Please critique my reel

[Marc Levy]

Greetings. I'm posting this here as well, as it seems to get more traffic than the "please critique my work" section. I'd like feedback on my reel:

 

www.marclevycine.com

 

Select your preferred format under the "reel" section.

 

Thanks

[Rolfe Klement]

There is some really nice stuff in there. And I love the slow approach!! Who is the music by?

 

My only comment would be to use DOF to reduce showing the background when you do not have massive art dept work

 

Your understanding of framing is great and I would try get some shots in with really wide and really tight lenses (like a 10mm Ultra and a 180mm ultra)

 

But otherwise great

 

my 2 cents

 

Rolfe

[Guest peter orland]

Hi Marc...I like it a lot, some really nice stuff.

 

I would have ended it on the shot of the guy sliding down the fence, then when your name comes up the solo piano hits in, the other colour shots all feel like repeats after that.

[Cole Webley]

I also liked the tempo of your reel. Looks pretty good. I wished that one of the songs lasted the whole length. Can't decide which song I liked best but I wish it was one continuous song. Good stuff.

 

The length was good -- not too long. I like what someone said about ending on a note and having your name appear again at the end.

 

Cheers.

 

Cole

[Joseph White]

really nice stuff man, love the running through the fields stuff and everything with the kid in the fields, hills. i think it's a good length, my only comment/criticism would be that its SUPER moody which is great considering the material , and im not saying you should put some sort of pop song over it, but it definitely shows one side of your work very heavily and i think perhaps when you have the song shift, instead of going to the second bit of score with the child singing maybe go to something slightly less heavy, but the images are strong as is the editing - nicely done.

[Guest Ken Maskrey]

I like it as well. For me it's timely in that I need to put together one as I've just about got enough stuff.

 

For everyone in general: Is it appropriate to have just one reel or one for genre, i.e. one for action, one for drama, etc. I ask because my instructor, Ric Waite, has three reels, each for a different genre. His explanation, was that, if you're going for a particular movie, you want to be specific to the type of movie.

 

Me, I don't know...I'm just mentioning what I was told. I'd be lucky to have a reel half as good as this one.

[Adam Frisch FSF]

Who is the music by?

 

Explode by The Cardigans. Takes a Swede to know a Swede :D

[Marc Levy]

Greetings. Thanks a bunch for the feedback - all great observations and ideas. I will definitely utilize for my next cut.

 

The music: Adam's right, "Explode" from the Cardigans off of their Gran Turismo album - in my top ten.

 

Best

[Travis Cline]

Let me start by saying - very sexy photography. It looks really good. As far as the cut goes, I would advise not to repeat the same faces. You have shots from the same movie spread throughout the movie which is fine I suppose, but for me, I don't like to come back to the same face again and again. It makes me think you don't have that much to put on your reel and you're spreading it out to make it feel like more, which I don't think is the case. Some one with such good photography obiously has experience, I just think you should emphasize that better in your reel. For example, you have a long section of Nazi stuff and the discus thrower whcih I think worked really well. I'd love to see the stuff with the black kids all together. But that's just me and maybe that wouldn't work that well. Thanks for posting this, it helps everyone who is trying to cut a reel, myself included.

 

Travis