A high intensity crime thriller, Love and Guns follows the story of a man caught between corruption and redemption, blending elements of classic noir with a modern cinematic aesthetic. The film, which has been widely acclaimed at Los Angeles film festivals, was produced entirely in Australia, utilizing virtual production techniques to create immersive environments while maintaining an indie film budget.
Love and Guns was filmed in a compact 5x3 meter space, yet features a diverse range of cinematic environments thanks to in camera visual effects. By using a combination of projected Unreal Engine backgrounds and green screen techniques, the team was able to achieve a high end, immersive look without the need for extensive on location shooting.
“Filming Love and Guns in such a small space while creating expansive environments was an incredible challenge,” said Djeric. “Using DaVinci Resolve Studio allowed us to seamlessly integrate our virtual backgrounds with the live action performances, ensuring a cohesive, high quality final product."
"Davinci Studio was extremely stable, I was able to edit and key complex shots natively in raw files without transcoding to proxies on an affordable gaming laptop. This is a lifesaver for indie filmmakers, when juggling creative work between mundane tasks and day jobs!”
With nearly half of the film’s scenes incorporating green or blue screen elements, Djeric relied heavily on DaVinci Resolve Studio’s Fusion page for advanced keying and compositing. The Delta Keyer tool played a crucial role in achieving precise chroma key results, even in low light, high contrast shots that are characteristic of the noir genre.
“I was amazed at how well DaVinci Resolve handled the compositing and grading process,” said Djeric. “The ability to work natively with raw footage, apply real time noise reduction, and grade complex scenes all within a single platform was a game changer.”
The film’s striking visual style was enhanced by DaVinci Resolve Studio’s powerful color grading tools. Djeric employed a bold mix of deep reds, blues and moody shadows to create an atmospheric noir look, leveraging still frames and color matching features to maintain consistency across scenes.
“DaVinci Resolve Studio gave us complete control over the film’s aesthetic,”Djeric explained. “I could generate stills from key shots and apply the same grade across multiple scenes with ease, saving an enormous amount of time.”
One of the standout features used in post production was DaVinci Resolve Studio’s AI powered noise reduction. Due to the high powered fans from Unreal Engine projection systems generating unwanted background noise, the built in AI audio tools were essential in cleaning up dialogue and ambient sounds.
“The AI noise reduction feature saved several key scenes where external noise was interfering with the performances,” said Djeric. “It was incredible to see how effectively Resolve was able to isolate and remove unwanted sound without compromising dialogue quality.”
With Love and Guns earning praise for its innovative approach to indie filmmaking, Djeric is already in pre production for his next feature, Potato, an AI driven film that will push the boundaries of virtual production even further.
“DaVinci Resolve Studio has become an essential part of my workflow,” Djeric concluded. “It’s the perfect tool for filmmakers looking to achieve big-budget visuals on an indie budget.”