Michael LaVoie

Funny. I almost made this point yesterday but I thought it was too negative. haha. I agree and I think the last thing that any insecure producer/director/actor wants is to be surrounded by far more competent crew as it could make them look green. So they employ a top down approach of bottom rung candidates so that nobody on set knows more than them. This practice is industry agnostic although in film, you can see it everywhere. Take a wander through Linked in at some of the resumes of junior and even senior VP's. You'll find a ton of people with zero background and education in entertainment who landed jobs at top development companies. Truly a head scratcher.

B&H dropped this in my inbox today. XPeria Pro available for pre-order. But the cost? Yikes! I guess it does multiple tasks, livestreaming in 5G (w 3rd party apps), HDMI-in for monitoring and USBC tethering when shooting with other cameras. Buying gear to do all this would be cheaper than the cost of this phone. On the other hand, a phone with Sony's Venice color science in the sensor? Along with Sony's pro menu in the U.I. when you open the camera? Hard to resist. For Android users, the biggest hurtle to smartphone production work is the godawful buggy, thoroughly confusing 3rd party apps like Filmic Pro that never work right on Androids and always crash repeatedly. I have to wonder if their U.I. really gives you actual control over the camera and if it operates with stable consistency. Anyone tried it on the Experia 1 II?

Personally I can't watch the films of Wes Anderson or Miranda July and not get the general sense that these are artists making movies. Granted not every director would fall into that category but not everyone has the same approach to storytelling. For some, the craft is just a means to tell the story, for others "how" they tell the story is almost the whole point.

True. He has stated in interviews that he doesn't remember how he did most of those films cause he was drinking too heavily. I don't know if that refers to his time on set or between films but he has admitted to having a problem with that. I think with any craft, there are techniques that are going to be abandoned with advancing technology but then there are general principles which will apply no matter the technology used. I'm for preserving and promoting the latter. If for no other reason than it would help newcomers to know that stuff so they can break the rules as they go forward.

Where this really is a disaster is when you have the production positions filled with first timers. Like a 1st A.D. who's learning on the job. That's truly ridiculous. You need to be a 2nd, 2nd A.D. for a while and work up to being a 1st. Ideally doing it for someone who is experienced and good, otherwise you'll have no idea what that job actually is. The same holds true for most positions in film and tv.

In the past I'd attempt to make that point to producers that if they're looking for a "lighting designer" for their crew then they need to fire their DP. That never worked unfortunately. Inexperienced producers often mistake the role of gaffer for a lighting designer and assume that the DP only has to know about the camera and lenses. Attempting to school a producer in this area is a war of attrition. Don't bother. There are some producers who hire cinematographers based on their ability to properly evaluate lighting levels across the set and set the lights according to the camera settings rather than the other way around. That's the difference between a DP and a videographer. A videographer adjusts the camera to the environment. The DP adjusts the environment to the camera. But again, we're talking about DP's who probably don't know how to use a light meter. There isn't much to gain in pointing it out to them. Producers hire based on reputation and resume. Stating the obvious or calling someone out on their bullshit rarely ever makes you look correct. Especially when you are.

I wonder if this processor will make it's way into their line of SXRD projectors.

To tweak in postproduction and apply that common teal orange look of blockbuster movies you're referring to, this software package offers finishing LUT's. The M31 is the one that gives the look you're after. Just keep in mind that less is more. You can apply this to an adjustment layer and only use it at 60% or so. Usually that's more than enough.

I remember that issue of American Cinematographer. Lynch and Deming discussed that scene a lot and it was super important to them how dark it was. Unfortunately when that scene occurred there was also a reel change. I remember cause I was a projectionist back then. Funny to hear how all that careful deliberation was literally chopped out of the film because of the accident that the scene occurred during a reel change and most of us didn't know why there was so much black leader in the head of the reel. We literally chopped it all out. Well, most of us. I knew better. Cause I was reading A.C.

Another trick I used was when I've need crew on smaller corporate or documentary gigs where I need an ultra quiet set. I've hired sound recordists and explained prior to arrival on set that I actually want them to work as grips or as an A.C. This was primarily because the job was too small to bother working with career A.C.'s or grips who in many cases, would not be a good fit in a corporate office environment. I needed people that would work and remain quiet most of the time. A sound recordist working as an A.C. is also not interested in taking your job and handing out their own DP business cards on your set. Which has happened to me in the past. So, there's also that security. This always worked well because most sound recordists know how to use a C-stand and many can even pull focus on basic shoots where there isn't complicated wireless camera gear to learn and setup. It saved me valuable time. It's like hiring a general P.A. but one who can actually use and setup camera / lighting gear. The breaking point for me was hiring a Gaffer who would only delegate. Never actually do anything. That's great on a large set where there's a pre-light crew and a large team. You gotta have someone on set to call out to people and keep track of who's on what. But not when it's 2 and 2. In that situation, chilling with a coffee while 2 guys work their ass off is just ridiculous. That's why I started going with all swing.

I stopped hiring gaffers a while back because I was doing smaller shorts and features where there was mostly house power and no need for electrical distribution. I was asking production to only hire "Swing" as our G&E crew. There were no gaffers, grips, no electrics. No best. Nada. Just swing. This meant no hierarchy on set. Zero middle management, zero discussion. Just hands. Which is exactly what I wanted. Just hands moving units where I wanted and needed them. Obviously this would never fly on an IATSE shoot but for non-union simple 1 ton jobs, it was a real breeze. I'd never attempt this on a regular set or something where there are lots of trucks and huge areas to light.

Everything Aapo and others mentioned about experienced producers, presales and distribution advances is 100% spot on. If you really want to learn filmmaking. Read The Biz It is a business first. Plan for a profit and you will likely ensure that people see your film. What's out of your control is when someone like Weinstein buys your film and buries it on purpose so that it doesn't compete with other films they are releasing at the same time. Those are business tactics that do happen as are theater chains closing, studios shelving etc. But, honestly, those are good problems to have. You will likely make another film if you have problems like that.

Name an industry where it isn't all about "who you know".

If you're an outsider, the entertainment business is designed to make you quit. That applies to everyone. Also, keep in mind that Hollywood isn't greenlighting anything financially risky. But they acquire and distribute risky films all the time. The Oscars, Sundance, etc. These are actually reasons for studios to buy certain independent films where there is more diversity in front of and behind the camera. Moonlight, an Oscar winner of 2017 only pulled in 22million domestically on a 2M budget. Which for an indie is great. but for a best picture Oscar winner is pretty low by comparison to other winners. Dallas Buyers Club did $28M domestically on a 5M budget. Even for the top winning diversity films, they are usually box office bombs but studios buy them anyway for the awards.

Most movies are co-financed and produced by various companies. This is for a number of reasons. Actors may own a production company and prefer a share of the profits over a salary, etc. So they join as a producing entity. But typically within this consortium there's one central developing company or production company that is the real reason the movie is being made. It's their film and they may choose to make that apparent in the credits. This is why there's a slideshow of logos in front of every movie. Nobody goes all in on financing their movie cause 99% of them lose money. It's not ego really. It's just making sure people know which of those companies actually made the film.

I will consider Kinefinity a viable brand when AbelCine takes on their product line for sale or rent.

Same. Way back in the day I'd actually color correct for a Rec709 consumer box TV set with factory settings and always had better results from that than any flat screen or computer monitor. Now I have an HP Dreamcolor Display calibrated with an X-rite puck and although it usually performs, there are always issues with getting true black. I use a waveform but it's those highlights and shadows where you want to know how dark is too dark. A war of attrition given how little people seem to care about true black at all these days. When calibrating or when finishing a grade I would often put a clip up online on an unpublished page and then visit a local bestbuys or Microcenter. Then I'd go through various brands of laptop PC's tablets, Macs etc. Whatever devices they had online and check out how the clip looked on a variety of screens and conditions. Just to see an overall benchmark. Calibrating only to industry specs leads to issues like that Game of Thrones finale battle scene that nobody could see because it was graded for a perfectly calibrated screen watched in a pitch black room with perfect internet speed. Best to plan for people watching stuff on phones and computers with wildly different results.

I hope that after they filmed that shot of a single woman waist up, they also filmed a dance number with multiple subjects on frame together side by side head to toe. Otherwise that entire effort was killing a fly with a bazooka. You could do that shot with one crew member on a stage a quarter that size. Not sure anyone is safe in that pic anyway in spite of the PPE. Given the recent experiment we saw in Japan...

This company builds systems that would definitely run unreal 5 with no trouble. https://www.pugetsystems.com/ I may talk to those guys end of summer to see about getting something custom built. Gotta save up.

Yeah but the money for a topshelf graphics card or entire mocap system is nothing compared to what it would cost to shoot it live. I took a look at a complete package from Iclone and it was under $30k. Not too bad. Matt Workman took an interesting approach to capture and is using an HTC Vive. Which is cool cause at least you can play games on it. I haven't upgraded my post system in about 10 years so I'm probably gonna go all in on something that can do this. The time to learn it well enough to work proficiently is probably 3 years at a minimum. By then the processing power and software abilities and cost to build worlds, characters etc will probably come down in price and take less and less time. I see this whole effort as getting exponentially cheaper and faster for everyone and soon it will be a much more common mode of commercial and narrative production. I have several feature scripts for indies that cost too much to get a greenlight as a live action film nowadays anyway but they'd make great animated films. It's definitely worth looking into. The virtual camera unit system is awesome. Where you can use a tablet as a camera and handhold shots. I love that feature. I like Blender for now cause as you said it runs on older hardware and while I'm learning, it's perfect. Plenty of tutorials and the interfaces are similar anyway.

Funny, I've been thinking the exact same thing. Blender or Unreal, Faceware tech, Rokoku suits and using lyrebird A.I. to change voices in post. Never seen this done on a small scale character driven indie film. That might be interesting. I'm starting with a small webseries in Blender. Finishing up the scripts now and learning the software. A feature film in Unreal or Blender might be tough for one person to manage. Have you asked anyone about the timeline of creating and rendering photorealistic characters and worlds for narrative production? I'm very curious about how long that might take. Also, the overall cost of buying objects and sets from those marketplaces vs scanning 2D photos of locations and making virtual sets out of them. I've seen people doing this in Blender. I can imagine the cost would add up. 110 scenes and 300 shots? That could become expensive if you have to buy all the assets in each shot. If you have to make it all from scratch it might take forever.

The new Sony XPeria 1 ii Pro actually has an HDMI in to use the phone as a monitor. Though it would big as an EVF. It also supports live broadcasting through 5G. Sadly, this is not available in the US at the moment. Hopefully soon. It may turn out to be a Japan only product.

Non-luck related career advancement is impossible. Someone somewhere is greenlighting you as the film or TV shows cinematographer and they have to say yes. Luck is just another word for timing. So you have to meet that individual, first, then they have to like you and or your work. Both out of your hands in most cases. Even if you go the producing route and literally create your own opportunity. You still have to pitch investors. Sit down with bankers and convince them of your vision and ability to make it happen. So even in that case they have to say yes. The only way out of luck is to be independently wealthy. Which many successful Hollywood players are. Take Megan Ellison. Annapurna is basically a hobby project. It continually loses money despite producing amazing films with A-list stars. Some people are just too big to fail though. When your father is Larry Ellison, you're not terribly worried about the bottom line.

Correction: "Don't buy Apple, Nike or Levi".... products. But their stock? Uhm, yeah. Go for it. In the meantime, whether you're a narrative or commercial DP, the best thing you can do is team up with really talented writer/directors who have a strong vision and whose work, whether commercial or narrative will get noticed. Then you have to hope that as they move up, they take you with them. Cause that's how you typically climb. On the strength of the work and the relationships. However, the odds of this are so low. You have to find that person and click with them and then stars must align to make your projects viable and possible. All out of your control. Seriously, if I knew then what I know now, I'd say back off the cinematography thing entirely. haha. Learn how to produce. If you can create your own opportunities you can shoot whatever you want once you raise the money. Not that raising money isn't hard. It's very difficult but once you do, it gets slightly easier each time. Provided you make consistent returns to your investors or banks. Whichever are backing you.

Drive-ins won't work in cities like NY. Rooftop Cinema Club which, one would think could manage this easier than most is still closed for Covid 19 till further notice. I've seen many movies at Rooftop Films. Looks like they may be gone soon as well.