District 9 RED One

[Waikato]

Hi Trent, just saw the films few hours ago.

Very stunning work of Cinema Vérité and every film will always carry something unique.

nice work on the shot of MNU special force soldier, a shot down the barrel of their tactical rifles BUT facing backwards, framing the back section of the rifle and the soldier. Especially when the weapon was fired, the effects the shot produced "can't get any closer to the action", of that firing muzzle. something great that i learnt.

congrats on all the favourable reviews and high ratings. Good to see RED performed so well under such hostile environment in JHB.

p.s. I liked DISTRICT 9's trailer a lot before the film was released, so that i used 50 hours and made a similar faux trailer for one of our film's school's leaving tutor 2 months ago, solely inspired by seeing D-9's trailer then. here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mblAWpE0L8

greetings from NZ

[joshtownsend]

Saw it again and tried to watch from a filmmaker POV but couldn't do I got pulled into the movie completely.

Again I really loved the grain. Would love to know more about that. The grain made the CGI look completely real along with amazing motion blur.

CGI monsters look more real when the shot is documentery style or even home movie camcorder stuff (handheld, grain/noise, non Hollywood gloss). Something about it being "familiar" makes sell better as being real.

[Stu Mannion]

The best sci-fi action movie in years. Intelligent, with something to say.

Red is going in the right direction with the next gen cams - more latitude and less compression. These seem to be the only things stopping them besting 35mm.

[Trent Opaloch]

Wow, thanks again so much for all the great feedback guys. I'm glad so many people are enjoying our wacky 'little' movie.

Waikato - nice work on the short! Love it!

Kyle - Ja the HF100s were hard mounted in some of the MNU vehicles not so much as crash cams (we had RED's in crash boxes for that stuff) but more so as a dash cam type of feel. We actually didn't end up using much of the that footage in the final edit though.

re: digital projection - I've seen the film 6 times now since the comic con premiere & I have been most impressed w/ the digital projection of the film. Just caught a cast/crew screening here in Vancouver w/ the vfx teams & the digital screening was fantastic.

re: the color timing - is an effort to blend the two worlds of the film together to balance the doco & cinematic parts of the film & portray this sun bleached, hot & dry environment in a realistic manner. I feel it served the story perfectly.

thanks again!

[Steve Sherrick]

re: digital projection - I've seen the film 6 times now since the comic con premiere & I have been most impressed w/ the digital projection of the film. Just caught a cast/crew screening here in Vancouver w/ the vfx teams & the digital screening was fantastic.

I'll have to go back again and see it in digital this week. It will actually be a great way to see how each distribution method serves the movie.

e: the color timing - is an effort to blend the two worlds of the film together to balance the doco & cinematic parts of the film & portray this sun bleached, hot & dry environment in a realistic manner. I feel it served the story perfectly.

I thought this was very effective. If there was a huge difference between the doc style and the cinematic parts I'm not sure this plays as well for me. I really liked the approach you took. It seemed much less polished and artificial to me than other movies I've seen in this genre in the past few years.

[Jared]

Had to see this opening day and loved it. Excellent work from all the RED crew. I stuck around till the end of the credits just to see the logo =)

Question about one of the sequences: What camera was used when MNU has him in the underground lab and is forcing him to fire each of the alien weapons in succession? Is this the Red?

[Justin Thomas]

wow I didn't know this was even shot on red. Definitely a priority to see now!

[Brook Willard]

Wonderful film, caught a midnight screening on Friday and again last night.

[Vince K]

I wasn't lucky enough to see it in digital....yet... but I thought it was a fantastic film...absolutely loved it!!

[Sean Rawls]

Just saw it. That was a great movie. Loved the camera work. Didn't feel artificial like Cloverfield. Great work Trent and the entire camera dept.