After a young girl’s drawings are transformed into living monsters made of crayon and glitter, her older brother leads a mission into the woods to destroy them

Who said working with kids is hard? Director Seth Worley proves that working with the right kids in the right environment can make for the best experiences. ‘Darker Colors’ may seem like an episode straight out of Stranger Things, with an all-child cast and a monster ridden environment. It brings back the chilling 80’s goosebumps with modern day production standards. The film actually takes child creativity to a hole new level.

Of course it’s a proof-of-concept

Like almost every other online short ever made, this is a proof of concept for a feature. Although it’s a first proof of concept for me, all my other shorts have just been created to be shorts. The entire short was shot in 2.5 days, with an entire year spent on postproduction.

Our main camera was an Alexa mini, with a RED (dragon I think?) as b-cam which lived on our movi and jib for our day in the woods to allow for quick and easy transition from handheld to movi/jib. I modeled the monsters in Cinema 4D, rendered in Element 3D, and composited in After Effects with Red Giant Supercomp.

While the visual effects and gritty monsters were certainly eye catching, it’s the kids that were the real stars of the film. Lexi Janicek was simply kick-ass and brought her A-Game to really elevate the experience to another level. While the two boys JT Underwood and Jeremiah Rusch brought in a whole lot of character and dynamic to make the film as fun as it is. Did we mention it features one of our favourite (short film) composers Makeup and Vanity Set?

One of the most exciting things about ‘Darker Colors’, is the actual making-of video. Besides the really cool visual direction and VFX of course. We go behind the scenes to see how Seth and his team were able to bring his idea to life. This definitely leaves us with a tone of excitement and hope to seeing this as a feature film one day!