Digital Filmmaking, Black Magic Time?

Digital Filmmaking, Black Magic Time?

During the last two years a great many cameras have been introduced. Part of being any kind of technician is choosing the right tool for the right job. No two of us see the world in exactly the same way so no two of use will look upon a film shoot the same way. This takes us to the choice of cameras. The type of camera that you pick for your digital feature film shoot will largely reflect how you wish the world you are going to be creating to be seen. For others of us it comes down to what will test and challenge our skills as an artist. Anyone can shoot quality footage with a Red, but only a few of us could pull it off with a Sanyo pocket camcorder or a naked smartphone.

Today’s post is not about what camera is best for your needs. It is instead going to be about one of the newer cameras to become part of the debate. At the end of this post I am going to include a overview video about the camera that was done by the legendary Phillip Bloom. The video will be the longest that I have posted here, but it flies by for those of us who cannot get enough of this type of information.

First up I would like to show you a side by side video that compares the Black Magic camera with one of the best Canon Dslr cameras.

  

 Next I would like to look at two short films that were shoot using this camera. I believe the best test of any camera is to see how it actually performs in action. After all this is about digital film making and not recording shots of trees and flowers.
  

 This next video is the reason why I hang out at Vimeo so much.

   
Love Squirts from Adam R Brown • YellowLinePics on Vimeo.

 

 During the next year there is going to be new devices added to the argument and I must say that the most important thing to keep in mind is that being a film maker is about the things you do before you start filming. Pre production is where your movie will make it or fail. You must have a quality script or nothing else you do will matter. If you do not have the most experience cast then it will be up to you to rehearse them and to nurse them when necessary through scene after scene. Film making is fun, but it is also hard work. To quote a indie film maker that I have become a fan of, Oklahoma Ward, if you are not willing to work eighteen  hours a day you are not going to make it, you are just not going to make it.
 

 That will be it for today. This has been a great year for me as a blogger and as a writer in general, but it has kept me from doing much actual work on a project of my own. I have been doing a lot of script editing for friends. Also I am hitting the five month mark on the pre production of my first feature where I will wear the big three hats of writer, director and producer. Until this process I never understood why it would sometimes take a year and a half to shoot a film. I would love to be able to shoot a film in ten days, maybe the next one.

Take a moment to share this post with a friend and keep believing in your project. Work towards it each day. You are a film maker. Sometimes film making is not about going out and getting the hot new camera. Sometimes film making is about spending days learning about insurance and location permits. Sometimes being a film maker finds you in a room surrounded by beautiful people all looking to you for their next or first job in front of the camera. Enjoy the ride guys. When it is good it is good like one of those happy ending Twillight Zone episodes where you are Charles Bronson and you get to start the human race all over again with a twenty five year old Elizabeth Montgomery at your side.

 

Me + You, Interview Part 2

Me + You, Interview Part 2

The is the second part of my interview with Iyin Landre, the film maker behind Me + & You.
If you would like to help with her Kick starter campaign you can do so by  clicking here .

Q8. You wrote the script. There are a lot of ways to write a script. Some start from a outline or even a narrative story and then craft the script. Others just sit in front of a blank screen and do not stop writing until the rough draft is done. How do you approach the screen writing process and how long did this script take to write?

A8: I actually finished writing my first draft as a result of taking a screenwriting class. The first week we went in with a logline – mine was, “An American girl travels to Brazil and some f**ked up sh*t happens.” After that, I wrote 10 pages a week and in a couple of months I finished the script. I would say that my writing style is to have a basic outline in terms of major story arcs, but I usually just write according to how I feel the scenes should flow.


Q9: Hollywood prides itself on diversity. Film makers looking at the industry town from the outside would point out that they may achieve diversity in the form of cast and or crews at times, in thought and content it is still a industry built upon types and type casting. There are films that will never get made, stories that will never be considered and actors never hired because they do not fit the world view of what they believe will sell.

For the first time since Jackie Chan did Rush Hour (and his part in that film fit perfectly with the type casting that the Industry does) a major studio summer release had an asian actress, Rinko Kikuchi, as the co-lead and that movie was Pacific Rim. A film directed and produced by one of the world’s greatest film makers, Guillermo del Toro, who has never officially worked inside the Hollywood system so he did not get the memo saying that casting choices like that are not done around here.
You are an Asian actress in Hollywood, would someone from your background ever had been considered for the lead in a film like your's even if it was specified in the script?

A9: I think if I were an already established actress with some clout, then yes, my name maybe would’ve been thrown in the mix. But since I’m not, the possibility of me being cast in my own film was probably slim to none. But to be frank, there just aren’t many Asian or Asian-American actors playing lead roles in films outside of Asia. I remember reading an article where Lucy Liu (our most notable actress) said that she’s not approached to play the lead in romantic comedies because people don’t see her in those roles, like they do Julia Roberts or Sandra Bullock for example. In my opinion, I think we need more Asian-American filmmakers, more people behind the scenes writing, directing, producing films in order to see change. You can’t just complain of seeing stereotypical portrayals in the media and not do anything about it – because to instill change, you actually have to go out there and create new images, stories to replace the old ones.

Q10: If the parts are not being written or casting directors are not willing to consider all types as being equal options for any given role is it going to be up to actors to create roles for themselves?

A10: I can’t speak for other actors, but for me it’s always been the case. I wanted to do more than play the Asian masseuse with an awful pan-Asian accent, or even play the doctor or lawyer – I wanted to be play dark gritty characters with depth, complexity, characters that dove head first into danger, action. And seeing as how I was rarely called in for roles that excited me to that length, I realized I had to write them myself, for myself.



Q11: Have you decided on the camera and the equipment that will be used on this production? Have you settled upon a DP?

A11: Have been looking into cameras that will fit my budget – may do the Red Scarlet, and also have a Black Magic 4K or Mark III in tow for scenes in the favela, for better motion and movement. Have not decided on a DP, will most likely crew up in Brazil this way I can save on production/travel costs. But the style of cinematography I’m looking for is a cross between City of God/Y Tu Mama También/Elite Squad – fluid motion mostly steadicammed or hand-held.

Q12: How much of the movie will be shot here and how much in Brazil?

A12: All of it will be shot in Brazil!

Q13: Since you are an actor by trade I think that the film makers out there would like to
know what is it that actors expect from them? There are going to be productions where there is no pay or the pay will have to be deferred. Where the film maker is just starting out and all that they have is a good script and a borrowed Dslr camera. Should they approach who they believe to be the best possible actor or actress available or should they lower their expectations?

A13: Yes I say always approach who you want first. I read an article where Hugh Jackman did some student shorts not too long ago. As an actor, I expect the director to know what he/she wants, to have a very clear vision but also be able to collaborate and listen to those around him/her. But I think most of all, it’s to foster a safe environment for the actors, where you gently shape their creative expression into how you see fit for the story.

Q14: When starting work on a new project what are the things that are going to impress an actor and what sends signals that the film maker is not up to the job?

A14: I would say wishy-washiness and lack of preparation. If the film maker isn’t sure of what he/she wants, or doesn’t have a plan when we get on set – it makes me doubt the final product.

Q15: Okay back to the subject of your project. You have set a goal of seventy five thousand dollars. If you do not reach your goal the first time around will you press forward? Will this move get made no matter what?

A15: Yes we are making this film no matter what. With Brazil set to host the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016, timing will be an important factor to the degree of “heat” on our movie – so we’re plowing full steam ahead.

Q16: It is said that you know that you are doing what you were meant to do when you feel a kind of freedom that goes beyond words. That the thing that you are doing is effortless. When you were in a foreign land, surrounded by people who spoke a language that you did not understand yet, shooting scene for your trailer, did you find that kind of effortless freedom?

A16: I hadn’t thought of the word freedom to describe what I felt, but I think that’s a very astute description. Because there were so many unknowns – the city, the language, the culture, not having a cast or crew – I really had to believe in what I was doing or else I had absolutely nothing. And in starting from zero and building from the ground up, I had to slough off any pretensions, any fluff and ask myself whether or not I could do it at all. I think in being so single-minded, it helped me to realize that I was doing exactly what I was meant to do.



Again, thank you for doing this interview Iyin. I wish you the best of luck with your campaign and the production of the film. I look forward to posting the trailer for the finish film.

http://www.twotwelveprod.com/


Okay guys I am going to be taking a few days off from posting. I have a ebook to edit. I think that the up coming posts will be about using your own social media to help market you work. The other post will be on the topic of how many independent film makers narrowly define being indie as having to fit into certain categories. By far the most success indie film maker of the last eight years is not mention much or show much respect by the larger indie universe. Think about who I could be talking about, I bet that no one guesses right.


That is it for today guy, thank you for visiting and please take a moment to share this post with a friend and to stumble us on stumbleupon.

The Greatest Independent Filmmaker

            The Greatest Independent Filmmaker

    Some of you will disagree strongly with this statement. I will make it anyway.

    Alfred Hitchcock was not only the greatest filmmaker of the 20th century, but he was the greatest indie filmmaker as well.

   “He worked for studios all of his life. He made the most hated of all types of films to the old world of indie film makers. He made the kind of films that made money. You can’t call that guy an indie film maker.”

   I can and I will.

    Look at it this way, in the world that Hitchcock lived in there was no way that you could be a truly indie filmmaker. The only one who tried it was Orson Welles and he got crushed by the studios. Movies cost a fortune to produce. The only way to distribute them was through the studios and the theaters that they owned and operated. Tv did not exist when he started his career. There was no dvds, no videos, no digital downloads, no internet. He had to work within the system and take his shots when he could.


   In England he had some control near the end of his time making movies there. Arriving in America he was employed by David O Selznick, a hyper control freak who had no problem with re-editing Hitckcock’s films. Some would argue that he re-edited Rebecca into winning best picture. I would argue that it was probably a best picture winner before he touched it and if it had lost Hitchcock would have won with the first of his truly indie productions in America the film Foreign Correspondent.    

   When not working for Selznick his contract was loaned out to other studios. This gave Hitchcock the freedom to do within reason what ever films that he wished to. This allowed him to make the movie that would be his favorite, Shadow Of A Doubt. He took a movie star and turned him into a serial killer before most of the world had any idea of what a serial killer was.

   A few years later Hitchcock would gain his total independence and form his own production company. This did not last long due to the fact that he wanted to be a little too experimental. He made the movie Rope that was shot in ten minute takes. Easy to do now, but a nightmare to do back in the forties. At the turn of the 1950s he was back working for the studios with a new respect for what they could provide and also what it took to make truly independent films. He would spend the next ten years making a few movie for fun and profit and then others for himself. This cycle would allow him to give the studios what they wanted. Massive hits like Strangers on a Train, The Man Who Knew Too Much and the Blockbuster North By Northwest.
His indie type on movies were almost as successful. Movies like The Trouble With Harry, I Confess, Rear Window, Dial M for Murder and Vertigo.

   If nothing I have offered has gotten through and you still think Hitchcock was only a big studio director and nothing more please explain Psycho.

    He took a tv crew to shoot a movie. He shot it in six weeks. He shot it in black and white. He used mostly his own money. He took a movie star and killed her a third of the way into the movie. He was the most famous director on earth. Famous for elegant thrillers with Grant and Stewart and Grace Kelly. Nearing the age of sixty he hammered the film going world with a dark and bloody little thriller that despite hundreds of attempts no one has been able to come close to repeating during the last 50 years.

    And he followed that one up by spending a year working on and shooting The Birds.

    Hitchcock could have relaxed. He could have settled into doing the same movie over and over again, but instead he was always stretching and straining to do what had never been done before.

    Indie stands for independent. Doing it your way is what will make or break your indie film. Right now there is a film festival in my city. Except for the Graveyard shift (horror and action from around the world) there is not much independence of thought on display. Do not think about festivals or awards when making your film. Do not think about anything, but what will please you and the audience that you have in mind. This is why Hitchcock’s films have endured the test of time.

    Are their filmmakers today who work within a studio system and still managed to maintain their independence? Have a look at the films of the great foreign filmmaker Takashi Miike. Izo, Zebraman, One Missed Call, The Happiness Of the Katakuris, The 13 Assassins, Audition and Ichi the Killer. He has done a dozen more I could name.

    This post has strictly been my opinion.

    Okay that is it for today. The next post is going to most likely be about Found Footage. I know that we have talked about this subject before, but it has become a Genre that is almost strictly part of the horror film world and I think that it is time to grow the genre.

    Thank you for visiting and I am still looking for my first guest Blog post. If I could pick the subject it would be editing. That is my weakness and it must be someone’s strength.

    Okay good luck and good bye for now.