Worlds At Atomic War (Part 1) + Interview with Patrick de Leon
SHORT FILM SYNOPSIS: "The Earth is being invaded by Martians, suddenly another mysterious race enters the picture who seems to have previous knowledge of (and a vendetta against) the Martians. Why are the Martians invading? Who are the strange amphibious aliens helping us? Why is young Chip Carson caught in the middle?"
Worlds At Atomic War (Part 1) is a new short film by Patrick de Leon (maker of the Buck Rogers fan-film), done as a school project (Patrick is majoring in Visual Effects at the Art Institute of Colorado), which details the account of an alien invasion in Denver, Colorado. Do note that the above posted video is not th final version, as Patrick plans to fix a couple of more things (Will update when that happens!).
CLICK THRU for a quick Q&A I had with Patrick, along with image-stills exclusively for this interview, and VFX test shot of the Martian War Machines!
TOYSREVIL: What were your design influences? What was the style-plan for this short film?
PATRICK DE LEON: I wanted to do something that was a throwback to the old 50's budget movies like "Target Earth". The biggest inspiration was the 50's "War of the Worlds", and I was imagining what they would look like if those ships were bipedal robots instead of just ships. I based the head off the original shipsand based the bodies of the the bodies of the aliens. There also some "Neon Genesis Evangelion" influence as well since it's one of my favorite anime's of all time.
TOYSREVIL: 50's SciFi and Anime? Nice! Let's start at the beginning, shall we? How did the project get started? And who else were involved? Breakdown the making of the film for us, Patrick!
PATRICK DE LEON: It took about 6 weeks from start to finish with a budget of $0. I shot all the footage on HD, modeled the robots in 3d Studio Max, used tracking software to track the CGI with the shaky hand held footage. Final Compositing and effects was done in Adobe After Effects. I also created the mask worn by the suited alien, and the raygun is the one I crafted and submitted to your raygun contest over a year ago but was too late.
PATRICK DE LEON: It was a school project for my Advanced Editing class.This was a collaboration between me and my class partner Brice Bloxom (who starred). Brice assisted with the sound and editing as well as directing the shot placement. Without his help the deadline would never have been met. Soundtrack is by Bernard Hermann from "The Day the Earth Stood Still".
[Above: VFX Test Shot]
TOYSREVIL: Nice job all around, Patrick! Absolutely cool when you are able to combine your love for creating customs and props with your obvious love for filmmaking! What is the full duration of the film in actuality? How many more parts should folks be expecting? And is there a planned frequency to their releases?
PATRICK DE LEON: The final length of the movie is yet to be determined, though there will be at least three parts. They will be released over the next few months.
TOYSREVIL: Thanks for trouble for this Q&A, and here's looking forward to the next installment of Worlds At Atomic War!
[Do cehck out more of Patrick's work via his blog: http://atomicrayguns.blogspot.com]
