PEHJ Productions creates movie using video game software & cellphone

By Paul Hill

April 27, 2016

SanFrancisco, Ca. – PEHJ Productions has announced today that itis on track with its newest animated movie “The Practical Joke.”

About PEHJProductions

 PEHJ Productions is an independent film company that hasfound a cool way to satisfy video game lovers and animated movie lovers at thesame time. Their new animated movie “The Practical Joke” will make you feellike you’re playing a video game and watching an action filled animated movieat the same time.

PEHJ Productions has decidedto use a video game software called iClone Pro5 to produce this movie. The ideawas to go total gorilla style. So they also decided that when recording theactor/actress, instead of using a sound booth; they decided to use cell phonesto capture the actor/actress voices. They also used Microsoft 2013 PowerPointfor some scenes.

This is PEHJ Productions’first commercially produced animation. They wanted to be different to show thatgood movies can be produced using many different platforms as well as having agreat script, a shoe string budget and a lot of crazy ideas.

The movie is based off thebook “Roger B. Private Investigator in Action is my middle name.” Currently themovie is still in production and will be 1 of 3 movies based off this one book. 

About themovie

"THE PRACTICAL JOKE” movie trailer

https://youtu.be/XmOWvF2E3bk

Stealing, lying and playing pranks is all these 3 badkids know. Until one day by accident, they find out about a little girl thatwas kidnapped. Feeling their moral duties they set out to rescue her. Kevin,Willie and Scooter are about to embark on a dangerous life changing journeythat will make you say "YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A GOOD GUY TO BE A HERO,ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS SAVE THE DAY.“

Please enjoy one song from the movie sound track:

Artist:Ian Patrick Cook

Title:“Save the day”

ByPEHJ Music

 http://yourlisten.com/paullehill/save-the-day-movie-theme-song

To be honest, I think you need to spend a lot more time mastering the tools before you go "Global".

I second that ...

I do need more training but I'm a producer not an animator. 

I do need more training but I'm a producer not an animator. 

I do need more training but I'm a producer not an animator. 

O.K. You are not an animator. That's o.k.
If you are a good producer it should be no problem to hire some guys to do good looking renderings for you. Don't you think? I wouldn't say that I am an animator, I learned over the years, but the thing I can do is to tell stories in a hopefully exciting way. The animation stuff came by doing what is needed to be done. I learned and I got better. Here is my first iClone movie I did in late 2012.



When you watch the movie you can see that the animation at the beginning of the movie is very stiff and unnatural. These animations were my first steps on iClone. When the movie progresses, you can notice the increase of the animation quality. Because I used this movie as a learning project.

If you really want to do the animation by yourself, I suggest not to aim on the "global market", but to see this project as a learning ground. To get used to the tools iClone provides. It will take time, but when you do it seriously you will get better.
Watch tutorials, a lot of those are free to watch. Ask the community, you will always get an answer.


If do not want to go the hard way ... hire people, get them paid, get them to make your movie ...

Direx

An interesting project.

I appreciate your bold "gorilla style" concept of using cell phones and a shoestring budget.  There's something to respect when someone takes an artistic risk.  I've taken a few myself, sometimes for the purpose of stretching my comfort zone.  My results have been mixed, but that's the nature of taking risks.  If it always worked, it wouldn't be called a risk.

I'm not sure "good movie" and "a lot of crazy ideas" go together in the same sentence though.  As a producer, be sure to keep the project a consistent style with a strong story.

I hope you have fun, and good luck.

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iClone 7... Character Creator... Substance Designer/Painter... Blender... Audacity...
Desktop (homebuilt) - Windows 10, Ryzen 9 3900x CPU, GTX 1080 GPU (8GB), 32GB RAM, Asus X570 Pro motherboard, 2TB SSD, terabytes of disk space, dual  monitors.
Laptop - Windows 10, MSI GS63VR STEALTH-252, 16GB RAM, GTX 1060 (6GB), 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD

This is going to be a very acid edged post, but hopefully this will be helpful. 


-First thing I see is poor set design, especially the UV Mapping. Poor selection of textures, bad mapping, no pixel shaders (reflection or blend). Blocky models with bad texturing is plainly an eyesore. You're not the only one here... but this is a very common occurrence.



I made a quick floor plane using a marble texture, use your best judgment on what looks good. UV Mapping is easy to do and relies on a good eye to get it right. 

Camerawork draws attention to itself a few times, a shot has an effect to its viewer. If you make it pay attention to itself, you lose the viewer. Plan your shots, the more dramatic the scenario... you want to bring in the camera so the audience can be drawn in as well.

 Animation is very stiff and uncomfortable, use dummies for reach objects. Use idle animation when characters are standing still to achieve a fluid motion. And use dummies, they are your best friend.

I noticed the output is windowboxed as well. It's something with the NLE, make sure the aspect ratios match with one another. 

Hope it helps,

Benjamin Tuttle







iClone Certified Director and makes miserable Westerns.

I think the subject line with "international market" set a high expectation.

As a first project, it's a nice start.
As a globally released movie, well, you got some good feedback on that already.  If you take it the right way, there are a lot of people who will gladly help you improve.

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iClone 7... Character Creator... Substance Designer/Painter... Blender... Audacity...
Desktop (homebuilt) - Windows 10, Ryzen 9 3900x CPU, GTX 1080 GPU (8GB), 32GB RAM, Asus X570 Pro motherboard, 2TB SSD, terabytes of disk space, dual  monitors.
Laptop - Windows 10, MSI GS63VR STEALTH-252, 16GB RAM, GTX 1060 (6GB), 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD