before, and by the end it felt like everyone had my back. Part of
Highest peak
Most fulfilling moment:
Seeing my kids play around with the Metahuman characters and working with them during the voice recordings.
Lessons and advice:
When directing child actors. This video about directing children also helped me a lot.
Enjoy the journey!
Keep the story in the driver's seat
Get as much feedback as you can.
Handling sound effects was my other Vancouver Film School roommate and director of The Devil Show, John Thordarson.
Biggest Challenges
1) The Clock. In one of our Week One "Coffee Hour" sessions, our instructor Peter Lish remarked to us that "to me, the biggest obstacle you all have is time. I don't think students can fully understand how much of a challenge it is to complete a film in six weeks." Boy was he right. I felt like I was putting in a full 100% of time and energy every day of the fellowship, and it was still a battle to end up with a film I could stand by.
2) Personal Standards. I did not see this as a no-pressure situation where I would be happy with my final film no matter how rough or simple it might be. Instead, I imagined judgment I might receive in the future from visualization colleagues. It feels petty to admit, but I wanted to use this as fuel for me to be ambitious and make the very best thing I could. Thankfully, the support of my family and members of the fellowship helped prevent me from collapsing under that self-imposed pressure.
3) Split Focus. My wife and I had been house-hunting all summer with no luck, and in an example of tough timing, we had put a bid down on a listing during the first week of the Fellowship. To our surprise, the offer turned out to be accepted! Although I was overjoyed and pretty confident that I could handle the fellowship and all the escrow paperwork simultaneously (thank goodness school was in session yet), I nevertheless prepared to step up my game to make sure no mistakes would be made while handling them both.
4) Creative autonomy. Although I have made a lot of personal art in my spare time, the fellowship came at a time when it had been a while since I did this purely for myself, instead of for the purpose of better understanding a subject in a professional project I was working on, like dog anatomy and movement for Cruella. Over my animation and visualization career I have had the privilege to often rely on talented directors and supervisors to determine whether an idea or piece of creative content is good enough to be considered "approved" to proceed with. The drawback to this creative dynamic , however, is that it can somewhat stunt my intuition and confidence when determining if my own work is truly worthy of being deemed "final." I think the good side of having this creative experience is that it is second nature to me to look to others to see when something is "working" or not. If we work in isolation, it is more than likely that what we think of early on as dynamic and exciting may in the end feel cliche or unclear to others. Constantly requiring
5) Workspace. My home office area was fully cramped with boxes and other miscellaneous items as we packed during the Fellowship. Along with this clutter taking up the background of all my behind the scenes footage, this significantly reduced the size of a mocap volume that I could rely on for performance capture.
2) Personal Standards. I did not see this as a no-pressure situation where I would be happy with my final film no matter how rough or simple it might be. Instead, I imagined judgment I might receive in the future from visualization colleagues. It feels petty to admit, but I wanted to use this as fuel for me to be ambitious and make the very best thing I could. Thankfully, the support of my family and members of the fellowship helped prevent me from collapsing under that self-imposed pressure.
3) Split Focus. My wife and I had been house-hunting all summer with no luck, and in an example of tough timing, we had put a bid down on a listing during the first week of the Fellowship. To our surprise, the offer turned out to be accepted! Although I was overjoyed and pretty confident that I could handle the fellowship and all the escrow paperwork simultaneously (thank goodness school was in session yet), I nevertheless prepared to step up my game to make sure no mistakes would be made while handling them both.
4) Creative autonomy. Although I have made a lot of personal art in my spare time, the fellowship came at a time when it had been a while since I did this purely for myself, instead of for the purpose of better understanding a subject in a professional project I was working on, like dog anatomy and movement for Cruella. Over my animation and visualization career I have had the privilege to often rely on talented directors and supervisors to determine whether an idea or piece of creative content is good enough to be considered "approved" to proceed with. The drawback to this creative dynamic , however, is that it can somewhat stunt my intuition and confidence when determining if my own work is truly worthy of being deemed "final." I think the good side of having this creative experience is that it is second nature to me to look to others to see when something is "working" or not. If we work in isolation, it is more than likely that what we think of early on as dynamic and exciting may in the end feel cliche or unclear to others. Constantly requiring
5) Workspace. My home office area was fully cramped with boxes and other miscellaneous items as we packed during the Fellowship. Along with this clutter taking up the background of all my behind the scenes footage, this significantly reduced the size of a mocap volume that I could rely on for performance capture.
Conclusion and Advice
Looking back, the Unreal Fellowship was exactly the right training and experience I needed to advance into the next chapter of my career. This was due to the incredible connections to wonderful people that the program surrounded us with. If you are reading this and are interested in applying, I could not recommend it enough (please reach out if you think I could offer you any help). This advice also goes for undertaking any large creative effort.
So, in the spirit of paying forward some of the knowledge I gained, here are the dicotomies and principles that I recommend keeping in mind should you be chosen for the next cohort:
So, in the spirit of paying forward some of the knowledge I gained, here are the dicotomies and principles that I recommend keeping in mind should you be chosen for the next cohort:
- Ensure full dedication within a healthy life balance. Things will come up in your life that might pull you away from having 100% focus on the fellowship, but try to put them off for the future whenever possible. This is an opportunity you won't want to regret splitting your focus on. That being said, I never felt it necessary to put in any all-nighters, because in my experience you need that rest to recharge and come back stronger the next day.
- Follow your intuition and solicit feedback. When you begin, your own excitement and curiosity are the best indicators of what direction to go, but the reactions of others to your ideas and work are usually a great barometer to improving the quality of your work. If an idea doesn't "do it" for you, skip over it, but if others are seeing things in your story that you hadn't noticed, give those observations a fair chance to be examined. We were recommended by my mentor David to present our stories to the full fellowship as early as possible, and I'm glad I did.
- Keep the story in the driver's seat. After you have decided on your inspiration
