How many of you guys have had mentors?

[Ben Schwartz]

This is something I think about all the time. I live in NYC and I'm 6 months away from graduating film school with an MFA in cinematography. I'm 27 years old and worked professionally as a photojournalist for years before school. I don't think I'm cut out for assisting at this point. I've assisted on non-union shoots, but if I were to try to assist full-time after graduating, it would take years just to get to second AC...after I did a year at CSC or Panavision earning just above minimum wage, I'd spend another year in the back of a truck loading. I think assisting is great if you start young -- like early twenties -- and have no pressing debts, real-world commitments or responsibilities. But if you're closer to 30 than 20, involved with someone, paying off debt etc., I think it's a bit late to start at the bottom of the crew ladder. I've also done some G&E work, but there again, you can get so wrapped up in it and used to the steady paycheck that DPing can fall by the wayside if you're not careful. Not too mention I love my girlfriend, and film crewing in my experience is detrimental to relationships...I've met one too many divorced gaffers. So I'm going to try to just shoot all I can, whenever I can, on whatever I can.

 

And yes, I would love a mentor, just someone to shadow and observe...but I think reading the posts on this forum is like being mentored. I've learned so much here that I've been writing down everything that strikes me as important to keep from forgetting it! :D

[DavidSloan]

I feel you, Ben...I'm in a similar boat. I've also taken the oath of shooting! I'm not interested in being someone's AC or some G&E cat. We all know that in New York once you're known as G&E no one is gonna call you to shoot. The only people who see you as a DP are your friends from school so make sure you DP your butt off in school and make solid connects, because these are the people who will call you to DP their 1st feature, not the established nyc film crowd. Make friends with as many directors as possible and keep pushing your reel. hopefully one of these directors will get something going and take you on. Otherwise G&E, and AC is nice to pay bills but gets you no where if you want to shoot.

[Annie Wengenroth]

I think it is funny how "DP" has become an acceptable verb. There was an Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode involving frat brother aliens and the term "DP" but it stood for something else... :P

 

Anyway, I'm at a school with a film program but I'm actually majoring in sound design so my education has been slightly less traditional. By the time my interest in film had really peaked, it was too late to change my major and I enjoy the sound design program anyway, so I've stuck with it.

 

My dad bought me a Bolex because he thought I might enjoy it, since I have always been interested in 35mm still photography. So the Bolex was part of my introduction into filmmaking and between that and my old hi-8 camcorder from high school (The stuff I shot in highschool consisted of documentaries about friends, an interview with my dog, the arts festival at the summer camp I worked at, and a music video!), I started to get into the whole cinematography thing. I took Intro to Video and Intro to Film and I read A LOT of books and continued to shoot with my camera and with the cameras at school. I also looked at this site and looked up different types of cameras online.

 

Then I started working for audio/video/film equipment checkout at school and that was what really gave me the hands-on experience. I helped out with grip stuff whenever I could and eventually my friends started asking me to help with camera duties on their shoots. The fact that I can do location and post audio AND camera/grip work has become a real asset for me. Plus, students know that *I* know the equipment, so they like having me on set because not only do I keep good track of everything, but I can use it, too. This is because when there's a slow moment at work I duck into the back and pull out a camera, a different one every day. I get other people to help me out and I practice little things like loading mags and reading the camera manuals.

 

For a while it bummed me out that I hadn't switched into the film program but now I think that I've learned a lot just through my own experiences. I'm not sure how this is going to pan out in the *real* world, but for now I'm just going to keep doing what I like doing and let it fall into place; after all I am not even 23 and these things take time. I guess in an informal sense I have a lot of mentors. It's been really cool and a lot of fun.

[Lise Camp]

I think my hating lights is more of an issue of there is so much to learn! How do you know that the way you have lit a shot is actually the right way?

 

Also, I have 'access' to a fairly well known DP who has done very large productions but I'm resistant to ask for work experience or if I could work for free. Aren't high profile DPs really busy and very rarely take on juniors?

[David Mullen ASC]

It's not so much an issue of right or wrong lighting, but whether you feel you achieved what you had in your mind, or whether it looks good to your eye. It's not like getting the correct answer for a math equation.

[Josh Bass]

If this matters at all, I finally got my head, at least to a decent amount, around lighting, at least the basics.

 

I didn't mess with it at all (used available light) in stuff 'til about the middle of last year-ish. Then I bought some stuff and started using it. I just wasted hours moving the lights around trying to get something that looked "cool", not at all understanding the relationship between light placement/direction and how the light actually looked on the subject as a result, nor the methodology behind soft light, etc. Finally, after much reading and on-set trial and error, I am where I am. No genius, certainly, but at least now "get it" enough to do good work.

 

That's the big thing about lighting, I think, is understanding what you'll get before you even turn a light on "seeing the light", if you will. If you can get there, you'll be well on your way. Until then, yes, you will hate and dread lighting, much as I did. But I think to be a DP you have to know that stuff. Unless you wanna shoot weddings/bar mitzvahs/depositions.

 

Reading alone won't help, either. It does NOW, because I can relate to a lot more of what I'm reading, but when I was ignorant in the ways of the photon, most of what I read went in and out, without ever registering with me. Buy some cheap crap and experiment. I dunno. Whatever.

 

Now, back to topic!

 

I have a guy who I've PAd for on a few shoots, and who will usually answer cinematography questions I email him, as well as helping me get "in" with the production community. Kinda like a mentor, no? Maybe a half- or quarter- mentor? A mentor with a piece of diffusion?

[oscar jimenez]

HI, I did have what you can call a "menthor". Actually I had two. One "mentor" always told me: I'll have you sweating tears and blood today, I'll make shure that happens" .

I've learned from one of the best. Not for free, blood, pain and sweat, lots of times.

[Lise Camp]

Josh,

 

Thanks heaps for your reply! That is really good advice! I think it's mostly about the idea of doing lighting right now is a bit daunting! I have been doing still photographs for years, using natural light, and they have always turned out really well. I just find the idea of so much to learn daunting! And I feel like I should get learning now! I want to get out there and learn and get hands on right now!

 

Lise :blink:

[oscar jimenez]

Thanks heaps for your reply! That is really good advice! I think it's mostly about the idea of doing lighting right now is a bit daunting! I have been doing still photographs for years, using natural light, and they have always turned out really well. I just find the idea of so much to learn daunting! And I feel like I should get learning now! I want to get out there and learn and get hands on right now!

 

Dear Lisa:

When I read your post I could not possibly imagine someone who hate lights. As a Friend of mine once said: I do hate people, but never got to hate equipment, it is not to blame for our lack of knowledge, neither our own mistakes. I find light such a "sacred energy" and I find myself very much privileged to use such thing to make a living and enjoy it. You might hate light, it's not a simple matter. Here's my advice on some books that may help to understand:

 

1. Ansel Adams- The negative

2. Blair Brown- Motion Picture and video lightning.

hope this helps and you may find em useful

Oscar

[Lise Camp]

Dear Lisa:

When I read your post I could not possibly imagine someone who hate lights. As a Friend of mine once said: I do hate people, but never got to hate equipment, it is  not to blame for our lack of knowledge, neither our own mistakes.  I find light such a "sacred energy"  and I find myself very much privileged to use such thing to make a living and enjoy it.  You might hate light, it's not a simple matter.  Here's my advice on some books that may help to understand:

 

1. Ansel Adams- The negative

2. Blair Brown- Motion Picture and video lightning.

hope this helps and you may find em useful

Oscar

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Dear Oscar,

 

I only hate lights in the sense that there is so much to know, and I'm only so young right now - I have a long way to go and it's scary! I love how light can be used to express emotions, how (if done right) light can make someone look beautiful. I love LIGHT, it's just that I don't really know where to start. But thanks for your recommendations! I'll certainly read these books. I'm just about to start pre on a short film that I wrote and will be filming. If I have any questions (which I'm certain I will!) I'd love some help!

 

Lise :blink:

[Felipe Perez-Burchard]

...but I think reading the posts on this forum is like being mentored.  I've learned so much here that I've been writing down everything that strikes me as important to keep from forgetting it!

 

Ditto to that,

for the last four years I've been visiting this and other similar forums (you guys write in all of them, so you know which ones), and I learn every day.

I'd just like to say thanks to everyone.

 

-felipe.

[Laurent Andrieux]

How do you know that the way you have lit a shot is actually the right way?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I guess, when you have finally figured out there is no "right way" but the way you like it!

It all depends on your own "eye" somehow...

 

The rest is only technics, to help you set what you're looking for...

 

(I realize David has already given the good answer again)

Edited December 31, 2004 by laurent.a

[Laurent Andrieux]

Don't know why, I can't edit this one either...

 

About mentors, I think ACing is a very good way to learn. At the first times, you are so worried about your job, that you don't see much of the lighting process but when you begin to be more at ease with it, you begin to learn.

 

Also, things that you see sometimes only make sense after a while. I kearned a lot from seeing Bernard Lutic working, thought I could only take all the benefit of it years after.

 

On the other hand, I've been ACing a DP on several features or tvfilms, I didn't like the guy that much, the way he would lit and his personnal behavior. He used to tell me I was there for sweat blood and tears all the time, but, hell, how much I learned with him !

 

As he was doing the light and operating the camera, he used to go to the lighting job first, as he didn't need to have the camera in place to start with this, and while he was doing it, I would place the camera, choose a lens, prep the eventual trackings with the grip, tell him what problems I would see in the frame, etc. 80% of the time, after he had done his lighting, he would come to the camera, check the frame and movement I had prepared with the grip and say "we're ready". The remaining times, he would change one or two parameters, so I could see how he would make the shot better and we'd shoot.

 

As a teacher now (I decided to teach because I didn't want to work for free on shorts as a dp for years before I get one first feature, and it is totally linked to what someone metionned about private life, wife, kids etc. and why I left Paris), I can tell you I thought - and actually was a bit aware of that (because I want them to grow their own judgment and eye, not to believe blindly what I tell them)- that my students would consider me as a mentor. In fact, it's not the case. May be it's because they are in their 20's, but they rather consider me as a provider of knowledge, just what they are expecting - and in the private school I teach it's more even a "customer to provider" relationship - and consider it as "the contract" . I think they are right ! Just like seeing a dp work may only provide benefit to anybody only years after, they see what I teach them as something more than just a "contract" in the time.

 

The fact that Greg considers his teacher as a mentor may be due to his age...

 

So may be, what I'm trying to say is something like "don't look for mentors, you'll have them anyways, just make your way"

[Lise Camp]

I would really LOVE to have a "mentor" and as I have mentioned previously, I have access to a fairly well known DP...I'm just not sure if I could ask for experience from him. I'm really reluctant to ask. Is there some sort of line that I shouldn't cross when it comes to DPs and work experience? I mean, I don't want to go chasing such a well known DP, when I should really start somewhere smaller...

 

Should I start off small and eventually work my way up to asking him? Because as it is now, I have very little on-set experience and I'm scared of making a fool of myself when it comes to set etiquette, and how much I actually know...

 

Lise :blink:

 

p.s - This forum is certainly like one giant mentor! you guys are excellent!

[Phil Rhodes]

Hi,

 

You're a girl. Wear a big pink bow in your hair, smile sweetly, and look cute. Even hoary old British DPs have a morsel of warmth somewhere in their hearts.

 

Phil

[Kevin Zanit]

My favorite sexist moment involves a big name DP who will remain nameless.

 

There were two people up for the same job. One was male, the other female. He asked "Do they know what they are doing?" Yes "Ok, well what does she look like" Umm, shes all right, well not great "Okay, tell him to come in tomorrow".

 

I have seen the opposite ring true, very true in the past. The moral of the story is, hedge the odds in your favor, using all of your personal "tools".

 

 

Kevin Zanit

[Morgan Peline]

Hi,

 

As I'm going back to film school to the NFTS, to start shooting again, I am also of the opinion that that the only way to become a DP is to 'direct the photography'. However, I have to say that the three years I spent in the industry as a trainee, loader and assistant in live drama and animation were really eye-opening. I saw ways of doing things with cameras and lights that would not have occured to me if I had to think of them myself. I'm not a very talented assistant but if I hadn't worked as one I don't think I would have seen half as many different camera and lighting techniques as I have. In the long run, I think it is always useful to work for others for a short time if possible, though if I had my time again, I would probably choose the electrician route to start with...as I've realised I really don't like camera assisting, it's so boring.

[Laurent Andrieux]

I would really LOVE to have a "mentor" and as I have mentioned previously, I have access to a fairly well known DP...I'm just not sure if I could ask for experience from him. I'm really reluctant to ask. Is there some sort of line that I shouldn't cross when it comes to DPs and work experience? I mean, I don't want to go chasing such a well known DP, when I should really start somewhere smaller...

 

Should I start off small and eventually work my way up to asking him? Because as it is now, I have very little on-set experience and I'm scared of making a fool of myself when it comes to set etiquette, and how much I actually know...

 

Lise :blink:

 

p.s - This forum is certainly like one giant mentor! you guys are excellent!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

May be what you could do is give him a call, meet him, tell him you LOVE his work (that may be true, better have seen all his work before), tell him you study and want to work in the industry, then see waht he says. You could ask him when he's in prep for a film, to meet his assistants (they're also are not closed to female's charm... ;) ) see the tests at the rental house (where you'll learn a lot) and afterwards, ask to come sometimes on the shooting, and then, do what M. Zanit told you he used to do : watch, listen, be a shadow... Things will come their own way...

[Lise Camp]

Hi,

 

You're a girl. Wear a big pink bow in your hair, smile sweetly, and look cute. Even hoary old British DPs have a morsel of warmth somewhere in their hearts.

 

Phil

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Phil,

wearing a big pink bow in my hair, smiling sweetly and looking cute will NOT help! Infact, it would work against me! I have discovered (and have been told numerous times from previous lecturers) that because I am a GIRL it will be difficult to find any kind of work - even if I am offering myself to work for free! My first day at university I introduced myself to my lecturer and his reply wasn't "nice to meet you", instead it was "*grunt* our first girl. I'll be surprised...very surprised if you actually make it in this industry." He then looked me up and down and turned his nose up!!! To which i replied "well, I'll see you at the top then! Only I'll be lookin down at you!"

 

It sucks that being female has to be something that works against me... Although, all it has done has made me more determined to prove sexist pigs wrong.

 

May be what you could do is give him a call, meet him, tell him you LOVE his work (that may be true, better have seen all his work before), tell him you study and want to work in the industry, then see waht he says. You could ask him when he's in prep for a film, to meet his assistants (they're also are not closed to female's charm... ;) ) see the tests at the rental house (where you'll learn a lot) and afterwards, ask to come sometimes on the shooting, and then, do what M. Zanit told you he used to do : watch, listen, be a shadow... Things will come their own way...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

That is very good advice. And I do LOVE his work and have seen most of it. I think learning during pre is an excellent idea and would certainly help when it comes to wanting experience later on. Thanks heaps. I think I might give him a call soon - I believe he is currently overseas filming a feature for Andrew Adamson.

 

Lise :blink: