***THE FOREST II: RELENTLESS THIRST - Release Thread!***

It's been nearly two years, but we're finally done. We had a premiere on Saturday (and had the EXACT same problem as RvD2 - the laptop conced out a few minutes in, because the power wasn't connected. I felt like such a fool).

The Forest II on STAGE6 (Recommended)
The Forest II on YouTube (Part 1 of 2, due to 10 minute limit)
Big ol' high-quality WMV download
Not quite so big very good-quality WMV download

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It'd difficult to fit this film into any specific genre - it works in action, comedy, horror, mystery, and several others. Mainly I'd define it as a deadpan comedy, if I had to. It has guns, beer, explosions, and a ridiculous amount of rotoscoping. What more could you want from a film! A story? PAH! It has a bunch of movie references too.... loads of 'em... might be fun trying to spot them all.

I'd recommend watching the first before you see this - but we deliberately wrote it in such a way that it's not entirely neccesary. If you get the urge, watch the first one here.

THE FOREST II: RELENTLESS THIRST
A year or two after the grim events that led Mike and Liam to take a shortcut through The Forest, they find themselves once again beerless and in desperate need of a fix. They must battle The Simons to retrieve beer. This 20-minute, tongue-in-cheek deadpan action comedy is directed by and stars Liam Comerford and Michael Connor as themselves, and Simon Plant as The Simons. 3D work by Paul Canning.

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So, there you go. My christmas present to you all. I hope you like.

 

Lemme just get my popcorn ready...

 

Oh Oh Oh! Sequel time! Finally!

Now the question is; WHY am I hyped for this thing? I have no idea. Part I had "it" somehow, and this has "it" cubed... lets turn on the popcorn machine and turn up the Big Knob on the surround receiver....

...playing... wait... are they drinking "last" beer? L O L.

...oh I know this shot! L O L !

...wait... that's mens beer L O L O L.

...OK ROTO HELL! OMG! A M A Z I N G ! ! !

...**breathless** **gasping** is that a BFG9000?!?

... cant... take... more.... need... air!

.... splat... ouch... *SPLAT* *OUCH* ! ! !

LOL

And then the ending is ... ha ha ha.

Great work, and a ton of great "invisible" effect work. I mean, I know how that car shot originally looked, for instance... ! !

*applause*

/Z

 

Thankyou very much Zap - you have made Liam and I grin like kids in a sweetshop. The invisible effects probably took the longest, and I'm pretty proud of most of it.

If anyone mentions the weight I've put on between The Forest 1 and The Forest 2, heads are gonna roll

 

Nice! That was really entertaining. I loved the various LOTR references and the part from Last Crusade was hilarious.

The shot at 9:46 is pure win. I've been thinking of doing something similar for SFIII and I'd be extremely interested in seeing a breakdown or even just an explanation of how you pulled that shot off.

There definetly is something to be said for the hidden effects, which are some of the most impressive. I tried really hard to find fault with the logo on the side of the van, but it looks absolutely perfect. In fact the only reason I know that it was added in post is because I remember seeing the breakdown video you did for various shots from this film.

Well done man. I hope there is a Forest III coming. Speaking of which I tried to watch the first one but stage6 doesn't seem to be working for either video, for me at least.

 

You guys sure do love your beer, huh?

Maybe this would have been more entertaining if I'd actually watched the first one, but I d'know...maybe if I actually liked beer...maybe if I were a guy...either way, this didn't grab me. I didn't even really watch the whole thing. I got as far as the first few shots starting to fly and just...wasn't into it. Just...no real interest. Sorry.

But it IS a pretty decent technical achievement. The FX were above and beyond what a lot of fan films accomplish, and that's certainly worth noting.

 

I appreciate that. I didn't think it was going to be a film you liked. Definitely a blokes film.

Thanks, I'm glad someone got the references The Last Crusade one was one we were a bit worried about - we were even thinking of calling the beer "Grail" to make the reference more obvious. But by scoring it in a similar way to IJ at that point I think we sold it.

On location Liam just acted out the impaling - it wasn't until a couple of months ago that we shot the arm element - using the shirt Liam wore when we were in principal photography, a baloon of fake blood and a greenscreen. Then some Trapcode Particular particles and some extra blood stock footage (thanks to Andrew Kramer and Detonation Films) and it's golden. That was one of the tougher shots to do. I'll post a proper breakdown at some point.

 

*nod* I didn't wanna be mean about it, and I think you took my reaction--it wasn't even really a criticism--as intended. Excellent; I've had much worse interactions on TFN over a film I wasn't all bouncy over before.

 

That was quite entertaining. Of everything I loved the pulpy feel of the dialouge.

?Was this real, or was it all a delusion? Had I already I already started to go mad from the immanent soberness that would begin to consume me??

You just don't get that anymore on this side of the pond.

 

This was great. I'd enjoyed the first one very much and this surpassed it on all levels. Nice clean sound, good camerawork, great foley, homages to other films all over the place, and great effects. What I liked was that it made a good cohesive whole when combined with the first movie -- it becomes a larger two-part story. That's impressive.

 

Thankyou for the kind comments all. Special props go to Bob of Detfilms - there's plenty of his stuff in there.

Question is.... would this help me get a job? I'm looking to become a compositor ultimately, and will likely go the roto route first....

 

Well if not at least be secure we'll nag you for F/X help.

 

Well, presenting yourself as a drunken bum might have its drawbacks but the roto route's probably a good place to start. Don't know of UK houses myself, but I know that Phil Tippett uses a lot of roto artists in the US...

 

I think I might owe you, for showing that Key Pixel trailer thing

 

I really enjoyed it, especially the first half. I know it's been said a bunch already, but I can't get over how good the van shots look after seeing the raw footage a while back. Excellent.

Love the grenade launcher on the G36. That explosion looked like a beast to roto.

I'm gonna check out part 1.

Thanks for the fun little flick.

 

It was well put together but the lack of plot just let the whole thing down. I mean, did you have to lift a whole scene from SPACED shot for shot?

 

I suggest you watch Spaced again. I would also like a bit more information on where we are lacking plot?

 

If anyone's interested, I've put together a quick blooper reel of sorts:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=85icYpyOxmk

I've also nearly finished a DVD of the film which has the usual extras. I've had a few requests for this, but since we have used Freesound samples in the film I can't sell it. If anyone would like one, it'll be the old send me a blank DVD in the post with enough money / postage to cover return costs and I'll burn it for you free of charge.

 

Very nice effects work right there. After Effects indeed is a truly powerful artist's tool(love it).

What are they going to do when they run out of beer again?

 

Wow, that was pretty amazing. I haven't seen Part I, though, so I probably didn't get too much
But still, very impressive, technicalwise, and - even more important - a very entertaining piece of film. There are many movies, especially Star Wars-related, that I mainly appreciate because of the FX work, but not this one. I really liked that as a pure film itself. Keep up the great work!



P.S.: Might I ask which kind of camera was used to film that?

 

Funny stuff.

Plus it really shows how much post work had to go into this.

 

Finally got around to watching this, was awesome. A lot of hard work for sure with some of those effects, i remember seeing the raw footage.

The Indy reference with the beer was hilarious.

 

Thank you very much for saying that. I was hoping it would be seen as more than a glorified effects showreel. That means a lot.

Indeed you might. The camera was a JVC GR-DV700EK. Not a new or particularly brilliant mini DV cam by any means, but with the right care in post, I was very happy with the visuals we got from it. I have said that this will be the last film of any appreciable scale that I film on mini DV, however. Not as a result of the images we got from the camera; I just feel we've moved on.

Heheheh. I actually wanted to re-film the last bit and change the line to "Heh, we're gonna have to go out again in a minute!", but we'd moved from that house and couldn't get the room again. Ah well.

Really glad you enjoyed, and glad you got the reference . That was one of the more obvious ones, admittedly.... I'm a little bit upset no-one has spotted the very visual Cast Away reference at the end of the Simon's Shack scene

 

The DVD is finished - PM me if you want a copy. I would post an ISO torrent, but I get the impression there wouldn't be many seeds.