Ocean Platform

Time: Spring 2003
Camera: Sony vx-2000
Location: Greenbelt Access Television
Lighting: 2x Lowel Tota-light, 4x 500w work light

The ocean platform was the very first scene conceived for the film, and was used as the inspiration for the story. Tristan called me excitedly and announced that he had the perfect opening scene for the movie, but of course it was "too crazy" to be describable over the phone. He insisted on showing me storyboards, but asked if I could create an effect where someone is standing on a dock, looking into the ocean as a time-lapse effect shows many days going by. I thought this might be doable so I started messing around with it. I didn't make much progress, but I did come up with a new idea.

A mysterious character walks out of a building that's built on a platform in the middle of the ocean. He looks to sea as several fighters are approaching. He climbs into his own ship and flies off as the fighters destroy the building and platform.

When I met with Tristan he didn't have any storyboards for his scene (which I was told involved a character flying around and blowing up a lot of buildings) but I explained my idea and he really liked it. From there it took off into The Last Move (eventually). A number of changes were made from my original concept. Obviously MysteryC does not have his own ship, but rather teleports away. His appearance also changed; I imagined a gray raincoat with a hat, but in the end we went with a Matrix-esque black coat. The building became much taller, which I thought to be more dramatic.

The special effects in this scene are my favorites in the film, and have the most man-hours behind them. Almost every shot in the scene was redone two or three times as I gradually improved my skills. The changes were not always massive but improved the coherence and credibility of many of the shots. I was an over-the-top perfectionist for this one because it was the first big action sequence of the film and I wanted to really grab the audience.

To that effect, I spent a long time arranging and choreographing the attack sequence after the missile destroys the security tower. I was aiming to give a strong sense of speed and intensity, and I feel I came pretty close. I also spent a very long time deciding how to show the destruction of the tower. The wave covering the camera was honestly a cop out; I had much more detailed ideas and plans but no means to create them effectively.

As high budget as parts of this scene are, I can't overlook the incredibly low budget segments. For example, the "weapons console" is nothing more than a sound board, which I foolishly sat on a soft chair, giving the whole thing a little bounce whenever a button is pressed. The diplomats-under-attack shot was as simple as shaking the camera and jiggling the light switch. And who could forget the bright-orange floored community center hallway that MysteryC walks down in the "United Diplomacy Building." Who comes up with this crap.