Merland Hoxha

Good point

I was clearly referring about getting a movie distributed rather than produced. There's a huge difference between these two. And yeah Netflix prefers acquiring the rights to an existing movie rather than producing a new one; most of the time. Just look at their library. This is pretty obvious.

Are you meditating or just too tired to write a full response? If you're meditating I would like to know which meditation you use. I heard transcendental meditation is good. Lynch is always bragging about the benefits he gets from it.

There's companies like Netflix who will. If your movie looks good(mostly cinematography-wise) you will most likely get into at least a few B-level festivals and you will meet someone who will make you an offer upfront. There's not such a thing as an inexperienced producer/filmmaker who makes a good movie(still referring to the visuals).

And I agree with Miguel that if you make a movie that "looks good", you can sell it easily. The biggest misconception is that it's all about the story. Not true at all. A movie will sell, if it looks reasonably well shot; if it looks like a movie rather than an ambitious student project, you will sell it. Unless you have zero interpersonal skills and can't show up to a meeting without looking completely homeless. In that case, shave your beard and shower. If you don't, you might still sell the movie :)

You have a much higher chance of making a crappy feature and sell it to Netflix/Amazon/Sony Classics than to make a short that will lead you to be hired as a director on a mid-high budget feature or a TV show. As a matter of fact a Sundance, SXSW, TIFF winning short still not be enough to get you to work in Hollywood. Just look at the previous winners; with a few exceptions, facts speak by themselves.

Well I hired a person to clean the sound in post. As for the actual recording I boomed an overhead mic and got help by a film student I used to take classes with. Either way thanks for offering your help. I'm located in LA though. are you in in NJ? I'm shooting my next short in late May. MH

George: I did hire a person to clean the sound in post and they did improve the short but I guess not well enough. I wasn't happy with the results either as it didn't sound cinematic and I guess the right amount of compression is what was missing. I must say that I'm proud of recording he voice-over by myself though. My actor was really good. And yes the BMCC has a great dynamic range and by exposing to the right, I was able to recover a lot of the details in the shadow (with some noise). Macks: I agree that the the sound needed a better approach both during production (I used the in-camera sound only, in some scenes), and in post( compression and folley are main factors). Joshua: As for the movie being too long for its own stake is because I wanted to make sure to express the idea of Jonathan's life falling apart as much as I could. I wanted to show that this happens gradually. I do agree thought that for festival purposes, by cutting the movie in half, it would have greatly benefited from it. It's interesting that you're mentioning that the movie wants to be a comedy though. That wasn't really my goal but someone mentioned to me that it has elements of satire. As for using master shots mostly, I think that's my biggest mistake in this film. I just like the idea of perfect composition and getting points of view that nobody else gets. I don't like moving the camera much to be honest, but then again I do understand that this has been the standard for decades. In particular, in the last few years filmmakers have been seeking an extreme realism at the point that many movies use handheld despite the large accessibility of tripods and steadicams. I guess I will have to find a compromise between my personal style and what's now considered "cinematic". By saying that I have my own style though, I'm not trying to establish that filmmaking is completely subjective because I do understand the importance of camera movement, and coverage. I'm not just at the point yet to make these artistic choices. Thanks for the advice everyone. I agree with some of your observations and disagree with some others but this is very helpful. MH

Hi everyone, I have written/directed a short film last year and as I'm approaching the production of my new short film, I would like to hear some experts options about the look of my film. This was a one-man-crew project and therefore I didn't have the resources/time to hire a DP at the time and I would like to hear some opinions of how can I improve my visual storytelling skills. I am aware of many of the errors I have made in my short but I'm not going to bring up my point of view as I would much prefer to hear some "fresh" observations. Thanks in advance for taking the time to analyze this. PS: feel free to comment on anything about this short but I'm mostly interested in hearing opinions about: cinematography and coverage(if that's a separate category at all). Thank you, MH Password is: 11112222