Just noticed that over at fxguide they have a really interesting interview. Here is the info.

A conversation with Gareth Edwards, director of Attila the Hun, about how he completed over 250 visual effects shots for the film using a combination of After Effects, Premiere, MochaAE, 3dsMax, and more.

And here is the link. Listen

Epic Tale Of The Fall And Rise Of Mankind Comes To Life In New Multimedia Movie Project.

Today Patrick Lawrence announced the release of the first two “Video Pages” of his new serialized multimedia movie, “Heaven: The Fall And Rise Of Mankind.”

“Some people have said I am nuts for doing a project like this on my own without a budget, but sometimes you have to follow your dreams,” stated Patrick, director and sole staff member of the project. “I’m working with very limited budget, and I think ‘Heaven’ shows what can be done now with the latest technologies and how they are democratizing entertainment.”

The “Heaven” multimedia movie tells the epic story of the fall of Lucifer and mankind and the long path to final redemption of the human race. This story is played out over the great canvas of human history. And to tell this amazing Biblical story, Patrick is using a hybrid multimedia movie combining aspects of film and graphic novels, etc., into one project. It’s based on the concept of “video pages” and “audio pages.” Video pages are basicly short videos, and audio pages combine grapic novel style images with an audio soundtrack. The project will also be released in serialized form for free on the website www.theheavenmovie.com.

Key Features:

>High-quality full-screen SD video.

>Free viewing and download of the video files in the popular DivX format.

>Video can be played back on most DivX compatible devices.

>Stunning symphony orchestra soundtrack.

>Narration by respected English Shakespearean theater actor Barry Boys

>Epic story that stays true to Biblical sources.

>Advanced special effects and animation.

Bio: Patrick Lawrence is a full-time illustrator and VFX artist who specializes in Christian content.

Contact:

Patrick Lawrence
http://www.theheavenmovie.com
817-641-2758

Well with the launch of the new site I decided to take a little time off from production and work on promotion for the last week or so. And in working on promoting the site is really split into two avenues. The first one is promoting the site by getting it listed on related lists of multimedia and movie projects. And also getting links from any other site you can make a deal with to help your rankings and drive more traffic to you. Then the other avenue is promoting the video pages. The main way to do this is to upload the video pages to as many video hosting sites as possible and to add the video feeds to video search engines. So after working on it all this week I found some tools to make life easer and I thought I would share them. And to start off I will talk about promoting a video online.

Rules

1. Submit your video to as many hosting sites as possible.

This is the most important rule in promoting your video. There are a large number of sites with more added all the time. Here is list of few to give you an idea Stage6, Godtube, Sclipo, Sumo, Sevenload, Youtube, Google, Dailymotion, Blip, Metacafe, Yahoo, Facebook, Myspace, Vimeo, Revver, Veoh, Vsocial, Photobucket, and Putfile. By posting on these each of these sites you get access to their huge base of visitors. And not only that your video can get picked up by other sites that scan those sites and soon you can have hundreds of sites with your video embedded. But it does seem to have a lot to do with number of views of the video, number of comments and keywords etc. For example this test video Creation has 35,000+ views and a large number of other sites with it embedded. And when they show the description then you get a link back to your main site if you remembered to put a link there. For example the Creation video above shows up on this Honk Kong based site Here.

So now I am sure you want to know an easer way to post to all of these places without spending days doing it. Well so did I so after much search I found several sites that will let you upload the video one time and they will upload to all of the sites they support. And they will do it for nothing or a very modest fee. They are…

Vidmetrix
Pretty nice but does not support many sites.

Heyspread
Submits to the most sites as of this moment but does not seem to save the username and passwords. This would be a problem is you uploaded lots of videos every month. Or you might find an autofill widget that would work to help with this.

VideoPostRobot
Supports a lot of sites but looks a little like a scam or addware etc. Trying to find out more about it before I try it.

Tubemogul
Probably the most easy to use but Heyspread submits to more sites.

Also keep in mind its still worth uploading by hand to sites they do not support like Stage6 and Godtube.

More coming soon.

I know many of you have noticed the links to Digg, Facebook etc at the bottom of stories on the BBC and on other countless blogs and sites. And like me you probably thought to yourself this is a great idea I should try this on my site or blog. If so then you more than likely had the same frustrating experience of trying to find all the best sites to link to. The correct way to link to them. And a way to add them to the site and make it look nice. So let me save you some time and make your day. Because I finally found by far the fastest and easiest way to integrate these services into your site. The answer is AddThis. Addthis lets anyone add over 30 services to their site or blog by just adding a snippet of code. Or if you are running wordpress with just a plugin. Move your mouse over the Bookmark button at the bottom of this story to see it in action. So what are you waiting for add it now and start letting people help you promote you site.

Well I decided to also post the video pages to Youtube as I get them done. I am doing this so people with slower connections can watch them with a shorter download time. Its also a good way to promote the site since Youtube gets so much traffic. Any way here are the links and videos if you want to share them with your friends with slower connections.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvhHnFisM10

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4ZQZxN7moc

Well now that the sites finally up and the first couple of video pages I can take a deep breath. Ahhhh Ok well now back to work:) The next thing I am working on is creating the look of Adam and Eve. And even more importantly I am working out the production process for the rest of the project. As I get more information on this I will make sure to post the information to help others working on no-budget or microbudget project.

Here is a sneak peak of Eve where she stands now. Including the 3D model without hair etc. She will probably not change much except maybe the hair. Let me know what you think.

The new website has finally gone live as I am sure you have all noticed. I am very excited about the new concept of the multimedia book and the possibilities it opens up. So please check back as new content is added and come along for the ride.

Also if you find any bugs let me know. Becouse it seems no matter how much you check you always find a few after the site goes live.

Well just thought I would update everyone on the new computer and studio news. At the moment I have most of the custom water cooling system done and I am just saving money to by the rest of the system all at one time. I also have most of the new office/studio done and when I have the extra time and money will get moved in. Here is a link to some images of both and below is a picture of the external cooling tower I built. http://www.pwlawrence.com/temp_art/water_cooling/

Big changes are underway here at TheHeavenMovie.com. The site is about to get a complete makeover as part of a radical redirection of the Heaven movie project. The site makeover will probably take one to two weeks. And at that time I will announce the new direction of the Heaven movie project so please check back and keep us in your prayers.

This animated film is an adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. Rather dark and depressing but these spotlight films are mainly about the animation.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3