New York Street reference photos

Other New York Photos

Statue of Liberty Photos

Empire State Building Photos

The General (Inspiration)

This is my idea of what the "General" should be like - George C Scott in Patton

Might need to tone down the sheer craziness of his personality though...

Vehicle Doodles

Not too much stylisation yet, mostly just a slight squaring off of the sharper corners.

The front views of the cars on the bottom right are part of a plan to prevent the street scenes being filled with obviously identical cars - one car model, but with several radiator designs to go with different colour schemes; maybe also a 2 door and a 4 door model

As for the time, the cars are all based on mid-50s designs, but that's easily tweakable.

Also, there'll be a police car model (mainly just a gumball light and a paint job, but also a spotlight) and a taxi model (paint job and "taxi" rooflight)

"Special" Effects

I got a book on special effects from the library, and stumbled across this gem from the dying days of back-projection - The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953)

I think we REALLY have to get at least one shot into the trailer, what with it meant to be a low budget B-Movie and all.

Plus, it's a pretty simple effect - render the projected footage, run it through a couple of after-effect filters, and then project it onto the virtual glass.

Character inspiration

Okay, these are just my personal opinions.
Following Alan's suggestion, here are the first images that pop into my head for a couple of the characters.

Scientist

General

Feel free to add your own images.

1950s B-Movie Trailers

It Came From Outer Space

 

Earth vs The Flying Saucers

The Creature from the Black Lagoon

The Deadly Mantis

Aircraft Selection

Since we're going to have "stock footage" of aircraft making rocket attacks in the trailer, we need to decide what type of aircraft so we can begin modelling as soon as possible.

to that end, here are a bunch of aircraft that could concievably have been available in "stock footage" form in the mid 1950's.

P-47 Thunderbolt

P-38 Lightning

A-1 Skyraider

F-4U Crusader

F-94 Starfire

I've got plenty of references for all of these, so pick the one you think looks best.

Finding the right Centipede or Millipede

My job for the weekend was to find specific Centipedes or Millipedes that we could use in the trailer. Alan suggested that I look for the creepiest or the strangest, so I looked around to see what I could find.

Whilst looking, I've come across an interesting bio on Centipedes. It gives a description of Centipedes as a whole and their behaviours and hunting patterns. This will come in handy when designing and animating the the creature.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/414.shtml

The site explains that the Centipedes (Although meaning "A hundred Legs") in fact only have around 30 and the legs arrange in segments. There are also legs at the front that acts like a jaw and vertical legs at the back that act like senses to help them go backwards. Their common prey involves insects, spiders and other centipedes and they're also venomous.
What I already knew was they are harmed by harsh heat so they have to keep moist and out of the sun. Although I didn't know that they were nocturnal.




Giant African Millipede

This following Millipede is gorgeous and creepy at the same time. I like the smoothed shape of the creature and the almost innocence of it. Although the Millipedes are perfect candidates for the trailer, I believe the amaount of legs could lead to very difficult problems. For example this species of Millipede can have up to 400 legs; which is 2 legs of either side of each segment.





Back to Centipedes

I found a very interesting Centipede called the "Scolopendra Gigantea"; its venomous, it looks very creepy but with beautiful colours, its legs are long and a separate colour from the body (a venomous yellow) and its extremely fast and agile.

                            

Monster Idea - Artheopleura

The Artheopleura is a relative of centipedes and millipedes that grew from 0.3-2.6 metres in length. It lived in the carboniferous period (340 to 280 million years ago). It is the largest known invertibrate of all time.

This creature had a powerful set of jaws but mostly ate plants and moved swiftly across the forest floors. The Artheopleura became the size it did because of a lack of predators and the huge amaount of oxygen in the air.

Possible animals for the monster

Hey guys I was looking at possible animals we could use for the giant monster that attacks NYC and I remember the idea of a crab coming up in one of our meetings. There's a couple of crabs that took my fancy, first being then "Sally Lightfoot Crab":

I think that this crab is just beautiful, the colours are amazing and its like a monster in disguise. I also thought that if we were to go with the 1950's Technicolour style, then this crab would be awesome for that.

Also on the subject of crabs, I found this other crab called the "Fiddler" crab:

That large claw would look brilliant as it smashes through a landmark building and it also gives a sense of oddness and weirdness to our monster.


But if we are just a fan of all crabs that are freakishly large then maybe the "King Crab" or the "Coconut Crab".

The Cave

Just a quick post guys, I watched this trailer from the film, "The Cave". I was thinking that it was exactly like one of the ideas we had and if we went down the route of a hidden cave in NYC then this could be great research. Plus theres a comment on the page saying, "That's the problem about exploring unknown places, maybe you'll find something...... or maybe something will find you." I think this would be a brilliant slogan for the movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5AHUMpBtCE 

The Biology of B-movies

A very interesting and useful Archive on B-movies by Michael C. LaBarbera

The Biology of B-movies...

http://fathom.lib.uchicago.edu/2/21701757/