Video Information

Information

  • Member: silver_moon
  • Studio: Dark Moon Studios
  • Title: From the Ashes
  • Premiered: 2006-09-23
  • Categories:
  • Song:
    • Submersed Hollow
  • Anime:
  • Participation:
  • Comments: Well, here it is. The most time-consuming AMV I've made, and the last one I'll ever make. I purposely tried to make my last video be my best one. (If you want to see my reasons behind my retirement you can read my journal).

    I really wanted to make a non-typical Full Metal Alchemist AMV that did the series justice, so I thought one of the most interesting ways to do that would be to make an alternate storyline (a video that doesn't follow the actual plot of the series). By re-designing some scenes and changing the events, I could show the overused FMA scenes in a new and different way. Naturally, this involved a lot of compositing, masking, and frame-by-frame work, so I decided to learn how to use Adobe AfterEffects to make things a lot faster and easier.

    Technical:
    This was first dive into AfterEffects, and I was really glad I did learn how to use it for this project. It gave me the control over effects that Premiere couldn't, and made doing some things a whole lot easier. I also went out of my way to make sure I used *entirely* DVD footage. Since only about the first eight DVDs were released in North America at the time, and I really wanted to use the last episodes, I ordered the Japanese DVDs.

    In the credits, I showed a few examples of the before and after shots of a few of the scenes I changed. Pretty much every scene in the video has some kind of effect on it, but I showed some of the more interesting before and after's.

    Storyline: *Full Metal Alchemist spoilers*
    The intro shows Ed standing by himself while he burns down his childhood home, and then goes into a flashback. The childhood section is the same as in the series (Ed and his brother, Al, try to revive their mother who died from an illness with alchemy, and are unsuccessful. Ed loses his arm and leg as a side effect, and Al is taken into the Gate), except instead of Ed attaching Al's soul to a suit of armor like in the series, Al is lost inside the Gate and Ed is left alone (I mainly chose not to include Al's armor in this video because, with Ed alone, it gives him more reason to feel "hollow", to suit the song better, and I thought it would give the scenes a different feel without Al present).

    Ed then leaves on a journey to find a way to bring his brother back from the Gate, and learns of the philosopher's stone and its power from Dr. Marco. But then he learns what ingredients are needed to make the stone (sacrificing human lives), and isn't sure whether it's worth it to make the stone. Scar overhears, and decides to kill Ed before he can try to make the stone. Before he can, the homonculus appear and take Ed with them, and want him to make the stone for them. When Scar sees Ed refuses to kill people to make the stone, he decides to save him. They go their separate ways, and Ed decides to confront the homonculus.

    Ed's father, Hohenheim (who left when Ed was a child), sees him passing by and follows. When Ed sees that one of the homonculus looks exactly like his mother (and that he'd actually created her when he failed to resurrect his real mother), he's stunned and one of the other homonculus takes the opportunity and kills him. Hohenheim comes into the room, sees Ed dead, and creates a philosopher's stone out of the homonculus to resurrect his son. Hohenheim pays for the transmutation with his life, and is taken to the other side of the Gate. Ed then uses the remaining philosopher's stone to resurrect Al, and is brought to the same place as his father. Ed was able to bring back Al, even though they're living in separate worlds.
    *end spoilers*

    Lyrics:

    To you
    I'm all I've left undone
    I'm all I haven't won
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow
    Lift me up

    You take
    The breath you didn't make
    What's left you did forsake
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow

    You can make me scream internally
    You can make me breathe eternally
    Yeah

    You see
    The things I cannot change
    The things that make me plain
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow
    Lift me up

    We've made
    All from the sum of none
    All that we have become
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow
    Lift me up my soul's so hollow

    You can make me scream internally
    You can make me breathe eternally
    Yeah

    Fill, fill what's in me
    Fill, fill what's in you
    Fill, fill what's in me
    So my soul's not left so hollow

    You can make me scream
    You can make me breathe


    Thanks to beta-testers Bakadeshi, *inverse*, Greek Prince, and JCD, and as always, to my sister Sierra Lorna for her helpful AMV insights and AfterEffects wisdom.

    Time Spent: about 175 hours in four and a half months
    Programs Used: Adobe AfterEffects 6.5, Adobe Premiere 6.0, Adobe Photoshop 5.0
    Resolution: 640x480

    Enjoy, and comments are appreciated. ^_~

    Contest Participation:

    *AWA Pro 2006: Winner of Best Character Profile, nominated for Best Drama, Best Storytelling
    *AnimeUSA 2006: Best of Show

Opinions (97)

  • Orig
  • Visual
  • Sound
  • Synch
  • Lip
  • Effects
  • Effort
  • Re-View
  • Overall
  • 9.66
  • 9.86
  • 10.00
  • 9.74
  • 9.82
  • 9.90
  • 9.43
  • 9.78

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