Miniatures have been at the centre of movie making for over 100 years. From Star Wars to Lord of the Rings these tiny worlds are a big part of both the big and small screen. Canadian miniature artist Marina Totino lets us into her studio and shares a look at the talent that's landed her jobs in the TV, music, and video game industries.
00:00This is Marina Totino and she builds tiny worlds.
00:04She's made a literal career of creating the most amazing tiny things
00:08and there's a reason that her creations are being sought out for movies, TV shows, and album covers.
00:14Hey, I'm Alex and today we're pulling a Miss Frizzle and shrinking down to explore the world of miniatures.
00:21If you want to blow up the White House, fly the Millennium Falcon, or visit Hogwarts,
00:25there's only really one way to do it right, miniatures.
00:29A trip to the moon started the trend over 100 years ago in 1902,
00:34and since then we've gotten blockbusters like The Lord of the Rings and Blade Runner 2049.
00:39The towering city of Minas Tirith still holds up 20 years later,
00:43and the level of detail in the futuristic sci-fi Los Angeles of 2049 would blow your mind.
00:49Now I could legitimately sit here all day and simp over the technical ability of these artists,
00:54or we can go on a field trip.
00:56Montreal is home to more than 40 visual effects companies, making it one of the largest post-production hubs in the world.
01:03So it's no surprise that we have some serious local talent here.
01:06Marlina Titino is a photographer, digital artist, miniaturist, and filmmaker.
01:11She's worked on movies, TV shows, and commercials, but miniatures have become an obsession,
01:16and she's building all of it right here out of her Montreal apartment.
01:19I started out making miniatures because I come from a film background and I studied filmmaking.
01:25I've always loved filmmaking, but I also have, I was going to say I have a hard time.
01:31I love stop motion and I wanted to get into stop motion.
01:35So I'd written out this entire script, I started building out characters and fleshing out ideas,
01:40and I started making this set.
01:42And I started in 2017, just building this little house.
01:47That was one of the first dioramas or miniatures that I'd built,
01:51and I fell in love with it instantly, and I couldn't stop building miniatures.
01:54And it came to a point where I realized I don't want to necessarily do stop motion right now.
01:59I want to focus on set design and focus on making miniatures and creating these spaces that don't exist
02:04so that I can film inside of.
02:06What draws me to it is the ability for me to express myself
02:11and express a lot of the darkness and isolation that I often feel.
02:16I love playing with light. I love creating atmospheres, feeling,
02:20and revisiting places that might have existed at some point but, you know, no longer do.
02:26Like, I play a lot with nostalgia. I play a lot with vintage aesthetics and stuff like that.
02:32I got into film when I was younger. As a kid, I played a lot with Windows Movie Maker in my webcam.
02:38Like, you can make people disappear and, like, add, like, dumb titles, like, add credits,
02:42and I'm like, wow, people are going to know me now.
02:44So I got into filmmaking through that. I worked in the film industry,
02:47and the transition from film to miniatures happened when I lived in Toronto.
02:51And that's why I went there initially because there's so many U.S. productions that go there.
02:54So it's if you're looking to make it into the industry and want to work on big sets,
02:58Toronto's the place to be.
03:00I was so already very artistic and wanted to do my own thing and always knew that I would.
03:05So I think that was more of, like, a gateway into what I actually wanted to do.
03:09And being on set was super helpful for me anyway because now the stuff I'm shooting,
03:14I incorporate a lot of the stuff I've learned from set onto my miniatures and filming those.
03:18So my process works by me thinking of a very small idea,
03:23and usually it just kind of grows over time.
03:26And the way that I think about miniatures is I think about scenes.
03:30I think about, like, how they would look cinematically.
03:33So then when I think of an idea, like the laundromat, for example,
03:36I'll think of, like, what's happening in there.
03:38Like, there's something in the laundry machine, it's spinning,
03:40and I'll think of, like, actions, and I often create spaces where there are no people involved,
03:46mainly because I don't know how to make people yet,
03:49but also because I love the idea of creating spaces where it seems like someone was just there and just left.
03:55Once I sketch it out and figure out the scaling,
03:57I do a lot of the scaling work separately on a graph sheet and figure out, you know, sizes,
04:02because miniatures is really all just shapes.
04:04It's just putting shapes together in tiny shapes and figuring out how big you want certain things.
04:08So, again, I'll have the idea.
04:10I'll come up with the composition in my head from a photography slash cinematography standpoint,
04:16and then I'll sketch it out and start building that based on that idea, based on that sketch.
04:21And then when I start sketching things out, it'll be something like the TV there, which ends up here.
04:27I'll kind of sketch out an idea and then make little notes of what type of material I would use,
04:32what color this part's going to be.
04:34I use a lot of styrene.
04:36I use a lot of balsa wood, bass wood, cardstock paper, glues of all kinds.
04:43Things of all kinds.
04:44Sometimes I'll be on the street and find a bunch of shit and I'm like, I can use this.
04:48There was the ice storm in Montreal.
04:50Branches and trees fell onto the streets and I took that opportunity and took a bunch of branches inside
04:58and started placing them into one of my miniatures like the clown head as trees.
05:04And it looks pretty good.
05:05So is everything made from scratch?
05:07Yes.
05:08One of the biggest things I worked on was one of the first commissions I ever had as a miniature maker.
05:14It was for a TV show for Crave Canada.
05:17It was a Quebec TV show called Le Fin Fin de l'Histoire and it's a true crime TV series.
05:23They asked for 10 miniature sets and I had to build all 10 within a span of like four months.
05:28It was insane.
05:29I didn't even trust my ability yet because I had just started, but I said yes to it and I was like, I can do this.
05:35And I really pushed myself and I built these 10 miniature sets and the host comes in and he kind of plays around with all the little pieces,
05:42kind of explaining what happened in the crime that took place.
05:45And he explains like the scene and I didn't know what I was capable of until I was put under that much pressure.
05:54And it was so awesome.
05:55It came out really cool.
05:56I got to make the cover art for a song by Lovejoy, which is UK band.
06:02Very awesome band.
06:03I got to create like a plane that was crashing down into the water.
06:08That was such a fun project to work on because I didn't, again, know if I could do it.
06:13And I kind of just say yes to things and then hope for the best later.
06:16That plane crash was also in the music video for Call Me What You Like.
06:21They asked me to shoot shots of when the plane was pristine.
06:24And then also when it was crashing.
06:26So I just shot little shots of the model kind of moving in the air and I had people helping me like carry it across the screen and stuff like that.
06:33It was very cool.
06:34How long does it take to do a project like this?
06:37For something that I'm shooting that I don't have to send off.
06:40So something that's not necessarily like an art piece that you can put up on a mantle.
06:44It takes a lot less time because I'm not so worried about what the outside looks like and how to deliver it.
06:51And, you know, what materials I'm using for the walls and for the base and all that.
06:56Whereas if it was a bigger piece or like an art piece like my video store, that one is built from, you know, the inside out all the way around.
07:04And that could sit on someone's mantle.
07:06So that one takes longer because I'm really particular about the details everywhere.
07:11Whereas a set like this, like the airplane was shot in such a way that the plane was in the middle.
07:18The background was further away and then the water was even further front.
07:22So if you shoot it at a certain angle, it looks like everything's all together.
07:25But if you look at it from the side, everything is like dispersed.
07:28So it's not an actual diorama piece.
07:31It's like an illusion that you create with all the pieces.
07:34This was just a small look into the even smaller world of miniatures.
07:38And the incredible talent behind the magic that gets custom built for movies, TV shows, and the music industry.
07:45Big shout out to Marina for letting me into her studio space to freak out over every little thing she's built.
07:49If you want to see more of her stuff, you can find her info in the description below.
07:52That's it for me. I'll see you in the next one.
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