What's the Next Step?

[Brady Nemeth]

My question is, what is the next step for me to take?

 

Essentially, I just finished the "first step" of fooling around with home digital camcorders, and essentially know all the basics to a generic movie. Where do I really go from here? I'm going to be a senior in high school, so i'm limited in a sense. I'm also looking for the cheaper ways to do things because I'm saving to go to France next summer.

 

For a next step (not sure if it is too far/not enough) I was thinking about buying an inexpensive actual film camera. I'm not sure if this is the next step or not because I have taken a photography class in school, and I wasn't sure if developing film for still cameras is the same process as film for a video camera (may be a stupid question :unsure: ). I've developed several roles of my own film from a still camera, but I wasn't sure how that translated over to "film film". When I got to thinking about it, i'm pretty sure, all I really need is the beginning part of it, developing the roll itself, because I won't need to be making out prints of each shot (will I?). Does "Developer (we used Kodak d-76), Stop Bath, Fixer, Water" actually make sense to some of you "movie buffs"? I'm really just more interested in building steps towards more technical stuff, rather than planning the shots (and other things like that) at this point.

 

Lastly, are there any good websites/books to read about how movies are made? Once again, i'm looking for more of how they are made in the sense of how things are done, not really the "artistic" aspect of it. For instance, I still don't get how it goes from film, to digital editing, to back to film? Any recommendations would be great.

[David Mullen ASC]

http://cinematography.com/shop/books.asp

 

First of all, video cameras don't use film.

 

The color negative or b&w negative film (or more rarely, color or b&w reversal, i.e. "slide" film) that runs through a film camera is not that different than what you use in a 35mm still camera. Not exactly the same, but similar (still color neg uses a C-41 processor but color motion picture neg uses an ECN-2 processor. Color motion picture negative has a heavy carbon-black remjet backing that acts as a lubricant, anti-static layer, and anti-halation backing -- since movie film runs so fast through a camera -- and removing the remjet is part of ECN-2 processing.)

 

Specifically, you should read Dominic Case's "Film Technology in Post Production", as well as spend time at Kodak's website:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/index.jhtml?pq-path=2/523

 

Film may be transferred to digital video for "offline" editing; the tape contains the time code information and how it relates to the film's periodic keycode (a barcode version of the edge numbers on the film) that runs alongside of it. See:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/students...4.9.6&lc=en

 

This way, after editing is finished and an EDL (Edit Decision List) is generated of every cut by time code, a negative cutter can take that info and the matching keycode and cut and splice together the film to macth the video edit. Once that is done, a print can be struck from the cut negative.

 

Or the film negative can be scanned to a high-quality digital format, edited digitally, color-corrected digitally, and the edited digital master can be recorded back to film again using a film recorder like an Arrilaser.

[Ted Hinkle]

What I would suggest is to learn as much as yuu can about film and the process of how movies are made using film, and while your doing that keep making home movies with your digital camera (film is defenitely not a cheaper way to do things, for instance just to use an old super 8 camera which is essentially the same film you use in your 35mm still camera just a smaller size, hence 8mm or super 8mm) it costs $30 for the film and then $30 to develop it and that only gives you about 2 1/2 minutes of footage and then the only way you can play it is on a projector, no easy editing on your NLE (Non-Linear Editing system), so that doesn't include the costs of telecine (or getting it transfered to digital format). And don't stop taking pictures with your 35mm still camera, those same basic principles like having the correct exposure will carry over when you start doing film.

 

I think a good book to start with is the "5 C's of cinematography" so you can learn a little bit of history and how the the basic elements of cinematography came about.

 

But when you do feel more comfortable and confident pick up an old super 8 off ebay and try it out, just make sure you got your scenes planned out well cause the second you pull that trigger $ dollar bills go flying out the window!