Patrick Kalyn post-produces his latest short film with DaVinci Resolve's Fusion and Fairlight modules

The Fusion and Fairlight modules of the DaVinci Resolve software Blackmagic Design have allowed visual effects artist Patrick Kalyn, who has worked on Deadpool 2 o Blade Runnner 2049, post-producing his latest science fiction short film.

Patrick Kalyn believe SpaceX Final Transmission with the aim of turning to acting in order to improve his work as a director. In the piece, Captain Taylor (Kalyn) transmits a last message from a ill-fated base on Mars to warn the crew of a ship from space that their lives are in danger, implying that the members of his crew have gone crazy. Everything, of course, is created by himself: “It was the ideal project for put Resolve to the test. I shot the short in my living room with few lights and a green background, as the story is told through a video message sent by Captain Taylor and is part of a longer script that I am currently writing.”

The compositions were carried out in the module Fusion by DaVinci Resolve Studio. Kalyn relied on various tools to create the environments with visual effects, including the compositor Delta to remove the green background, the node for base images and the boolean operators of the channels: "Since I did not record a base image, I resorted to said node and increased the erosion value to fill the gaps. The computerized environment was rendered in layers, and consequently I had to reconstruct the diffuse pass in Fusion using the boolean operators of the channels. The landscape seen through the observation window is actually a photo of the surface of Mars captured by the astromobile Perseverance. Once the environment was created, I overlaid random code elements on the computer screens, as well as dusty light and debris floating in space, to prevent the background from being completely static.

Kalyn also used tools like depth blur to dim focus the greater the distance from the camera. Likewise, he added a soft glow on the character's shoulder with the aim of improving the combination of the background with the base image; some optical distortion in the background, so that it looked less computerized; and included dirt on the walls, by merging multiple images in multiplication mode.

Audio with DaVinci

Patrick Kalyn also used the module Fairlight by DaVinci Resolve Studio when creating audio effects during post-production, as he himself relates: "After working on the dialogue, I only had to add sound effects (SFX) and music from my sound library. I had individual tracks for the effects that are heard inside and outside the observation deck. In the first case, using a low-pass filter, I made them sound as if they were coming through thick walls."

"I mix as I edit the sounds, setting the volume of each one for each clip. I also use the sliders to apply adjustments to the entire track. I love the fade function located near these, as it is very useful when listening to various sounds so that I don't go deaf when the effects are loud," he adds.

The experience of working with DaVinci Resolve has been completely for Thick: “The biggest advantage of post-producing a short film with effects like this entirely in Resolve is that the filmmaker has everything they need to create exceptional, high-quality content in a single program.”

https://youtu.be/DNBSUbYeGlc