Children of Stone (Part 1 of 2)

Giant rock monsters from ancient times awaken in the present and find they must battle to determine the fate of human kind...

See concept art and other behind-the-scenes material on my website:
http://dontmesswithdinosaurs.com/?page_id=383

This was my film project for my senior year of college (I majored in film production and minored in animation, Loyola Marymount University 2007)

Credits (informal):
I (Brian Engh) wrote, designed, directed edited and did most (like, at least 80%) of the post production effects and animation.

Will Hyler
( http://www.youtube.com/user/willhundredpercent )
and
Katie Bode
( http://www.youtube.com/user/somethingbode )
were always there during production doing everything imaginable. From painting everything grey (Katie) to building the stage we shot the rock monsters on (Will). They handled biz.
Will then stayed on through the very extended post production to do the sound design.

David Reilly
( http://www.youtube.com/user/Inchingwheels )
supported the film throughout its entire life. He started the conversation that inspired me to conceptualize about rock monsters, he helped on the set a bunch, and he kept encouraging me throughout the gnarly post production process. Even when I could no longer see anything good in the film he would see stuff I was working on and get excited and that really helped keep me going.

A bunch of other people who helped doing all sorts of stuff on set:
Ali Beltramo (Katie Bode's right hand gal), Andrew Doman ( http://www.youtube.com/user/crotchfire ), JJ Conway, Franz Schmutzer, Alfonso Estrada, Scott Gairdner ( http://www.youtube.com/user/Zoltarkill ), Ricky Fosheim, Matt Bordenave, Zach Ramirez and Luis Silva.

Stephen Engh (my dad) built the miniature airplanes you see shooting missiles at the rock monsters. The models he built were actually able to open their bombay doors and lower their 'missile pods' (as seen in the film). That wasn't an animated effect (the shooting/exploding missiles, however, was).

Maren Engh (my mom) made the costumes for the Sage and the Boy. She also made a few cave people costumes for some scenes that I didn't end up putting in the finished movie because I screwed them up.

Donna and Ruud Vis (Andrew Doman's mom and step-dad) let us film in the awesome ravine adjacent to their nursery (where Volciathan wakes up).

The movie stars:
Lucius Bryant (Narrator/Sage)
Adrian Schemm (Boy)
and Ben Stewart (Volciathan - the rock monster who loves humans, AND he played all of the humans who hate rock monsters. Talk about dramatic range!)
Josh Goldman, Patrick Donelly, Will Hyler and Jeremy Polgar
( http://www.youtube.com/user/jpolgar1 )
all played Metamorpholith (the rock monster who hates humans)

On the post production end of things, I got some solid compositing from Alfonso Estrada, JJ Conway and Keith Henry.

Also my thanks goes out to Jessica Frederick of Mhz Networks for saving me from wasting tons of money on putting this in film festivals. She randomly saw the animated intro on Youtube and asked if they could play it on their TV channel Mhz Worldview. I said "WHOOAA YEAH!!! You can play the WHOLE MOVIE!!!"
If you don't get Mhz Worldview, and you want to, you should check out their website here:
http://www.mhznetworks.org/mhzworldview/

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• fighting
• action
• adventure
• sci
• fi
• fantasy
• science
• fiction
• mythology
• dinosaurs
• geology
• paleontology
• paleo
• cave
• paintings
• nuclear
• explosion
• mushroom
• cloud
• special
• effects
• charcoal
• animation
• traditional
• rubber
• suit
• monster
• kaiju
• godzilla
• rodan
• ghidora
• mothra
• battra
• angilas
• baragon
• gorosaurus
• toho
• destroy
• all
• monsters
• igneous
• volcanic
• basalt
• metamorphic
• fossils
• mass
• extinction
• folk
• lore
• nature
• pollution
• consumerism
• end
• of
• civilization
• environment
• sustainability
• ecology
• animism

[potter0067]

This would be so much better without the Yank voice. Who the feck trusts a Yank?!

[HistorianHimself]

I'm not really sure what you mean... Do you mean to say you don't like movies narrated by Americans?

[wilmarcooks]

you need to make a sequel with organic monstars... and call it children of RAWRERERER

[HistorianHimself]

Oh shit! I meant to click the big thumbz UP! >>>  hahaha!!

But yeah, I WILL.

[410MaXiMuS]

Absolutely amazing... period. Im curious, how much $ did you end up spending to pull this off?

[HistorianHimself]

hehah, well a lot by MY standards, but very little by most filmmaker's standards.

The total cost came out to somewhere around $2700.

The real expense was the amount of time put into it, especially in post production. If I had hired people to help with that the movie would've been a lot more expensive.

[phuq1deology]

man,

Ive never seen a guy with such an artistic talent that spanned so many genres.

you're like a Renaissance man only post modern and neolithic at the same time.

scratching his ass with a light sabre while making the world his cave wall...

[BajanFahLyfe]

Awesome! 5 stars!

[MegaHolly2011]

this is very weird;/

[MegaHolly2011]

wot the is this

[stevedaniels5]

@McGinlay1

I doubt you've had a single creative thought in your insignificant little life.

[McGinlay1]

This is the Most ridiclous "THING" I have ever Encountered in my whole life can't belive somone actually made this a film it is theres not even a word in the english language to describe the unoringinality of it stone monsters seriously thats somthing that a child would think up and it wouldn't take them long to do that it is actually almost funny how bad it is try comedy

[stevedaniels5]

Such a cool mythology. The rock monsters voices were perfect...damn creepy. I also saw you did the amazing sound design for the animated "The Statement of Randolph Carter." Keep on making this stuff man.

[CalmplexLocust]

Wow this is amazing!!!

[GojiGuy]

This is wicked. Great job!

[Swimnebulafilms]

Okay man, this is nuts. Nuts.

[aftermath220]

so thats what happened to my pet rock.....