[andi*pandi]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

I think it had to do with the alcohol content rather than the specific brand/flavor. And I apparently was misinformed. According to The Smithsonian, it was an Anheuser-Busch product. The link includes a photo of a can with the prop label.

The can without the label says JR Ewing's Private Stock. So that is also a fake brand!

[ghporter]

Actually, that’s a real beer. According to Untappd, it was a special release from Pearl (a Pabst company) in 1980.

OK, I said “real beer” talking about a beverage produced by Pabst, so the “real” part is probably a subject for lengthy discussion.

Anyway, the level of detail a prop needs is directly proportional to how much screen time it gets, and how closely it can be seen. You could mock up a Bud label, print it in full color and apply it to a can of tonic water, or you could wrap wrapping paper with a cool design on it around a can of tonic water. It’s the difference between a “hero” prop and “just a prop.”

[subego]

Today is the official start of production!

Of course, my dad might be getting sick again, so the whole thing might just blow up 20 meters off the launchpad.

[subego]

My dad seemed okay when I called a few hours ago, so that’s relaxed the vibe.

[ghporter]

Among the corollaries to Einstein’s Theory of Relativity are “it depends on which side of the bathroom door you’re on” and “time passes slower when you’re worried about X”.

Try not to call too often to check on your dad. My professional advice is to set a timer, and don’t call until after the timer finishes. How long? How frequently do you call him on a “normal” day? About that long, maybe a little shorter.

Also, (referring to your “minor irritant” post), my brain is having a little melt down around putting “Tic Tok” and “production” together in the same sentence. Most of what I’ve seen there has featured “less than professional production values.” I’m looking forward to what your project winds up looking like.

[subego]

Luckily, I had a legit reason to call beyond worrying, so my checkup was stealthed.

Also luckily, in a weird sort of way, I order my dad’s dinner every night, so we talk at least once a day no matter what. Sometimes it’s twice a day, as I’ve just introduced him to this crazy new thing they call “lunch”. Long story on how this arrangement emerged, but the upshot is the benefit of forced contact far outweighs any downsides.


With the TikToks, our production is waaaay pared down, but the trade-off is we’ll start releasing content in weeks instead of years. Hopefully it’ll still rise above the norm.

[subego]

The shoot itself was the ideal setup for a first day of production. Just driving around and getting shots of the city. No actors to figuratively or literally cater to. Minimal time pressure past having to start at 6:30 in the morning. I always want something like this for the first day, but never get it.

Even better in terms of stress reduction, the iPhone is simple enough I don’t have to be the camera operator unless the director is actually in the shot. Instead, I got to be the Assistant Camera we never had on the web series… with a super-simple and light setup.

Gorgeous weather too with pretty clouds. If it wasn’t for the dad scare, it was perfect.

[ghporter]

Excellent news. I’m still gobsmaked that one can use an iPhone for professional video production, but looking at the iPhone 14’s camera specs (4k video at up to 60 fps?!?!?!), yeah, it works.

[subego]

Also, TikTok itself is only 1080, and the screen people watch it on is generally small.

I’ve got a 14 Pro, so I was all excited to use ProRes, but I realized the night before the shoot the file sizes would be too large. I needed to start working on the footage ASAP. With ProRes it would have taken hours to get off my phone.

[ghporter]

I may open one of the TicToks my son sends me on my iMac to see how the video looks on a 20 or 21 inch screen. Though I won’t be surprised if I have to do some gyrations to see the video on a landscape screen…

[subego]

Watching these on a computer screen is a nightmare scenario for me.

[andi*pandi]

tiktok on desktop is fine. it letterboxes (or the vertcal equiv)

[reader50]

Pillarbox.

[subego]

Originally Posted by andi*pandi 

tiktok on desktop is fine. it letterboxes (or the vertcal equiv)

The nightmare part is a desktop is a combination of the worst viewing conditions.

The screen is large, the viewing distance is close, and I imagine for any given price point the panel on a monitor will be crummier than one on a phone.

[subego]

Well, as promised, we shortened the production time. Channel is up, first TikTok released!

https://www.tiktok.com/@misterdobbs



Edit: of the ones we have, I have to admit this is my least favorite.

[subego]

This one I like. Glitchy AI heavily featured.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8jabeQu/

[andi*pandi]

1) i like the juxtaposition of old architecture elements and new cars

2) for ai pretty good. ai does ok when it's not faces or hands.

[subego]

Is the juxtaposition you’re talking about from the first one? The non-AI one?

This can do halfway decent faces, but we’ve started feeding it damaged source material in the hope it’ll glitch out more. The footage from this one was straight.

[andi*pandi]

Yes the first one.

Which AI are you using?

[subego]

Of course, any intelligence displayed with the first is wholly non-artificial.

The AI we use is from a company called “Reface”. They have a mobile app and a web interface. There are a ton of style options, but the one they fed vintage photographs is right up our alley. We actually started using it so much they want to talk to me next week.

https://reface.ai/unboring/restyle

[reader50]

Originally Posted by subego 

We actually started using it so much they want to talk to me next week.

For a promotion, or is this a hand-over-fist situation? Give us some money, before we hurt you? Have they threatened your cat yet?

[subego]

They actually charge already, though there’s this slight worry in the back of my head we’re violating their TOS, and talking to them is going to be a problem.

As far as I can tell it’s more “you’ve suddenly become a relatively big client, and we want to understand it” interview. They’re offering some free rendering in exchange.

[subego]

Originally Posted by subego 

there’s this slight worry in the back of my head we’re violating their TOS,

Decided to finally read the TOS.

The good news is I apparently have good instincts. The bad news is I apparently have good instincts.

[reader50]

Well said. That was said well.

Be sure to point out the prominent mention you're giving their product in your credits. They're being mentioned in a popular movie! Also make sure all your pets are locked in the house. Just in case.

[subego]

I seemed to have survived the interview! TOS thankfully never discussed. Company is in Ukraine, so that’s got to be a drag.

It was all basic user experience questions. What I like, don’t like, suggestions, etc.

[reader50]

Cool.

I think you should be pro-Ukraine through the end of the war. They did you a solid.

[subego]

One of the memes du jour on TikTok right now is women asking their significant other how much they think of the Roman Empire. We decided to chase it. Four days from the shoot to finished product.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT862taSd/

[ghporter]

I liked it. The Roman Empire montage was great - a combination of statuary and Hollywood-ized imagery that felt spot-on. Funny too.

[subego]

TY!!!

[subego]

My two favorite AI glitches from this set, neither of which made it in.

Here, the AI took the charioteer’s helmet for a fine coif. I call it “Ben Her”.







With this one, the right “hand” is tip of his sword being put back in its sheath. It turns back into a sword once the tip goes in.

[reader50]

Ahh ... AI rendering. I was wondering how the heck you did all the Roman stuff in a few days. Was any of it filmed - dress actors up in Roman gear?

I personally like the helmets with red ... feathers? chimney-sweeps? on top. Their mohawk version may predate the Native American one.

[subego]

Crest?

[subego]

No shoot this weekend, so I decided to tighten up the automation for recording the dialogue. I’ve got to generate one Logic Pro file per shot, per actor.

This was going well in the beginning, but somewhere along the line AppleScript became necessary. Now I’m torn between using it extensively or keeping it to an absolute minimum because sooner or later Apple’s going to take it behind the shed and give it the Google treatment.

[subego]

After a day-and-a-half of dicking around with AppleScript I’ve managed to get it to… open an Excel file.

Almost all of that time was spent figuring out a way to poll Excel to see if it was done loading. I’m sick of really long, hard coded delays.

[ghporter]

Excel isn’t helping you out. I can say that with certainty.

[subego]

The AppleScript implementation in Excel is surprisingly robust. Documentation is two decades old though.

Where Excel did me dirty is once I nuked all of the calculations from Excel I plan to port over to AppleScript, the Excel file opens quickly enough I don’t really need the “has Excel finished loading” polling any more.

[subego]

Oooh… this is one of the test ones we shot last year with the kids from the series. Also one of my favorites so far. NSFW.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT864KDWC/

[Thorzdad]

The bakery closed shop right after they made the “Fuck You Asshole” cake for you? I’m not saying there’s a connection there, but...

[subego]

That’s the one!

The company that made our “Fuck You, Asshole” candy bars is still going.

[subego]

What I have come to hate about AppleScript is the auto-formatting in Script Editor makes comments really suck.

[subego]

Took way longer than I wanted, but I’ve finally banged the AppleScript into something workable. The code itself is kind of ugly, won’t catch an error, and isn’t commented, but it executes smoothly in my tests. I’ll find out this weekend if it holds up to real world conditions.

[reader50]

If it does work as expected - take the time and add commenting afterwards. Future you will thank you, when you need to adjust the code a couple years from now.

[subego]

You’re absolutely right of course. I sort of half-assed it by using really short, descriptively named functions… or whatever AppleScript calls them. I’ve forgotten already.

[subego]

A couple more cats. Second is my favorite of what we’ve produced so far and is NSFW. First is my least favorite. It needs some motion graphics or something, but I think is SFW.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8M6BBHD/

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8M62kcs/

[andi*pandi]

The one with the fortuneteller cuts off too soon. Her blind eyes shooting lazers at the cats, I can see it!

[ghporter]

I heartily agree with reader about comments. I’ve been playing with HTML/CSS/PHP stuff, and have wasted TONS of time playing around with code that I’d already gotten working, or - let’s be polite here - editing the “old version” of a file because I hadn’t realized I had a copy of that sitting around. It’s a CSS file, and no matter what I tried, nothing I changed had an effect. Duh! Some of that “wasted” time was policing up my server folders to get rid of code landmines like that.

And I agree with andi that the first one stops before it “should” end. Unless that’s intentional, that is. Because that would fit too.

[subego]

Well, it more or less worked. Dropped one shot for some reason, but I (still manually) checksum the number of files against the number of log entries. Maybe automating that part is a future project.

It generated files for 50 shots in 15 minutes. This would have taken more than an hour before, and involved a lot of manual sorting, cutting, and pasting.

I’m considering putting in a comment here or there, but I can’t overstate how awful Script Editor makes commenting. Like, when I was writing this, if I needed to look up how to do something I’d prefer it when the examples weren’t commented.


Edit: the issue is Script Editor’s auto-formatting. Overall, it’s pretty awesome, but it won’t allow using more than one space, and it won’t respect tabs that do anything other than line up nested code blocks. The standard practice which evolved from these restrictions is the comments go above the line they’re commenting. It’s a nightmare to follow.

On the same line is almost just as bad because there’s only a space and two dashes separating the comment from the code. It’s very difficult to tell where the code stops and the comment begins. Maybe I can play around with the color and make them really faint or something

[subego]

Oh! In the second one the idea behind the fortune teller is, well… nothing. It’s just supposed to be nonsensical.

[subego]

In other news, as I expected, the AI service has been steadily “improving” their results, which makes them boring. So, in protest I’ve fired up Stable Diffusion and seeing if I can roll my own.

I’ve gotten some promising results, but it’s slow as molasses. One frame takes about 40 minutes on my ancient iMac. Just installed it on my HTPC, which is an M1 Mini.



Edit: surprisingly, the M1 only shaved off five minutes, but since I’ve got two instances running now I’ve effectively cut render time in half.

[subego]

Getting Stable Diffusion going is really easy, BTW. Goggle “draw things”, download from the App Store, type in some disgusting furry fetishes. It won’t judge.