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Could you win Best Editing without actually editing?


Joshua Robert Dy

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Hi, I'm a Zoomer film student and I was just thinking about the Super 8 competition where they were not allowed to do any post-production whatsoever on the one 50ft film they shot.

This got me thinking which led to the aforementioned title above. If you somehow were just able to shoot a feature length film in 10 4.5 minute rolls of 35mm in one takes, could you still win Best Editing awards?

Is Best Editing just a Post-Production only award or is Editing also in Production? This justs reminds me of an interesting video where it was discussed how animation was edited and apparently animation editors already hold significant roles in just Pre-Production!1!

hehe sorry if this was a dumb question, but still looking forward to cinematography.com's thoughts!

- Josh

Edited by Joshua Robert Dy
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It was actually done... I can't for the life remember the title. It was a hipster film shot in LA, using 2 perf and 1000ft loads. Very clever movie, well made actually. It all takes place in a single take, but they used the reel breaks as a "shot" change. All done on Steadicam and the operator(s) were beasts. Where the film COULD have been better, it wasn't half bad. Great low budget vibe and it had a little theatrical run on 35mm as well, that's where I saw it. Damn I wish I remembered the title. 

I mean theoretically if there is no physical editing, no editor attached to the project, you can't really get an editing award. Animation is edited in the storyboards, so they do have "editors" on both the pre-production AND production side as they will cut down scenes that don't work, so they always need an editor. But a film that was shot entirely in camera, roll by roll would not necessarily need an editor. However, if you're doing multiple takes it can be an issue. Also remember you need to put a slate in and mark each new roll. So that would need to be cut out, so an editor maybe necessary. 

Interesting thought tho! 

Oh and welcome to the forum! 

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5 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

Oh and welcome to the forum! 

Thanks Tyler! This is some really cool information that I really needed because, as a broke student, it would be turboeconomical to use as little film as possible (some suggested Shooting ratio be 6:1???!). Knowing it's possible to literally do a 1:1 shooting ratio and that someone did it, I guess this gives me lots a hope [it is going to be a M A S S I V E challenge tho]. Again, thanks so much Tyler!

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12 hours ago, Joshua Robert Dy said:

Thanks Tyler! This is some really cool information that I really needed because, as a broke student, it would be turboeconomical to use as little film as possible (some suggested Shooting ratio be 6:1???!). Knowing it's possible to literally do a 1:1 shooting ratio and that someone did it, I guess this gives me lots a hope [it is going to be a M A S S I V E challenge tho]. Again, thanks so much Tyler!

Bro tell me about it. I actually shot a feature in 2019 that we did one takes on pretty much everything and we only shot 25 rolls or something stupid like that. So if you count reaction shots and such, you're looking at 4:1 ratio? It was tight, but we got it done. Film looks great. It was 16mm tho, so that's something to think about. I think with 35mm, I'd try to go with 1000ft loads, but that's me. 

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1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

It was 16mm tho, so that's something to think about.

16mm was actually my plan all along! I am working on a very very tight budget (3-5000 USD) to make this feature (imma collect money from doing odd jobs and begging parents). This budget restriction is so because, even though I could [not to flex] convince my parents for 20 grand, not everyone (especially fellow countrymen of the third world) could chalk up that amount.

I did think about just using my sister's iPhone 4k camera and it would be much much cheaper, but I guess I'm a knight-errant filmmaker who still uses film ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

1 hour ago, Tyler Purcell said:

I'd try to go with 1000ft loads,

Given my budget, I'd probably be shooting on a Scoopic, Bolex, or K-3, so I'll be using 100-ft rolls (thinking of buying only 20 rolls of Tri-X for a total of <55 min) [our uni has a 16mm projector thats cool as hell and i wanna use it!!], and as for the vision of the film, it's still cooking ?

Thanks again Tyler for the info because im still trying to figure out the scope and limitations of my film. Cheers!

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14 minutes ago, Tyler Purcell said:

OHHHHH so do it as a spliced together, projected presentation? WOW that's nifty. 

Yeah, it's going to be projected in our uni theatre for my thesis film defense to my professors. This is going to sound ambitiously dumb, but for the thesis defense, I want to emulate the home movie 16mm projector vibe where every new roll has to be manually loaded. However, for the subsequent screenings, I will print the spliced version (I already inquired for Moviolas and Steenbecks here in the Philippines) on B&W print films [the print films are going to eat like at least half my budget].

19 minutes ago, Tyler Purcell said:

What about soundtrack? 

haha im boutta pass away from the thought of syncing audio in post!! However, to continue with the emulation of home movie projector screenings (really noisy), I'm going to try to make the film [ambitiously dumb once again] suitable with and without sound.

I have a Robert Wadlow-tall task ahead of me, but thanks for the support man!

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