Hover-bike scene

Telling the story:

One scene I have been thinking about for some time is a hover-bike scene.

Film unfolds by the main character telling his story. He tells his story as a part of a journal project, because he is told that he ought to share what he sees with other people. Because of this, he tells how he sees the world "now" and how he saw things before the accident at the same time. For the viewer, this creates a juxtaposition of how he sees the world; and this tension is paralleled by his quest to gain not just sight but vision... an understand of how the world really is.

One of the ways that I envisioned the pre-accident life to be portrayed is in a scene where the main character rides around on a hover-bike. This scene highlights just how much he was able to (literally) see before the accident. This is important because the scene is a juxtaposition to his life now. In the flashback, there is a reflection of the future; foreshadowing is a powerful way to aid the viewer in understanding where the story is going.

The scene is important in telling the overall story; but it presents a technical challenge: How am I going to film a hover-bike scene?

Compositing:

The basic way that the effect is going to be achieved is through compositing.

Compositing is an easy way to achieve digital effects. As the video below shows, basic compositing can be achieved through using a green screen and a model:

To do the scene in my movie, I will have to have three shots:

• The first will be a shot of the background.
• The second will be of a green screen. 
• The third will be graphic effects that help ties the two preceding layers together.

These shots would be easy to do, but they require two locations and a bit of editing time. I've already got the first two locations, the outdoor shot being the C&O Canal near Shepherdstown (I still have to get written permission, but all that is required to get this shot is to take a camera and a wheelbarrow to the canal); and the green screen shot can be filmed in the comm lab studio at Shepherd University. The final part of the compositing process could be done with Adobe After Effects. 

So, yeah... my film will have a hover-bike scene. I think that it is pretty cool that my education has enabled me to film this kind of scene; I'm excited to see this happen, and I hope to post a video of this scene as soon as I've finished it.