CageMatch 4-26-07

Another Thursday, another CageMatch...or was it? This was not just an average everyday show. Both teams put on great performances, and I could've seen the voting going either way. MGP ended up winning. I was amazed at how entertaining Caligula was. I had never seen a monoscene before, and thought I'd be bored, but all three of them gelled together and put on a cohesive performance that rode the rollercoaster from pathos to hilarious comedy. Remi in particular hit some bits that had the audience (and me) laughing and applauding. You know it's brilliant when you hear applause.

Anyway, enough about the lowly performers! On to me, Me, ME! The intro video turned out pretty well. People seemed to like it. The pacing was good, and I was particularly pleased with the angle, which was that Caligula was comprised of members from some of the most powerful teams in the history of CageMatch, now united together as a triple threat. The only part I wasn't pleased with was the framing of the individual turnaround shots of the Caligula members. I really wanted to matte out the brick wall, but difference mattes don't work the way I hoped they would. Also, the shots were too far away--the figures really should've filled the screen, and I didn't realize that until I was half-done with the editing, and I ran out of time to fix it.

I was quite proud of the Caligula identity screen. There are a bunch of tutorials on how to make photos of people into stone, but none of them worked well for these shots, so I did some experimentation and came up with my own method, an amalgam of the tutorials I found with a few special Ted tricks for good measure. I thought the Remi bust turned out particularly well; very haughty.

I also premiered a new CageMatch intro video to go along with the theme that I love so much. I had made an attempt to put together an intro video for DSIF this year, but it was crap and never saw the light of day again. The new video was made with PulpMotion, which I hesitate to mention publically, because it's my new secret weapon that makes me look like a video genius. Now the secret is out. I used it to make animated scrapbooks for Eitan's barmitzvah and the Bubi play, and used it here for the 3D museum effect. I love having the "Hall Of Champions" introduce the show, because it pays homage to the great teams we've had on the show, elevates the history of the CageMatch program, and shows off my identity screens. I'm not going to put the intro up on YouTube, because I don't want people to get tired of it; I want to keep it special for the show itself, so if you want to see it, come to the show!

The new intro video ends with the new CageMatch logo! It's animated, with barbed wire and chainlink fencing zooming by in the background with perspective-slanted text in the background. You got a peek at a draft version on Wednesday; the final version just has a thicker black glow around it to make the text stand out a bit better. I forgot to make a jpeg of it for this report, but should have it up on my Flickr page by tomorrow. Anyway, the animated fencing was purchased off the wonderful stock art site iStockPhoto, and was exactly what I needed to inspire me to create a new CageMatch logo.

After the show, a bunch of us got together and hung out at Milltown, where we made lots of noise, had good conversations, Shane lowered himself in most people's eyes by stating he loved "National Treasure", Joe Jones freaked out over a dead squirrel, and Edwardo beat Jennings in "Don't Break The Ice", two falls to one.

Another Thursday, another CageMatch.