As a famous fashion photographer is forced to track down the murderer of an enigmatic model
the terrible hunch emerges he might be the killer himself.
Mystery Thriller
produced in a virtual studio environment
Premise:
The soul of an unborn child returns to take revenge on the man, who is responsible for her death. - Asian mythology brakes into western materialism.
Synopsis:
The life of Charles Renoir, a famous fashion photographer, gets turned upside down as one day Kyoko an Asian model appears in the studio. He is fascinated at first sight. She is not somehow pretty, she is an exceptional beauty with a mysterious charisma. Charles persuades her to do a private shoot. The next day Kyoko is reported missing. The police suspect that she has been murdered. Charles was seen with her on the evening of her disappearance and so he gets targeted by the police. Especially because of his bad reputation. Charles is not only well known for his work, but also for his fondness for drugs and his affairs with younger models. To prove his innocence, he has to find out what happened by himself. This sends him on a dark and terrifying journey. The deeper he digs, the more he starts to realise, that not only he might be the one with blood on his hands, but also that he might be responsible for the death of an innocent unborn child.
Who is Kyoko?
CAST
concept teaser
PhotoGRAPHER: Marcel Romeijn
Model: mijung kwon
CREW
concept teaser
CINEMATOGRAPHER: holger fleig
LIGHTNING:CHRIS JANIK
COLORGRADING: MICHAEL SIGEL
MAKE UP ARTIST: VANESSA SOJKA
Assitant director: Sara Krupper
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: NICK MANNU
written, directed, edited by
ludo vici
As we target the international market, the whole project will be produced in english.
Thriller and horror remain promising genres.
The suspenseful and entertaining story, the dark erotic undertone and the poetic approach of Kyoko´s Picture meet the claims of genre fans as well as of film lovers who prefer a more independent and arthouse atmosphere.
The project is in the stage of development at the moment.
If you want to know more about this project or if you are maybe interested in cooperation, we look forward to your message.
Why producing in a virtual studio ?
Filmmaking is all about having dreams. Not only in terms of passion, but also in terms of imagination. The latest developments in CGI filmproduction, especially the platform of the Unreal-Engine are a fantastic opportunity for independent filmmakers. We designed the story of this thriller with this technical aspects in focus.
Based on the philosophical concept that time is a kind of a sphere in which all possible events are existing simultaneously and we only experience this sphere as a stream of events, the whole story takes place in the studio loft of Charles Renoir. This studio represents his whole life, his person with all his aspects and abyss. Behind each door, each window lurks a splitter of his dark story, a step into his dreams, into his consciousness.
The story-design is not a narrative sequence of events. It is more like a video game in which the main character explores his inner world.
Inspired by the great filmwork of Akira Kurosawa, (especially his film DREAMS) and Sion Sono, we are going to create a universe of surreal pictures.
As the story unfolds his real existence, his past and the transition to the mysterious world of the other side blend into a labyrinth of suspense and horror.
How are we going to do this from a technical point of view?
Over the last two years, Virtual Production has evolved into a complete shift of production paradigm in the film industry, thanks to Epic’s tremendous efforts in implementing real time capabilities into their Unreal Engine game development platform. Using the embedded Blueprint technology, which is basically a visually aided C++ compiler, it has become possible for filmmakers to create a virtual set that can be filmed against. The content of the movie backdrop can be changed on the fly, during actual shooting, giving the team on the set the immediate view of what the final scene will look like. In addition, virtual equipment, like cameras and lighting can be setup in a way to transfer control from the virtual into the real world. So, ultimately, this technology is going to replace the existing Greenscreen methodology to a great extent, with the big advantage that the in-camera virtual set captures the final picture during shooting, reducing today’s necessary post-production workflow and somehow reversing the workflow. Every filmmaker out there has heard these words at least once: “we fix it in post!” – now, with this new technology at hand, we are rather going to fix it in pre-vis already.
The most prominent example for utilizing this technology is with Disney’s Mandalorian, taking this workflow as far as we can go currently, technically spoken. They used a huge LED dome to provide the virtual backdrop. Of course, a production of this scale is still not in scope for independent filmmakers as we are, simply due to the cost associated with building a giant LED wall, but there is also a huge opportunity in this for the Indie level.