Nice. I confess I skipped through a bunch of it but it looked and sounded great. The Sam Elliott style VO dude is AWESOME!

Very nice - and good to hear the background story.

Cool. Liked it.

Nicely done - you must have been crazy busy trying to get that laid out, refined and make everyone happy all in the 14 day time span.

Mike

Looks and sounds great, very well done.
My only criticism is I found the film damage FX on the stills added nothing other than a distraction. Other minor quibble was something odd happens to the hand that picks up history when it goes in a freeze, maybe it needed deinterlacing.

Bob.

very good - but a little too much in and out on the stills, a few subtle pans might have give them a little more...

Thanks for the feedback. I have to say, all the feedback is a LOT like the revision meetings: more motion, less motion, more visible minorities, more women, more industry, more agriculture (seriously, the big win image: the visible minority female lab tech image - but the client was happy, so there you go).

The effect on the stills was actually toned down from what they wanted (no kidding: "we want it like the effect you can do in that Apple program"). Oy. Ultimately it was to suggest that it was film and not stills. At the launch, a couple of people asked where we got the old film footage of the bison and construction. It was a bit much, but they REALLY liked it thick, so client wins again.

The hand weirdness on the silhouette was, sadly, one of those things I would have loved to have fixed. Long story short: it was originally an animated sequence with an indigenous/first nations person walking into frame, stopping, reverse angle, bends down, picks up a rock, examines it, zoom into rock and the shot crossfades to the stone in the 3D models. The minister hated, and I mean hated with a special kind of vitriol, the animation...the day before the preview. The green screen sequence was set up, shot, and processed, placed in, and rendered the evening before the 9am preview meeting. I would have loved to have had more time to clean it up. It was shot 1080p 60fps, but I was outputting to 720p 30fps for the project (which was the final delivery). It's fixed now, but that will more or less just be on my demo reel.

As for the 3D...it's not consumer grade. 3Di Interactive (http://www.3di.ca) did the animation. They took architectural drawings it Google Sktechup and imported them to 3D Studio Max. From there they output to the Unreal game engine. They built downtown Edmonton, Alberta in just a few days (they're mostly former Bioware crew, so they're animation studs and professional to boot). Once the models are in the 3D engine, it's basically like a computer game. They just set up camera paths (that was interesting learning how to describe and direct the shots when we only had an exterior (and they only wanted to show the front, and only one room interior). You just ran the camera paths on a timeline, created curves, durations, and "look at" points (which can also move) and then run the moves in real time (which is why they used fraps to capture - I've recommended they pick up a Black Magic intensity...they can just output HDMI from their 3D system, and then capture on a second system in full HD (and less nightmares - no moire and less chance of bad frames and headers (fraps is for gamers, not editors). 3Di are the real stars of the show - it was their contract and they delivered multiple shot sequences that clearly reveal the project. An architect friend of mine was blown away not just by the quality, but the quality in the timeframe (they generally just output stills and real time fly-throughs).

The Sam Elliot VO is actually a local voice actor by the name of Gord Marriot. He's a gem. Gamers will recognize him from Bioware titles like Mass Effect, Neverwinter Nights, and Jade Empire.

I'm blathering because it was just such an intense, brief, and unusual project .This falls into its own category in almost every way (but I did discover how fantastic archives are - I could live in there and just find historical images for montages - amazing stuff).

There's so much I wouldn't have done (you're spot on about the motion and the film damage), but the client was happy, so I just kept my mouth shut and moved on to the next part of the project. It's a miracle that after endless meetings and 22 revisions (version 7 was the first version that even somewhat resembled the final product - and version 12 was the first one where I actually had a sense that I'd be able to deliver on time).

More than anything, I'm just happy Vegas can do everything it does, and how it does it (the crashes were insane, but here's lookin' to 10.0d).

I enjoyed the video, and since you explained why you did the old timey effect on the stills I won't mention why I didn't like that part. :)

I was going to suggest on some stills to do the "kid stays in the picture" effect, to me that is a nice effect with enough subtle movement to look cool.

And really, the Bioware folks helped with the 3D part of it? That is completely awesome! (I just got done with Mass Effect 2), love their stuff!!

anatavism, as someone who once did a domestic violence video for the province of Ontario that took 3 years from concept to completion (I really HATE "video by committee"), I congratulate you for being able to pull this off in only 14 days.
Great video !!!

Mike

Thanks for the 3D explanation.

It wasn't bioware who did the 3D, but 3Di Interactive...which is a lot of former Bioware animation studs.

rs170a: I feel your pain. 3 years. Good heavens. I really can't imagine what that was like...especially for something with all the social and political implications of domestic violence. Hats of too you for that.