[Equilibrium vid] Words of the Dead

[permetaform]

(I would recommend using VLC Player to play the vid, it's free; or if you stil have problems playing the vid you can look at this guide.)



Please right-click and save as! (all feedback and critique are adored and will be responded to)

Words of the Dead | .avi (720x480, 29.9mb)
_{Source: Equilibrium
Song: "The Chemicals Between Us", by Bush
Summary: Preston's dead haunts him still (always).}

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Thanks: Much love to morgandawn, lierdumoa, and laurashapiro, for betas and audiencing and encouragement.


Chemicals Between Us by Bush

I want you to remember
A love so full
it could send us all ways

I want you to surrender
All my feelings rose today

And I want you to remain
The power of children can amaze
I'll try not to complain

I know that's a pisser baby

The chemicals between us
The walls that lie between us
Lying in this bed

The chemicals displaced
There is no lonelier state
Than lying in this bed

I want you to remember
Everything you said
Every driven word

Like a hammer
Held to my head

The chemicals between us
The walls that lie between us
Lying in this bed

The chemicals displaced
There is no lonelier face
Than lying in this bed

The chemicals between us
The chemicals between us
Lying in this bed

We're of the hollow men
We are the naked ones
We never meant you harm
Never meant you wrong

And I'd like to thank
All of my
lovers
lovers
lovers
lovers
lovers
lovers

The chemicals between us
The army of achievers
Lying in this bed

The chemicals displaced
There is no lonelier state
Than lying in this bed

The chemicals between us
The chemicals between us
Chemicals

The chemicals between us


Notes: This vid took both forever and 2 months. Or rather, 2 months stretched over the course of a year. I...gah, I give up. This really should've been done in Adobe After Effects, but I was crazy and stubborn and in the end too lazy to redo my work elsewhere.

My computer had it's revenge tho, in massive export problems. Fun times.

One of the most interesting problems was attempting to make the lyrics more audible with certain cuts. Dunno if the solutions succeeded, but it was an entertaining experiment in any case. Other interesting problems include trying to include massive amounts of relationships in only 4 min., the solution as near as I could make it is to basically have an intro section the length of an entire verse and chorus (PLUS the intro). Usually I'd only story intro during the song's intro, but the world I was trying to include was too big.

I...really really don't want to imagine attempting to remaster this sucker. ::facepalm:: Or at least, not before the next evolution of whatever programs' gonna replace After Effects. Because honestly: way. too. tedious.

I think...this is actually the first vid I posted this year. Wow, I'm lagging. ::wryyyyy::

_{[main vid index]}

Comments

Re: WOW!!

[permetaform]

Oh! Wow, please give my thank-yous to your future SIL for the complement!

I'm glad that you liked my vid and that it makes sense to you with the context of the movie.

The effect loved Sean Bean, he looks good glowing, ;D, and I'm glad that the interrelationships worked for you!

[permetaform]

=D ::GLOMPS::

[permetaform]

Thank you! I'm glad you found it accessible despite not knowing the source; I try to have a stand-alone story in all my vids, and am always sorta relieved whenever I get a response that mentions that it's good despite a person not knowing the context.

[permetaform]

::glomps!:: It's always a relief to me to know that my vids are accessible to people who don't know my source; I know I tend to vid obscure stuff and am always trying to make sure people aren't bored despite that.

And yeah, I sorta did imagine this as a fanfic ::bounces::, actually my main inspiration for the vid is laceymcbain's Care In The Holding, and am glad that you found it as having no ragged edges 'cause I was experimenting with toeing the line of AU.

[permetaform]

Heee! I'm so glad you liked it, and that you found it to be a love story. I was trying to be careful of it, because I didn't want to bash any of the canonical relationships, and yet to protray this...this...I dunno, that...if they could have loved, if they had the ability to love, this would be it.

[nightengale.livejournal.com]

downloaded~ full watch later, with commentary...kick my ass if I don't. RL is trying to eat me raw.

[elfiepike.livejournal.com]

ahahah, i didn't mean to imply that i hadn't seen equilibrium, i totally have! that's part of why i enjoyed it so much, i think, because i can still vividly recall the scenes you've grabbed and spliced together--though in some small way it makes it harder to understand the first time around, because it's been so long since i've seen if that i was trying to remember which bits came from where and not quite paying enough attention.

so, you know. i have to watch it a few more times. ♥ what a hard life i lead.

...i seriously adore how you've drawn all these parallels between, um, christian bale's character and his ghosts. so good!

[obsessive24.livejournal.com]

Oh my god. I'm just speechless. This is amazing. I've been looking forward to what new vid you're coming up with, but this just blew me away beyond measure. Spectacular ghost effects aside, the pace of it, the way you use speed changes to maintain such an incredible sense of dynamic and drive, and all the colours, repeated images and symbols - it's so potent and incredible. Equilibrium is visually striking and it's easy to make a good vid out of the footage that you've got, but what you've done here has gone so much beyond that - you've constructed such an intricate journey, full of parallels and connections and such amazing emotion. It's just... wow. Absolutely fantastic.

[charmax.livejournal.com]

Excellent, excellent vid!

[mranderson71.livejournal.com]

*cut n pasted from my reply in Vidding*

That was a truly refreshing take on Equilibrium - I thorughly enjoyed watching that!

The ghosting effect was inspired & served your story telling aspect of the vid extremely well. Quality for the file size is impressive too...I see in the properties its Xvid but I didn't think it was possible to get a 3.50 song @ 720x480 in at 30 meg with that quality.

You could have probably shaved a meg or 2 by cropping the black & the top & bottom too, but still...Im in awe of the quality of this vid.

Nice job!

[little-sparks.livejournal.com]

Absolutly stunning, wonderful work.

[fireflykiwi.livejournal.com]

Stopped by because it was recommended, and all I can say is WOW. I am truly amazed.

[bradcpu.livejournal.com]

Here via obsessive24's rec. That was stunning! I've seen several Equilibrium vids but never the movie itself, and even *I* got chills seeing Sean Bean walk out beside Christian Bale for the big fight scene near the end. Beautiful symbolism there. Even setting aside the effects, the overall style of clean, sharp motion and flow was just mesmerizing. Love detail shots, the closeups on the hands, and so forth - they give the piece a very intimate feel.

Wonderful work.

You're a God

[jade-kadir.livejournal.com]

I saw a rec by obsessive24 who's got a good eye for good vids, and I have to say that this one is the best vid I've seen ... ever ... hands down. The vid was crisp and I loved the effects used, like the ghosting and the time dialation. It ws also highly emotional for me. The song was an inspired choice given the plot of the film, which may be something that people who haven't seen the movie are missing out on, but it was an excellent choice. Overall, watching this was a sublime experience and I too shall pimp your vid to my friends as it should be required viewing for all people everywhere. Thank you so very much for making it and I look forward to more quality vids in the future.

[astolat]

AAAaaA GODDAMN YOUUUU NOW I FINALLY HAVE TO WATCH THIS MOVIE. rarr.

Spectacular. I so want to know how you did the effects -- did you actually hand-edit frame by frame to insert Sean Bean into those scenes? I have already gathered some sense of the movie via fannish osmosis, and the song choice is perfect; the intercutting of the snowglobe and the book of poetry (even while I'm probably missing some significance) leading up to the gunshot is just fantastic. Also, I love that one shot of the martial arts practice -- something about that is just perfect, and the one shot where Bale is on his knees crying out on "lovers" before the final fight sequence with Sean Bean's ghost at his side.

(PS: I just rewatched Welcome Home also after seeing this several times, and that vid still makes me get all teary every single time.)

[permetaform]

::glomps:: Thank you! And I'm glad that it still...::flails:: I dunno, at certain points I just kinda loathe it and lose all perspective on it. I'm glad it still works, I guess is what I'm trying to say? Something.

::glomps again:: thank you.

[permetaform]

::bounces and squees:: I'm especially glad that you liked it because I loved your equilibrium vid. I'm glad that the effect worked for you, and that the structure worked too especially because of all the relationships I tried to cram in. Thank you!

[permetaform]

::points at icon:: I'm a total beat whore, I helplessly time things. XD And actually, the shooting/snowglob section was one of my favorite bits to vid. =)

Thank you! I'm glad you liked the vid!

[permetaform]

Thank you! ::glomps:: It's awesome hearing that from you 'cause I adore your vids. I'm very glad that the connections between everyone was clear for you 'cause I'm not naturally a narrative vidder.

[permetaform]

ohhh, I see what you were saying now. ::GLOMPS YOU MORE:: 'cause, see, I'm not naturally a narrative vidder, so I'm really glad that you got a sense of story from the vid. I'm glad that the splicing together of the scenes worked, because I know that I jumped around in time, and the structure of the vid (time-wise) is a bit odd and back-forth.

I'm glad that the parallels shows through; it was something that I tried and...well, you never know if something works unless someone mentions it, y'know? =)

Thank you for your feedback, it makes me smile and squee.

[permetaform]

heh, it's not much different from the draft you saw. ::wry::

[permetaform]

First and second week looks openish, and then I'll be a combination of up north and visiting family.

Maybe we can do something in January before your school starts up again?

[permetaform]

thank you!

[permetaform]

heh, part of the struggle is getting enough power to your computer to make it bend to your will. ::wry grin:: unfortunately, my computer still refuses to bend to my will and thus the difficulties with the exporting. Perhaps it's a difficulty with the computer itself that's a problem? Also, some vidding programs are more non-intuitive than other ones; and Premiere for instance tends to be overwhelming.

[permetaform]

thank you!