Nova: Horror Sci-Fi Filmmaking with VFX and Practical Makeup

Ever wondered how the movie magic of low budget indie films comes to life? Join us as we pull back the curtain on the award-winning sci-fi horror short film NOVA. Our esteemed guests for this enlightening chat include the brilliant minds behind NOVA: Kelly Kula, Miguel Amodio, David McAbee, and David Smith. They share their incredible journeys in the film industry, fascinating experiences on the set of NOVA, and current projects that are sure to pique your interest.

We offer a compelling exploration of the realities of producing low-budget indie films, emphasizing the pivotal role of pre-production planning in implementing visual effects and the value of having a VFX representative on set. Join us as we shine a light on the complex process of creating an effective visual effects sequence for an indie film's unique challenges. We'll discuss everything from crafting an authentic throw-up scene to finding the perfect sound effects and the importance of actors' performance and consistency in making visual effects believable.

Get ready for a deep dive into the VFX production process from the creative geniuses behind NOVA and For the Love of Jessee. Learn from their experiences, from navigating a two-day shoot to making smart choices with time and money, culminating in dozens of festival appearances and awards. Listen in as we discuss the significance of the visual effects enhancing the story rather than detracting from it. Prepare to be inspired and educated by this insightful discussion on filmmaking, visual effects, and the journey to success in the indie film space. Tune in and let's explore the world of indie filmmaking together!

Watch Nova

Watch For the Love of Jessee

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Nova: Using VFX and Practical Makeup to Bring an Innovative Horror Sci-Fi Short to Gory Life

Paul DeNigris: A well meaning scientist finds herself infected by a possibly intelligent parasite as her experiment goes awry. As the camera orbits around her in a seemingly unbroken take, we watch as the parasite overtakes her body and she deteriorates before our very eyes. This week on the VFX for Indies podcast.

Today with me is the team behind an award winning crazy gruesome sci fi horror short that my team and I had the absolute pleasure of doing together. Incredibly gnarly visual effects for titled Nova and the team here, we've got Kelly Kula, producer and actor, Miguel Amodio, editor, David McAbee, writer, director, and David Smith, cinematographer.

Welcome to the podcast guys.

David McAbee: Howdy. It's good to be here. Great to be here.

Paul DeNigris: Let's start really quickly just with introductions and sort of career highlights and we'll we'll we'll go ladies first. So Kelly, let's hear from you.

Kelly Kula: Awesome. Yeah. My name is Kelly Kula. I am an actress by trade and honestly it sounds silly, but Nova was one of my career highlights just because of the team that you're about to meet and all the accolades that we received from the work that we did.

I work for Plate pros, where I am the CCO or the chief content officer. So I am basically a stock librarian for three 60 footage. And with that, I get to actually interact with a lot of more filmmakers than I thought possible. So that's really exciting. And right now we're just working on independent.

Feature films and short films because the writer's strike is definitely affecting us, but we're remaining creative in the meantime.

Paul DeNigris: Right on. Welcome to the podcast.

Kelly Kula: Let's move

Paul DeNigris: to David Smith. Speaking of plate

David C. Smith: pros. Sure. Yeah. I work with Kelly have for quite some time. So I'm David Smith.

I'm a cinematographer by trade. Although I've been involved in over my career did a lot of editing, a lot of VFX. Even did some gapping back in the day. So have had my my fingers and just every piece of the filmmaking pie, and for Nova was the cinematographer and we also had an opportunity to invent a couple of camera rigs that were pretty instrumental to the way that particular project came together.

I'm also the founder of plate pros. So the company that Kelly was mentioning and then also am a a co owner of another company that's tangential to that called the car stage. Involved in the VFX and now more the in camera VFX virtual production side of things. Generally I'm a tinkerer, an engineer, and I like to build cool things to make storytelling better.

Awesome. Welcome. David McAbee.

David McAbee: Hi, David McAbee. Writer, director producer on a good day. It's, I think it's really funny how I know, I guess the four of you, but the three of these lovely humans I've been in the industry for close to 50, 15 years, met David Smith in my first year of working production and figuring out where I fit in, in the production world.

But as far as Nova goes, Nova and for the love of Jesse are definitely my two. Pinnacle moments as far as my career goes and they both have to do with everybody here, which is really cool But Nova, it's everything that I grew up watching Rad horror stuff and then I got to dip my toe into new technology with you guys

Paul DeNigris: And then last but not least, Miguel, who was instrumental in introducing me to this crew.

Miguel, tell us about yourself.

Miguel Amodio: Yeah, hi, I am Miguel as you stated. Been an editor for almost 20 years, which is crazy when I think about that now. Dabbled with camera a long time ago until I met people that were better at cameras than me. And realized that my place was behind a computer screen making the hard choices and, pissing off a director or something.

No I've been cutting narratives out for Probably the last 10 years pretty consistently. Content, I should say, narrative style content. And yeah man, what I got a few features in the works. Jesse and Nova I have some edits in. They great, they gave me that opportunity to work on it.

Edit Nova, but it really is. It's funny how you really don't see my edits and Nova at all, which we're okay with, like we were very happy to be here and surrounded by some really wonderful,

Paul DeNigris: right on. It's been a while since I've seen all four of you. I think the last time we saw each other in person was actually at the premiere of for the love of Jesse up in Wickenburg, Arizona, just an hour up the road from where I am right now.

And before we get into Nova. Cause that's really the topic because it's got a lot of juicy. Technology stuff that I want to dive into before we get into it. I do want to talk about for the love of Jesse, because it is much more the typical project that, that me and my crew work on indie drama, small character based.

Story based, not a, no in your face visual effects, lots of subtle work all there to support the story. Maccabee, since you, you mentioned Jesse earlier, what can you just give us a quick, the back of the DVD cover if they still have those the back of the DVD cover synopsis of the movie.

David McAbee: I'll give you the

Paul DeNigris: back.

David McAbee: Nah, you beat me to it. You beat me to it. Yes, the quick rundown on For the Love of Jesse is Dr. Luke Matthews loses his wife. while she's giving birth to their child. And in that process he goes through a big life changing moment of becoming a dad, excuse me, and losing his partner.

And then he hires a nanny to help with the baby and in turn falls in love and happily ever after. I lost my wife in the same house.

Trailer (2): These things will not fix themselves. So I will stay here for a little while, but you are hiring me. I wanted someone to talk to.

Trailer: Sage, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there when you lost the baby.

Trailer (2): I hope you're not here to interview dressed like that. Interview?

Trailer: I am looking to hire a nanny.

Trailer (2): Are you serious?

Trailer: Luke? Are you interested?

Paul DeNigris: Again, you hear that and you go, okay, where are the visual effects? We're not doing anything. We're not creating digital creatures. Nobody's, snapping half the universe into into dust or anything like that.

Although the

David C. Smith: sequel is sounding like it could be really cool.

For the revenge of Jesse. I think that's for the revenge of Jesse. There you go.

Paul DeNigris: So how did the, this is the kind of movie where you didn't, visual effects probably weren't part of the plan when you were filming it was, you just went about it like a normal indie film shoot at what point did it become obvious or did it, it was, at what point was the decision made to say, okay, Hey, Miguel, we, we need to get some VFX in here.

At which point Miguel then called me and said, Hey, we need to get some VFX into this movie. How did that happen?

David McAbee: Oh if I remember correctly, Miguel probably was on our 10th cut of the film getting down to the wire of delivering it. And we're noticing. Again, not big things, but just small things that would add to the story and the beauty of what Wickenburg is are the big starry skies and maybe replacing a name or two on a business.

And we obviously can't use Vaughn's grocery store. But we can use Wickenburg outlet or Wickenburg grocery. And it was knowing that if we added a little effects, it would just make the screen pop a little more and no one would notice except for us. It wasn't a Nova type thing where we're stitching, where you guys are stitching all this, all these things together.

Let's put some starry skies and replace that sign or the the time lapse at the bar, putting some neon signs and make those pop a little more.

Miguel Amodio: The day for night, the day for night stuff.

David McAbee: Oh, the day for night stuff. Yeah, absolutely.

David C. Smith: Even when we were shooting too, so while we, before we knew that you were an option and it, it was an incredibly ambitious shoot on a very tight budget.

I think that's probably the understatement of the century. And so while we were shooting, so little things like the grocery store sign, that sort of stuff, I have a tiny bit of history in VFX. And so while we're shooting, I was like that's probably something I could do on my own if I had to just little things, sign replacement, that sort of stuff.

So we would shoot it with the idea in mind that if push came to shove, we could take care of the little stuff in house, but then once, once we got into the cut and that's really where it was amazing once you came on board. Is now that opened it up where it wasn't just what kind of, silly little things can we do in after effects?

We were now we're able to step up the quality level and that opened up, I think more opportunity to do more fixes than I think even while we were shooting, we thought would have been possible. End result was significantly better.

Miguel Amodio: That was a big thing. I advocated for a lot of this because.

When we started the editing process, Smith, David Smith had, had said, I'll handle whatever we need to do in house. But as David Smith mentioned during his intro, he's got a lot of hands in things and he always has, so he's incredibly busy. And then to task him with, Hey, we need a sign replacement or a day for night.

There was no world we were already between Smith and I, we were working on a couple of short films that were just like in post hell. And these were like the low, no budget project. Where people are really expecting and David, to his credit, had also helped do some VFX on another feature that his wife had shot.

And again, just three or four little things, can be incredibly time consuming if your days are, top to bottom with doing a hundred different things. And especially that not being his job. Realm per se, even if he's got that experience. It was really clear to me that if we had a, if we had any chance, it was like, we're going to have to get that solved.

And you and I had the good fortune of meeting on Ayman's toppled project years ago. And I always remember being really impressed with just the work that you were doing at that level for like literally no budget. And I had always wanted to work with you. And so when the opportunity. Came about I pimped you out big time.

But it was one of those, it was one of those things that I was, Maccabee could tell you, I was in the head of Bay actively trying to make For the Love of Jesse, a Star Wars fan film. And he wasn't going for it. I kept saying, we need to make this the most unexpected Star Wars fan film. But it really, you, that's one of those things where I, I think you think there's three shots, right?

You think, ah, it's just three shots. And then before you know it, you're going down the list, and you're like, shit, we've got five shots, ten shots. Oh man, we've got twenty shots that really, when you really start picking it apart, you're like if we're gonna do the work Let's do this work, right?

And But, I think what we collectively all when we did that work and we were able to put those lists together and bring you on board, I think it really helped just Keep you engaged in the film without it pulling you out because of something that just feels off because we didn't have time to go shoot it or, do it ourselves correctly.

It's like always better when you can hand it off to people that are laser focused on a skill set.

David C. Smith: Yeah, I think that is, it's a common trap and it's a trap that Miguel helped us avoid. But I think it's something, especially on the indie podcasts that we're talking, okay, but let's talk about VFX for indie film.

I think that's a big thing is really being realistic with yourself about what you could or what you should take on as a low budget indie production, because it's really easy for things to spiral out of control. And how many projects have we heard about that never saw the light of day? Because, they're waiting on VFX.

They're waiting on the final sound mix. They're waiting on final color, there it, when you're in a no budget scenario, it's really easy to feel like, okay I'll just take that on myself. Not realizing that there's lots of, there's lots of help out there and you just have to ask for it and you have to be passionate about the project and find the right people that can help you get it across the finish line.

Cause honestly if we decided to do it in house, we might still be waiting to see what the final product looked like.

Paul DeNigris: Yeah. Yeah. Right on. And how many films have we, have been shot that never see the light of day because legal. The distribute, the distributors, legal department is like we can't have all these Heineken and Bud Light signs all over this bar scene.

You got to get rid of them and they don't have the budget for it. And that was an example. We had a couple of these these shots in and around the tavern or the bar in your film. And I distinctly remember, painting out Heineken and stuff like that, because it's, One, it's not cleared.

Two, they're not paying to have their logo there. Three, it's distracting. And four, it was already a visual effects shot. So let's just kill these and just streamline it. So it's not like in the middle of this dramatic, potentially tear jerking scene, it's all of a sudden like drink Heineken.

Miguel Amodio: I learned a lot, I learned a lot from that. Experience because that was the first time I had worked with anyone at your level And I think it was a lesson for all of us, right? Like it was a lesson for well, maybe not david smith, but for McAbee and I and even kelly who was around Watching the long hours and nights that, McAbee and I were, like, cutting this film and trying to put it together.

It was a lesson, right? It was a lesson of this is the shit it takes. This is how much it costs. I think, a project, we won't go into it, but a project recently that, I had brought to you, that you had to respectfully decline for very good reasons. Was another education on me on even the breakdown of what it costs per shot.

When you came back and you're like, dude, the amount that they're asking for number of shots versus how much they're willing to pay is 30 or 40 bucks per shot. It's fucking nothing. And I remember, and I already remember thinking, Oh my God, like this list is out of control, but. Wow. Okay. Also good to note.

40 a shot, not appropriate. Not that I didn't think that it was before but it's just more ammunition for me in the future when I'm considering bringing anything to you or other VFX people, like what the expectation should be

David McAbee: as far as FX go on Jesse. It was the linchpin of the whole experience that made it feel legit.

I had only directed one short before that and and. A bunch of reality stuff, but never a feature. This was my first feature. So I had Smith who I had all my faith in. So camera done. Now I got to focus creatively on actors. We got some amazing talent. One of them sitting with us today, done. We got it. And then getting into post and learning and watching Miguel do his magic.

And then getting to that last point of the story where we just need things to Pop or be covered and watching how it is supposed to be done. Gave me faith in future projects that are like, okay, not only can it be done, it will be done and it's a good, like seamless process throughout the whole way.

David C. Smith: So something, there's a phrase, there's a phrase that you hear a lot that it makes everybody cringe, fix it in post, right? That's. That's the worst phrase you can ever hear, but it actually can be an incredibly important and valuable tool. But for me, it's fix it in pre like I a friend of mine, a VFX supervisor, a friend of mine has a t shirt that I keep asking him to make me a copy of that just says fix it in the pre.

And for me, the fix it in post idea, so long as you're doing it, knowing what you're getting yourself into. I think where we're fix it in post has gotten a bad rap. Is because people just assume that it's easy. And so they just go, whatever the problem of the moment is. I don't have to worry about it.

Somebody else is going to take care of it later on. That's the wrong approach to fix it. But if you go into a problem, cause it was like, we were talking about a second ago, make sure you turn the neon sign off, do what you can on the day. But there is going to be some things that you can't do.

And there's going to be some things that you realize that actually is a much easier fix later than, okay, we're going to, we're going to get a cherry picker out and we're going to rip the sign off the front of the building, right? There's, there are some things that, that fixing it on the day just won't work or is way harder to do than a simple replace, but the key there is especially for a low budget.

Is knowing who's going to do your VFX before the shoot. And if you have the ability to have a VFX representative on set as a VFX supervisor, or even just making sure that your DP has a chance to have a conversation, a meaningful conversation with the person who's going to be doing those fixes. That can help you know, when is that the right choice and when is it a suicidal disaster.

And sometimes the thing that feels really difficult turns out to be super easy, and the thing that feels super easy turns out to be a killer. And the more of that you can decide ahead of time, the, for, to Miguel's point on the other project, where he's approaching you for a budget after the thing's already been shot.

Unfortunately, then the die is cast, right? There's not a whole lot. It's either going to, it's going to sink or swim based on the decisions that were previously made. So as much as you can front load those choices, you're going to have a much better time.

Paul DeNigris: Absolutely. And that particular movie that, that Miguel was talking about, about half of those shots were fixes to a costume that had, they just pumped the brakes for half hour and let the costumer sew in some additional Velcro.

So the costume wasn't splitting apart and revealing that It wasn't a creature, but it was a guy in a suit that half hour. Okay. Everybody take a break, let the customer fix this thing. And then we'll I get it. Like you're on set, you're burning money. You're burning daylight. Like it's the pressure of being on set been there, done that.

That's why I sit behind my computer. Now don't go on set because it's insanity, right? I totally get it. But had there been a VFX person, had the director gone? Hey, this is a problem. Can we fix this in post? If I were there, I would have been like, sure, but is that really where you want to spend your money?

We're going to talk thousands of dollars of paint outs or pump the brakes. Everybody go to lunch early. Let's fix this on set. It's figuring out where time and money are always our enemy. In pre production and production in post and it's figuring out where do you want to spend that time?

Where do you want to spend that money and doing it smartly so that yeah, you can get you When you spend money on a company like ours to do video effects for you Are we doing something cool that helps tell the story or we just fixing fuck ups that could have been fixed in five minutes on set Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, and there was one one thing I wanted to note Where I learned, right? So Miguel, you said it was a big learning experience for you. I try to learn something on every project and take something from every project forward into the future. So there was this one shot in Jesse where you guys had this long dolly steadicam move through the ER.

And it's this big emotional scene. And all the monitors, all the vital sign monitors are blank. And, after the fact, you guys said, Oh, it'd be great if we could populate these with something, so that it doesn't feel like we were shooting in an empty ER. So I said, cool, we can do that.

We'll add all that. Send me the footage. And I killed myself for days trying to track this footage, right? I couldn't get a solve. I tried it in every piece of software and every piece of software was just. Either giving me weird results or failing to solve. And I was like, what? I don't understand.

It is a fairly straightforward, just Dolly push in what is going on. And so I started to track individual points. I'm like, okay, if I can't get the automatic trackers to build a point cloud, I'm going to do it manually. I'm going to track all these points. And I started to look at it like microscopically.

And all of a sudden I saw the, like the shapes of things in the background were like, Warping, there was like a computer terminal sitting on a desk and all of a sudden that went from being a box To doing this warp and I was like, hey miguel. Is there a warp stabilizer on here? our old friend adobe premiere right the warp stabilizer, which a lot of filmmakers love right because Again, time and money being your enemy you shoot it as, as steadily as you possibly can.

And the little tiny bumps you go, Oh, warp stabilizer, take care of that. Drop it on there. Click analyze. Looks good. Let's move on. And you forget it's there. And I was like, Miguel, I think something's going on here. I think Adobe screwed us. Can I see it without the warp stabilizer? And sure enough, the second he gave it to me, it tracked perfect.

And now it's one of those things. It's like in my contract now with new clients, like you must remove all effects. From the timeline,

Miguel Amodio: And so that was a David McAfee decision. He said, I don't think Paul is working hard enough. We should make his life more difficult. I believe warp stabilizer on there.

I just make his life a little bit of hell. And I said, I don't think that's

Paul DeNigris: appropriate. So

Miguel Amodio: here I am throwing him under a bus because it's his fault really.

Paul DeNigris: I totally appreciate it. I love a good naughty challenge, when it's like, how do we fit, how do we figure this out? Of course, I like it to be, something a little more flashy than just simply a simple monitor track.

But again, if I learned something, I feel like the project was worth it. Money aside, everything else aside, like if I learned something, if I get better at what I do by helping you guys make your movie better, then it's win. It's win, win. Like we, everybody comes away with something that, that really helps them career wise.

And that's why like, when you guys brought Nova, I was going to

David C. Smith: say, I hope we didn't have any stabilizer on Nova. No.

Paul DeNigris: No so the fact that I love good, knotty problems to solve it, it tickles the part of my brain that once was a mechanical engineering student before I caught the film bug and switched.

That when I heard the idea for Nova, I was like, yes, we're in a hundred percent. Let's do this. Somebody give me again, give me the back of the DVD or the below below the video on YouTube synopsis of Nova.

Kelly Kula: Basically, it's just an idea of a scientist who creates something that she believes is going to help humanity.

And when she discovers the opposite is true, it's that timeline of figuring out how you can undo you wrong. So the urgency and the frustration and the passion and the fright, it was just a combination of all those things, but just trying to undo a wrong within five minutes when your whole life's work is behind it and the drama ensues.

David McAbee: I got the idea shortly after working on Jesse. I wanted to see. I wanted to see the deterioration of somebody and it was like, is it a zombie thing? Is it a vampire thing? But seeing something in one real take of someone just melting, deteriorating from life all the way to death. And And then that's how Nova was born and I pitched it to the team here.

And again I always say this, but I think I was born in the wrong decade. Cause I'm always thinking like 15 years too late. Like we'll just get a dolly track and we'll put it around our actor and we'll cut behind the head and easy breezy. There's our horror movie. And then I pitched this to Smith who liked the idea or liked the story at least, or liked my beard that day.

I don't know. But classic Smith goes, yeah, it's cool, but we can do better. We can go bigger. And I'm just like, okay, what's bigger, what's better, more cameras, less cameras. And that's where it was for me. Really fucking cool to watch each person here individually go okay, I got this.

I'll take it for Smith. I'm going to invent a robot camera to hang from the ceiling and track our and track Kelly and then Kelly going I got Nova. I got Dr. Nova Thorpe. Let me dig in deep. I want to rehearse and which paid off. And then Miguel although a lot of his editing standing around, he's like,

Miguel Amodio: Standing around.

That's all I did. Yeah. It's standing around. Spin around. But the

David McAbee: notes judging the, yeah. Always judging. But the notes that, obviously the editing work that, that Miguel did was amazing. But also the notes that he was bringing to the table, what if this, what if we try this? Don't do that. Try this.

Were invaluable.

Miguel Amodio: And yeah. And knowing that, we had an internal discussion with Kelly and everyone here that. We knew before we shot anything that we had to bring you on, that we needed somebody that this was going to be a combination. Once McAbee and Smith had figured out, okay, we're going to build a, motion tracking arm.

That's just going to get same movement every time we're going to go through stages of makeup and we've got to seamlessly put it all together. And we knew it was going to be a V, it was going to require heavy amounts of visual effects. From the get, and that felt good to know. That the project was, whether it was going to be good or bad was really like that we went into it knowing like we need a visual effects component that we're not going to have on set just to blend it all together.

And I think from day one, we knew like this whole thing is going to live or die on how believable that is and not, you can forgive a lot of things when things aren't perfect in, when there's low budget. But. You know when something keeps drawing you in and doesn't pull you out and makes you cringe and wince and all that that this was going to be, when they made the creative decision to just do a one er, to make it look like a one er.

We knew, okay, we need this visual effects component so we can see Mac me as idea of the melting and we can hide any of those inconsistencies that

Trailer: the motion tracking,

Miguel Amodio: Would pick up because of Kelly's continuity issues or whatever. Yeah.

David McAbee: And if I'm being honest, the special effects arm of this movie, the leg of this movie, it scared me more because I'm such a practical effects guy, and I'm so quick to notice like.

CGI blood or gore or whatever. And it pulls me out and pulls me out of it. And it was no that's no shade on Foxtrot or you Paul. I was just like, Oh God, it's gotta feel real. It's gotta feel grounded. This isn't a Star Wars movie. This isn't a sci-fi, like a space SI sci-fi. I tried this is, I fought hard.

Yeah, you did. Again, you tried. But I want it to feel like a grounded horror story that, that is that is connected to Earth and it's not big. And then when we started that, I, and I knew like the tracking that, that we'd be able to get that, that didn't scare me. 'cause that was the concept from the get go.

But it was the addition of when we got into the weeds of things. The veins growing up the arms and onto the neck her face deteriorating. I was like, Oh, just, I'm worried. I'm scared. And now on the other side of it, obviously going, Oh, there's no Nova without that. There's countless film festivals that this thing got into where we talked specifically about those things, about the beautiful blend of special effects score and.

Grounded, real gore.

David C. Smith: So the thing that, that for me, the biggest special effect and visual effect of the whole project was honestly Kelly and what, so the idea of doing a transform, a transformative narrative in one shot and what appears to be one shot. The technical side of blending the takes together, that was something that I think we had a really.

solid plan from the beginning on what, we were really methodical about what the actions were going to be, what elements in each frame, we're going to be moving from one take to the other, where the transitions were going to happen. That, I think we had a ton of forethought and planning and storyboarding, and that we had really well in hand.

But none of that would matter if Kelly wasn't able to, from one, because it feels like one take, but you have to remember it's not. And she's going back into makeup before every transformation. So she's got to hold that through line so that it feels seamless. The technical seamlessness to me was the easy part.

It was the consistency of performance that was the thing that was truly incredible to me. So I don't know, Kelly, what did Talk about that. I was going to say,

Kelly Kula: Smith makes me cry on the podcast. I know, I'd love to hear, I'd love

David McAbee: to hear Kelly's thoughts on that. That's a really good point, Smith.

And before I, Kelly, I let you, I want you to take it. That is such a good point because I've talked about this movie, A Hundred Ways of Sunday. And it is often overshadowed that it is, Kelly is the core of this movie. All the special effects, all the writing, all the directing, all the inventive camera work that Smith had to do all would have been out the window had Kelly not been able to make it what it was, what it is.

Paul DeNigris: Absolutely. Totally agree. Before Kelly chimes in, I just want to say when we saw the raw footage or the footage that had been chopped and put in sequence by Miguel, I said to my team, I said, Kelly is absolutely killing this performance. We can not. Let her down with our work. Like our work has to be at the same level.

Otherwise, what are we doing?

Kelly Kula: And this is exactly what I love about filmmaking because I, right when I started almost 20 years ago, it's I believe that I can find a team where all the creatives in their respective departments are so passionate and so talented and so dedicated to what they do, that you have the comfort of knowing that you can do your work and trust everybody else.

to do theirs. And it may have taken me a lot longer to find these people, but that was the comfort in it. Like they're writing the directing. Maccabee had the cinema technology and the DP ing David had, Miguel with the editing and the support and the creative vision. And Paul, I just met you actually on the phone, I think beforehand, but knowing that you have such a dedicated, passionate team.

I don't care how good of an actor I am. I still couldn't have done it without. And that, to me, is the biggest thing, biggest takeaway from this short. But yeah, I think the challenge of it as an actor, being from my side, is You are supposed to look like you're not acting. And I had to hit a certain mark, hunch a certain way.

And if I was just a little bit off, then it was going to be, Oh, the stitching was gonna be a little bit harder. And I had exactly two minutes to know where the camera was in the room, but also not be aware that the camera's in the room, but you had to hit certain marks, like when it's over here on my left, I have to do this.

I have to pull my hair off. I have to take my skin off. I have to pull an eyelash off or whatever it was at that moment. So it was a really big challenge to be technically aware of what was going on in the room, but still trusting that the work that I did personally with the character would still be able to outshine that, and that you wouldn't see me thinking and seeing the camera, that you could just see me creating the pain in the world that I was in.

Paul DeNigris: Right, plus you're having to carry all of the narrative weight by delivering that monologue.

Kelly Kula: And it was fun, but it was fun. It's the

Paul DeNigris: monologue, it's the emotional content, and It's remembering all your marks

David C. Smith: and maintaining a through line, like that was the part that blew my mind. Is that because we had five stages and each of those stages needed to, you needed to feel her transformation and her internal journey.

And so being able to stay consistent across that. And it's for me, the fact that, between those transitions, there's a couple of hours of makeup. So it's getting back to the place you were a couple of hours ago and literally picking up exactly where you left off and then advancing forward and then doing that again and then doing that again and then doing that again.

So it's funny. We're talking about Kelly that you know, I was going to take us in a different direction. You got

David McAbee: No I just want to ask, I, I've worked with Kelly for years and years now, and Nova is still one of, I think the best things we've worked together on, but I've never talked to you about Nova as in what was like, what was our rehearsal process like for you?

What were those on day? Cause I, Smith and I were in a separate room for me. You had that room day of, when we were shooting all to yourself to be in that character, but I'm on the other side of the wall. Gag harder. Cough up a tooth, pull your hair out. How is that for you as an actor for this role?

Kelly Kula: I personally enjoy it. And I think it is obviously actor dependent, but I like to be challenged with, you should be directable. Those little things shouldn't throw you off, even though they are special effects, heavy, like having a tooth in there, but just finding a way in the moment to create how I can transition quickly to that without, It being inauthentic.

So it's a lesson in authenticity is make sure that did I do my work? Did I actually commit to it? And if you threw something my way, eat a pizza. I'll be like, yeah, there's just things that you should be able to be spontaneous about and able to weave them into the story you've created if you've made your story really clear.

I spent, it wasn't a really long script, but on the back of every page, I just wrote like a, I, that's my process is just writing how I feel, what I'm thinking, my life story. And. Just reading it and letting it flow authentically. So if I believe that in the moment and you throw something crazy at me, it shouldn't stir.

So that's, you and I had a little bit of a rehearsal process, but it was more technical because like we took all the beats okay, these are your five transitions. These are the five things that I want to see. So that helped me create, okay. What in my mind is going to support that as an actor when I have this big technical thing that I have to do?

Again, it's that whole support. Everybody in their own department is So excited about their vision that this it geeks me out and luckily it doesn't throw you off in the moment because you're just so excited to be doing what you love with the people who love doing what they love. And it's, it sounds so kitschy, but it's, it is, it's true.

David McAbee: I knew we were onto something good. It was day two of shooting and my then girlfriend, now wife was watching the monitor with Smith and I and Kelly's in the middle of her scene and she's coughing up a tooth or throwing up the blood and I go get you gag harder and she does this horrible gag.

It's in the cut and my wife who's standing behind me or my girlfriend at the time was standing behind me and she gags for real. And I was like, baby. You can't do that. So we were onto something so good that I knew we were onto it because the audience that I live with and love was gagging for real.

So I knew we were on the right track.

David C. Smith: There's, there was something we talked before. I'm sorry, Miguel, you go first. You've been trying. I'm sorry. No. Go ahead. Go ahead. We were talking about something that we learned and talking about with Jesse. And the thing that I learned on this one was actually based on the gag.

And the actual gagging, not the overall gag of the film, but the having, so we've all seen the, put the pea soup in your mouth and the beginning of the take you throw up and then you go on with your take the fact that we threw up twice. And where you don't know that there was a, for me watching it as an audience member, that, that drew me in more than I ever expected, because it felt I know you're so used to that, just little gag that, that.

The throw up happens at the beginning of the take because they had it in their mouth. The fact that in the middle of the scene there's a second throw up, that felt so real, because where'd it come from? That, that, that pulled me into her world. And I never in a million years would have thought that, that puke would be the thing that would give me empathy.

And yet, that's exactly what my experience was as an audience member where I finally saw the cut all put together. So anyway, so use two pukes. I think that's the big takeaway from this whole thing

Miguel Amodio: I remember because this was such a big challenge for Kelly, not challenges from an acting, it was a challenge from an acting perspective, but because of all the technical stuff, she had McAbee and Smith at her disposal, but she didn't want anybody else around, so I would say, I was really already trying to think, Okay, how are we putting this together?

And I was trying to think about the stuff we were going to be giving you, And I remember a point of debate that I kept trying to bring up, But it wasn't always appropriate because they were just so in it, And they had to get it done, And our first days got boned because of the arm that was built wasn't working right.

So we had to have an extra day. And, but I remember thinking like, so what are we doing at the end? When Nova's alien clone or whatever she is killing, The doctor, how does that act, what does that look like? And I remember there was debate about oh maybe it's a tail, maybe it's spikes or whatever.

And we couldn't really lock it down, and then of course you get into pause and you're like, fuck! So how does she fucking kill herself? Because, a big dick tail is just not gonna look cool and the boys have already done it, right? Also, oh, But also I remember thinking that was a fun creative challenge that when we actually put it I was I just I don't remember what we were in a cut and I was just like what if it was just like a sort of a force push or a something and that shockwave effect.

Yeah, that hadouken that shockwave effect that you added I think, with the sound effect of the sound design and all that it's just you didn't need to know what it was, other than, yeah, it worked. It totally worked and just the ripple effect that sort of pushes through the camera, I thought was really awesome.

But I knew, I fucking knew we had gold, man, as soon as we saw, I think the, as soon as Kaylee hits the ground, and she turns on the face mask, and you see the HUD. And I remember seeing that HUD and thinking, Jesus we've, We have already surpassed Jesse, just in terms of the believability of that HUD display on that 3 face mask from Home Depot.

It was incredible how authentic that looked, and yet it didn't pull us out of the design choice that you made, and your team made, and the way you put it together. It didn't pull away from Kelly, it felt very natural. It's another thing that was Killer was just how it lives there like it continues to live there and then on those tracking shots We can see her and I know that was a point of challenge, which I'd love for you to talk about But just really cool like when you're there, you're not noticing those little things that you probably yeah, it's very cool

Paul DeNigris: yeah, I mean for us the you know, the watchword was always authenticity because we had a Obviously we had everything had to hang on Kelly's performance.

But then we also had the practical effects that you guys were doing from take to add, to continue to add more and more gore to her as she deteriorated. So with that informed, cause we were doing the black veins and stuff. And so we were connecting the dots, right? So there would be something on her arm and then that would be where the black veins would originate at the beginning of the take.

And then as we orbited around, we'd have to, as we came back around to that side. Those veins would have had to grow and also not connect to the next lesion that was added to her skin practically. And so it was always, we were always being guided by. how Kelly was reacting, scratching, itching, pulling, spitting out teeth, whatever it was, that was always, we, we were always the, like the digital arrow, like pointing towards, okay, this is where the next gross thing is going to happen on her.

And we had to get it all to stick seamlessly, so that was a big challenge. It was just we used every trick in the book to, to track her skin. I think at one point I did a full face track and created a digital mesh of Kelly's face that had her texture projected onto it and sent, I think I sent you guys the screenshot of it and Kelly was like, Oh my God, what is that?

It's just her disembodied face floating in the digital void. Yeah, to

Kelly Kula: me, too bad I was already taken. I'm in a great dating profile pic.

Paul DeNigris: So we had all of those challenges. The stitches were a challenge, right? You guys did really great work trying to match Kelly's position and body language. But even then, there was always going to be little things that would, that wouldn't match up.

And so we, we did a bunch of different morphing tools and tried to make anytime you saw a shift in sort of her back as the camera went across, make it look like a breath or connect it to her, she gasped or something. And we'd have the, so it looked like her shoulders moved in pain and it wasn't just some weird artifact of.

Of the stitch. But the HUD, the HUD was actually, once, once it was the mask was down it basically just sat there and we were able to get a really good track, on that like hard surfaces are relatively easy to track. And I've got a great match mover who basically gave us the full rotation of every take.

And because it was the same, I think he only had to do a solve once. I think you guys gave me a clean plate. With just the helmet sitting in the middle of the floor. And so he was able to track that. And I was able to use that single track on every take because it was exactly the same because of the camera tech that you guys had built.

So that, that part was easy. The hardest part was when evil Nova picks up the mask and we're looking through it and the thing is bouncing all around and it's got no, it's transparent. It's got no tracking dots on it. So that one was a little bit of a challenge, but But otherwise, yeah the, we like hard surfaces, especially things that just sit in the camera moves and the thing doesn't move.

Those are perfect.

David C. Smith: Miguel mentioned it a second ago, but that the first day was a wash. And that comes back to, what we were talking about before about knowing when. You can fix something and the fix that, that we came up with. So the motion control rig didn't work.

It's so we literally burned the entire first shoot day. trying to figure out why the thing that worked in rehearsal didn't work on the day. And it turned out that there was a glitch in the software, the motion control keyframing software. So the original plan was for us to have all of the camera movement, not just the spiral, the dolly, but also panning and tilting and zooming was all happening under motion control.

So that was the original plan and we had built the rig to allow for that. But the software that drove that had a glitch. All of our rehearsals was only two minutes. We never went over two minutes. And it turns out that there was a glitch that the software would crash at two minutes. And we didn't know this until we were actually trying to do the longer takes.

And so what that meant was all of our key frame camera movements were out the window. And that was the decision then was, okay, let's just ditch all of that and get rid of the software and just do a very simple, we're only going to key frame using the motion control head has the ability to set key frames internally as well as to take external computer key frames, but you're only limited.

keyframes internal, whereas we had 100 keyframes that we were trying to achieve. So we threw all that out, and at the end of that first day, where everybody's looking at me going, this whole thing is, if this doesn't work, we don't have a film. And it's okay, we're gonna get rid of all that, and we're gonna do all the camera movement in post.

So we're gonna let the dolly happen in real, and that, that's what's gonna be motion control. But all panning, tilting, and zooming is going to happen as a post reframe and what I think happened in that process is that we made now the post, the VFX were a lot easier. I can only imagine how much harder your world would have been.

If that system had worked and if we'd given you now something, now you're tracking zooms and camera movement that is happening in real time as opposed to the post effect. So the fact that you were able to do the blend and then we could use reframing to also hide some of the challenging areas.

It's look, this edge up here in the hair really is not. We can get everything working on the shoulders, but the hair is not working. Okay let's just reframe around it a little bit. So what started out as a failure of the mechanical technology. Ultimately, I think, turned into a benefit in the end.

But that was also everybody having the faith in the moment of going, Look, this is gonna work. Yes, we did just kill an int It was a two day shoot. We, 50 percent of the shoot we threw away because the system didn't work the way we thought it was going to. And then coming back, regrouping and, then hitting it hard the second day, and being able to get everything done.

Yeah, but those are the, those are those challenges in the moment. And that's what filmmaking is all about is, and to everybody's I, I owe everybody a debt of gratitude that they all went, look we believe you that it's going to work. We're going to come back tomorrow and we'll figure it out.

And yeah.

Paul DeNigris: So how many festivals did did Nova ultimately end up playing and how many awards did it win?

David McAbee: Great question. I don't have exact numbers because it came out or we finished it right at the tippy tip top of COVID when everything was shut down, which to me is was a real bummer because we got into dozens of festivals and we won dozens of awards.

And we were only able to go to, I only went to one or two, maybe. I think we did some of the virtual ones together which were a great It was a great punt if we can't be there in real life but it was accepted to some of the coolest festivals that I've only hoped to be a part of it was so bitchin and the few that I got to go to, to actually sit in a theater and listen to people.

As they watch our movie and whisper. Oh, gross. Oh, cool. Oh. Ew. Was so awesome. And the plaza is always nice, but it's, I love sitting in the back and watching just how people reacts to Kelly Melting

Miguel Amodio: the Joe Bob Drive-in theater was coolest. Oh, the job. Bob, the

David McAbee: Thank you, Miguel. That was so cool.

Miguel Amodio: I am a

David McAbee: huge, just so it's out in the universe. I'm a giant whore nerd to the core about this stuff and being a part of Joe Bob Briggs haunted drive in, I guess it must've been October of 2020. Was so cool having all these cars park right up, look at the screen and watching everybody to the right, to the left and front and back all watching this giant screen with our movie on it.

Beautiful. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. Yeah. Where can people watch Nova right now? Go to YouTube, type in Nova short. It'll be the first thing that pops up.

Miguel Amodio: It's

Kelly Kula: on it's on alter, on YouTube. Altar. Altar, yeah. Al the Altar.

David McAbee: The altar and dust page. On YouTube. But if you just type in Nova short it goes right to those pages.

Paul DeNigris: Great. And I'll link that in the show notes. So moving on, let's hear about what you guys are working on now. Let me, let's hear about plate pros and quickly. Cause I know we're coming up on an hour here. Quickly what kind of work are you guys doing with plate pros and where can people find out more about that?

David C. Smith: So it's tying into the whole VFX part of it. And this is where having a little bit of a background in VFX turned into an opportunity to be able to provide. We recognize that there was a gap in the industry around shooting VFX elements outside of the normal production pipeline.

So often when a television show or a feature are trying to rush through the storytelling part of the day, it's really easy for the little tiny elements that are helpful for VFX to have get either handed off to a PA or forgotten altogether. And for years now, we've been through a company called third law productions that we're now rebranding as plate pros.

We've been providing production services that are geared specifically for creating VFX elements on set. And that very quickly turned into a lot of array work. So shooting with multiple cameras to get 360 environments. That's a kind of bread and butter for us. And then that turned into really doing a lot of 360 environments for driving.

So Play Pros, that's, I would say 95 percent of what we do is moving environments for driving scenes. So when you see an actor driving a car nine times out of 10, they're on a sound stage, either a virtual production, LED stage light car stage, or they're on a green screen. And so we provide the content that you fill what's going on outside the car with array photography.

So our new thing that we announced at NAB just this last week, Cinegear Cinegear and Paramount is a new stock footage library for those 360 plates that are pre stitched. So it's now a 12K pre stitched library that you have literally every direction you can possibly look inside a car. Every pixel is represented and is is there.

So you can look straight up, you can look behind you, you can look in any direction. But it's all one massive file. So that's an innovation. That's something we've been dreaming about being able to do for over a decade. Traditionally we do it with a bunch of individual small angles and you can somewhat merge those together.

We're doing all of that so that you don't have to, so it's all pre stitched ready to go.

Paul DeNigris: That's fantastic. On behalf of all VFX artists worldwide, we thank you. Because I have used some of your packages from the, the previous iteration where it was different plates. And yeah, there's challenges always, right?

Trying to get those to stitch and hiding seams behind the A pillar, B pillar of the car, things like that.

David C. Smith: Yeah. So that's very cool. Don't have to do that anymore.

Paul DeNigris: Yeah. Fantastic. And then you guys are affiliated with car stage, which is in New York.

David C. Smith: Yep. And long Island city. And we are in the process of we've established a location here in LA.

So we're opening an LA stage as well in the next few months. So it's, we just celebrated our two year anniversary last week for the long Island city car stage. So that's a purpose built soundstage. That's full of large format led screens. It's very different than what, if you're familiar with the Mandalorian virtual production, big curve volume.

That's one way to do it. We take a different approach where it's seven mobile screens, so they're flat screens that are able to move anywhere in the room really easily. You can grab our largest screen with one hand and drag it 80 feet down the middle of the stage. So it's about being really adaptable.

We can conform the room to whatever each individual shot needs. It really efficiently, really quickly, but it allows us now to create a 360 degree lighting world. So you're everywhere you look, you're looking at a pixel of actual light coming from a screen. So that means that the lighting in the scene is the scene is being lit by the plate itself.

Everything moves in a very believable way and it's a much better end result. And now it's also, and my apologies on the VFX side, I'm taking work out of your pocket is you walk away with a finished shot. So you're capturing it in real time in the actual camera, so that you you walk away with a final product.

But our goal there, similar to what we were talking about before, do you really want to spend your money? On these effects or those effects, the driving comps, I think have been the bane of most VFX companies existence for a long time. Because it's not the most creative in terms of, it's just straight comping.

So our goal is how can we take those shots, get them done in the can so that you can spend your time doing more important stuff. So again, let the VFX be. The cool fun stuff and take the drudgery out of it.

Paul DeNigris: Absolutely. And the VFX world is definitely still benefiting from all the innovations that are happening in the, what they call IC VFX in camera VFX or virtual production, we're folding unreal engine into our workflow, whether it's post, Or it's in camera with, there's LED stages here in Phoenix that we have relationships with and I'm always looking for opportunities to, to bring work to you guys at car stage as clients need it.

I, again, it's the right tool for the job just because sure you guys could, a client could pay us to do this to do driving comps, but if we can get, The same result or better for the same amount of money. And the director can see it in real time by going to a place like car stage. It just makes sense.

What's one piece of advice you would give to filmmakers who are new to using visual effects in their storytelling? What's one advice you would give them as far as helping them through the process, helping them, get over whatever intimidation factor there is or fear of the process and the expense.

David McAbee: I'll start it out. Swallow your pride and trust the process. Again, still as a guy who knows next to zero about all of all to me, it's, you guys might as well be doing voodoo. It's all voodoo. You guys put a little thing in a cauldron and cool stuff comes out, but trust the process and swallow your pride.

Kelly Kula: From the actor's standpoint, I say that there's no question. That's too stupid. Again, I think pride goes along with that one, but always ask questions if there's something there. Because I feel that the questions I've asked have made me a better filmmaker overall, because now I'm able to make the filmmaking process easier for my team.

Miguel Amodio: Yeah I'll follow that up exactly what Kelly said. Ask questions. Don't be afraid to ask questions. And really, to add on to that, I would say reach out to Kelly. The biggest houses imaginable and the smallest and ask those questions. I think it's incredible how often people are willing to help.

If you allow yourself to show that you don't know something, but you're genuinely curious about learning, people want to see you succeed. And I think most of us remember when we started versus where we've ended up. So ask a lot of questions. As Kelly said,

David C. Smith: I would say, and this might be a little controversial depending on what software you have access to, but move the camera.

So many times people think that the trick to a believable visual effect shot where you're trying to add something into the shot is to have a lock off it turns out that a lock off is actually a little bit harder. If you move the camera, there's such good tracking available right now, and this is where, make sure you've had the conversations that everybody's talking about.

Make sure you have the guy on the phone who's gonna, or girl who's gonna do the compositing work. Don't take my word for it. Take their word for it. But my hope is, and my experience has been, you can hide a lot with camera movement and and that also can really lock an effect into a scene. If it's well tracked, it now suddenly feels much more believable.

And it turns out that some for certain shots, for certain circumstances, moving the camera can be a much, much easier process than if you have a lock off. So don't just automatically assume because the VFX shot that it has to be a lot that oftentimes is the opposite of true.

Paul DeNigris: Agreed. And I always tell clients when they ask, is this going to be easier if we just lock it off?

I always say, don't shoot it differently than you would, right? It's our job to make it fit your photographic style. I don't want it to be. A bunch of handheld shots. And then we cut to a lock off. Cause this is the VFX shot. That's not how we do things. And it's a good advice. Everybody's advice.

Fantastic. That's a, that's great. I hope that the independent filmmakers that are watching this episode feel empowered and and realize that it's a team sport. It's a team effort. And asking questions and. Planning and fixing it in pre are the key things, but also learn what's out there.

Learn, learn what tools are available to you in terms of VFX and let it expand your story, right? Because the story of Nova is a really great example of a film that doesn't happen without technical innovations, without special effects, makeup, without digital visual effects added in post. And it's not effects for the sake of effects.

It's effects. To help sell the authenticity of what the character is going through and the story that you guys wanted to tell.

David C. Smith: And now with the new AI tools that are coming, there's a whole, this world is changing so fast right now, every three days, there's a new white paper that completely changes everything about how all of this works.

So yeah, try and stay up with it or find somebody who does stay up with it because. What was impossible a week ago is easy today. It's moving that fast.

Paul DeNigris: So what's what's next for each of you? Any upcoming projects you want to plug or or cool stuff that you're working on?

David McAbee: Kelly, Miguel, and I have a new short coming out shortly.

It's called Blue. It's another horror short because that's what I do. So keep your eyes open for Blue.

Miguel Amodio: I have a feature coming out at the end of the month. We're premiering at the Chinese man's the. Just another feature two lives in Pittsburgh. My God sorry. I should have plugged that.

David C. Smith: And then we're, in terms of play pros car stage right now. Unfortunately the business side of my life has been pretty dominant. So I haven't had a lot of time to to devote to more of the artistic part, but I'm looking forward to getting back to that. But on the business side yeah, play pros play pros.

com. That's the new library. Yeah. And then CarStage, which is TheCarStage. com those are my two big passion projects right now. They just happen to be passion projects on the entrepreneurial and technology side less so on the filmmaker side, but we're getting back to that too.

Kelly Kula: Yep.

I'm support class with Plate Pros. So like right now my creative end is, I want to say stagnant. It is building. In the background. So working towards a recognizable feature films and television. But in the meantime, my loyalties are with Smith and we are going to make plate pros we're expanding the library and hopefully people will catch wind of it and be as excited about it as we are.

Paul DeNigris: Thanks so much for joining us on today's episode of the VFX for Indies podcast. You can find transcripts, images, and other cool stuff at our website, vfxforindies. com. If you enjoyed the show, please. Subscribe, follow rate, review, comment on either YouTube or your favorite podcast app. On behalf of everyone at Foxtrot X Ray, I'm Chief Pixel Pusher Paul DeNigris, and we all thank you so much for your support of the show.

See you next time.