I had the opportunity to teach a film acting class for an after-school drama group this winter, and the result is this film. I’ve always wanted to make an old-school science fiction film with miniature model work in it, so that’s the script I wrote for my class, with the cheesy title The Children of Space.
Because I’ve never shot an effects film before, I intentionally went with a 1960’s low budget B-movie aesthetic. That way, even if the effects were sub-par–which they definitely were–they would still work visually. Everything was shot in a small church classroom with a green screen and four LED light panels over the course of six weeks, and the visual effects are a mixture of lo-fi CG models, actual hand-made models and basic compositing in Adobe Premiere. I shot the film with my Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera and a couple of C-mount prime lenses as well as some Panasonic and Olympus MFT glass. I graded it with Osiris Film LUTs and added a grain filter to get the video closer to a 1960’s film look.
The Children of Space is a far from perfect film, and I consider it a practice project more than anything else. That being said, it was a joy to work with these students, and we all pretty much had a blast. Enjoy!