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Cinematic Contest #5 - Results

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Story:

The story itself has potential, but it mostly resembled to a trailer than an elaborately developed plot.

Certain elements from Narnia (closet being the portal), Jessabelle & Skeleton Key (spirit seemingly being harmless, but actually wants to switch places with the protagonist) and Legend of Korra (consequences of spending excessive time in the spiritual world) could not be neglected while I was watching this.

For the amount of information conveyed to the viewer, it was very slowly-paced. The only hint in regard to what has happened to Albert is a book and potentially an inscribed ritual that would send their souls to the purgatory. Albert was too naive and careless to meddle with the dark arts and his fate was indeed torn to shreds, as warned by the book's incantations. It is not revealed what has happened to Peter, whether he participated in the ritual and how he survived if he did. These holes in the story generate more confusion than empathy and it needs a lot of imagination from the viewer's side to interpret the intention of the author.

We are then shown the lonely abyss where Albert resides and from a single line in the cinematic, we understand that this is a depiction of the purgatory. There is no sign of torment in Albert's spirit, who is able to wander within and fuse himself with the real world. This is a stereotype born by the use of the word 'purgatory'; if there was a broader definition in that, you could have used another word and explain it throughout the cinematic. Eventually, it would have allowed you to be more creative and, given that the viewer would be exposed to unique imagery, immersive.

For someone like Peter who was gullible (according to his friend) and feared the sound of the word 'purgatory', I was surprised to see no reaction when he saw the ghost of his friend – how common to see your deceased friend's mirage talking to you and directly ask why he switched off the lights. Even if he was not intimidated by that, the dark man's manifestation should have at least caused a scream or some indication of fear. After all, he is just a child (based on the distorted pitch of the voice). As a final note on this point, you should have better managed the dark man, when he appeared. Surely it was Albert's trick to get Peter in the purgatory, but it was unrealistic to see the dark man simply standing there.

After these events, we suddenly see a priest standing by the bed. This implies that Peter's spirit was the one who left the bed and not his physical self; moreover, it implies that his spirit was lost for hours, days or even months. Again, there is no indication of how long it has been, and there are no doctors involved (typically, we would see a doctor trying to save the child or some life-support machine attached to him than a priest). Time is therefore absent in this cinematic – everything is floating in a time-gravitational world. Actions and decisions are also not explained thoroughly: why they wanted to cast this spell, how they found this book, why the door was closed in the beginning (which automatically involves parents, yet we saw neither of them during these events) and what follows after the possession.

The number of characters was really low (3). This constrains our focus on nothing else but these characters and backstory would have enriched the main story on both visual and emotional levels.

20/70

Terrain:

There were no particular techniques used in terraining the scenery – everything was flat (almost completely disregarded the Z axis). The room was nicely done and there was a wide array of model packs used to come up with this result.
For more realism, I would like to see more toys here and there, scattered on the floor, knowing how untidy children are. Toys or other objects could also be placed inside the box in front of Peter's bed. It is as if he occupied that container for Albert's soul.

The purgatory was not well executed. It looked more like a dark chamber where the ghost was condemned to relive his final moment, but it did not look like that either. Clearly, the use of a cave-like scenery was an attempt to demonstrate the bowels of the earth (which is actually the interpretation of hell), but it was not done in a sophisticated way. It was simply composed of rocks and lanterns, shrouded in darkness. Even if it is barren as we all assume the purgatory to be, it could assemble more features and elements to enhance the feeling of terror associated with it.
When the flashbacks were shown, you could have used another room for the purpose (e.g. a school environment), to widen the scope of the story. Taking advantage of that scene, you could have unraveled the thread of the story and unriddle the speculations made in the story section.

25/50

Audio & Visuals:

In terms of visuals, there was a number of inaccuracies across the scenes.
Initially, the decision to instill human-like behavior in Albert's spirit was not the best. We explicitly see the spirit to switch off the light and the close door. Ghosts, from the folk ideology, are manifestations of energy and are able to cause motion and fluctuations in electric currents. Thus, both of these actions were contradicting to his own nature.
For a dark-looking spirit, I am not sure how Peter was able to distinguish Albert's figure in the darkness of his room. In addition to that, I did not understand why the spirit came out of the box. For an entity that can clearly bridge the physical with the spiritual world, I cannot imagine how it would be contained or obstructed by physical objects.

In the purgatory scene, we see that the candles' particles are getting darker with the presence of fog, which goes against the rational aim of their placement: to lighten the path. Instead of fog, you could have used black glows, placed in a way that they do not intercept with the lanterns. Actually, I am not able to say which method you used, although I am thinking you have used both. In spite of that, there is no light actually emitting from them – you should have used light models to illuminate the surrounding environment. It is also distracting to see light abruptly coming into the scene (guess you either remove the black glows or the camera makes them disappear), when Albert encourages Peter to jump.
The scene was not rich in effects to comment on each of them, but the other inaccuracy I noticed was the fireflies. Even here, I feel that you wanted to aesthetically boost your scene, but you forgot the fact that living creatures make no sense in the purgatory. Peter entered this 'dimension' only due to Albert, but this does not justify fireflies being there.
Overall, as previously mentioned in the terrain section, I found the interpretation and subsequent execution of the purgatory to be weak.

As for the sounds, things are slightly better here. You have used multiple sounds to compliment the visuals and their timing was great (not delayed, neither premature).
On top of that, you have used voice acting, which is always welcome and fascinating. I cannot say that the result is as fascinating though. Both voices are identical (if we had no names as references in the dialogues, it would be really hard to tell who is who) – the only difference is the echo effect. Thus, the pitch is the same.
The voice acting itself is moderate. There is no sentimental value in it, except for one: "What happened?", when Peter wondered. Given the high pitch you are using, the dialogues are performed very fast, in a robotic way, which does not leave room for emotional timbre. If you know that you are going to use high pitch (which will make the audio timeline significantly shorter), make sure you add lengthier pauses in-between the words. Peter's voice acting was a lot better than Albert's. I could clearly understand how naive this child is (slow uttering, question-based lines and an almost complaining voice). You could have emphasized the line where Albert mocks Peter "Oh come on! Don't be such a big baby!"; you could have acted a more regretful tone upon "I'm sorry, Peter, but I want to to live again."; you could have made the following line more convincing "Come on, Peter, I know you can do it!" - a) it did not make Albert sound hasty and b) the second part of the line was not acted in an encouraging way.

Finally, I wondered why you decided not to include music. Some soft, atmospheric, thriller-like music with a mix of piano tones in the flashbacks would have greatly contributed in the vividness of the scenes.

27/50

Camera & Technical Competence:

The camera was pretty stationary: it was either following a character or panning to a different angle. Albeit such a thing is not necessarily bad, as it also contributes to descriptive scenery, e.g. introduction to a scene, it has been majorly used throughout the entire cinematic.
Moreover, a stationary camera is linked to slow pacing. Since emotional context is lacking and the story has no lengthy narration, it only causes a deleterious effect on the output. The height of the camera has no variation, continuously placing the viewer in a third-person perspective and disengaging them from the characters. Other basic camera effects have been utterly neglected (such as tilting, close-ups and general zooming). This should be refrained from a cinematic with active dialogues and should be primarily employed during a narrative cinematic. For instance, a close up could have been used in a key element of the story, the reading of the book, or the scene where Peter possesses Albert and wakes up from the deep slumber.

I was however excited to see a very nice trick: when Albert fell off of the rocky formation in the purgatory and “landed” on his room, reading the book during the flashback. This is an example of smart content and deliberate camera controversy.

The fade filters were long, which exposed lacking behavior of the characters while the fading occurred; that said, from vivid and fluid motion taking place in the scenes, we were abruptly drawn to a still image fading in. This results in suspense to be dropping low. If suspense is dropping low, the viewer is unable to discern the importance of each scene. In order to resolve this, you can avoid using fade filters upon every change of the scene. Alternatively, you can decrease the time it takes for the filter to fully blend in and you will be able to have better and more meaningful control over your scenes and to fill these time-gaps with complementary content.

Finally, the camera shake right before the possession was rather awkward – I do not see why an environmental effect should take place for this incident. The camera shake combined with the red lighting provoked the feeling that the purgatory roared in its own way; there was a soul trade – Albert for Peter. The way you set it up is as if the purgatory empathizes with the injustice that took place at that moment, however it cannot be conceived as a moral ally of the viewer (who also senses the injustice). I understand the need that arose in this case, in order to make a fancy transition and magnify the treachery, but it was out of place. Again, in this scene, I have to highlight the idleness of the characters, while the purgatory is shaking.

20/70



Story:

The story of this cinematic clip was sadly poor. Despite the fact that we have not seen something like this directly reanimated in the WarCraft world, it inevitably echoed The Mummy Returns movie and the fairly new The Pyramid. Consequently, it is in par with certain characteristics (clichès) that have flooded this genre: a greedy and narrow-minded character with no respect to the past, who always has an eye for looting; a moral antagonist who tries to bring sense into them; a curse that awakens from an all-ancient slumber, ready to swallow everything and everyone; a bunch of scared-to-death superstitious peons and the incarnation of a (demi-)god.

Although these repetitive patterns make the plot familiar (which, studies have shown that something familiar induces liking), it fails to instill depth and to make the plot less predictable. The story was revealed in a visuo-linguistic manner and the dialogues were unable to spark great excitement and suspense. I am glad that you have also included questions, as they make the story more interactive. However, I did not comprehend the reason why William said twice that the tomb has remained intact. I believe it was quite obvious from the start.

The adaptation to the contest's theme was more than sufficient; fiction was brought to the events, as expected. The title was rather generic and it would better fit a Sci-Fi cinematic. I also found its use quite naive, since it foretells a bad ending. I would definitely recommend a neutral title, which is more reflective of the story (e.g. "Beneath the Sand").

The ending was a bit abrupt. Although there was diligent commitment to escalating the impact of the events, the ending offers vast grounds of interpretations. Sure the god will eventually bring chaos into the world, but I would really like to see how the portrayal of mass destruction would be attempted on a visual level. By not doing so, presenting a gigantic god wandering through the physical world and acting as a harbinger of catastrophic events, it feels incomplete and unconvincing.

Overall, the congruence and similarity to other plots of this kind was positively weighted, which is not advantageous.

35/70

Terrain:

The scenery was definitely a major benefit. The execution was smart and the placement halfway through the ground made the terrain look realistic (as if the ruins are still being unearthed). Obviously, some parts of the terrain looked really barren, but in a desert-like scenery, it is natural. The city was surprisingly well-made; there was attention to detail and this definitely contributed in bringing out a lively and realistic result.
The debris was finely scattered on the ground and the statues alike, depicting the decay of a formerly glorious tomb. Admittedly, there was harmony throughout the hues and it was very refreshing that shiny gold was missing.
I was slightly distracted by the low number of objects that were used in the burial chamber. 'This' treasure that we expected to see in abundance was not well justified. Additionally, I expected to see some webs floating around: the tomb would look older and more mysterious. Finally, some corpses of monks or workers set adjacently while the two characters moved towards the burial chamber could also provide greater definition and spookier ambiance; after all, if a pharaoh was buried with his/her servants, imagine a god's tomb. You could also scatter one or two of such corpses on the floor and excuse it as someone having entered the tomb before or someone having left in rush (an interesting twist to what the characters previously said – also contributes to suspense).

40/50

Audio & Visuals:

I found some flaws with the visuals, which could be avoided or at least neglected.
First of all, the characters turning was slightly awkward. Some modification to the models to add bone_head would certainly make it more realistic than whole-body turning (which was by the way slow). This also applies to the car in the first scene: it looks like you have ordered a move command instead of periodically moving the vehicle, which in turn made it look much less mechanical. When you have multiple path turns, you need to avoid a series of plain move commands (maybe it makes sense in a game, but not in a cinematic).
Secondly, there was this fidgeting ('jerky') motion when the models were descending the staircase, which is drawing a lot of attention, causing utter disregard of the surroundings (and thus making the camera work useless at that point).
Thirdly, the appearance of Anubis had three subsequent mishaps: the lighting of the environment suddenly became too intense (in the room before his arrival), taking away the previously atmospheric ignorance of what lies ahead; the constant animation loop of his left shoulder; the removal of the god's spiritual form, by maintaining the model's full opacity.
Fourthly, the crouching workers outside of the tomb were highly static (and it was obvious because of the high-duration cameras). I am positive that this has to do with the absence of a proper "mining"-type animation. Thus, you could another model for the purpose (which would also add visual diversity). When you first showed these models (in the excavation area in front of the tomb's entrance), I thought they were mummies. If I hadn't seen them moving around in close scenes, I wouldn't have known.
Fifthly, the military men, in the scene with the jeep approaching, had a really slow animation. Very nice of you to make their animation speed slower, but the model was not good enough for what you wanted to achieve.
The sand passage looked like an elevating floor, while the sand flowing out of the sculptures unfortunately still looked like water. While the idea is really interesting, the execution did not justify the result. You could have removed the waterfalls and actually make it an elevating floor (by retaining the traps and the bodies on top).
Finally, the dynamites appearing out of nowhere was quite unsettling. You could have used them as hand attachments first and then make them appear on the ground – at least you would have a smoother transition.

Regarding the sound, it featured everything, music, voice acting and sound effects. Although you have established high realism and immersion, there are still a few flaws to count.

The music transition was not always accurately executed and it is evident from the scene right after the detonation: the music ended as abruptly as the fading filter came in, just like the point where William gets out of the car. I did not understand why you completely removed the music whenever there were dialogues. It would appear more natural if you simply decreased its volume – plus, it would make the transition easier and less prominent.

The sliding door's looping sound was badly decided on; there was no circularity in the end and beginning of the sound, causing obvious pauses in-between of each replay.

There was a virtually wide range of sounds used, also featuring 3D positioning (e.g. vehicle moving toward and away from the camera), but you could have used some eerie loops for the tomb, which would also complement the music. Moreover, I would like to hear some crowd talking throughout the city scene. Heavy footsteps following Anubis's movement animation could bring higher contrast to his size, compared to the legion of his minions. Using footsteps on the main characters is much appreciated; you are basically minimizing the impact of the boxy WarCraft III look with these details.

Finally, the voice acting was moderate. The quality of the recording was not good, but issues of equipment are not a reason to be judged upon and will thus focus on the depth of the acting. It has been clear that both characters were acted by you. Given the constant interaction between them, it would be better to attempt a much different voice for one of them, because it feels like the same person is talking. The acting itself was a bit shallow; there were no ups and downs worth mentioning and it was especially blatant when William stated that the tomb was virgin of human presence for many centuries. Although the dialogue prepared for awe and admiration, the acting did not encompass that.
The only attempts I saw with actual acting was when William was angry at Eric for being gullible and when Eric said that the place is cursed (the emotional arousal occurred too suddenly in the voice).
Voice acting has to escalate depending on the scenes and the cameras. I believe that the acting came out plain because you did not empathize with the characters. Best way to solve this is to train yourself in contemplating on how it would be like, had you been in their shoes. Panic, fear and excitement should all be delineated throughout the scenes. This will help you establish an emotional affect on the people who are watching your cinematic, while it also facilitates immersion (which is hard to achieve in this engine). To my experience, voice acting the lines prior to determining the camera action (and then the environment) allows you to put emphasis on key-aspects of the story. Of course, this is my personal workflow and it does not mean that you should blindly follow it, I am just tossing an idea.

30/50

Cameras & Technical Competence:

The cameras were well controlled and the scenery was easily observable. Multiple camera angles were introduced and one can easily familiarize with the surroundings. I would suggest more cameras within the tomb; if you used high pillars and took shots from the low corner of the room and/or featured an eagle-eye view while the group was exploring the interior, it could give the illusion that the tomb is bigger than what we saw.
At the same time, when William and Eric reached the burial site, instead of slowly revealing the statues, I would definitely suggest using snapshot-cameras (of 1-1.5 seconds in duration) with an accompanying sound for every statue. This would instill tension and it would prepare us for something "dangerous" coming into play. We were already warned anyway by the sudden lighting change in the previous room.

The camera panning was following the proceedings in the right speed. However, I would like to see some forward panning during the exploration of the tomb; if you used a close-up camera to move it along the direction of the group's facing and models' height, it would make you feel part of the group.

Fortunately, you did not overuse fading filters. You were really parsimonious to their use in the first scenes and fairly enough. You could have used a couple of them in the tomb, making the transition from the lit torches to the darkness of the cave (and then shifting smoothly to another camera). More filters could also be used in the final scene: they would serve as cues to what could come next; then, after increasing the speed of camera switching (and of course decreasing the filters' duration), you could end the cinematic with a high-duration filter (0% initial opacity setting, 100% final) and a growling sound.

The camera effects were used in a very anticipated manner (which is good). The explosion and the tomb ceiling falling apart, they both required the camera shaking effect. My suggestion would be to also use low-duration shakes when Anubis is walking through his legions (this would manifest his gigantic size, provided that you want to display that). Speaking of which, it would be good if you had taken a shot from a lower angle on Anubis, for the same reason as before.

Overall, I do not have major camera complaints, you did a really good job; some changes here and there would just give more power to the story's depiction.

55/70




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Formula: (Votes / Total Votes)*30 + Judge's Results*(70/40)

Entries
APproject: (16/24)*30 + (155/240)*70 = 65,208
Tickles: (8/24)*30 + (92/240)*70 = 36,833
With 10% pool, APproject receives 55 reputation and Tickles receives 39.



Contest | Poll
 
Level 25
Joined
Aug 13, 2011
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739
Even though the outcome was fairly obvious from the poll, it was an honor getting stomped by you, AP :xxd: Hopefully more than just two people participate in the next cinematic contests.

And Pharaoh, that is some impressive judging. Thanks for such detailed reviews.
 
Level 31
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2,555
It was an honor to compete with you too Tickles, you certainly did a good work as always and to my mind it was equal quality.

Impressive judging indeed, it was worth waiting. Personally I never thought about the importance of all those extremely small details, but the judge and some viewers has a keen eye and demands a lot, even modeling and sound effect modding experience to perfect those little gaps and to get loose from the feeling of Warcraft's limitations. Your judging, Pharaoh, certainly pushes forward to pay more attention to those little things.

Oh and thanks for congratulating. :)
 
Well done, guys, and thank you for not giving up on this, when everyone else was dropping out - I would easily get discouraged. I honestly wish we would have more cinematic maps, I just love them.

At some point it felt like a good idea to begin our own cinematic, as Hiveworkshop, with lore-creators, artists and coders. However, given the participation in contests, it was more like a dream (not coming true).

Flaws are expected to be seen by non-professionals. To be told what is missing or could be changed is not an act of superiority complex by the "experts", a notion that has been lying in the Arena forever. It's just that, when we develop a cinematic, a game or anything, we are bombarded by so many thoughts on what's left to develop, that we either undervalue the importance of details or we completely forget them in the long run.

Tickles, I encourage you to fill in those story gaps and increase the length of the cinematic into a bigger story. APproject's was more complete, so it's up to him to work on it further.

Good job to both of you :)
 
Well said, Pharaoh.

Sounds like a great idea, I would surely wish to contribute for this big idea and be a part of it, big and high quality work would surely be fun. :)

Start the campaign and consider me in. Gotta say though, I'm not really into Wc3 anymore; if we were to engage in such a project, I'd recommend either SC2 or Unity 3D (especially now that the free version (5.0) contains all the pro features), merely for greater quality and less limitations. I am too busy at the moment to recruit potential members. However, I'm available to pitch in for lore, coding and general concepts. But yeah, my initial interpretation was a cinematic for an expansion to WarCraft, something to shake and inspire Blizzard. The reason behind this idea is to justify our role and dedication, as a forum, to this game. It must use custom content that is not present in World of Warcraft, but it will be something that fits the aesthetics and lore approaches of the company. This would allow each artist to contribute in a more personal way rather than following a protocol, but at the same time to display our experience with their world.
 
Level 31
Joined
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Messages
2,555
Well, it is your idea and you would be perfect to lead such a project, I don't think I could do such a thing myself, but I would surely wish to contribute in some way of course if this becomes the next big thing. Sadly you are busy and this will not let it go through as easily as it could.
 
Level 2
Joined
Mar 26, 2015
Messages
8
I'd love to make more cinematics with advanced cinematic makers :'D
I'm currently a depressed thing on a slöw computer :/
But I've got skill and I'm encuraged by friendly faces and the joy in the making.
 
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