Upon seeing more footage from the Forward Unto Dawn series, I believe that too much color has been drained from the footage. I know that for “war” movies it is a trend to de-saturate it and make it look “gritty” like news footage, but the games have never been like that and they work well with brighter, deeper colors.
The series almost looks grayscale and I think it is unappealing to the eye. I will be sure to increase the color saturation to more life-like levels when I watch it upon release. What about you?
> I don’t think we have seen enough footage from it to judge this yet.
And really most of the footage that we have seen has been primarily night shots or a darkened classroom >_> The few we have seen of daylight settings looks just fine, as do the dark shots. I don’t have any problem with it at least…when does that start up anyway? October 5th?
> > I don’t think we have seen enough footage from it to judge this yet.
>
> And really most of the footage that we have seen has been primarily night shots or a darkened classroom >_> The few we have seen of daylight settings looks just fine, as do the dark shots. I don’t have any problem with it at least…when does that start up anyway? October 5th?
> Greyscale? Hell no, the footage just isn’t over-saturated. It’s not exactly the prettiest thing to look at, but it’s realistic.
Realistic? I see more color in the real world than what I see in the series. The world doesn’t get de-saturated just because someone feels bad, or a war is going on. The only equivalent would be when it’s cloudy, raining, or snowing, and even then the world doesn’t look half as colorless as what the FUD series looks like.
I don’t think I’d recommend increasing the saturation as much as you’re suggesting - you’re going to get a lot of colour noise and it’ll just look even worse.
I’m not really seeing the problem here - movies aren’t real life and shouldn’t try to mimic it. I don’t think that the world of Halo would look good at “real” saturation levels (remember that Halo 3 live action thing? I don’t think it really looked good at all). The producers want something that will fit the tone of the film more, will make it look good, and apparently having darker, grittier colours is how they wanted to go about that. And you know what? For a 90 minute web series intended to promote a video game, I think that’s totally fine.
Maybe it’s meant to be darker. Maybe to give that sense of this being in the past, or to give that feeling that nothing seems bright and happy anymore since they’re at war.
… Or it could just be that the military acadamy the story’s characters are at just doesn’t like nice, bright colours.
The indoor parts are the only thing you’ve described and they are dark classrooms.
The outdoor scenes look just fine, cloudy maybe but that’s what you get for filming in Vancouver.
The color correction is not final in the stuff that we have seen, but I agree that it is worrying. It has a very low-budget, student/fan film project look to it, and mixed with the film style I can’t shake that vibe. I have high hopes for FUD, but Im almost certain its visuals will have a very amateurish look to them despite the professional involvement. MC looks like something out of high-budget MTV movie awards skit rather than something official, it just has a cheesy look to it.
That said, the shorts they have been putting out to inspire hope, even though they too leave a lot to be desired visually.
Ultimately, I hope whatever look they go for it is done with care… Some of the shots look like a simple filter put on the film rather than careful color correction. I see what they are going for, only it seems to have a cheap look in the trailer. If they can pull it off it will be visually appeasing, if not it will work against it and look cheap. Here’s hoping this will not be an issue when the first episode hits in about 10 days or so.