Ah, they aren't just acting. They're over-acting!

kp

Good thing you can't smell via computer.
Cuz that stinks.

"Who are you! What's going on here! Stop fighting me!"

Blurg.

How exactly is this Firefly influeced? Firefly has great writing.

I feel sorta bad knocking a show with such a low budget, because I know throwing money into something isn't necessarily the answer, but that looks awful.

This sounds and looks as if it was taped in a high school boiler room.

I think SCIFI will be ok with Sanctuary...

How dare you even mention Firefly?

This is just awful. And I am not talking about the low-budget set.

@darcymcgee: Yeah, on Firefly, it would have been "stop gorram fighting me." So much better! Seriously, I don't know why you guys are so down on this. It looked fine to me. I think it'll work better with music, though.

You can feel the low budgetosity and the dialog is a little rough, but it's better than 90% of everything SciFi is showing.

Huh, interesting. The idea of a Deaf character (and how they opted to show her particular POV) is intriguing. I'm also curious how they'll handle communication - it's enough to place on the "keep an eye on" list, certainly.

The premise sounds pretty cool. Give it flash gordon's budget and call it a day. Probably get some good stuff out of it.

The dialog though.... eeep!

Someone hire some script writers for this trash.

@Charlie Jane Anders:
That's the PROOOOOOOOOOBLEM, CJA- it looked fine to you.
Admit defeat, hang your head in shame and move on to the next post.

Some cool background music would clear that dialogue problem up.

+ Watch video

ACTING!

Didnt seem too bad, those lines seem to fit Bruce Willis tho, wanna see the whole thing, not just a snippet:P

I can handle the low budget look of it, but the acting needs to be better, good acting can emote interesting meaning into a vanilla script, IMHO.

I was just wondering, on Monday actually, during the Firefly minithon, what a shame it was that the show just happened to be a few years ahead of it's time...if it were on the air right now, given the current scifi-friendly climate on TV, and of course if it wasn't on FOX, what it's fortunes would be...

It's not fair to judge based on a few moments.

But those few moments? Godawful. The acting and the writing combined together into a big moment of suck. The thing that leapt out at me?

When the square-head guy is beating the deaf girl, the actress playing the sidekick doesn't know what her character should be doing- so she thrashes around like a six-year old that needs to use the toilet.

I wouldnt lay the blame solely on the actors, its the director who said to himself "Yes, thats great, next scene."

Personally I feel alot of "poor acting" lies on the responsibility of the director, it my philosophy that the director needs to push the actors into the scene, not just ask them politely to stand where they are and read from a script.

Personally I'd love a shot at making something like this, because these are the kind of shows which can test the waters, much like Space Above and Beyond, if we hadnt had that show, do you think we'd get Battlestar Galactica the way it is now?

@Charlie Jane Anders:
"It looked fine to me. I think it'll work better with music, though. "

Ya, after the line "It's locked" and "So what do we do?" I literally heard the "porn groove" start up.

Seriously, this was not only written bad but acted worse.

Guys come on, this was done with no budget. It takes a lot of effort to do something like this and they should be proud of that. There's a saying that it's just as hard to make a bad movie as it is to make a good one. I'd like to see the whole thing and maybe give them another shot at post-production.

Besides it's not that much worse than Red Dwarf (flame shield at maximum sir!)

@ShockTerminal: OMG, this reminded me of porn acting too! They had the same sort of dead eyes. Except this was not as depressing as porno.

That's probably related to what DangerousDac said. If the director had stepped in and made the actors deliver their lines faster, so there was less dead "wait for the next line" time, I think the acting wouldn't grate on me so much. Of course, it'll still need a writer who speaks like a human.

This reminds me of the live action opening original Resident Evil game.

Except Resident Evil sucked in a GOOD way.

I've worked on a couple of fan film productions. I like what I've seen here, and the premise sounds good. I'd volunteer to help out if the production was local to me.

The acting is terrible and the script is terrible but neither of these things would be fatal if it weren't for the even worse direction. Just because you have no budget doesn't mean you have no imagination. The actors didn't know where to stand, the camera moved around missing the action, the cutting was rudimentary, the set meant you couldn't see the actor's faces properly and when the deaf woman came through the hatch the director decided to do a close up on the gun instead of the action - which should have been on the actors. Pewww.

kk you rabbling jawas. we get the picture, you hate it.
[backstory]
I play the 'deaf girl' in this no-budget series.
The director funded the whole thing out of his own pocket so he wouldn't be yet another trek-trolling-armchair-Lucas, waiting to 'get a shot' at making a film. FYI, there are pro writers on staff, this particular clip obviously isnt the best of their work.
[/backstory]

Thank you haters for turding the efforts of 5 fellow sci-fi fans. Lumping us in with fanboi mill pr0n-fi is great encouragement for other indie filmmakers pursuing this genre. You're the reason there's nothing new out there, not the sci-fi channel. So go suck an egg.. while you're up there.. waiting to get laid. ;p

@cyr3n:
I guess it could be a bad clip, it happens. But I'm going to give my honest opinion on what I'm given. Perhaps if I saw more I might think different. I only wrote what I thought.
That being said, I am a filmmaker and have heard plenty of criticism myself. It's going to happen, no matter how good it is or isn't. It's just something you have to live with. Sometimes people hate your creative work, it sucks but it's that's their opinion.
Like I said maybe the rest is different, but I can only comment on what I'm given.
BTW: Was it shot in Bulgaria?
PS: I've been in a 9 year relationship (just cause you went there) =P

@cyr3n: Now we really want to watch your show.

@joemono: bring it on~

@ShockTerminal: guilty conscience?? you weren't a hater, was not referring to your post. After 1200+ views, if 12-20 are bad.. then we're still within the bellcurve. 2% will always hate you. And never tastes as good as whole milk. cha cha cha

I'd still watch a whole episode just to check it out. I like the premise, and I've sat through much worse dialog than that in many of my favorite shows. Hello, boxing episode of BSG. Sorry, but on the bad writing scale that was this scene times ten million.

It's not the quality of the set or even the camera work. It's the total redundancy of the dialogue. The way the characters say their lines with hardly any physical presence (standing around, looking at each other) makes it seem like the script was short on descriptive notes for the actors. It also looks like it wasn't storyboarded before being filmed, otherwise moments like mashing the "door open" button and then saying to the character standing next to you "it's locked" would never happen. This is kind of redundant, mood-killing stuff is all over that clip.

Not to mention it looks like they picked a pretty dull clip to show. No sense of character for any of the three; hardly any situational premise; a thinly-veiled conflict that falls apart about as easy as it starts when he knocks the gun out of her hands.

A different clip probably would have served as a much better advertisement. This one falls into the plodding, poorly-thought-out B-movie range.

This looks like the beginning of geeky porn.

How to know when your Sci-Fi acting is bad:

When your "lead" doesn't take the opportunity to inject some humanity into a techno-babble line of exposition and merely stares into a monitor screen instead.

Seriously, this is what passes for post-worthy these days?

Watch that bit again and pay attention to when he moves to the monitor right at the top... that's pure apathy, baby. I'm not talking about the character, I'm talking about the actor.

And yes, there's worse Sci-Fi writing out there, and the sets aren't bad... but I couldn't tell you a goddamn thing about those three characters souls from that clip. Which is something you can't say about a scene of BSG, Heroes, or even Bionic Woman- which for the record I've only ever have seen scenes of. Still grok the characters, tho'.

This is really not enough to form a reasonable judgement of this series. I wholeheartedly support independent scifi of this sort, and hope the creators can pull it off. Sort of reminds me of FMV from video games in it's current state, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. Keep working on it folks, it's a good enough concept and you've brought it thus far, but take some of these criticisms to heart and upgrade the product. The dialogue and delivery could definitely use some more spit and shine.

Like anything else it probably needs a little more room to show the whole story and stuff, but the acting reminded me of the stuff we did in our high school TV Lab.

Plus, is it just me, or did that dude just completely handle that weapon wrong as well?

Is this space porno?

Wow, look, a wooden crate filled with guns! It must be the future!

@cyr3n: You opened with an insult, that's an excellent way to gain our favour.
So, firstly I'd like to reverse that and say I find the premise of this series interesting, the sets professional and the back story somewhat dynamic... well done. I suppose all independent efforts of this nature, and I wish more people would.
That said, I wasn't impressed by this clip.

If I was to make my own series in this fashion, and then it came to the point where I had to decide upon a first clip for release I would want to choose one that demonstrates the pro-writers I have working with me, the excellent acting and the fantastic directing.
I'm trying to sell people on this series, I would choose the BEST of what I had to offer.
Either that didn't happen here (in which case I'm going to question, why not?) or it did (and then I'm going to have to question what meant to make me want to watch?).

I understand that this type of production is hard, and that the reaction of fans and potential viewers is important to it's success, so maybe you should take those comments to heart and try to improve in the future, people will respect that.
You work on this show, you should champion it, you should promote it and you should defend it, but that doesn't mean you should show your most venomous side in doing so.
People don't like what they have seen - fine, it's their opinion, I didn't like what I saw either, obviously you did, that's fine too.
But it's not fine when you try to attack those who didn't like it, it's not going to sway their opinion, it's not going to make them want to watch, and you really need to make them do that. Some decorum cost nothing, but it can earn you a lot.
I would be ashamed if someone on my staff behaved like you did.

And the fans aren't the reason that nothing new exist in the medium, they are the reason that Serenity exist, they are the reason that Jericho got a second season. Fans are the force behind any successful show, or any brilliant idea.
Sometimes they might not prove to be enough, but when something reaches them, they can get results.

That said - can you really make a veiled claim that this is new? It's clearly inspired by Firefly, so far as to draw direct comparisons from it, and beyond that it's even more similar to Cowboy Bebop. Firefly got a lot of negative attention for it's similarities to Cowboy Bebop, it was even claimed to be a blatant rip-off by a lot of people, I can't imagine what people will think of your show with this fact in hand.

I hope you do well, I hope this series is good, but from what I've seen of it, I'm not impressed. And I'm not impressed by the attitude of people that should be saving face in the public light.

If your show doesn't work it's because people aren't interested, not enough of them, anyway. It's not because they are wrong, it's because your simply not making a show that is gripping them, or your not doing it right.

I hope you see this and accept it as a valid response to your rather angry reply, and I hope it sparks you to engage in some intelligent debate about what you said and the points I've tried to rebuke it with, if not, then at least I've had my soapbox moment, and were all entitled to that - although I'm not sure you believe that.

@cyr3n: Looks promising - you guys should cut a trailer.

Message boards have no imagination.

@cyr3n:
You definately need a good trailer cut for this with some juicy externals and a few character highlights. You give the fanboys something to drool over, they tend to lighten up.

Sanctuary is laughably bad. Jesus. This reminds me of Starhunter. Also, not a very good show.

"There are bad guys on this ship."

"What do we do?"

"I'm not going to tell you. Just be quiet."

[nudges gun out of bad guy's hand]

"Now I'll yell at her. Don't bother watching the door for more bad guys. And whatever you do, don't pick up the fallen gun."

"Uh-oh."

"What! I'm busy!"

"In a dramatic plot twist, your plan didn't work."

I know Firefly, and you sir, are no Firefly.

Firefly and Sanctuary both rock in completely different ways. *This* most certainly does not. The acting is completely amateur and the clip lacks content to peak my interest to see more. Dreadful.

Ok!

That clip obviously sucked. But. With ALLOT of work it can come out really good. Here's my moment by moment critique.

1. Why does she swing her arm in the opening sequence. It's a movement done by teenagers in our time... it gives her character, right away, a feeling of immaturity.

2. When he asks "where is everyone" She completely ignores his question and asks one of her own. And secondly, he isn't really looking around, and thirdly, is he scared, anxious, nervous, or just mildely courious that he's on a spaceship, in the middle of space, and nobody else is around... WHO IS HE? Where is the emotion that would define more, what type of person he is.

3. She asks " What kind of ship.." Also no emotion, no "feeling/dimension" to the character. Why is she asking, why does she care, what difference would it make, whats her motivation. All important questions to really get the actors into the script.

4. When he answers her question, if he knew in advance he would have done a slight "over the shoulder" thing to indicate to us, who can't see the view screen, that he already knew, and was checking something else out on the screen. If he didn't know, how does he "figure it out" so quickly?

In short, What's on the screen?

So! Basically a good effort, but, someone who probably has experience with some other form of scriptwriting, and not really familiar with the nuances of human dialog, and emoting on a "real" level.

@JohnnyZito: We are working on the trailer! Most of the ships were designed by an engineering physicist so there's a lot of detail on the CG end. Our youtube channel at [www.youtube.com] has a couple presentations of the Ikarus mining drone, Mars Warship, and the X-38 reentry vehicle.

@Marcus117: I don't think you realize my post on was directed at trolling haters w/o constructive criticism. Saying "this is space porn" "this sucks" doesn't help anyone. It brings down the morale of people who've dedicated many weekends over 2 years to make this show. And certainly doesn't help to direct future filmmakers into new areas of thoughtful exploration... beyond demonstrating there's a lively market for space porn.

Being a convention junkie & gamer, I'm well aware of the power of fan-based community. I operate my own mmorpg on the side; work on 2 more during the day. And run piles of websites. Sci-fi is another passion of mine... which is why I'm here! You can't seriously sit there and say "oh that guy is allowed to be a prick, but you, you're not allowed to say suck-an-egg. bad girl!"

The facts are: This is an indie sci-fi series. No one is paid. The audio is all raw.. not post-worthy. Probably not the best clip to rep our project overall but it has 4 out of 5 of the main cast in it. We're just as sick of the crap on the sci-fi channel as you are. On the weekends, (when not LARPing or gaming) we tirelessly work on VR. why the heck are you comparing us with bsg or firefly anyhow?? BSG, sanctuary, and firefly all have pro actors and budgets. lol~ we don't! >.<

@cyr3n: I'm not comparing you directly, I think it would be amazing if you can establish your own strong identity. I think you misunderstood me in some way, if anything I was saying you might want to avoid drawing those comparisons, becoming over shadowed by them.

And yes, some people weren't constructive, I agree totally. No one is allowed to be a prick (although we do all slip at times, I'm no exception). I suppose, more than anything, I was simply disappointed by your post, I hope hoping you'd use it to shed more light on the show and defend it better. I'm not sure why that is, but like I said your back story interest me, and I support all ventures of this kind, I suppose that might be why.

Anyway, your reply to me was very good. Reasoned and polite, I appreciate that, thank you. I'm going to keep an eye on Venus Rising, because despite not being entirely sold by this clip, I see potential for improvement, and in the end I loose nothing, but you gain a viewer - maybe even a fan.

Good luck with the project, I hope you'll come back to this place and talk about it some more when it's out.

psst.. here's a new CG clip:

+ Watch video

@cyr3n: I quiet liked that CGI shot, is it final or a work in progress? Either way I'm quiet a fan of the designs.