Special FX on Film:
The Planet, Starhyke & Microgravity

An interview by Don Eminizer

Who doesn’t remember the first monster they ever saw on film? Who doesn’t remember the first effects bonanza they ever saw that blew their mind? Come on now, fess up. You know what I’m talking about, that first dream that took your breath away, whether it was King Kong pounding his chest in 1933, or Robby the Robot talking from a Forbidden planet circa 1956, or even the beginning of Star Wars, which took everybody’s breath away in 1977. Film magic starts with film, but it ends with magic, and let’s give credit where credit is due, it’s the make-up and special effects artists that make movie magic happen. You wouldn’t even see the stars in Star Wars if it wasn’t for the artists at ILM.

Hollywood’s star lined walk of fame may be engraved with the names of famous actors and actresses, but it was most certainly paved with the names of great make-up and special effects artists like Dick Smith, Rob Bottin, Rick Baker, and Ray Harryhausen. In fact, these make-up and special effects artists, and countless others like them create the tinsel in tinsel town. Of the talent that it takes to make a great film, the SFX masters are the dream makers. The artists that make people look like God’s and Goddesses’, the artists that make nightmares exist, and the artists that make simple impossibilities become screen reality. They are the techies of the artisan group. They have to realize the un-realizable, Macgyver the impossible. Whether they do it like they did back in Harryhausen’s day with painstaking Claymation, or they use the derma wax and red food dye of the early seventies, or they utilize the current genius of computer animation, it’s the SFX guys that have to perform their job with a unique ingenuity. Not everybody has the budget of a Lucas or a Spielberg.

That is why, most often on an independent film set, the make-up/sfx artist, set designer, and/or animator has to be one of the most talented of the bunch. They have to do the most with the least. They have to design dreams with a strict budget in mind, and then figure out how to make them work. In order to get to the high dollar gigs, most effects artists have to not only start with independent films, they have to hone their craft making them. But filmmakers large and small all share the same problem: How do I make the impossible a possibility? I asked this question and many other questions of independent filmmakers from a trio of interesting projects that display effects as efficiently as any major studio might. These films, The Planet, Microgravity, and the pilot for a British sci/fi series called Starhyke, exhibit a stellar example of the special effects mastered and displayed in the world of independent film today.

I had a chance to correspond with Mark Stinton and Michael Clark of the Planet, David Sanders and Seth Talley of Microgravity, and Peter Draper of Starhyke. It was an enlightening discussion of the state of effects in independent film, the use of effects in independent film, and the future of film overall. Horror films and sci-fi films historically have a cult following in the cinema world. They’ve hinged on their effects, realism, and storylines in the past. All of these things have to work together to make an independent horror or sci-fi film a cult hit. These three films and their talented creators all have this potential. I asked them about their influences, to see if there were signs in the films. Mark Stinton of the Planet replied, “In terms of special effects it’s difficult not to be influenced by the big hitters like ILM or Weta. Interestingly one of the biggest for me was Chris Foss. We had planned for our space ship to be very Foss and we actually created a big ship with huge yellow strips. But once animated it looked bloody silly and we went back to a more traditional design.” Michael Clark from The Planet added: “I have so many influences regarding fx and make up, Rob Bottin, Rick Baker, Sid Mead, Carlos Rambaldi and Stan Winston of course. But also some of the more experimental effects people like Chris Cunninigham, better known for directing music videos for Aphex twin and Bjork. Everything this guy does is amazing and freaks me out.”

Peter Draper of Starhyke said he handled only the CGI for the pilot episode of Starhyke. A talented team headed by Richard Dawson handled the characters, make-up, and the wardrobe. In his case, he was influenced by animators dating back to the late eighties, “…ILM, a group of guys from MIT. Back then there was no CGI other than in little snippets. I saw a very short film with a story called Green Death by this group from MIT that made me laugh.”

The duo from Microgravity added: “I would have to cite Ridley Scott, Douglas Trumbull, and Kubrick as principal influences. Their narrative standpoints and visual styles figured
prominently in the desire to make a science fiction film that focuses on the actual dramatic potential of space and technology. Other filmmakers have used the genre and space environment as just a flashy backdrop for more conventional stories. Additionally, these filmmakers broke ground with special effect techniques that utilize more in-camera, optical and miniature technologies that still seem more realistic than today’s computer graphic simulations. Futurist Syd Mead has also been the source of enormous
influence and stimulation.”

The filmmakers cited influences big and small. When asked how these influences affected their films the responses were varied.

Mark Stinton: In so far as that we wanted it to look like one of the big FX houses had
done it. It’s not quite that good, but we wanted it to have that credible look to it. Like ILM on a lazy day.

David Sanders and Seth Talley: The film itself, and its approach, was actually inspired by the Twilight Zone vignette "Nightmare at 20,000 feet" - the George Miller version from
the movie as opposed to the original series. The look of the film was primarily influenced by Yoshiaki Kawajiri's anime short "The Running Man" with its lavish love of dials, stern expression and mysticism.”

Peter Draper: I’ve been doing this since the mid-nineties so I’m a computer graphics animator by trade, early on I was influenced by the models in Star Wars and the like, and the early Star Trek stuff, but I’ve done it so long now I’ve moved on.

I remember the John Lithgow piece. It exhibited that claustrophobia inherent in great sci-fi and fantasy flicks and great Outer Space horror films like Alien and Outlander. These new films, Microgravity and The Planet had that claustrophobic feel, while Starhyke employs a sardonic, existentialist sense of humor which is claustrophobic in a sense.

The Planet starts out with an ambitious and effective apocalyptic space battle. It uses jump cuts and excellent sound editing to create a sense of panic, a starburst around the depth and alienation of space. Microgravity offers the panic of being trapped in a tiny spacesuit buried in the depth of space. They both were effective. I asked how this was accomplished.

Mark Stinton: This was all about confounding audience expectations. It’s a low budget
film, so it should not open with a huge space battle. So let’s make it as big as possible. When you sent a film out some people are only going to watch the first 5 minutes, so let’s hook them as fast as possible! So yes, I wanted to draw the audience in as fast as possible and take them to our new world. Also, we didn’t have any sets, just a few crap corridors, so I threw the camera about so people would not notice. Editing slight of hand.

ME: How was it planned?

Mark Stinton: Planned? It was improvised mate! The original script did not have that bit,
but our actors had been so good we wanted to give them a bit of special action. So I filmed then in front of green screen or running about (some if it is my apartment) and built the sequence around that footage. It turned out fine, I love that opening bit.

David Sanders and Seth Talley: Microgravity became a film easily dominated by the effects and techniques used to create these (type) moments. Once we knew we had a plausible and cost effective way of achieving these scenarios, we in effect had to engineer the rest of the film around them. There was always the danger that the film would be long on visuals and short on narrative. "Microgravity" was also conceived as a proving ground for our visualization and execution skills. Now we know in what ways we hooked an
audience and in what ways we lost a couple people along the way.

ME: The trailer for Microgravity even conveys a sense of panic, largely due to the jump cuts between live action and some effects themselves, like a digital panic attack in space? How much were the effects utilized and considered in the cutting of the film, and even the trailer itself?

David Sanders and Seth Talley: Thank you! You know, it's interesting. The video track of the trailer was created by our first editor shortly after production wrapped. When we hunkered down and finished the edit, we still had this rushed, thrown-together trailer. Our website was about to go live and the trailer simply wasn't up to snuff... so we scrubbed the audio and started from scratch while leaving the video cut in place. The trailer audio was very much "composed" to match the video and give it the claustrophobic sense we were looking for. Apparently we succeeded.

ME: The opening scene in Starhyke was compelling as well, a grand bombardment of ships.

Peter Draper: If I had it to do over again that’s one of the things I would polish. It’s good as it is, but I would add a few things to it, a few more ships being bisected. It being a pilot we had to cram 90% of the effects in the season into the first show. We did it all in about two months and pulled most of it off.

ME: I thought the opening was spectacular in The Planet as well.

Mark Stinton: Well any low budget film that starts with a space battle is ambitious.
Personally I liked the monster FX, just because we didn’t go for that solid CG look. The idea of space ghosts worked quite well and we spent a lot of time making that work. If the audience had found the monster FX laughable… we’d have died.

Michael Clark: Probably my favorite effect in the intro is the point of view shot from the cannon under the ship leading to the bridge blowing up. I just made up the cannon tracking shot to fill in some seconds of film, but the way Mark edited it into his sequence with the bridge was great: it really sold it.

ME: All three these projects effectively utilized effects to paint a picture, and they did so while subsisting off of independent budgets. I asked what a hamper this was, and what they would change about the whole project if they could.

Mark Stinton: I would have liked the space ships to be better, if I’m being honest. They
are a little too cartoon for my liking. But it was our first ever attempt at that sort of thing. When Revenge of the Sith came out the opening battle made me very jealous! Rubbish film like, but nice spaceships... I’d put in a big sexy blonde chick!

Michael Clark: As we have been making short features for a while now, we’re quite good at working within whatever budget we need to. For a science fiction feature such as “The Planet” we knew that the demands of the costume/effects etc. would define the budget: people expect to see guns, monsters and explosions in this type of movie so these were the essentials. We budgeted the materials to match the requirements, cutting every corner we could and begging/borrowing the rest. Mark had written the script with this in mind so there wasn’t really anything we had to leave out due to cost, sure we had to make a few compromises but what you see in the final film is pretty much what was in the original script.

Peter Draper: Well, we knew how much money we had from the get go, so budget wasn’t an issue. I could’ve used some more time. There’s, in this industry, what we call the golden triangle of film making, money, time, and material. I could’ve used more time. There were a lot of late nights. We basically worked around the clock for two months straight. Overall I’m happy with it, but being a perfectionist there are always a few things I’d like to go back and fix, like the big space battle.

ME: These films each had unique characteristics and signature effects moments. I started with David Sanders and Seth Talley from Microgravity.

How did you intend for the effects to help define this portrait that you had in mind?

David Sanders and Seth Talley: The goal was to tell a story in as visually exciting a fashion as possible. The film was meant to create a sense of disorientation. We were blessed with an exceptional Storyboardist, Richard Bennett, who has gone on to do work with David Fincher and Stan Winston. Our Production and Set Designers, Mamiko Otsubo and Tomoya Imai, were well-tuned to our wants and took everything the extra mile. Our costume designer, Eejay Jung, exceeded our wildest expectations as well - so in essence, it wasn't the "effects" that made the film, but the design. We also shunned CGI as much as possible, primarily because of the "artificial" look it gives you but almost equally because decent CGI is expensive. By doing as much as possible in camera and on set I think we gained some free authenticity that would otherwise have been expensive.

Peter Draper: The crossovers, which are crossover effects between CGI and live action, were challenging on Starhyke. There were some scenes in the deck and any scene where we used a green screen in the ship, particularly on the deck were tough. The holographic head displays took a lot of work and layers of animation. The big battle scene. We did that the last week before we finished and there were a lot of long days, but we planned it that way.

ME: And what about the battle scenes in the Planet, they were very realistic looking like old news footage?

Michael Clark: All 3 of us, Director, Modeler and Production Designer had well defined ideas about the space battle. Mark Stirton produced animatics for most of the scenes and Kerwin and I followed them pretty closely. The main freighter was always intended to be a sort of Aircraft Carrier “target” for the little assault ships, we even included a Kamikaze fighter. By referencing the footage from the Battle of Britain, Midway and other more recent conflicts I think we hoped to give the viewer an easy to understand beginning to the movie, something that was not outside their collective experience.

Mark Stinton: We even looked at news footage of Iraq and attacks by terrorists to
convey the ‘real’ feeling. I don’t want to over play this but even the 9/11 attack was looked at. That’s why one of the ships is a suicide ship. It’s sad, but people understand that now. Should sci-fi reference that sort of thing? Provided it’s done with thought and not just for the hell of it, I think yes.

ME: Agreed. Historically sci-fi has mimicked the political history of its time, from Bradbury to Huxley, and even Star Trek. StarHyke is an excellent tongue in cheek political thesis. Often a sci-fi films appearance can aid such a message.

How did the final films aesthetics compare to the initial visions?

David Sanders and Seth Talley: We achieved what we wanted in a general sense. Although I don’t thing the internal conflict of Eniko the cosmonaut was really fleshed out in the film the way we would have liked. She is pretty much the hapless victim in a series of bad events. Originally, one was meant to ask the question of whether some of the dangers we real or imagined by the character. From a technical standpoint there were going to be some really cool external shots. We debated endlessly about star field/no star field, knowing we couldn't pull a star field off without spending a lot of money in post on a DI. There was a crucial shot that simply didn't get picked up in the fog of war that compressed the exterior narrative somewhat also. When originally written, all the dialogue took place prior to the spacewalk - but when we assembled the edit the conversation was tortuously slow. We moved half of it to the end where it added more meaning as a recalled or imagined counterpoint to the previous dialogue. As far as the look and feel, however, we accomplished most of what we set after and quite enjoy the film from a visual and atmospheric standpoint.

Peter Draper: We knew going in what the time frame and budget were. I’d say we were over 90%, but there were a few things I’d polish. There always are.

ME: What do you intend to do next?

David Sanders: Make more movies! I have shifted focus for the time being on shooting rather then directing. I just wrapped five months overseas as cinematographer on a Thai feature entitled “A Moment in June” due to be released in 2007. As my creative partner and writer Seth Talley continues to develop certain screenplays, we move closer to our plans of forming a feature effort on a small scale. Provided we could figure out a source of funding we would like to be shooting a first feature within the next two years.

Peter Draper: We’re just waiting to dock as it were and get back to work. As soon as Starhyke gets picked up we’ll finish filming the first season.

ME: Much like Outland and Kubrick's film, the first Space Odyssey, 2001, all these films do a terrific job of making you feel the claustrophobia of feeling trapped in space? How did you go about this, and how were your effects and shots designed to accomplish this?

Peter Draper: The space effects were all CGI and took a lot of effort. Of the two months we spent the most time on those. It takes a lot of thought; geometry comes into play, a lot of planning and careful execution.

David Sanders and Seth Talley: Again, thanks! I think it has more to do with the contrast between reality and "Star Trek" than any particular technique we used, just like with
Outland or 2001. But from a framing standpoint the environment was designed to spiral in on itself like a seashell. But we wanted to focus first on the form of the interior and then the in hospitable control and service features of the craft. The fact of the matter is, going into space is a lot more like going camping than it is like going on a Carnival Cruise. We did extensive research on the way people actually lived aboard Skylab, aboard Mir, aboard the ISS. We paid careful attention to Soviet-style space exploration, which is far more pragmatic than NASA's. We strived to make the experience seem
"real" rather than "fantastic" and filmed the results.

ME: It started with the credits in the Planet. The credits give you a precursor to the film and that claustrophobic feeling. Beat. Credit. Beat… Credit…. How long did it take to synch the credits with beat of the music? How and why did you work on this effect?

Mark Stinton: To start with the titles were going to be much more involved ...Holographic stuff spinning about, a la X-men. But we did those titles at the end of post and I was very tired. So it just seemed right to do a simple FX. It took about 2 days, rendered the titles and then edited them in time to the music, simple but effective. Maybe a touch too long, but I was getting punchy after 2 years of work!

ME: What software was used to enhance each film, particularly the space scenes?

David Sanders and Seth Talley: Very little software manipulation was done to the film outside of a few composite shots that combined the miniature work with background plates that themselves were mostly sourced from scientific and survey photographs pulled from Soviet and American Lunar missions. The initial composite of the ship, the meteor, the moon and the star field was done painstakingly in Adobe After FX, with a 3D Moon element. 2-D interface graphics were assembled with Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and After FX by digital artist Earl Burnley Jr. The Zero-G wind-up monster was composited in Final Cut, played back on an LCD and captured on 35 - since it's supposed to be broadcast video we were able to "cheat" and do the FX at a very low, economical resolution. The whole film was edited in Final Cut Pro 5, with sound editing in Logic Pro. Other than some sound design done in Kyma (a boutique hardware/software platform developed by mad scientists), the whole of the film is kind of cinema verite.

Mark Stinton: Cinema 4D, Bryce 5, After Effects, Commotion.

Michael Clark: All the animation for the space based scenes was produced with Maxon Cinema 4D (V.9). For people new to 3D animation like myself and Kerwin, we found the controls relatively simple to understand, and I think we only suffered a few minor brain hemorrhages learning it. All the space craft and sets modeled by Kerwin, in Autocad were easily integrated into the Cinema 4D environment and then textured, lit and given particle effects for the lasers and smoke.

The space environment was all Cinema 4D, with Photoshop texturing for the planet (an 84 megabyte color map). The millions of layered explosions and other post work was produced with After Effects, which is still in my mind one of the best effects packages for low to mid budget productions.

Peter Draper: A series of programs, many of these mentioned.

There were elements of Hitchcock in Microgravity, the pans, the shadows, the close-ups of voyeuristic eyes, and the horror of someone witnessing something frightening? How did the effects play into this ambience?

David Sanders: I tried to make the imagery as impactful as dramatically possible. In many situations the best shots in the small environment were presently obvious. One thing to remember is that the best close-up in the world is meaningless if it's a close-up of an unconvincing performance. Although we'd love to take the credit, much of what you're describing is simply the raw talent of our actress, Tarika Brandt. We created an environment for her, and she breathed life into it.

ME: The garbled audio effects added to the whole feel of alienation in Microgravity, the labored breathing trapped in the space suit, etc. The sound effects played a great part in building the sense of panic in this film. How did you set about planning this and pulling off the effects with such great-understated drama?

David Sanders: My creative partner Seth Talley- the screenwriter, composer, sound designer and sound editor - thank you for noticing. A movie is a combination of the aural and visual experience. We conceptualized both environments long before scripting or shooting; the notion was to create as close to a "real" experience aurally - as well as visually - as we could.

A capsule with an air leak won't sound "quieter" to the astronaut; it will sound lower in frequency due to the physics of wave propagation. A space suit wouldn't be "silent" - you'd hear the ventilation, the rustling of the suit, your own breathing, etc. A space station doesn't sound like the USS Enterprise, it sounds like a cross between an air conditioning unit and an old PC with whirring motors, air rushing through ducts and so on. The effort, again, went into recording and layering the real sounds we would
expect to hear aboard a Russian space capsule; our aim was, more than anything, to be genuine (there were some heated arguments, in fact, about things being *too* genuine; in the end a little bit of the "Enterprise” sound seeped in simply because audiences expected it too much for us to employ complete realism!). The same approach was taken with the radio communication and "voiceovers" - what happens to a signal between Earth and
space? A little EQ, some compression, some bit dithering, some phase distortion, some interference and so on. Simulating that signal chain in Logic just took some trial and error and some comparison with NASA transmissions. All in all we strived to replicate the physics of space exploration rather than the impression of space exploration and we were
rewarded by the outcome

Will there be a full-length version of Microgravity, and how would you continue to build the panic with effects if there were?

We have tentative plans for a “Microgravity” feature. All it takes is money, right? The primary challenge between a feature and a short isn't about "building the panic" so much as it's about telling a story that can keep an audience interested for a couple hours. "Microgravity" as a short requires minimal explorations of "before" and "after," focusing tightly on the "during." Watching one woman fight paranoia for twelve minutes is one thing - watching her do the same for two hours would be excruciating. When we do the feature - something we have been developing - we intend to apply the same basic techniques to a new story with a great deal more narrative involvement.

ME: And as to the future of Starhyke:

Peter Draper: We’re just waiting at the moment. The show is being shopped now and there is some interest. As soon as it’s picked up we’ll get back to work filming the whole season. We’re all ready to go. We’re just awaiting the word and some funding.

Michael Clark: we are getting a 'view only' distribution for the movie in the U.S. starting in February. It’s a new start up channel called Illusion, which will feature independent SF from around the world.

ME: What about the Planet? Obviously it’s ready to be released and it’s going to be seen some in the US. It’s hard to get a film completed and released with next to no budget. What was the most difficult thing you had to overcome to get the film finished?

Mark Stinton: We could not solve anything by throwing cash at it. So the hard bit was just all the work involved. Keeping even a small FX crew enthused for 2 years of work with no pay is tricky. It all came down to belief.

Michael Clark: We had to overcome small problems on a daily basis, the same as any other production, nothing major though. We had two people off sick during some of the shoot (one of them being myself) so the director had to work around that and shoot pick-ups when the people could return to the shoot. A day of unexpected torrential rain led to the building of the space pod interior set for filming inside. That worked out really well and led to some good interaction between the characters.

Possibly the hardest obstacle was the learning curve the crew had to go through learning 3d animation, myself, Kerwin Robertson and Mark Stirton all had a mountain of work to do with no back up but our own initiative and the need to finish the movie. Without what I term the “effort monkey” biting at our arses the whole time, the film would never have been completed.

ME: In the end that’s what it all comes down to when making independent films, belief. In order to achieve Peter Drapers golden triangle, it takes a lot of belief, effort, and long hours, that’s something that all of these projects had in common. Oh, and they are all very good, especially when you find out the effort and talent they combined while being made!