New Vid!! Due South!!!

[sisabet]

So first of all - big huge beta thanks to renenet for going well and above the call of duty here. I am sorry I was such an unmitigated bitch last night. I blame After-Effects.

Massive thanks for additional beta duties to pipsqueaky (who remained firm even in the face of a very vid-disgruntled Liz), f1renze who freaking can pick up on ONE SINGLE FRAME MISSTIMED! (and also dealt with a bear of a me),absolutedestiny who sent me a key filter and then rued the day (muahahahaha), sweetestdrain and just_eunice for being so supportive, tzikeh for making sure I didn't watch "Victoria's Secret" alone, sockkpuppett for making sure I continued working even when it was hard and who had terrific ideas to tie things together, and laurashapiro and katallison cause they helped me figure out how to end the damned thing.

Whew. Also? None of the above made fun of me when they figured out what I was doing - although there were a lot of OMGWTFPOLARBEARVID. Mostly from me.

It really does take the Village People.

This is my first due South vid - no spoilers post season one.

Icebound Stream
Song by: Laura Veirs
I can hold a thunderhead in my heart


ETA: 8-19-09, this vid is now available again as a download:

Xvid version (28) Mbs available here


Additional source:

Inuit singers and footage taken from the documentary "Great North"
Additional footage from "Antarctica: An Adventure of a Different Nature" (I know, okay - I just needed snow), "The Blue Planet: Frozen Seas," "Alaska: Spirit of the Wild," "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom: Mammals of North America" and some educational film about glaciers that I can't find right now.

Also? infinitemonkeys for making this icon which reminded me of this idea everytime I posted.

ETA2: Oh yeah - that thing we do where I post something and you tell me what you thought about it? I *love* that thing! All feedback welcomed.

ETA3: Notes, interactive beta moments and my nervous breakdown during the making of the vid is discussed at length here.

Comments

[skipthedemon.livejournal.com]

Oh wow. That was exquisitely timed and mixed. You make me want Due South DVD's more then ever.

[killabeez.livejournal.com]

I know not from due South, but that is just really, really pretty. :-) And a fascinating concept. And did I mention pretty?

[castalianspring.livejournal.com]

...oh my god. That was just exquisite, to quote Ray. He wasn't even in the vid but I'm still feeling every bit of emotional impact that would have been there if he was. As it is, there's enough emotional impact to choke a polar bear. I love the polar bears, and the breaking ice and the plunging and the awesome, awesome timing. I never would have associated the song with DS, but boy, does it ever work.

One of my favorite bits of timing is at :55 when Fraser slams the door and then you cut to him opening it later on, then move to the revolving glass doors. Lovely.

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

Very beautiful! I'd never heard the song and I'm barely familiar with the source material (having seen two DS vids before this one, and one episode of the show) and it still really worked for me. I believed that I understood the story you were telling (hey, I could completely misunderstand and have created my own illusion of reality, but to me it's more important that I didn't feel clueless than whether or not I was "right" in the story I saw.) I really liked the song and I LOVED the fact that you added the non-DS footage -- my favorite shots were the ones where the polar bear had blood all over its (his?) face.

[quinn222.livejournal.com]

This is fantiastic, it packs a monster emotional punch.

You Made My Head Explode!

[vagabondage.livejournal.com]

OMFG!!! You are so damn smart! Every single aspect of this vid is absolutely DEAD ON. POLAR BEARS!!! So. Fucking. Smart. You gave me goosebumps, and at the end... all alone.. I teared up. AND THEN MY HEAD EXPLODED!!!

Love you sooooooo much for doing this. It is absolutely AMAZING!!!

[malnpudl.livejournal.com]

WOW! That was stunning... and immensely powerful.

I'm absolutely blown away... need to watch it half a dozen more times.

Again: Wow!

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

Okay, it just gets better every time i watch it (I"m on time six now.) Favorite parallelisms with Fraser/Victoria and the bears include: the first shot of the bloody muzzle bear cutting into Victoria walking away along the same axis, Fraser and his bear at the zoo, with the bear almost banging desperately at the glass (nose to the window! omg, with Fraser at the window later! the man behind glass!) and the Victoria bear with a bloody belly cutting to shots of Victoria wearing Fraser's red jammies. I'm just astounded, seriously. The cutting is so good, the rhythm, the way you just nail the primitivism of both of them--this relationship is Wild Kingdom, a conflict in the animal world, and it's sad but almost inevitable the way you present it; the brutality of sex and being alive. Holy Jesus Lord. I bow down!

[kiki-miserychic.livejournal.com]

Having never watched due South, I think this is breathtakingly beautiful. I don't completely understand what's going on, but I get the gist of it, and that goes a long way. It's the kind of vid that I don't need to know the whole backstory to appreciate.

[boniblithe.livejournal.com]

The best feedback I can give you is that this is the only Due South vid I have ever watched that has actually made me interested in seeing the show!

[c-regalis.livejournal.com]

Wow! This was beautiful. I'm blown away. Thank you!

[mlyn.livejournal.com]

Awesome work, hon! I love the visual rhythms you've captured and woven together, the metaphors, the effects, the focus on what an amazing story Victoria's Secret is. It definitely wasn't what I expected, since it's so quickly paced and there are so many (cute!) polar bears and awesome far north footage, but it all works wonderfully. Great job.

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

I don't know a single thing about "Due South" and... wow. Wow. I wish I had something smart to say about this. It's just flawless and beautiful and now I need to go watch it again.

[anoel.livejournal.com]

Wow, this video is just absolutely amazing. I have limited dS knowledge (some vids and katallison's fic) so I couldn't grasp as much as I wanted to but it blew me away with what I did come up with. The nature shots were interwoven beautifully throughout it, I love the parallelism with the polar bears (super cool when the polar bear was actually on the screen with them) and how it fits Fraser, dS and the song perfectly. I really liked the cold, snowy theme in contrast to the fire, showing their passionate relationship.

Technically it was just suberb. Your cuts were spot on and I loved how well they matched the music. It was so cool the way there was movement on the exact moments the song showed similar moment (hard to describe but for example at 0:16/17). I really liked how things would hit on the strong beats, it made it more powerful. I liked the color transitions like on 1:39 between the clip and nature and the color/movement of the clip on 2:14 (with the blue/red) stuck out as being particularly vibrant. The movement from 2:24-2:26 was just extremely cool and right after that with the trees and earth was a nice similarity, both being circular and reminded me of the snow globe.

There were some great emotional shots in it and I loved how you built up to the end. The snow globe breaking was a great image, just a perfect visual. The last images at the end, with them struggling, pulling back and forth were just incredibly significant and pulled it all together for a huge finish. I love the last image with the polar bear, it's the perfect finishing touch.

Also, I love the opening credits. Reflected the video really well. Overall, I just loooved it! Thanks so much for making it and I'm glad you had sufficient help to finish.

[ruuger]

Absolutely wonderful. It's been years since I've watched S1 of Due South, and I have no idea who the woman in the vid was, but it didn't matter because the vid was just so beautiful and emotional and just... Gah! Great job.

[norah.livejournal.com]

Oh, that was just wonderful. Thank you!

[corinna-5.livejournal.com]

Here via Cesperanza's rec -- it's everything she said it was, and even more gorgeous than I expected. It makes me want to rewatch the episodes, and since you know how heartbreaking that would be, that's quite the compliment!

[mondschein1.livejournal.com]

Oh. My. God. That was utterly, utterly brilliant. *rewatches twenty times*

I think this is even better than the ep itself. Excluding, of course, the fact that none of it would make sense to someone who hasn't seen the ep. So, so beautiful, and appopriately heart-wrenching.

[pearl-o.livejournal.com]

Oh, this is *gorgeous*. Oh, Fraser.

[xtrustno1x.livejournal.com]

Here by way of pipsqueaky...and...I'm speechless. Beautifully done and perfectly intuned to the music. I especially like the added footage. omgwtfpolarbear, indeed!

[thepouncer.livejournal.com]

That was magnificent. I need to rewatch, because the imagery was so rich and complex. Normally, I don't have emotional reactions to vids, but this one made me breathe fast and get teary eyed toward the end. I did was dS back in the day on CBS, and Victoria's Secret (and Letting Go) were the only episodes I had on tape for years, so I don't know how many times I've seen the episode. The message from this vid, though, seems even greater than familiarity with the source text would indicate. I really love it.

[elz.livejournal.com]

WHEE! And I just finished watching the show about a week ago. It does take a moment of... mental rearrangement to stop thinking of polar bears as inherently humorous animals, which obviously, they're not, when they're not randomly appearing on tropical islands. The visuals are really enthralling - I keep trying to listen to the lyrics, but it's hard to pull my attention back even that far. I love the rhythm it all has, and the way everything flows together with the image of the snow globe and the shots at the zoo. (I don't know if there was a spherical filter on some of the scenic clips, but it did feel like: ooh, it's the inside of the snow globe! it's the inside of his head! Poor Fraser!. Umm, yes.) I especially loved the way you captured the push and pull between Fraser and Victoria, and the transition from the diamonds spilling out to the birds taking off, right before Fraser makes his attempt at escape.

[dualbunny.livejournal.com]

Oh *wow*...

You are an inspiration. Seriously.

That's the most coherent thing I can say about this right now. :]

[linzeestyle.livejournal.com]

I have absolutely no knowledge of Due South outside of my flist's talk of Mounties and the burned copy of S1 sitting on my dresser that I'll never get around to, but this was very, very pretty. I loved the colors: the warm greens and yellows and cold blues and whites. And I adored how all of the clips flowed together -- particularly from 1:25 onwards it felt like all of the scenes were meant to flow together. Even the ones that (apparently) were not from the actual show. I would not have known you'd gotten source elsewhere if you had not pointed it out.

In conclusion: omgpolarbearyay!

Linzee

[barkley.livejournal.com]

That was very beautiful. I think I'm in love with the rhythm and movement of the vid.

(And just this morning I started listening to "Live at the World Cafe" podcast featuring a Laura Viers interview and she was talking about people living off the grid somewhere up north.)