Ebb Tide Project - "Elysia"

By Greg McCarron

I was thrilled to be selected as one of the moving image artists for the Ebb Tide project, as I knew it was an excellent opportunity to take part in a national event (The Commonwealth Games) and try out some new film-making techniques. My story concerned a Shetland man who was on a merchant navy ship in World War II as it was torpedoed and sunk by enemy ships. His wife at home was informed he had gone down with the ship, but in fact he had been rescued and taken to Pakistan. I wanted to use live action for his wife's story in Shetland, and a combination of animated photos and video clips to portray his journey home.

Techniques

The effects in Elysia were achieved by combining photographs and video clips in a variety of ways. Applying a mask to a video allows you keep certain parts of an image and replace others. In the past this was achieved optically by using a physical mask (usually made out of card or cloth) to prevent certain parts of the film strip from being exposed. For example, if you wanted to add a different landscape outside of a square window you would add a square black mask to the camera to cover up that section of the image and prevent any light hitting that part of the film negative. When the film was rewound there was then a second opportunity to expose that specific area of the film strip and you could film a new background for your window. In digital film-making masks are easily applied without the limitations of exposing film only once.

Keying is the process of removing a coloured backdrop, most commonly seen with use of green screen. By filming against a solid colour which contrasts strongly against what you wish to keep in the image (which is why green is commonly used) you can use the video editing programme to remove this colour and leave a blank space which can be replaced with another image.

Superimposition is the process of placing a video or still image on top of another. The various animated shots in Elysia were produced by using superimposed layers which could be individually animated. For example, if a video clip of the sea was the first layer, with a cut out image of a ship as the second, the ship can be animated to move across the frame while the background video stays in the same position. While layers can be overlapped and adapted easily with computers, optical applications of this effect were much more complex. To achieve layered animated images with a sense of depth for Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937), the Walt Disney studios refined and developed the multiplane camera – which consisted of seven layers of artwork painted on glass. These layers could be individually controlled, with the camera shooting down from above to give a multi-layered animated image. This technique was used in Disney animated movies right up until The Little Mermaid in 1989. 

The screenshot below gives you an idea of how many video layers were required for the project:

 The audio was also complex, requiring many layered elements:

Layered Images

In the opening shots I wanted to create the effect of a flying into a still-image postcard, which adapts into a moving video. I started with the composite shot of the Elysia at sea – a combination of video footage shot from the Northlink ferry and separate elements from a photograph of the ship which was provided by an American collector. As with the other ship animations, the Elsysia had four layers: the ship itself, smoke from the funnel, water spray at the bow and the displaced water around the hull. 

I took the still image and broke the water into nine separate layers which could be animated individually. Some of these layers were enlarged so that they could be animated to shrink away from the camera, while others were reduced (and extended) so that they could zoom towards the camera. Contrasting shades of blue were added to each layer so that they were distinctive. A text graphic was placed on top and the new composite image was printed out for use as a prop.

 

The shot of the lifeboat being rescued by a passing ship was made up of 10 layers. Separate shots of the Shetland sea and sky provided the background and the hull of the ship was a still image of an old water tank. The lifeboat was photographed in the Shetland Museum, and combined with a mirror image to make the boat appear to be symmetrical. Various shots of Gary at sea were cut out and shaded grey to provide silhouettes of the other sailors. Water displacement for the lifeboat and passing ship were added to blend the sea footage and still images together.

The shot of the ship leaving Pakistan was a composite image of 11 layers. To produce the effect of trees individually swaying in the wind, each of the trunks and treetops were in separate layers and animated individually. A video clip of the Shetland seas added some colour and movement to the image. 

The image of Hoswick was a composite shot of eight layers, adapted from a photograph kindly provided by the Shetland Museum and Archives. The two smoke layers were animated as if they were rising from the chimneys, against a video clip of the sky. The man and his dog were in separate layers, including their reflections in the water. The portion of the bridge immediately in front of them had to be included as a separate layer so they would appear to be moving behind it. Finally, a blurred image of the lake was included in a separate layer so that it could be faded in and out to give the impression of the water shimmering.

 

Masked Shots

Several shots had to have areas masked and replaced, for a variety of reasons. The living room set had a modern work bench set into the wall which couldn’t be removed. To get around this I piled up boxes on the bench and put a table cloth over it to give the shape of a sideboard. The table cloth hung low enough to provide a background for Helen’s spinning action, leaving a clear part of the frame to mask. I exported a screenshot to Photoshop and mixed in various photos of a sideboard, with this layer imported back into the video editing software to mask the modern workbench. If Helen’s action hadn’t been contained against the white tablecloth then her arm would have passed behind the superimposed mask and ruined the effect.

While the croft house exterior was in Cunningsburgh, the beach which Gary returns to was in Hoswick. To cover up a large path between Helen and Gary I exported a screenshot to Photoshop and copied and pasted various segments of grass to obscure the path. This layer was then imported back into the video editing software and superimposed on the video clip.

While filming Gary on the Lebotten beach the weather was not quite as sunny as I would have liked! The dull grey sky behind Gary was quite easy to key out and replace with a video clip of clearer skies. 

I wanted to film the ruined house in fog to add a more dream-like quality to the footage, as well as obscure some of the modern features in the landscape (telegraph poles, the main road, etc). We raced to the filming location while it was foggy but unfortunately it had lifted by the time we started filming. To add fog in post production I exported screenshots to Photoshop and created grey graphics which started out transparent before becoming opaque. When imported back into my video editing programme these new layers were superimposed on the video clips, giving the impression of fog.

The old ruin with the mangle was a great location but had some modern houses in the background. To get around this I exported a screenshot to Photoshop and coloured in the parts of the image which I wanted to keep. This mask was used to tell the video editing programme which parts of the image I wanted removed. A video of the Shetland landscape replaced the masked part of the frame, making a closer thematic link to the sea in the process.

Cecil and Grace’s wedding photo was not available when the final sequence was shot. A stand-in wedding photo was used for filming, with the correct image superimposed later on.

Battle Animations

The original image of the attacking ship had to be separated into three layers so that the ship and both sailors could be animated separately. The sailors had to be digitally removed from the image of the ship so that they were moving against a clean background. Smoke and projectiles were added, as was video footage from the back of the Northlink ferry.  A slow zoom was added to the ship layers to give the impression of motion.

While the Elysia was under attack I wanted an effect of shadow bands at the controls of the enemy ship. To achieve this effect I set up a white backdrop outside on a sunny day, and filmed the shadows cast by my hands on the white background. This background was then removed (with keying) so that the shadow hands could be superimposed on photographs of the ship controls. To give the illusion of the switches being turned on, the switches were added as individual layers and flipped. They were then superimposed in time with the actions of the shadow hands. A final detail of the control panel backplate was to replace all the English labels with Japanese translations.

To visualise the stress that the Elysia was under while being attacked, I took images of a ship’s hull and took various zigzag cut outs which were superimposed on the passing ship. This was combined with some more smoke images and a cloudy sky video backdrop. As an extra detail the lifeboat was included as a separate layer so that it could appear to sway with the motion of the ship.

The underwater torpedo shot was one of the most complex in the film. I started out by building a torpedo model out of newspaper, tin foil and a stainless steel IKEA bowl with a mask applied to the footage to remove the unwanted background. To get the effect of the torpedo’s water trail I took video clips of the trail from the Northlink ferry and applied masks to get a triangular shape. I wanted to capture real underwater footage for the background plate, so I bought a waterproof camera, tied it to the end of a fancy dress cane and captured some footage off the end of the Lebotten pier!

The hull of the ship was a close up shot of an old water tank. To give the effect of the torpedo ripping through the hull I superimposed an image of a damaged ship and then used a wipe transition with a photo of the ship interior underneath. The fiery explosion shot was a close up of paper being burned. For the shot of the Elysia sinking to the bottom of the ocean I had to digitally alter my photo of the ship so that it looked like it had been severely battle damaged. To achieve the background plate of the swirling ocean I filled up a large vase with water and took it outside for natural light. I used a stick to swirl the water around and then dropped some soluble medicine into the vase to give the impression of air bubbles escaping the wreck. When filmed from directly above, with the wreck superimposed on top, it gave the desired effect.

 

Flag Matchers

In the sequence where Cecil is returning home and Grace is making bannocks I chose to intercut with graphic matches of the flag to clearly tie the story to the object. The flag shots were filmed last, so that they could be as closely matched to the other clips as possible. This involved taking screen shots of the various clips, using a highlighter pen to define the key shape of each, and then trying to create that shape in the flag footage.

All in all it was a great project to be involved with, and an absolutely fantastic learning experience! Look out for other creative projects to be commissioned by the Shetland Moving Image Archive - who knows what film-making skills you could pick up!