Filmmaker Shoots ‘The Odyssey’ Entirely on iMacs (yes iMacs)
A director and comedian has remade Christopher Nolan’s summer blockbuster The Odyssey. But instead of shooting it entirely on IMAX cameras, the way Nolan did, Will Norman shot his version entirely on iMacs.
Norman created an alter ego for himself, Christopher Notlan, initially putting out a joke video in which he says, “Ever since I was a young boy, I wanted to shoot a film entirely on iMacs.”
But Little Black Book reports that the joke gained serious momentum and, before long, people started offering Norman help to actually shoot his budget version of the movie, which he calls “The Oddersy.”
Norman and his crew bought a 21-inch iMac for $20 from eBay, with the Uber ride to collect it actually costing more than the webcam-equipped computer itself.
Remarkably, Norman got hold of a 25-foot Technocrane for shots of a rubber dinghy, which represents the Ithacan warship used by Odysseus, sailing across a lake. Lime bikes were brought in for camera dollies, and the iMac had screw holes drilled into it so it could be mounted on a tripod. For the film’s visual effects, Norman used the iMac’s Photo Booth app.
“The first video was only meant to be a silly one-off joke. Then people started offering their time, equipment and increasingly ridiculous ways of moving an iMac. Before long, we had more than 30 people treating a £15 computer with the seriousness normally reserved for a Hollywood production,” London-based Norman tells LBB.
“The limitations became the most exciting part. The camera has no control over focus, extremely limited dynamic range, and occasionally decides your face should be purple, so every scene required us to invent a completely impractical solution.”
Norman actually wound up making the movie (top of the page) and gave it a world premiere in Shoreditch, London. One fan who attended said, “I’m not sure I’ll see anything like that again. I’m not sure I want to see anything like that again.”
Norman is encouraging people to watch “The Oddersy” on iMac — “the way Notlan intended.”
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