Destruction+Invasion

[Almondo99]

Hey
I just watched the trailer for War of the Worlds. I want to make a little short, mindless action kind of thing, where aliens or whatever are invading the Earth. I want dropships or something to come over the city and drop bombs, missles etc. Kind of like Independence Day. It won't have a story or anything, just a 3-8 minute short. The only programs I have are Final Cut Express and Photoshop. Any ideas/help on making this?

[ALove]

It won't have a story or anything, just a 3-8 minute short.

Big mistake.

[fi11m-m4k3r]

Make miniatures and film them infront of a bluescreen and cut it in

[Almondo99]

Alove It's just for fun.
How should I blow up the miniatures with fire? And how could I have ships come above a real city?

[Almondo99]

Also how could I make them look believable? If I could blow up a miniature bridge and/or houses like in the trailer that would be cool. Thanks

[maj_barnes]

For minitures, go to model train shops, they always have the best buildings at low prices; I should post a picture of my train set, it only takes up a forth of my porch!

[Almondo99]

That's exactly what I need, a huge miniature...city to shoot in. Any idea of the prices, like for a modern house.

[maj_barnes]

I've gotten a few for $15, but they were small ones. Little shacks and stuff are around $5 or $10.

[Almondo99]

I'm going to get some, easier than making it. Any ideas on blowin them up?

[maj_barnes]

Stick fire crakers in them?

[Almondo99]

Hmmm....if it fits inside lol
Should I just start a fire of grass and lighter fluid? Then speed it up.

[maj_barnes]

It sounds like a good idea, but a little dangerous-

Go for it!

[Almondo99]

Or maybe try it with stock footage.......not as fun though...
If I lit a roll of caps, would that make a big enough explosion?

[maj_barnes]

I don't think it would, it might just be some sparks and somke.

[Almondo99]

Stock footage then?

[OutcastJiob]

Firecrackers will definitely blow a model apart, but you won't be getting any fireball from it. Take a can of that air duster stuff (make sure it's the kind that has all the "FLAMMABLE" warnings all over it), or some spray deodorant, maybe even just propane, and fill a balloon with it. A smaller ballon, so it'll fit inside your model. Then place some firecrackers at the key structural points in the model and hook everything up, the firecrackers will detonate and ignite the flammable stuff in the balloon, and the building will blow apart with plenty of fire. I'd fire it electronically - use the cheap Estes rocket ignitors if you don't have a better system, they'll work fine. Slow it in post, plug in some good sound effects, and you have a nice explosion.

By the way, the balloon trick is pretty much harmless. It makes a "POP" and a fireball maybe a two feet across with a fully filled 8" balloon. A smaller one inside a model should be about as harmless as explosives get--definitely safer than the firecrackers you're already using.

Do a few tests with some crappy models first so you don't light everything in your detailed model only to find it only does half of what it should but still makes the model unusable.

And no, caps won't work at all.

Kitbash some models and you should come up with a good spaceship, too. Then you need a nice greenscreen setup and some city footage and you're set. Theoretically you could accomplish the spaceships with foreground miniatures, too, but that would probably be much harder to pull off convincingly.

[Almondo99]

I'll try the baloon way. If I was going to have a car drive down a street and have explosions (bombs) dropped on either side and have spaceships overhead....Any ideas?

[Almondo99]

Know where to get some city stock footage?

[maj_barnes]

Go to google and get some photos.

[Almondo99]

Ok found some. Having trouble with 4 and 8 point garbage mattes in Final Cut, help?

[Almondo99]

Garbage matte and flying ship help anyone?

[Radiate]

Isn't there a tutorial?

[Almondo99]

Hmmm....
Any help with shooting blue screen and background stuff? Like a tutorial or something about filming each of the parts, and compositing them. Also I'm going to film a car, swerving and stuff and add explosions with motion tracking.

[Radiate]

Try a forum search.

[I3lade203]

I somewhat agree with alove in that big mistake comment, HOWEVER, I do realize it is your time, and you just want to have fun. If your new to this kind of thing, remember it's not going to come out how you expected, but you'll learn a whole bunch in doing so! If your interested in doing miniatures, i'm not to much of a help, as my experiance with that streches only as far as constructing warhammer models. A combination of live action shots with convincing minature or bigature shots will work to your advantage. Remember, minature is to show HUGE, live action is to show well normal sized! Remember acting is very important to sell the invasion. People screaming, running, ect. Find a somewhat city like location that you can gain premission to film at and do it! As for special effects, what do you want the aliens to look like? Are you going to use a costume, or is it 3D? For spaceships, 3D would work better then minatures in my opinion, and for destruction , lots of pyro stuff and composting. Take whatever footage you can get live action mixed with whatever you can record against a blue screen or composite in. People dieing? Simple. All just visual effects with good acting. Depends on how you want the person to die of course, say get hit by a ray gun, and just evepaorate. That can be done with some composting, as well as placing the actors blank clothes in the spot to show them not there anymore. Any more detialted questions on what I said, just give me a PM.

Sorry for not breaking that up, but I didn't really think of it at the time.