aric with an a

look, I’ve been hard on the pyramids and vocal about the pain that is the tourism sector here.

but have also had a few adventures here-and-there.

this one might top the list.

Egypt winning the African Cup was insane.

as you can see.

and I gave into the vibe and jumped on a horse-drawn carriage to celebrate.

you can also see that might not have been the best of ideas.

I first met Tim Hey the second day I landed in Los Angeles - and when you meet someone who’s both humble and successful in the industry, you know you have a rarity. He stayed with Lori and I off-and-on a week or so, and, save for the mass shootings outside and a pension for lychee margaritas, it was fun.

Tim has been in the film industry now for nearly 20 years. First starting a Summer job at his local cinema tearing tickets and moving onto projectionist and engineer. About 9 years ago He decided he should do what he’d always wanted to do and play more of a part in making films. He went to the National Film and Television School in London to study compositing. After graduating, he got his first job on a film called Blade 2 doing prep work such as painting out wires and rigs that were in shots. Within a year he went freelance and started compositing. Between then and now he’s worked on such films as Harry Potter 2 and 3, Aliens vs Predator, Kingdom of Heaven and Superman Returns among many others. He then went to New Zealand initially for 3 months to work on King Kong, but that was 4 years ago, so I’m guessing he liked it.

…oh yeah, one last thing, he just got done working on a small-budget indie flick called ‘Avatar’ or something like that - be a peach and try to see it if you can.

-

what exactly do you do?

I am a compositor at Weta Digital in New Zealand and have been for about 4 years.

what is a compositor?

A compositor is an artist who brings all elements together for a final shot. For example in “Avatar” we have shots with multiple layers of jungles, skies & clouds, creatures, explosions, water, tracer fire and of course the na’vi characters themselves. We then have to make it look as if the shot was filmed with the same camera on the same day. Along with all the elements we add real artifacts you would find if you were filming with real cameras. Lens flares, lens distortion, focus pulls and atmosphere are a few of the added things which make a shot look more natural.

For this project I was a lead compositor so in addition to compositing it was making sure everyone on my sequence was kept up to date with status of shots, ensuring continuity between shots by establishing the look of a sequence alongside the 3D lighters and visual effects supervisor. It also involves liaising with the supervisors and producers and check we were meeting deadlines and flagging any problematic issues that may come up.

how long does each of those frames take to process?

Depending on the amount of data used in the shot and how many elements are used, a single frame can take anywhere from an hour to a couple of days. If you remember there are 24 frames in 1 second that’s a lot of data. Added to that on “Avatar” each frame was rendered twice (right eye and left eye). Luckily the way we and a lot of other large visual effects companies process - or render - frames is we use multiple processors over a network. This leaves us free to do other work and proceed with other shots. Once a shot is rendered it is then reviewed by the visual effects supervisor for any changes that need to be made before the shot is sent to the director to be reviewed.

how long you been working on this?

I’ve been on the show for around a year. however the project has been running a lot longer. Some people at Weta Digital have been working on it 3 maybe 4 years. Because this is literally creating a whole new world, everything has to be built and nothing from the real world can be used. That’s every plant, blade of grass, creature, bug, character, environment, object and vehicle that has to be created from nothing. Usually a film from being awarded to being delivered takes between 6 months and a year at most so that kind of gives you an idea of the scale of Avatar and the work that has gone into it from all the artists involved.

be honest. what’s it like to work on a James Cameron film?

I think that’s the most common question I get. This director is pretty good to work for. What makes it easy from an artists point of view is he has a definite vision of how the whole film and every individual shot should look like. Therefore the artists aren’t bouncing between versions and various different looks which can take up valuable time. On “Avatar”, especially as the show went on, shots we delivered for first look usually only needed polishing and tweaking before the shot was near final status. There were a few occasions where we would show him a version of a shot a few months after he first saw it and he would remember exactly how it looked and what changes were made.

what, if any shots appear in the trailers that you composited?

For the teaser trailer that was released in August I had about 8 shots. Mostly of the Thanator chase in the jungle and Neytiri in the forest surrounded by fire and smoke.

how many people worked on “Avatar”?

We started with around 300 people which is the usual crew for Weta. As the show went on and more scenes were being sent to us from production we ramped up to a maximum of between 800 and 900. Put it this way, it was a heck of a wrap party!

-

…at the time of writing, ‘Avatar’ netted $232 million on it’s first weekend. that’s a lot of money.

for reasons unbeknownst to be, a lot of people visit my little blog. a handful of you email, others comment, but going off the stats, only about 0.02%. which is fine. but what I’m going to need over the coming weeks/months is your help with something…let me explain:

here’s what I have: a computer. a camera that shoots video. a good pair of boots.

here’s what I don’t have: money

here’s what I want to do: see a few things before it’s all over

…so, as you may or may not have read over the past few days, I got a bit of a shock when I found out that the $ I had coming in wasn’t there yet. it might be, it might not be, but it was going to be used for an adventure. but maybe the adventure begins because I don’t have it. so I spent the past few days worrying, thinking, moaning, blaming - lots of things that end in -ing, but few that ended in peace. in excitement.

but no one really has any $ these days to do anything.

that shouldn’t stop the adventure - it should start it.

so, here’s my idea:

passion

wait that might have come across wrong, me mentioning having a camera and ‘passion’ being the answer. there’ll be no adult films, but what there could be are films about adults.

lemme ask you - if someone was willing to shoot a short 2-3 minute film on what you were passionate about, be it your work, a story you have, your charity, your hometown, anything, would you give ‘em a place to sleep and a bite to eat?

I think you would. I think anyone would.

the tricky part is that I want to do it in countries I know nothing about. people I don’t know how to speak to. etc.

but time-and-time again, I’ve met those who comment on how lucky I was to have English as my mother-tongue - and could surely find someone, somewhere along the way who could help.

so, here’s what I need - advice.

how could I do this? what am I not thinking of? is it even possible?

help me with this initial set-up and then I’ll start throwing out the places I want to go…

it would start with Turkey.

I haven’t gotten out much here in Hawaii.

but it’s because I’m working.

and I’m just fine with that.

because my work involves pushing a button.

and in-between, having fun.

and when your work involves pushing buttons,

and in-between, having fun,

in Hawaii

well, there’s not much room for moaning.

so I won’t.

hi there. you good?

I feel we never talk - oh, sure, there’s the occasional ‘here’s what I’m doing’,

but never anything about you.

but since you don’t have a blog,

I’ll just tell you more about ‘what I’m doing’.

the book is coming along - slowly, but still coming along. writing it was easy, going back through each page and making it make sense is another. but thanks to a random email from someone I barely know, I was given an idea of how to make it all work. so, thanks random friend.

got me some new-old boots on the way. I’m quite excited.

headed back to Hawaii on Thursday  - which will be fun.

which means I’m gonna have to rock my Frank Zappa on the islands.

need a new addiction? this tea is insane.

this song has been played a lot these past few days - the Swedes really can do no wrong.

I’ve become addicted to Netflix - and shall be posting some of the better ones soon. [it's Blaxploitation Week this week - lucky Lori!]

if you need a ridiculous sausage-and-rice recipe, I’m your man.

we attended some Gay Polo yesterday in Santa Barbara before hitting some wineries for tastings - you know, your basic Sunday.

I think I’m going to like Kodak Gallery is doing for storage these days.

…and I think that’s about the highlights.

I hope it’s nice-and-cool where you are. this time of year it should be nice-and-cool.

[and isn't that a great picture? I snapped that at St. Vincent De Paul's]

see this film. make this the next film on your netflix. don’t watch another film before watching this one. prepare to laugh, cry, sing along and stand in line for their next show. see this film and feel good about films.see this film. make this the next film on your netflix. don’t watch another film before watching this one. prepare to laugh, cry, sing along and stand in line for their next show. see this film and feel good about films.

[repeat X 10]

I feel like an asshole. seriously.

how long has this film been out and how long have I had it sitting in my ‘movies’?

this little piece called ‘the miroir noir’.

don’t get me wrong, I like the arcade fire. always have.

but have liked them in the ‘will listen to an entire album all the way through and not get tired of them’ like them.

but I’m halfway through their doco shot by vincent morisset [someone who I'll be stalking quite a bit now] and am floored.

fucking floored.

it’s artsy, but a good artsy. I need to find out who the d.o.p. was because he deserves a mention…ah - found it: vincent moon.

wow.

that makes sense.

fuck me, it’s good.

I’m serious.

do what you need to - just get your hands on it.

best band, by far, of the past 10 years. by far.

I spent about half-an-hour on youtube and all I could find was this - but it at least gives you an idea.

go [ahem] canada!

sometimes I pick up diary and start writing - remembering that I forgot to write earlier about whatever it is I was referencing.

so, skip this if you want. skip ‘em all if you want, but that would kind of negate you being here.

anyway.

- the fires here are insane. it looks like something set up by a sfx crew from down the street. the mountains we can see from our window have been outlined with an amber that would impress even the best of j.r.r. tolkien fans. it’s scary and beautiful. kind of like patricia arquette.

- I woke up the other night with the lyrics to an onyx song in my head and had to write it down on a piece of paper and my hand as not to forget. I then downloaded and wondered why and how the hell I dreamt about them. it did lead me to revisit the soundtrack to ‘judgement night’ which was impressive for it’s time - one of the first fusion attempts. living colour + run dmc / de la soul + teenage fanclub / sonic youth + cyprus hill = goodness.

- I’m writing. a lot. about 2000 words a day in the book. which is painful - for many reasons, but mainly having to revisit the old shanghai diaries for reference and man. I wasn’t too happy about being there. and I had better hair. ah well.

- this book has kept my attention for the past few days. and I like it. and this is on the way - which excites my head a lot.

- I’m an official netflix fan. every 2 days I have a new film. and I’m loving it. a list is coming. old news, sure - but it’s been a decade since I’ve lived here.

- my bro riaad is a funny man. very funny. kid should be on the onion.

- this week’s ‘rough sundays’ was good. but I liked having people co-host more. I’m looking forward to the new show, but I’ll miss my gospel as well.

- last night I made the best tequila-cajun-lime shrimp you might have ever had. mmmmmmm. no kiddin’.

- do you think mos def and I would get along well? I’ve always thought so. his ‘black on both sides’ is on right now and I just feel it.

- I’m on a hip-hop trip. but good hip-hop. c’mon.

- I’ve still yet to use the word ‘douche’. seriously. not because I have anything against it, I just always forget.

- I’m most excited about this film coming out. mostly because I love goats.

- yesterday in the mail, I got a) posters from Adam b) 40+ moon pies from friends of Lori’s and c) ‘choke’ from the aforementioned netflix. not a bad haul.

…is that all?

I don’t know.

probably not.

[photo of me in the toilet at the tate modern in london. how creative I am!]

I’m tired.

I wanted to write this tomorrow with…

well, lots of adjectives.

but wanted to write now.

see this film.

I’m quite the lucky boy.

I mean, sure, I could have probably bought the train ticket and somehow found my way around the neighboring city, guidebook in hand, taking it all in, but as luck would have it, a friend offered to take me there in her car. On the autobahn. Which was all the rage when I was 12.

‘There’s NO SPEED LIMIT! You can go as FAST AS YOU WANT!’ - sad that this was the extent of my European knowledge.

As it turned out, there was a speed limit, but who would want to drive fast past the old racetrack and under the previous checkpoints? Ignore a silent tribute to Babelsberg, the breeding ground for one of the all-time greatest films, Metropolis?

Not me.

About 40 minutes later we pulled into Potsdam. Walked the acres and acres of ‘Sanssouci’ - ‘without worries’. Took in the castles and (still functioning) windmills. Yellow houses arm-in-arm with mute streams. And sausages. So many sausages.

‘Are you in a rush?’ she asked through her grey and red scarf.

‘No. Why?’

‘Then why don’t you sit down to smoke?’

Good point.

I can go as fast as I want.