Savage Witches

The Burning Sequence Process

One of the more complex post production sequences in Savage Witches was the scene where the girls burn at the stake. There were four main stages of this process. Firstly we shot VHS footage of the girls on a wood-stack, screaming and struggling for their lives, we then exported each frame and using photoshop made them black and white. These frames were printed and each frame was hand coloured with water colours. The painted stills were then scanned and printed a final time in colour on gloss photographic paper, and we then filmed each photo being burnt from underneath with a candle flame. Finally, we then took two frames from each clip and put them together sequentially to create the final scene! All that for a one minute sequence! But the results are incredible, as the girls burn at the stake the film’s image melts and burns upon the screen.

The edit is now finished and we are starting to hear little bits of Fiona Bevan’s amazing music. We are getting ready to start on the sound design so not long now and we’ll be setting out into the world to show you Savage Witches!

Here’s a couple of stills from the dance sequence which will have you leaping out of your chairs in delight! 

Last week we had a brilliant day of voice recording and catching up with Christina, Victoria and Janos Horvath, our sound recordist. Here they are voice dubbing for when Gretchen and Margarita are chased by bees!

The edit is nearly there - Fiona will have her rough cut to work with by the end of this week!

Savage Witches soundtrack composer Fiona Bevan dresses up for a little scene in the movie!

Recording voice-overs tomorrow, the first stage of editing is nearly complete. Fiona will be starting on the music over the next few weeks!

The editing is going well and Savage Witches is getting into shape - here are some pictures of the animation we’ve been doing for the burning scene, hundreds of images that Daniel has been hand painting for the last few weeks. Soon we’ll be recording some additional audio and pick up scenes and more updates will come up on the next newsletter, featuring images of some of our super 8 footage which is now being processed.

Teenage sisters Gretchen and Margarita skip class and hide out in the school’s theatre store where they construct the most colourful and eccentric of cat costumes. Once again they find themselves in front of the headmaster who is bewildered and frustrated by their repeatedly strange behaviour. After receiving a severe telling off, they condemn the whole of society as pointless and resolve to either change it or be no part of it at all.

They leave school and wander through the woods, finding themselves in a secret garden. They peek over a wall to watch Philip Cyril who they believe to be a wizard, the last in a long line of wizards! He drops a key which they take assuming he intentionally dropped it for them - a search ensues for the lock to fit the key!

They have no luck; this frustrates them and triggers a rampage of destruction in which they eradicate all the pointless things from the world - but after going too far and eradicating themselves in the process, they set about creating a new world. At first it is beautiful and pure but it very quickly starts to resemble the old world.

Eventually deep in the woods they find a door which the key unlocks that leads them to an underground chamber. There they find the instructions for a spell which they perform without hesitation unleashing a vision of truth that they are not ready to face. However, once unleashed, truth invades the film and the games that follow pitch them against it.

They continue to run away from the things they don’t want to see, transforming everything around them to fit with their whims but their games end as the film ends with a final transformation, the death of Gretchen and Margarita.

Special preview!! Have a look at a few screen grabs of experiments from our edit!

Set photos - Gretchen and Margarita indulge in a relaxing bath.

Set photo - scene inspired by Balthus paintings in which the witches are trapped inside a painting.