Hellevator, starring Greg Nappo, is a short film written by comic book legend David Michelinie (Iron Man, Amazing Spider-Man, Superman), and directed by me, that we shot on the Panasonic HPX500 a little while back. It was shot completely against a green screen, and required all sorts of visual effects to bring to life. My long-time film collaborator Jeremiah Hall took care of all the VFX, using Adobe After Effects CS5.5, Photoshop CS5.1, Boris Continuum Complete 7, and Twixtor 5. Just a few days ago, he delivered the last clip, which I dropped into the cut, and now we’re moving onto sound FX and mixing, with the help of my long-time film partner Grant Balfour, who also composed the score.
In addition to the film being shot in 720p24 on the HPX500, we shot the background plates with a Nikon D200, Canon 60D and even an iPhone 4S, plus recorded voiceovers on a Sony HVR-V1u. I did the first cut, all green screen clips in Final Cut Pro legacy, but when Jeremiah first started delivering FX shots, I turned to Final Cut Pro X, and started from scratch — I didn’t use the excellent 7toX to bring in the old cut, I started fresh in FCP X. I had about 40% of the FX, so I used the green screen clips to create a new cut, and then I’d swap out finished clips as I received them. I’ll be using FCP X to mix the audio, and have laid the music onto my timeline.
Editing Hellevator in Final Cut Pro X
I’ll have a more in-depth article or set of articles on how we brought Hellevator to life once the film is done, along with clips or the entire finished movie. For now, check out our official Hellevator page.
