[Sandwich]

Alrighty... this is gonna be fun. First off, I just want to say that I do have some fairly specific ideas about what I'd like to see this video become, but I'm not gonna spill all the beans at the outset.

What I want from you is for you to download and listen to this piece of music (you'll probably have to turn up the volume quite a bit... at first ). While you're listening to it, close your eyes and imagine it as the music a FSU/SCP pimping trailer would be based around - what parts of the piece evoke what kind of feelings, which scenes would come where, the general style of the trailer, etc. Then post those thoughts here. I'll look everything over, and in a week or something, I'll post my vision for this piece. Then we can see what we actually want to do with this.

But for now... close your eyes, listen to it, and let your mind wander among hi-poly realms.

And yes, I'm totally serious.

[Galemp]

Hall of the Mountain King? So cliche, Sandy.

Don't snub the current WIP video a few threads south, though... in fact you might want to merge these threads and sticky it.

[Sandwich]

Singh's? Heh - we've been talking about this idea ever since I saw his first SCP video a few days ago. We've gone back and forth, and have a fairly good idea of what would work nicely for this one, but I wanted to get you guys' ideas before loading you down with mine and Singh's thoughts.

[Fineus]

Without going into detail (I already have in Singh's thread) I'd really like to see something fast and hard (no jokes please..). What I mean is that if I hadn't ever seen this project before, I'd like to be left sitting at the end of the movie going "holy ****, some bedroom programmers did all this? It looks as good as any new game on the market! I must have it!".

[vyper]

Not to rain on the classical music parade here but I would sugggest getting a community member to do the soundtrack. A fine example would be Flipside - check out some of his previously posted mixes.

Edit: Fixed Mosted -> Posted.

[Martinus]

Your current music choice is a bit... Silly. (IMHO of course. )

Letting one of the community do a track sounds like a good idea.

[FireCrack]

Yeah, flipside FTW

[WMCoolmon]

What mood are we looking for?

Suspenseful? Victorious? Beauty? Exciting?

Personally, I'm liking the Capella supernova music. Starting out slow, with moody closeups  & fades between the various hi-poly ships in the beginning, then cutting between various quick sequences of fighting and flak and beams.

But there's probably something better.

[Sandwich]

Humph! No appreciation of the fine arts!

Anyway, I'm not opposed to using our own music for a video, I'd just like to see something be made to Mountain King as well, since it was the music that gave me the idea for a FS video a few years back, not the other way around. There's nothing that says we can't produce multiple videos - the more, the merrier, I say - as long as they're quality stuff as well.

[Ransom]

Hmm. When I first heard this I thought it was almost comically inappropiate. But having listened to it a couple more times just now, I think it might work really well. I might even take a shot at making it myself when I get some free time if nobody else intends to by then.

[WMCoolmon]

I like the surprise symphony myself (by Haydn) but I'm not sure that would be appropriate.

[Sandwich]

Ok, here's the bit of conversation Singh and I had about this... perhaps this will whet your appetites a bit more...

Tell me kind sir, what are your thoughts about the FSU trailer being set to this piece of music?

I've had this desire to have a trailer for something FS-related to this piece for years. I LOVE it! Since the piece is very beat-oriented, around a 13-part rythym, I imagine that for the calm parts (0 to ~47 seconds), a ship, or fleet of ships (all HTL, of course) would be gliding through beautiful nebula-filled space, with perhaps still shots interspersed on the heavier beats (one still for beats 5-7, one for 8-10, and one for 11-13). Other things that could fill this space would be HTL cargo ships docking with HTL cargo containers (WOOHOO!!!!1112233), slowly spinning RBCs around a node, etc.

Once we gain a wee bit tempo and energy levels pick up (47 to ~1:25), the scenes would get more lively, with fighters zipping around and among capital ships, a chase-cam of a bomber making its way through an asteroid field, stuff like that - but no weapons fire yet.

From ~1:25 to 1:50, a bunch of battle shots from all sorts of POVs - chase-cam (on fighters, bombers, AND bombs themselves), in-cockpit, neutral POV, etc. Just standard battles, beams here and there, explosions, etc.

For the lead up to the finale, from 1:50 to 2:00, we'd reserve the special stuff - the Big C opening up in all different directions with her beam cannons, the Sathanas with all her fore beams blasting a Deimos to bits, etc.

Finally, during the dramatic BOOM-quiet, BOOM-quiet moments of 2:00-2:14, we'd have shots of the Sathanas fleet surrounding the sun, ripping it to shreds and triggering the supernova at 2:13, the explosion of which ripples outwards to the camera and finally overtakes it (total white screen) at 2:15, where we fade to black (or to an ending tagline or something) at 2:18.

For production values, I'd like to approach something like the levels of the Machinima "Still Seeing Breen" HL2 video - they've got some GREAT cuts and breaks in there they use on what could be long boring shots; I especially like the effects they use to break up the long zoom from 1:09 to 1:18.

Anyway, don't think for a moment that I'm expecting YOU to do all (or any) of this per se. I just saw that SCP trailer vid you put together and thought I'd get your opinion on this idea of mine before I unleash it to the public. So... whaddya think?

Ok, i just heard the music, and concur that this is actually quite a good idea. However, the timing will need to be adjusted slightly. I agree that from 0:00 to :47, stills and generally calm scenes would be interesting, and definately fitting. With each scene, the activity needs to be upped slightly. Maybe starting off with a few fighters, then going to a fighter and a Leviathan, and then changing to an Aeolus and a Diemos, with the final scene being of a Hapsheput and a Hecate. Having cuts inbetween the boring shots would be best, especially creepy cuts. Example would a scene of a freigther docking, and then suddenly cutting to a mysterious shivan silhouette in the nebula....

Then when we hit 00:47, we change to shivan ships. Again, starting from a few fighters, we quickly move up the ladder till around perhaps 01:15, at which point we reach the grand finale: The Sathanas ripping up a HTL Phenocia with full beams. After that its all fighter mayham. Any combat scene could go here, as long as it had big explosions and stuff. We dont have much time though, since we dont want each scene to be too short either (perhaps around 3-4 seconds each), so fighter/cruiser and corvette combat can be delegated around 30 seconds till we hit 01:35, and then we build up the beamz!!

Once we hit  01:35, we really bring it on. Capital ship wars, anything battle-of-endorish, the destroyers slugging it out in massive beam wars and such. Keep building up, perhaps starting with orions, Typhons and Demons, then raising the bar to hats, Hecates and Ravanas at around 1:45, and then finally taking to the Big C against the Sathanas in 'their finest hour' till around 2:05.

2:05 onwards, I agree - a shot of the sathani blowing up the sun would be hte best, with it transitioning to the actual explosion itself at 2:12, and then fade-out at 2:15.


If you can get the movies done, as well as the HTL models, Iam willing to peace it together for you. My adobe premier skills are not fully developed yet this current trailer im working on should be significant practice, to say the least. However, if you can coax Carl, he may be a better choice, as he's had experience with premier before as well.

Ok, I like your idea. Big grin

Creepy stuff: YES.

I have a feeling that the timing on things is a bit different between the two of us, but I get the general idea.

I think that it's fine up to the finale of the Shivan ladder - 1:15 is nothing spectacular - that's all at 1:26. But from that point, I like the idea of having fighter battles only until the next stage. I'm thinking BoE stuff... fighters zipping so close by capship hulls that you can't tell what ship it is easily, stuff like that. No beams, except perhaps as a very, VERY blurry far in the background teaser for the upcoming section...

This fighter stage would last until 1:50, when the tempo picks up again. I'm thinking at that point w'd take whatever camera angle we were in the middle of, one that's observing a fighter from up close, and suddenly and in an almost cartoonish fashion (with the zoom almost bouncing back a bit when it reaches the limit), a very rapid zoom out to a distance from where we can see that the fighter battle is just a small portion of a massive capital ship engagement, perhaps a dozen ships per side, surrounding the Big C and a Sathanas maneuvering to duke it out. Various shots of the various capital ships (except for the Big C and Sath) firing their beams from 1:50 to 2:00, at which point we focus on the massive firepower in both of those two ships:

The Big C would be surrounded by 4-6 smaller Shivan ships, and would unleash the full potential of 360³ beam firing coverage. So the camera angle would be relatively wide, or fairly far away from the Big C so catch it all. The Big C clears it's surroundings like this, but then...

A closer shot of the Sathanas opening up at the Big C with with all 4 front BFReds, the beams eating away at the hull of the Big C, until 2:00, when it suddenly goes black...

(the remainder of the trailer should be really spooky and goosebumpy...)

...and on every BOOM, a ghostly flash of the familiar sight of Sathani surrounding the sun, with an utterly black screen in-between flashes. Also, quite audible over the music, especially in-between the BOOMs, is the building sound of the Sathani subspace weapon warming up. During the BOOM-quiet sections, there are also bits where there's some continuous music - these would have video footage from the Sathani powering up their subspace weapon, which fires at 2:10-2:13 (when the strings are increasing volume in short rapid burts). Then there's a dramatic drumroll, which can be the supernova explosion roiling towards the camera, and finally overtaking it at the ending BOOM.

Anyway, regarding actually making this, I have no skillz... I was planning on it - like the rest of the FSU - being a completely open community project. I'd oversee things, but I don't know how to get them the way I want them

Ok, the idea is good upto the last bit. The reason I put the activity earlier is a time issue, actually. There simply isnt enough time in the track to completely catalogue all the events that we want to happen. 10 seconds to put in all the capital ship battles is going to be nothing but flashes, one after another. Most of our track is going to be like this, so having solid pieces for at least five seconds once or twice would make it less eye-straining, IMO.

Taht said, if you DO want to start off, it would definately be possible once we have at least 2 more hi-poly shivan fighters, as well as a shivan capship or two. After that, all that is actually needed are:

1. Someone with an ub3r fast PC and Fraps
2. Design the final mission where the Colossus lays the smackdown, and perhaps usage of the new spawn-ship code. Doing still isnt difficult either, and can be done in a 5 minute FRED job. Filming it is another matter, though.
3. Acquire all the in-game battle scenes available, preferably those using newer builds and higher-poly ships for the purpose of editing.
4. Edit it, and space to upload it.

[WMCoolmon]

I wish the music was more original though. I've heard the music in a whole bunch of commercials...

[Sandwich]

There's a reason for that, you know.

[Ransom]

Er... well could you share with the rest of the class, then?

[Mongoose]

I'm really liking the ideas being tossed around in that conversation.

One thought about the ending: lying around in my missions folder somewhere is a mission that someone made in an attempt to duplicate the Shivan supernova weapon.  The overall effect was actually pretty good; it was certainly enough to scare the crap out of me. Using a few clips from that mission, spliced with the actual cutscene, might be worth considering.

[StratComm]

In-game footage will be preferable, regardless of what it is.  Especially since the "rendered" cutscene that we do have of the supernova is practically useless because it's compression is so strong.

[Sandwich]

Er... well could you share with the rest of the class, then?

It's a good, versatile piece of music that can be used in any number of ways, evoking vastly different emotions depending on what it's being associated with at the time.

[CaptJosh]

If anyone is interested, I have an Mp3 of the choral version of Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings that was used in Homeworld.

[Galemp]

One thought about the ending: lying around in my missions folder somewhere is a mission that someone made in an attempt to duplicate the Shivan supernova weapon.  The overall effect was actually pretty good; it was certainly enough to scare the crap out of me. Using a few clips from that mission, spliced with the actual cutscene, might be worth considering.

That would be Sesquipedalian. It's actually gotten a few enhancements since the public release.

CaptJosh: I'd be interested in hearing that.