Hollywood Today 3D Television Show Wins

By Brian Zink

3DFF Program

One of the really interesting stories and presentations took place with the festival’s screening and panel discussion on Sunday afternoon October 3rd. SAFETY GEEKS is an over the top comedy satire that has a MONTY PYTHON look and feel. It’s loosely based on a number of TV crime shows; ‘CSI’, ‘Criminal Minds’, ‘Law & Order,’ etc.. This 3D presentation taken from their series with the same name is based around an elite group of bungling Safety Inspectors, P.O.S.H. (Professional Occupational Safety Hazard Team) and their weird comic adventures as they try to figure out what happened. The team’s motto is “We’re making the world safe, one accident at a time,” but ironically, they cause far more damage, destruction and death then they prevent. See more @ www.safetygeekssvi.com

The producers David Beeler and Tom Konkle who are seasoned actors and writers in their own right, came together some 10 years ago on a number of projects. With their internet offerings boasting over 12 million views, the comedy duo performed sketch comedy together for years and have produced a feature length mockumentary, The Archaeology of Comedy, the lauded Invention with Brian Forbes series, numerous comedy shorts and Safety Geeks: SVI …all leading up to their 3D Premier at 3DFF.

SAFETY GEEKS is TOM and DAVE’s first 3D Project and takes comedy to a new level with the use 3D storytelling. ”We love the idea of using technology and visual effects in the service of comedy. Which is interesting, as most 3D shows out currently are children’s stories, psy-fy, slashers or thrillers,” said Dave Beeler.

The real story here for many of the attendees and myself was how this was done. Series co-creator Tom Konkle said, “This was done with tremendous passion and commitment from our team — and I had a rifle trained on them.”

Firstly, the budget was small. All the actors were filmed in an airplane hanger on a green screen. The original actors’ footage was shot with HVX-200 Panasonic HDV Camera’s at 720 and then up-converted to full 3D HD. The backgrounds and foregrounds 3D images were then composited and edited in with up-converted actors 3D footage.

The visual effects team included Thor Melsted and Michael J. Smith with Tom Konkle as VFX supervisor. Leading the 3D stereography and visual effects, Michael Smith said, “This was a wonderful opportunity to try new things in the stereo medium without a committee mentality.” It was a daunting task to make up a completed virtual world for SAFETY GEEKS. Thor Melsted said, “The show has more composites than the first 3 Star Wars shots combined with over 2300 composited shots. Hundreds of backgrounds were created using photo plates, 2D for 3D conversions of photos, CGI and combinations of all.” And then, of course, the many 3D effects all had to be taken into account here. Some of these backgrounds had a cartoon look, intended by the creators who were going for “an alternate universe” like a live action Adult Swim cartoon. The integration of CGI and the actors throughout this full length comedy satire worked well to create a surreal world where anything could happen. …AND SAFETY GEEKS received Best 3D Episodic Comedy Series or Pilot, directed by Tom Konkle.

All in all, use of 3D contributed greatly to the story along with the integration of the 3D CGI animation.