Hi Mark,
my vote would go for F.
For some reason the first thing that came to my mind when I saw your concept sketch was a grainy black&white image.
Somthing like this:
Again, just my 2 ct.
Torsten
B-Movie Entry: Mark David
Aztan
#142
I would go for B background with with D or F spacesuits (at least the blue/red part) and for the rest of the spacesuit may I suggest trying silvery/light gold fabric that was used in those old tv shows like “lost in space” (here are some references:
http://sharetv.org/images/lost_in_space-show.jpg
http://es.tinypic.com/view.php?pic=2h30cpc&s=3
http://l.yimg.com/eb/ymv/us/img/flickr/30/29/002587873029.jpg
Good luck mate.
mdavid
#143
Wow! Thank you folks. Once again I am very grateful for your generosity and help. I always learn stuff in these challenges
walrus
Thanks Mike. It was your prompting that got me thinking colour schemes and I’m really glad that happened. You are right about the distance haze needing to match the sky more, although I’m tempted to be a bit B-Movie impractical here. If it ends up looking wrong then it will be 100% my fault. Thanks, too, for pointing out the tag game going on in the comp. I could fix that or I could have the guy on the ladder run down a few rungs to join in. He could be tagging the foreground guy! No seriously, I’ll do something about that
aimanimation
Thank you Aiman. A vote for a combination of the costumes of E with B’s background is a really nice suggestion 
BaronImpossible
Thank you Simon. I’m a big fan of your work so it’s a real delight to see you offering your opinion. Your suggestions hint at the kind of look which I guess I am leaning towards already. As a kid I saw plenty of B-Movies in black and white and then seeing them later in colour was almost a disappointment because of their choice of colours. If I can have a bit of fun with this while not going overdoing the ‘dreadful’ then I think that could be good
Ferx
Hey Fernando, thank you again. Your regular suggestions have helped me a lot in this challenge, as they always do. Your vote is definitely noted
Korendo
Hey Ralph. It looks like there are elements of B and F that keep getting a vote. That really helps narrow the choices down. Thank you
varma
Thanks Mathias. Actually, this time I hope to produce something along the lines of what I’m working through here. Time has been a bit of a problem for me this challenge - there has been a huge amount of stuff going on here (been a bit exhausting, to be honest) - and so I haven’t had the chance to be as experimental as I have been in the past
handlebar
Another vote for F eh? That is interesting. Thank you
Russel-Nash
Wow! You are brilliant! Your grainy black and white version has really got me thinking. I love how that looks. It has nailed the very look which I’ve been aiming for. I am extremely tempted to go that way but I think I might learn more if I try for a colour version. But of course if I’m unable to make my coloured versions work and I find myself running out of time then you have given me a genuine (and possibly better) alternative! Thank you!
Aztan
Thank you. Those picture references for the old Lost in Space TV series are superb. I watched a lot of that series as a kid. Now that showed the way to make a B-Movie! Unfortunately I don’t have enough time to model those kinds of silvery suits, although I agree with you that they would look better. I appreciate your vote/ideas on the colour schemes too
Bergquist
#144
Ello Mark,
so i just want to know where they came up with that ladder, hehe
I’m really diggin your entry, lookin good man
oh, and I like F 
Cheers!
mdavid
#145
Bergquist
Hahaha - I’m glad you noticed the ladder. It is absolutely meant to be completely wrong - something dropped into the set by a B-Movie props manager more concerned with his lunch than with authenticity. It’s also why I made sure the ladder was not the type that could be folded for storage. I love the way how we, the viewers, are never meant to notice things like this! More about the ladder will be mentioned in the plot, which I will post when I upload the final. Thanks for the vote on the colour scheme too
varma
#146
…Time has been a bit of a problem for me this challenge…
I hear you there, brother! Missing the good old days where challanges last an entire four months, you could take a break anytime, get married, go on honeymoon, come back, paint your house, have a cop of coffee, and still enough time to render a decent image in the end!
Yeeeah, good old days!
miketche
#147
I kind of like Torsten’s idea as well. Grainy black and white, but maybe with some slight coloration as if they tried to color over the cells.
mdavid
#148
Movie starts with stirring music and close-up of national flag flapping in outer space. The crew of the Outer Space Explorer, on a mission to find new reserves of the rare fuel element Detonatium (actually their real mission is to create a sequel to a moderately successful video) discovers a mysterious uncharted planet.
They decide to land, hoping to replenish their fuel tanks if they can find a bowser. This is when they remember the hatch on their space ship is built too high up and they don’t have any means of climbing down to the surface. They need a ladder for that. So they circle the planet looking for one. By an enormous stroke of luck they find one and land alongside it. Of course then they realise they need a ladder to get down to the ladder. But by another enormous stroke of luck the impractical sharp fins on the rocket prove woefully inadequate to support the weight of the craft on the dusty surface and the ship sinks deep into the soil. The crew step out of their ship’s hatch at ground level amid flag waving and stirring music.
For most of the rest of the movie, the crew dig their rocket back out of the dust. Okay, it was supposed to be a more interesting plot than that but the producer had piled the film’s budget into sub-primes - hey, they were triple-A rated! - and so the format has gone from space opera to an atmospheric and moving piece about dust.
At this point the marketing manager interrupts shooting and says the focus groups aren’t responding at all well to any of the film’s planned promotional material. Sweet, airbrushed pictures of shovels and astronauts pushing wheelbarrows aren’t stirring up the kind of frenzy the marketing guy thinks is going to fill cinemas. He says they need a better visual than an airbrushed shovel. Can they drum up something big-impact? And so the script writer is told to write a climax that’s exciting, visually spectacular, and manageable on the film’s remaining budget of $9.50. A solution is found: the director’s son glues some fake horns onto his pet lizard and they film it, using rear projection to give the impression of it looming large over the set.
And so here we see that climactic scene - our heroes versus the giant monster from Planet X. Awaken by all that digging, the great beast emerges to confront a surprised and terrified crew. It makes a hideous, loud roar that has the astronauts cupping their hands over their helmets and reminds the viewers of an elephant’s trumpet with some sound distortion. The creature advances and one brave soul looks around for a weapon. Forgetting that in the previous scene he had shovels, spades, crow bars and dynamite, he rips his antenna off his helmet and holds it out to . . . Okay, so we know that’s not going to end well.
The lizard eats the astronauts. Well, not all of them. One of them runs away. I’m not sure what happens to him. Perhaps he’ll be in the next film in this series. And see that guy on the ladder? He figures now might be a really good time to duck back inside and close the hatch behind him, and so he alone returns to Earth, amid flag waving and stirring music.
mdavid
#149
Well, an hour or two before deadline and I was able to upload something. Although I call this final, I would not quite call it ‘finished’. There are still things I think that can be done to this one.
It would have been great to have more time on this one. That’s not a fault of the challenge but 100% due to me having so much stuff going on here. Most of the time I assumed I would not have anything even close to finished by deadline but figured I’d just keep working on it whenever I found an opportunity. So I have not had the chance to experiment like I usually do. Or to create the level of detail which I normally like to pile into a scene. And perhaps more frustrating for me is the fact that I have not had the chance to try out all of your suggestions. So I am sorry if your great ideas have not been used here.
Once again, I’ve learned a whole lot and once again you folks have been amazingly generous with your knowledge and suggestions. I really appreciate that and know that your help has improved the image a lot. Thank you!
And so now, onto your stuff. Yet again, I’m seriously impressed by the quality of work happening - the diversity of ideas and approaches and the outstanding technical skills on show. I’m dying to check out a whole bunch more entries now
cheers
Mark
mdavid
#150
Software: CINEMA 4D
A giant, hideous monster (actually the film director’s son’s pet lizard with fake horns glued onto it) looms over the terrified crew of the Outer Space Explorer. A frightening battle follows, with the lizard coming off much better than the crew.
mdavid
#151
Software: CINEMA 4D
Movie starts with stirring music and close-up of national flag flapping in outer space. The crew of the Outer Space Explorer, on a mission to find new reserves of the rare fuel element Detonatium (actually their real mission is to create a sequel to a moderately successful video) discovers a mysterious uncharted planet.
They decide to land, hoping to replenish their fuel tanks if they can find a bowser. This is when they remember the hatch on their space ship is built too high up and they don’t have any means of climbing down to the surface. They need a ladder for that. So they circle the planet looking for one. By an enormous stroke of luck they find one and land alongside it. Of course then they realise they need a ladder to get down to the ladder. But by another enormous stroke of luck the impractical sharp fins on the rocket prove woefully inadequate to support the weight of the craft on the dusty surface and the ship sinks deep into the soil. The crew step out of their ship’s hatch at ground level amid flag waving and stirring music.
For most of the rest of the movie, the crew dig their rocket back out of the dust. Okay, it was supposed to be a more interesting plot than that but the producer had piled the film’s budget into sub-primes - hey, they were triple-A rated! - and so the format has gone from space opera to an atmospheric and moving piece about dust.
At this point the marketing manager interrupts shooting and says the focus groups aren’t responding at all well to any of the film’s planned promotional material. Sweet, airbrushed pictures of shovels and astronauts pushing wheelbarrows aren’t stirring up the kind of frenzy the marketing guy thinks is going to fill cinemas. He says they need a better visual than an airbrushed shovel. Can they drum up something big-impact? And so the script writer is told to write a climax that’s exciting, visually spectacular, and manageable on the film’s remaining budget of $9.50. A solution is found: the director’s son glues some fake horns onto his pet lizard and they film it, using rear projection to give the impression of it looming large over the set.
And so here we see that climactic scene - our heroes versus the giant monster from Planet X. Awaken by all that digging, the great beast emerges to confront a surprised and terrified crew. It makes a hideous, loud roar that has the astronauts cupping their hands over their helmets and reminds the viewers of an elephant’s trumpet with some sound distortion. The creature advances and one brave soul looks around for a weapon. Forgetting that in the previous scene he had shovels, spades, crow bars and dynamite, he rips his antenna off his helmet and holds it out to . . . Okay, so we know that’s not going to end well.
The lizard eats the astronauts. Well, not all of them. One of them runs away. I’m not sure what happens to him. Perhaps he’ll be in the next film in this series. And see that guy on the ladder? He figures now might be a really good time to duck back inside and close the hatch behind him, and so he alone returns to Earth, amid flag waving and stirring music.
mdavid
#152
3 versions of the final image in a row! I should explain.
The first is the low-res version. The second is a high-res but the colours looked a bit flat on my monitor. That was caused by a colour management thing. So I uploaded a new one with my web colour management settings and that was the third one.
Most people shouldn’t have colour management problems because most people don’t have their settings turned on. But I need to activate them for my print work. I think it’s worth it, but it does add another layer of complexity - more stuff to be aware of.
I tell you, they never warned me about these things in art school!
- Mark
Gunilla
#153
Mark! Huge congrats for finishing this epic scene - it turned out real well! And the story is fantastic, I bet if you ever want a new job, Hollywood is screaming for someone with your talent for writing captivating plots - extra congrats for that one.
As always, it’s been a pleasure to follow your progress on this. If there’s one thread to be constantly suprised from it’s yours - and that in a good way.
Good luck with this one and see you around (not in my thread though, since I so shamefully dropped out of it)
Ferx
#154
Hey Mark,
Cool image! Think you have a great design on the B-Movie way . The astronauts space suits are an awesome design and love that 50’s spaceship, with that “useful and portable” ladder ( really great cheesy details on the concept, skillfully managed :)) The lizard with the horns is the most B-Movie monster of the all challenge
Congrats for this cool image! All the best my friend … Time for a lot tequila shots Cheers!! 
mdavid
#155
varma
So true. A whole third of a year was a lot of time to get stuff done, in and outside of the challenge. Still, 3 months is not too bad either. At the newspaper where I worked as a cartoonist I used to have to churn out half a dozen finished cartoons a day - ideas plus artwork. So 3 months on one image still feels like a great luxury! Hopefully next time I’ll be able to have fewer external pressures
miketche
I can assure you, I was very tempted to follow Torsten’s suggestion
mdavid
And so you should explain too. It’s an outrage - 3 posts with the same thing! What, are you trying to take over this thread or something?
Gunilla
Hey thanks so much buddy. I’m very happy with the lizard but in my opinion a lot of the rest of the image somehow looks a little too fake, even for a B-Movie. But I’m actually not bothered by that because as always I learned a lot of stuff and had some fun. So I am glad I entered. I’m glad you joined in the mayhem for a while too. Your SlimeGirl thread was pure B-Movie excellence
Ferx
Thanks buddy. I was glad to cross the finish line with something. And I tell you, you really deserve to take a break now. You have done an amazing workload this time around.
varma
#156
Big big confratz my friend, great final!
A have to agree with Gunilla about hollywoods choice of director and head of screenplay division! You could make a lot of fun and interesting movies happen, B and A!
Your last choice of color palette was the best of all, and everything works pretty nicely now!
I’m gonna save this image to my harddisk, and as the number of Mdavid pics on my drive are ever-growing, I might need a seperate directory for them quite soon, only I figure out what that directory should be named as!!!
handlebar
#158
Congrats Mark, your image realy does have the classic B-Movie feel to it that for me invokes many fond memories from my youth. It’s like a little trip back into history to where it all began with the pioneers of compositing and film sets.
What a fantastic journey, i’ve realy enjoyed watching your thread unfold. Good luck.
Korendo
#159
Mark - Congratulations! The story is really entertaining, with a true B-movie ending. The 50 style colors are a nice touch.
BaronImpossible
#160
Good job on the colours, and you got some nasty yellow in there too (for the creature’s eye). The spacesuits are very 50s, great design. I like that two of them are running away, too, and leaving their mates to fight. Nice job!