Production Package - Language of Cthulhu - R'lyehian

The phrase I found and posted in my other most recent blog was written in Cthulhu's language. ancient R'lyehian. We thought it would be interesting to include this within our piece. Here is the basis for the language we found (so it doesn't look made up by us in the script!)

Vocabulary List

R'lyehian Word / Root English

• - agl-(suffix) place
• ah-generic action, e.g. greet, eat, do
• 'ai-speak / call
• athg-sign (contract) / agree to
• 'bthnk-body / essence
• bug-go
• c--(prefix) we / our
• ch' -cross over / travel
• chtenff-brotherhood / society
• ebumna-pit
• ee-answers
• ehye-cohesion / integrity
• ep-after; with hai, later / then
• f'- -(prefix) they / their
• 'fhalma-mother
• fhtagn-wait / sleep
• fm'latgh-burn
• ftaghu-skin/ boundary
• geb-here
• gnaiih-father
• gof'nn-children
• goka-grant
• gotha-wish
• grah'n-lost one / larva
• h'--(prefix) it / its
• hafh'drn-priest / summoner
• hai-now
• hlirgh-heretic
• hrii-followers
• hupadgh-born of
• ilyaa-expect / await
• k'yarnak-share / exchange
• kadishtu-understand / know
• kn'a-question
• li'hee-on pain of
• llll-at / beside
• lloig-mind / psyche
• lw'nafh-dream / transmit
• mg-(conjunction) yet
• mnahn' -worthless
• n'gha-death
• n'ghft-darkness
• na- -(prefix) (contraction of nafl-)
• nafl--(prefix) not / (not-present tense)
• ng- -(prefix) (conjunction) and / then
• nglui-threshold
• nilgh'ri-anything / everything
• nnn--(prefix) watch / protect
• nog-come
• nw-head / place
• -nyth-(suffix) servant of
• -og-(suffix) (emphatic)
• ooboshu-visit
• -or-(suffix) force from / aspect of
• orr'e-soul / spirit
• -oth-(suffix) native of
• ph' - (prefix) over / beyond
• phlegeth-realm of information
• r'luh-secret / hidden
• ron-religion / cult
• s'uhn-pact
• sgn'wahl-share space
• shagg-realm of dreams
• shogg-realm of darkness
• shtunggli-notify / contact
• shugg-realm of Earth
• sll'ha-invite
• stell'bsna-ask / pray for
• syha'h-eternity
• tharanak-promise / bring
• throd-tremble
• uaaah-(finish spell)
• uh'e-people / crowd
• uln-call /summon
• vulgtlagln-pray to
• vulgtm-prayer
• wgah'n-reside in / control
• y'hah-amen
• y--(prefix) I / my
• ya-I
• -yar-(suffix) time of / moment
• zhro-(lift spell)

Production package - The Shoggoth and Cthulhus Awakening

So looking into more research, there are some other elements that we hope to include in our story that we have found and adapted from Lovecraft's story and Cthulhu Mythos.

There are creatures in the Mythos known as Shoggoth. Shoggoth are amorphous blobs essentially, that originally can take the form of anything or anyone. We have decided to use these within our story but adapt them. Instead of the Shoggoth being able to shape shift, we are going to use them to essentially 'infect' people, causing them to become followers of Cthulhu, and taking control of their bodies. We will have them polluting the water supply, so they are hidden when people drink water out of taps, have baths and showers etc. it is when people come into contact with this polluted water that the Shoggoth will infect them and have them become followers of Cthulhu.

As for awakening Cthulhu, I have before mentioned the earthquake and how it rises the city Cthulhu rests in. In the original story after this happens, Cthulhu is awoken, but still trapped, waiting for the stars to align in a particular way. It is when the stars align correctly, he can come out of his slumber again. We wanted to include this element within our story, but again adapted. After the city rises Cthulhu is awoken but still lies dormant and trapped. It is using the Shoggoth to form a new cult that will cause him to rise again. The newly formed Cult of Cthulhu will wait for the stars to align properly, and then perform a ritual to bring him out of his 'cage'. The ritual will include the chant used in the original being "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn".

We were also thinking of possibly incorporating Lovecraft himself within the story. After the main characters find out what the monster is, probably from the infected Humans, they do research into Cthulhu. I figured an interesting way to go about this would be for the characters to actually look into Lovecraft's literature themselves. The idea behind this being that Everything Lovecraft wrote was actually true, so the key to beating the monster lies in his own literature, such as the Necromomion. We thought this could be an interesting twist in the story, and if we can find a clever way to incorporate it, we will.

Production Package - basic story idea

In terms of the story of our piece, which has the Working Title "Call of Cthulhu" (the same name as Lovecraft's original) we wanted to loosely base it on the original story, however set in modern times.
According to research, Cthluhu was originally a god that ruled the Earth after coming from another realm, however, he was eventually put to sleep in an ancient city called R'lyeh, which sunk to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. In the original story, an Earthquake brings R'lyeh up from the bottom of the ocean, where Cthulhu then telepathically communicates with unstable and mentally I'll people, in order to attempt to perform a ritual to wake him up.
We wanted to go with the same sort of premise, but with our own, modern twist. Cthulhu is said to be as tall as a mountain, thus we thought if he arose from the Pacific and attacked a city along the west coast of the USA, the obvious one would be LA, however we felt it should be situated in New York, especially considering the monsters size. LA would be too easy for him to destroy. Being set in New York, it has a direct correlation with other monster movies, and sets a better atmosphere due to the amount of skyscrapers. This lead us to decide Cthulhus size. Being as large as a mountain we thought may be too big.
Looking at the Empire State Building, it sits at 381m high, or 1250foot tall. We didn't want him larger than the tallest building in NY, so we have decided to have our Cthulhu standing at around 8-900 foot tall. Being in New York as well, would require him rising from the Atlantic Ocean, not the Pacific, thus we have had to change that as well.
As for the city of R'lyeh, we wanted to include another myth which more people have heard about, and that is the Lost City of Atlantis. Many believe Atlantis to sit at the bottom of the Bermuda Triangle, which is just off the East Coast of America. We figured we could have the characters realise a correlation from where Cthulhu rose from, and the amount of mysterious disappearances in the Bermuda Triangle. Thus, we are going for this as a basic storyline on Cthluhu's side of things (main characters and protagonists storyline have not been determined yet)
Cthluhu once ruled the Earth, as in the original story. When put to sleep however, he was lured to and lulled to sleep in the great city of Atlantis, forcing it to sit at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, along with Cthulhu. It was Cthulhus presence and dark energy which caused the Bermuda Triangle rumours, with a sleeping Cthulhu using his god like powers to destroy any plane or ship that disturbed him, perhaps in an attempt to be noticed so he could be woke on up again. An earthquake at the start of our film, will cause part of the lost city to rise, along with Cthulhu. This will then help him to communicate with the unstable and mentally Ill, as he is closer to the surface, and he gets them to form a cult, that wake him up.
The finer details still need to be worked out, and more research will go into the process of waking Cthulhu up and how he was put to sleep in the first place etc, but this is the basic story that we have come up with so far.

Production Package - collaboration plans

Despite 3 of us working together, there will still be some collaboration from outside our course needed. We were thinking of contacting an illustrator, to create an overall design for our monster , Cthulhu. This could then help us when contacting a CG arts student, who we wanted to ask to create a 3d model for us, which we could hopefully then process through a 3d printer in order to have a small model to give a better look at how we envision Cthulhu to be.
Next, perhaps with the same illustrator, we are aiming to get a storyboard commissioned.  OT for the entire film, but for the first couple of scenes. This could then be taken and placed into a short video featuring still images and sound effects to give a visual representation of the opening of our film.
I have also contacted, and am waiting to here back from a friend who has recently graduated a film music course, who is looking to expand his portfolio. I have asked if he would be willing to create a sound track for the film, featuring a couple of musical scores that could be placed on cd with the package, and perhaps even used for our title sequence and in the storyboard.
As a team we will be sending emails out for the collaborators we do need this week, in the hope we can commission people early on, so we can crack on ourselves and hopefully have somethig to show at the green light presentation.

Production Package Concept

So for the production package, I will be working in a team of 3 with James Ogden and Jamie Shaw.
The idea we came up with was to create a production package for a new monster movie, based on HP. Lovecraft's monster, Cthulhu.
We have taken inspiration from other monster movies, such as Godzilla and Cloverfield, but wanted it stylistically to be very over the top, such as the 2013 monster movie, Sharknado.
Using the monster Cthulhu has many benefits for us. The design of the monster is practically determined for us already, as he is a popular monster that many games and cartoons tend to feature. we just feel we will benefit from having our own interpretation of Cthulhu drawn up for us, possibly a 3D model made to show what he is really like.
The movie will be based around New York, set in the modern day, unlike the original Lovecraft story, which was set in the 1920's, around the time the story was written.
My main role in this project will be focusing on the writing aspect, coming up with the characters, plot line and writing the overall synopsis and 90 odd page script. James will aid me in the writin however the main bulk will be done by me, whilst James focuses more on the marketing and casting side of things, and Jamie will take the visual side.

Professional Practice - Directorial Showreel & General Case Study Update

So today I finished my Directors Showreel, as part of my case study for my Professional Practice unit.

What I neglected to mention, is my project with The Nameless Foundation fell through at the last minute, so I have had to resort to doing the Case Study. For my case study, I am looking into the Director/Writer/Producer that is Tim Burton, and writing about his career, how he got to where he is, how the usual person would get to his level, and how I would apply it to myself.

I have found this relatively difficult, but have some interesting books that have helped. I have also found good quotes from websites such as the BBC Writers Forum, skillset and general interviews with Tim Burtons about each of his pictures. What has been more difficult however is writing about how to apply it to myself. Naturally I can say that I would take the same route as Burton if I can, but elaborating in more detail is proving difficult.

On top of that, a Directors CV and Showreel must be made.

I finished the showreel today, and am pleased with the result. To create this, I had to gather together all of the best of my past projects, and even some of the footage of my upcoming projects I have directed. I picked and chose clips from each of them, which I felt best showcased my talents, whilst putting fitting music over the top of them.
The music I chose is Gary Jules - Mad World for The Raven
Extreme Ways - Moby for Gullible
Superman theme for Behind the Cape
and
Guitar Flute & String - Moby for The Tale of Graham Beadle

I felt these fit correctly. It was difficult to choose the clips, and upon looking at other show reels, I felt I shouldn't include much speech. I was directed (ironically :P ) in the other way with this, and lowered some of the sound levels so it wasn't just clips of people with their mouths moving.

Anyway, here is the finished product. I hope you like it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohJ-N3BTTrI&feature=c4-overview&list=UU01lt6FJ5Lg9X4z-8BFFWeQ

2nd Year Major Production - Behind the Cape filming

From Saturday - Monday I did the filming of my Major Production, my mockumentary "Behind the Cape"
It kicked off quite well. After having spent £75 on costume the night before, I created the costumes from scratch, with the help of my housemate who is on the Creative Arts of Theatre and Film course at UCA Rochester. We created the Captain Justice costume. To do this, I got a green morph suit, printed off the Captain Justice logo, and stuck it on. We then fashioned a cape out of blue material, put blue boxers over the top of the morph suit, and used blue gloves. I was very proud with the finished product and my actor, Jamie Drabble, looked fantastic.

The costume was good and rather fitting. I also had to dye the lab coat over night for Doctor Z, the villain. Sadly, the coat was meant to be black, and the dye we got turned the coat a bluey/grey. It would seem the reason for this would be that the coat was made out of polyester, and it should have been cotton to dye correctly and turn into the Black colour I wanted. As much as I would have liked he coat to be black, it did work well having it grey. The red Z came out really nice on the back of the coat, and it didn't make the costume so monotonous, as if it was all black it could have looked quite bland.

On the Saturday, we filmed all of the Captain Justice scenes, his talking heads, and all of the bits of just him. We could not do the outside bits as it was raining. We brought a rain cover with us, but did not use it as it was too heavy. Checking the forecast, we waited for the next day, as it was meant to be clear skies.

Coming to the next day, Joz Norris, who played Doctor Z, arrived early in the morning and the weather was kind to us, and we were able to film the outside park scene, featuring the first confrontation of Justice and Z. We also did all the parts we missed the day before that should have been outside with Captain Justice.

The shoot went really well. We did run across a few problems however. The main issue, was casting.
I had enough actors lined up, mainly to play all of the villains come the Doom Troop meeting in Doctor Z's house. One of my actors, Dalton Mundell, had to drop out at the last minute. He was playing one of the Doctor's henchmen. As the henchmen was a necessary part, I recast the person playing the villain 'Jeff' and cast him as Fidel instead. Jeff was wiped from the script entirely, however, I liked his lines so much, I decided to keep them, and give them to the non-speaking role of The Terrorist. The other issue I suffered from, was my actor for the character of 'The Fiddler' - a gypsy pickpocket, had to pull out last minute as they couldn't do the Sunday when we were filming. They offered for the Monday, but all the other villains, I only had for the Sunday. This was quite upsetting as I could find no replacements and the character had to be cut, despite his talking head being one of my favourites. It was okay to cut him however as the part wasn't entirely necessary, it would just have been nice to have.

Every thing else in the shoot went well. In retrospect, I next time would sort my casting out a bit earlier, and have dates ready and sorted knowing exactly when I will shoot, so I can make sure people will come exactly when I need them (although to be fair, they were sorted a while before, it was just last minute pull outs).
Maybe I should get back ups just incase.

Here are some of the costumes from the day.