From Wikipedia:

"primary effect is believed to be the stimulation of secretion as well as inhibition of re-uptake of large amounts of serotonin as well as dopamine and norepinephrine in the brain, inducing a general sense of openness, empathy, energy, euphoria, and well-being. Tactile sensations are enhanced for some users, making general physical contact with others more pleasurable..."

This is a tough drug to simulate on video since it's not hallucinogenic. Try to think in terms of mood and amplified sensation. There's a drug use scene in Garden State which may give you some ideas. The method used in that film is speed ramping from time-lapse to slow motion to create an unreal sensation. And then, of course, there's the ultimate drug movie: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, although many of the effects used there are difficult to reproduce on a low budget.

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Andrew Gingerich
Exploding Goldfish Films
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You could always use lighting and other effects to 'prettify' the video while he's on the drug. Maybe even switch to better-looking actors for that sequence :).

I don't know squat about the drug you're trying to duplicate but here are some ideas.

Use a tripod for non-drug scenes and then a steady-cam or hand held for the drug scenes.

Change the lighting for the drug scenes, make it more natural.

Put the actors in drab colors before hand and bright colors for the drug scenes.

Shoot the non-drug scenes on film or video 24p and the drug scenes at higher digital speeds to give a very different look.

Try a fish-eye lens to distort the edges and really make it trippy if someone gets close to the camera.

Do the accordian zoom effect a few times to create a disorienting change of perspective.

Add tracer effects in post.

Create different layers and make everyone slightly blurry on one layer and use a matte to have one non-blurry person at a time show visible from the layer beneath.

Or to really screw with people reverse everything I said here and make the drug scenes be the ones that look normal.

RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA

quote:

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Originally posted by MarkG

You could always use lighting and other effects to 'prettify' the video while he's on the drug. Maybe even switch to better-looking actors for that sequence :).

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that's really ingenious.

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watch Spun or Requiem for a Dream, to get some good ideas. I would change the color of the scene, use red lighting or other colors. A different lens would work nice like a fish eye or something, hold the camera dont put it on a tripod and move it around in a trippy motion. In post you could even simulate eye lids closing and opening. I dont know what program you use to edit but you could just use a crop effect and animate it to open and close, then blur the edges of the crop to look more natural. If you cant get a cool lens, then you can always distort the picture in post. Just make sure to really mess with the audio, lots of reverb, delay, deep bassy sounds, it will help contrast if you go to a 3rd person view during his trip.

Aswell as all the editing and visual effects and techniques mentioned above, I would also focus on sound and music in various ways.
Maybe not go overboard (slow-mo to speed-up really quickly) because that can look fake and humorous, but play around with various sound effects.

A good suggestion (I think) is to heighten diegetic sounds (sound that is used IN the actual scene). i.e. plates banging on table, glasses knocking, water dripping or gushing. If there is a mini-fight scene or someone bumped into someone else, heighten the sounds of the punches/bumps/falls. I think more than anything else (not that I've ever been on 'e'), drug user's perceptions of things changes drastically audibly moreso than visually.