darksiders 2

Harking back to the source material that the DarkSiders games are based on, I wanted this short film to feel slightly more comic book themed. Not outright copying the aesthetics, just treating shots as comic panels and applying the relevant compositional rules to them. In a subtle way.

Following an increasingly common pattern, the schedule from first looks at the draft script through delivery date was pretty ambitious to say the least. The location scouts found this church ruin a couple of hours driving time from Prague in a positively tiny place called Uherce. Art department had a day’s time to dress up and convert a messed up ruin into a messed up place of last, mostly spiritual, refuge.

DAVID MYRICK, my cinematographer, proposed shooting at night and lighting for day to maximise the usable winter hours and to reduce dependency on the ever uncertain sunlight. This played right into my hands, as it gave the actors and extras a special level of fatigue that only night shifts can summon. Working around budget and equipment limitations, we planned our shoot around visible areas and lit different areas of the location in phases.

We shot a live action, dressed up version of the Death character on set, but in post opted to use the CG character since it meshed better with the CG outdoor scenes.

Credits
Client: THQ
Agency & Editorial: Hammer Creative ( hammercreative.com )
Creatives: Brett Hocker, Scott Hayman
Director: Abed Abonamous
DP: David Myrick ( davidmyrick.com )
Production Company: The Ebeling Group, LA, USA ( theebelinggroup.com )
Producers: Matthew Winkel, Mick Ebeling, Martha Smith
Service Production: Stillking Films Prague ( stillking.com )
Post production: Gradient FX, LA, USA ( gradientfx.com )
CG: Plastic Wax, Silverwater, Australia ( plasticwax.com )
Shot on location in Uherce, Czech Republic in December 2011