A Red Dead Redemption 2 fan has spent countless hours creating a 38-minute short film that covers the story of the game. As players will know, Red Dead Redemption 2 is a long journey to play through but creator Captain Punch has cut it down into a cinematic film with a twist. Some fans are calling it their favourite Red Dead 2 video ever.
Titled Red Zeppelin, it goes through the incredible western story with new shots using a free cam tool and background music featuring Led Zeppelin’s discography. We spoke to the creator of this video to learn more about the idea behind the creation and how it came together.
“Red Zeppelin” covers the overall story of Red Dead Redemption 2 with brand new camera angles, sweeping montages, and a very unique soundtrack. My goal was to create the most cinematic RDR2 video out there. It took me 10 months to edit (on and off) during my spare time.
Captain Punch
A long time in the works
The initial idea was conceived over two years ago as Captain Punch was listening to tracks by Led Zeppelin on car journeys. The visuals and story of Arthur in Red Dead 2 seemed to fit with the music. he also loved Charles Liu’s Arthur video that has been viewed millions of times.
Punch said it’s the most cinematic Red Dead 2 video he has seen and wanted to compete with it. The idea was toyed with but “it seemed too ambitious/daunting” so it was almost left to remain as just an idea.
Production progress
However, Punch believed in the idea and production got under way in the July of 2023. From the start, a few mods were installed. The one that allowed this video to be created is the Cinematic Camera Mod by Jotrius. This let Captain Punch operate a free-cam and not just use the typical view found in cutscenes. Most of the shots were keyframed to be pinpoint accurate but others were used by moving a mouse around for some handheld frames.
The first half of the video was filmed twice. It was first filmed without any visual mods applied. Then a the second half received the visual enhancements. So the latter half of the video was actually edited first before the first was re-recorded.
What you see in the video is footage from the second round of filming. To elevate the visuals even more, a ReShade setup was used to bring a “1970’s-inspired aesthetic” to the video. FoodFiteVFX was hired to do post-processing effects too.
On top of that, several shots were not one and done. They had to be filmed several times due to how random the open world of Red Dead Redemption 2 can be. Rampage Trainer was used to minimise time spent recording by manipulating the time of day, weather, location, and more.
In terms of audio, there’s more to it than just adding Led Zeppelin music behind video clips. The voice line lines spoken by the characters were extracted to remove any background sounds found in the game.
The finish line
There was a rough 10 minute length mark but as more footage was captured and editing took place, it was obvious the general concept had to shift. The video was going to be less condensed and more open for newcomers to Red Dead 2’s story.
The final version of the short film was released on May 22nd 2024 after around 10 months of filming and editing plus 1000GB’s of video recordings later. You can watch the full video on YouTube in up to 4K resolution here, we’d highly recommend it!
Captain Punch has created several trailers and short films for games like GTA V, Spider-Man, Halo, and more on their YouTube channel for about a decade.
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