So how difficult is it to use 16mm?

[John Brawley]

Not at all. They're (often) crappy because they're hard to load, hard to handhold, have dark, vignetted, grainy, misaligned viewfinders, they're noisy...

Phil

Phil. You're repeating yourself.

 

You must have the worst luck in renting cameras. Clearly your experiences are not mine.

 

 

> What ? This doesn't even make sense. Are you saying the ground glass fell out on a camera you were shooting with ?

 

On that SR1 mod, if you tilted the camera from side to side, the groundglass would move about twice the width of the framelines. Dire I know and clearly a fault that should have been fixed but I have seen it on other cameras too.

Phil

 

I've never seen such a fault. Not to say it doesn't happen. ...you really don't have much luck....

 

 

> One could easily say that the video camera had a dirty head that meant you thought it was recording but all you've got is pixellated rubbish......

 

Yes but you know on the day.

Phil

 

The point I was making is that there as many pitfalls for those that don't know what they're doing on both formats.

 

 

> I live in Australia which is NOT the US. I have no trouble finding telecine for $250 per hour to Digibeta. (a spirit here is $1000 per hour)

 

Nor is it the UK with our standard approach of making everything pointlessly expensive.

 

Phil

 

Hey. I just rang the BEEB resources. They quoted me 180 pounds...about the going rate here as well. (that included VTR hire which my aussie quote didn't). I didn't bother trying to negotiate a better deal although the pleasant man on the other end was already giving me the word on how to get the rate down

 

 

 

> You mustn't be a very happy person.

 

 

 

But here's the thing. Looking at your website, you're clearly a successful DP. Fine, good for you. But like the most ardent proponents of photochemical origination, you are insulated from its problems. You don't have to load mags, you don't have to pay for it. If it breaks you scream at the rental house until they send you another one. You have no reason to know about most of the problems of film because you simply never have to care about it. Other people do that for you.

 

The experience of shooting film under fully-funded conditions is quite significantly different to trying to do it on a shoestring.

Phil

 

Um. Yes I do. You are the one that has old notions of what it is to shoot film. And you are making assumptions about the way I shoot film. I sometimes load my own mags. I just finished my first feature film and did several days where it was just me, the director and the sound recordist. I pulled my own focus and loaded my own mags....on the Aaton 35, one of the more fiddly 35mm cameras.

 

I bet you that the average feature budget in the UK is greater than here in Australia. The budget on my "fully" funded feature was 1.7 Million. There are low budget films being shot for less then a million (on film) here. Few Australian features cost more than 3 million to make. That is a shoestring budget.

 

This weekend gone I worked on a short, shot on 35mm. They bought short ends, did some deals with crew and post. i reckon they wouldn't have spent more than 5 grand making their film. Aside from a few publicly funded shorts, almost all of my film orginated shorts were short for a pittance. There's no such thing as fully funded. Oh. And my loader has only been doing it for a few months and has volunteered for me on several *films* for the experience.

 

And I care very much about any problems that are to do with my work because it reflects badly on me when it doens't work, even if it's not my fault. So I care.

 

What do you know about they way I work ?

 

I worked for 5 years at one of the larger rental companies here in Australia, who were also Aaton agents. I used to often work as a two man crew doing basic lighting and recording sound shooting on film, often for UK productions. I also worked in rentals for 2 years and while there were some of the problems you mention with the film cameras, there were just as many if not more from the video cameras. I had one caller in the middle of the night who complained his viewfinder wasn't working. After about half an hour we established his viewfinder brightness was turned all the way down.

 

 

Furthermore:

 

> You can easily go to a local camera equipment rental company and ask them to let you sit in the corner

> and practise loading a camera.

 

No, you can't. Not only are there only about three such places in the UK, so the chances of one of them being local to Mr. Ashley-Smith is tiny, but they're constantly inundated with requests like this. If I ran one of them, I'd be turning people down - and I'm a fantastic human being. There are so many wannabes and so little work, all you'll do with requests like this is poison the water for the future.

Phil

 

I just rang Panavision UK. They had no problems with me making a time later this week. ICE were also happy for me to stop by and practise my loading. I don't know how close they both are to Kent. Looks like about 3 finger widths on google maps...

 

 

There are no small scale productions shooting film in the UK. If you can afford film, you can afford the best crews. There is no starting-out here.

 

Phil

 

Are you seriously trying to tell me that no one in the entire UK shoots low budget short or student films on film ?

 

Phil I reckon you're just making general statements based on your own cynical and jaded views. I guess Mr Ashley-Smith may well be a wannabe....Im sure he appreciates your assistance and advice.

 

 

jb

[Alan West]

Getting back to the original question...

 

Having just been in the same situation, learning to load and operate a simple (an old Bell and Howell 70DR in my case) 16mm camera is not that difficult, espcially if you have shot still film on an SLR. However, it is quite expensive in the UK - I found it was nearly £100 per 100ft roll for colour negative to buy the film, get it processed (with a large minimum charge) and telecine. This means that if the results are not what you were expecting, finding out whether the problem is you or the equipment (or a combination of both) quickly becomes rather expensive and long winded.

 

Alan

[timHealy]

Aside from Phils the world is ending point of view, 16 mm is easy and enjoyable. And you'll love the quality of your images. I got a job as a camera loader right out of college and since the movie had money for only one experienced AC, I did more than just load mags. What I am trying to say is that one does not have to be a rocket scientist to figure it out.

 

I would say get yourself a Bolex, a light meter, and a few rolls of film and start shooting.

 

And if you find yourself in NYC anytime soon, shoot me an email and I'll show you how to use my Arri SR.

 

Best

 

Tim

[Chad Stockfleth]

a camera isn't a toy to play around with.

 

 

I might disagree here. No need to take ourselves too seriously. You can't hurt yourself or others by fiddling with a camera.

 

Get your hands on whatever you can and experiment. You seem like a reasonably intelligent person, I'm sure you'll do fine.

[Phil Rhodes]

> Are you seriously trying to tell me that no one in the entire UK shoots low budget short or student films on film ?

 

Yes. It certainly isn't done to any appreciable extent. Probably ten or twenty productions a year at starting-as-a-loader sort of level, if that.

 

> You must have the worst luck in renting cameras.

 

No, I'm just forced to rent the very cheapest stuff available - and (and this is very important) I am not a client any rental house really needs to care about. In the UK, it is a given that the majority - the vast, overwhelming, ninety-nine-percent-plus majority - of inexperienced filmmakers are going nowhere, because there is really nowhere to go in an industry that doesn't exist. They (and I, when I was at that point) aren't coming back with a big budget show in five years. There are almost no big budget shows. Why would anyone give a damn.

 

> Hey. I just rang the BEEB resources. They quoted me 180 pounds...

 

Yes that's nearly 600 Aussie dollars by the time you've factored in our exorbitant taxes. Still, I'm staggered: I'd love to know what the specifics of that deal were. Usually it's the transfer that screws film production here, not the gear or the stock.

 

> I just rang Panavision UK

 

You are very strange. You're also Australian, which probably doesn't hurt - there's a huge influx of Aussie crew, for some godforsaken reason. Hey, come to the UK, and make less money to work on worse productions, and get rained on! Yeay!

 

> I bet you that the average feature budget in the UK is greater than here in Australia.

 

Given the figures you mention, you could not possibly be further from the truth. People scrape features together for pocket money on miniDV here. There is almost no indigenous feature production whatsoever - a dozen shows a year, if that.

 

> They bought short ends, did some deals with crew and post.

 

You can't do any of those things here, for reasons already more than adequately covered.

 

Other guy:

 

> And you'll love the quality of your images.

 

The last 16 I shot was uniformly soft throughout, presumably because we believed the viewfinder. It was just barely on the brink of usable. I didn't love it.

 

> I got a job as a camera loader right out of college

 

Yes, yes, of course you did, because you are in the United States of America. That does not happen here.

 

Phil

[AdamBray]

Phil, please just stay out of this thread. You gave your opinion already. No need to comment on everyone elses opinion.

Edited September 3, 2007 by AdamBray

[Andy_Alderslade]

I might disagree here. No need to take ourselves too seriously. You can't hurt yourself or others by fiddling with a camera.

 

Get your hands on whatever you can and experiment. You seem like a reasonably intelligent person, I'm sure you'll do fine.

 

I really agree, people seem to assume that filmmaking particularly shooting actual film is a high art that only a few people can do, when in fact amateurs have been shooting 16mm and 8mm film for most of the 20th century. Of course granted a professional will obviously deliver better results.

 

 

To Daniel's question - there's no harm picking up a bolex or a K3 and just experimenting with 16mm, however in today's climate of always transferring to digital, the telecine will make this expensive - with a student discount for the film 200' (5 minutes) will easily come to £100 for film, developing and telecine.

 

Its because of this reason why I think David Mullen's strategy of learning filmmaking is better - Learn to shoot narrative on DV, learn to shoot film on super 8 reversal films and project them at home. This is amore acute and economic method.

 

Super 8 isn't cheap in the UK, but it avoids the incredible price of telecine, and subsequently will give you a chance to experiment and learn without breaking the bank. Seeing projected reversals will teach you a great deal more than having a telecine operator correct and hide your mistakes.

 

When there is a slightly more sizable and prepared project then think about borrowing or renting a 16mm camera and shooting negative for telecine.

 

Just my two-pence,

Andy

 

Question to Phil - Was that last 16mm experience on that questionable SR1 that you've mentioned several times before?

[Phil Rhodes]

Yes, it was.

 

P

[John Brawley]

> Are you seriously trying to tell me that no one in the entire UK shoots low budget short or student films on film ?

 

Yes. It certainly isn't done to any appreciable extent. Probably ten or twenty productions a year at starting-as-a-loader sort of level, if that.

 

Oh. Right. Cause before you said no-one...now it's 10 or 20. that's a substantial increase.....in 12 hours.....

 

Did you know that 67% of statistics are made up on the spot ?

 

 

> You must have the worst luck in renting cameras.

 

No, I'm just forced to rent the very cheapest stuff available - and (and this is very important) I am not a client any rental house really needs to care about.

 

You're paranoid. They don't care about you ?

 

 

 

 

> Hey. I just rang the BEEB resources. They quoted me 180 pounds...

 

Yes that's nearly 600 Aussie dollars by the time you've factored in our exorbitant taxes. Still, I'm staggered: I'd love to know what the specifics of that deal were. Usually it's the transfer that screws film production here, not the gear or the stock.

 

Phil. I spent 3 minutes talking on the phone and asked for the card rate. By my figuring of exchange rate it's $500. Maybe the rest is tax. that also included a VTR (which mine didn't) and my australian rate is a discounted rate. the card rate is about the same. As I mentioned, he practically started discounting before I'd even asked....

 

If I can ring the first number listed in Google under telecine london and get a better rate than you, don't you think that's saying something ?

 

> I just rang Panavision UK

 

You are very strange. You're also Australian, which probably doesn't hurt - there's a huge influx of Aussie crew, for some godforsaken reason. Hey, come to the UK, and make less money to work on worse productions, and get rained on! Yeay!

 

Umm. They would help me...because I'm Australian.....yep. Well. Maybe it makes sense....At least the colonials aren't whingers. Maybe they like my sparkling demeanour. And guess what. I'm not Australian. I just live here. And I also know lots of Australians who do travel to the UK and seem to have no trouble finding work in film and tv. And you poms make some great TV and Film.

 

> I bet you that the average feature budget in the UK is greater than here in Australia.

 

Given the figures you mention, you could not possibly be further from the truth. People scrape features together for pocket money on miniDV here. There is almost no indigenous feature production whatsoever - a dozen shows a year, if that.

 

They've only got statistsics up to 1993...when 103 features were made....maybe it's collapsed to a dozen or less in the last 3 years ? The last time it was less than 12 was 1912....when 2 were made. Oh yeah. And that's when they invented the feature film so none were made before that.

 

67% of statistics.......

 

http://www.bfi.org.uk/filmtvinfo/stats/filmprod.html

 

It's certainly more than gets made here in Australia.

 

> They bought short ends, did some deals with crew and post.

 

You can't do any of those things here, for reasons already more than adequately covered.

 

Phil. It hasn't been covered. I bet you I could ring some TVC production companies and buy or even have their short ends donated. Everyone else seems to disagree with you. It must take a lot of energy to be so negative.

 

jb

[Phil Rhodes]

> They've only got statistsics up to 1993...when 103 features were made....

 

Ah yes the BFI.

 

Their totals will include all the imported American stuff.

 

Someone who was latterly one of my best short-film clients used to work at a commercials production company. Aha, you'd think, she'd be replete with short ends. Not likely! They fridged every inch of the stuff for the next job. The idea that people routinely give away thousands of feet of film is outdated at best.

 

Phil

[Charles MacDonald]

To Daniel's question - there's no harm picking up a bolex or a K3 and just experimenting with 16mm, however in today's climate of always transferring to digital, the telecine will make this expensive - with a student discount for the film 200' (5 minutes) will easily come to £100 for film, developing and telecine.

Super 8 isn't cheap in the UK, but it avoids the incredible price of telecine, and subsequently will give you a chance to experiment and learn without breaking the bank. Seeing projected reversals will teach you a great deal more than having a telecine operator correct and hide your mistakes.

If you are trying to LEARN filmmaking, using a 16mm Camera with Reversal stock and beg or borrow a real projector! is a great way to pick us stuff quickly.

 

This avoids the Telecine trap. IN fact see if their is a lab that will still strike a workprint. You can do shots for the story you want to work on, and just stash the negative away. while watching/showing the workprint. When you have a bunch of stuff that you want to take to the next step, get out the rolls of Negative that have the good shots, splice them together with a cement splicer and get it all tranfered as one session. (Give the telecine folks notes and understand you will definatly have to spend the 5 cents a foot to have the film cleaned.

 

YOu can even try an edit on the workprint but remember that the stock is Polyester these days (The lab I use - uses 3383) and you will have to use on of those awful tape splicers to cut the workprint together. (WANTED, Film cement that works on Poly film!)

 

Per minute costs are a lot cheaper on Video., but that is Televison production not film making is it not?

[John Brawley]

> They've only got statistsics up to 1993...when 103 features were made....

 

Ah yes the BFI.

 

Their totals will include all the imported American stuff.

 

No Phil. It doesn't.

 

Here's the breakdown on UK native, co-pro's and foreign film shot in the UK.

 

http://www.bfi.org.uk/filmtvinfo/stats/box...eatures-03.html

 

Someone who was latterly one of my best short-film clients used to work at a commercials production company. Aha, you'd think, she'd be replete with short ends. Not likely! They fridged every inch of the stuff for the next job. The idea that people routinely give away thousands of feet of film is outdated at best.

 

Phil

 

I got a bunch last week for nix. I'd be happy to send it to you now that I've organised some practise loading and a cheaper telecine deal for you.

 

jb

[Phil Rhodes]

Feel free to send it to some worthy starving filmmaker!

 

Phil

[Jon Kukla]

I had no problems whatsoever getting into rental houses and later working on professional FILM gigs when I was living the UK during the past four years. (And for the record, my departure from the country had nothing to do with the industry and only to do with sudden new Home Office visa rules that made it impossible for me to stay.) It's very simple: networking, networking, networking. And of course knowing your stuff as well as you can. I had no real experience prior, nor did I have any connections of my own - I just got in there, learned the equipment, learned the theory, and tried to help as many ACs as would let me. Then contacted them and slowly got jobs. In fact, if you want to learn 16mm, the UK is probably one of the best places in the world to be - it's more popular there than 35mm is, and there's even been a backlash to a certain degree against HD, due to implementation problems. Which is not to say that HD is going away, but 16mm seems to be a solid "known" quantity that producers are still comfortable with. Kodak and Arri both consult the UK market extensively when working on new 16mm products; Arri even had several secret development meetings with top camerapeople there to discuss what direction the 416 should go towards.

 

You can listen to Phil and just give up. But he's never addressed any of my contrary-wises EVER in any thread, so keep that in mind too. If you want to give this a try, though, no one's asking for you to make giant investments of money or sign any contracts, so you might as well give it a try and risk losing nothing but some time. However, if you wanna play life safe, I hear there's a shortage of accountants. (And Phil, please consider it! You'll be much...er, marginally happier.)

 

Just remember, people who succeed aren't perfect - they fail a lot too. The difference is that instead of moaning, they assess the situation and look for other possible solutions to the problem instead of giving up.

[Andy_Alderslade]

Yes, it was.

 

P

 

Well there's the answer the SR1 was never made for a super16 conversion, plus if like many its been worked non-stop since its manufacture its probably tuckered out. Bit lousy for a member or Arri staff to rent it out, they should know that even a free piece of equipment can be devastating if faulty.

 

Next time use those people I told you about, they have an Aaton XTR, SRII and SRIII, just make sure you get a relatively good AC to test it thoroughly first, they naturally can't keep their equipment polished like a rental firm, so just take an extra bit of care.

 

Regards,

Andy

[Phil Rhodes]

I think the most telling thing here is that on the list of productions we've been offered, the indigenous stuff made a under eight and a half million pounds. That's in total, you understand; a conglomerate of all locally-produced, locally-funded films. Most of them made no more than a few thousand pounds. If there is a word to describe a situation that woefully feeble, I'd like to know about it. Those statistics make my point more forcefully than anything I could possibly say.

 

Yes of course you could take out an SR3 or an XTR, but that will cost you a small fortune, so you won't - you'll take out something old and crappy. This is exacerbated by the fact that, as Mr. Kukla quite correctly notes, 16mm is used for a lot more TV stuff here. This means that decent, reliable 16mm cameras are extremely expensive to rent, disproportionately expensive, even for here. You therefore have a choice of using:

 

- Crappy 16mm cameras nobody else wants;

- Massively expensive 16mm cameras

- 35mm cameras which are probably cheaper to rent than the 16mm cameras (yes, seriously), but which of course cost a fortune to feed.

 

Tests are almost always impractical on small, one or two day shoots for things like music videos where the cost of the tests would approach the cost of the production. Unfortunately, the more tests are desperately required, the less likely they are to be done, in my experience.

 

Phil

[Jon Kukla]

I don't know where you're even coming from on the tests issue, Phil. Any DP worth his salt knows that rental houses and labs will let you use their resources gratis for a limited amount of test footage. And any DP or AC worth their salt will either have shortends on hand or be able to obtain test rolls if they don't have the right stock.

 

I've never heard of any 16mm shortages in the UK because, like any good business, they don't like to turn jobs down. And good luck finding a rental house that even has an SR2 - virtually everyone has gotten to the 90s now.

 

As for the cost of the equipment, no one but a fool ever pays full rate. I've shot student films on Moviecams with UltraPrimes for ridiculously low prices (still not dirt cheap, but far better than anyone should reasonably expect) - deals are always possible when you establish a good working relationship and remain as flexible as possible.

 

Any other straw men I should meet?

Edited September 4, 2007 by Jon Kukla

[Phil Rhodes]

> Any DP worth his salt knows that rental houses and labs will let you use their resources gratis for a limited amount

> of test footage.

 

Yes - if you're a feature or a very big name. Otherwise forget about it. This is one of the biggest problems with shortends in the UK; the fee for the clip test tends to be about a third of the potential value of the stock, so if it doesn't work out, you've just wasted a lot of money. I understand that in most other parts of the world it's unusual even to charge for this.

 

> And any DP or AC worth their salt will either have shortends on hand or be able to obtain test rolls if they don't

> have the right stock.

 

Again, if you are a very successful bigshot, yes maybe possibly. We're not talking about the top end of the market here.

 

> I've never heard of any 16mm shortages in the UK because, like any good business, they don't like to turn jobs

> down.

 

Who? The rental houses? Good luck - I've tried it myself.

 

> And good luck finding a rental house that even has an SR2 - virtually everyone has gotten to the 90s now.

 

I only know of three, and they're all privately owned.

 

> As for the cost of the equipment, no one but a fool ever pays full rate.

 

Again, again, again... if you are a huge American import feature, yes absolutely because you are taking enormous amounts of equipment out for months on end. If you are a major TVC production house, you will be back to them again and again and again. If you are a low budget music promo, forget about it. I'm not blaming anyone: it's what I'd do; you can't expect people to discount you more than a fraction if there's no real reason to believe they'll be good business in the future.

 

Really that's what this is about. The chances that anyone in the UK will ever become a major client of a lab, post or rental house is so vanishingly small - much, much smaller, at least hundreds of times smaller than anywhere else in the world - that there is no reason to assume anybody is worth discounting, so they don't. I've been there.

 

Phil

[Jon Kukla]

I'll put it bluntly - you're out of your mind. I've never had any of these problems that you claim exist, and I'm not at all a big-budget bigshot DP or AC - I just do regular work like dozens of others out there. If you can't get tests, you're simply not trying. If you can't find shortends and know ANYONE in the industry, you aren't trying.

 

I've been to rental houses many many times and never been told that there were no more S16s left. And my point about the SR2s is that there are so few left because EVERYONE HAS MOVED ON TO NEWER MODELS. Getting an XTR or SR3 is not a big deal.

 

In conclusion, I simply think you haven't made any significant effort.

 

But this is the whole point, isn't it? You want everyone to give up. Do you actually think random strangers will just suddenly listen to one random man ranting in the wind telling them to give up even trying to attempt their dreams? If you're right and everything is hopeless, you're still as much as fool to try to stop them as they are to try it (from your point of view). And they'll figure it out very quickly if it is so dreadful. If you're wrong, you've either squandered your chances and are too bitter, or worse are cynically trying to profit on the misconception that somehow you're going to intercept a significant percentage of people wanting to enter the field. There are better windmills to tilt at. And your pessimistic slant endears you to no one, including the handful of working professionals in the UK who also frequent this board. I don't care if that bothers you personally; I want you to seriously ponder what you're doing, what it is and isn't accomplishing, and what difference it really is going to make. Any fool can deride a newcomer.

[Daniel Smith]

Ok first of all, thanks for the replies. I've gotten a much better understanding of it now.

 

I think what Phil is trying to say here is, it's not worth it, for me anyway. And to be honest, I have to agree. It would cost me near enough 6 months savings to shoot a 16mm short, and then the film would sink into the depths of youtube and that would be that. Unless I find some amazing ways of distribution.. which is un-likely.

 

I don't think it is worth blowing all that hard work, on that. (I can't afford to blow £2500)

 

However. At least if some other students at Ravensbourne want to make a 16mm shoot, and want to collaborate, then I'm may just be up for it.

 

Once again, thanks. I certainly won't be funding any projects entirely by myself, but who knows who I'll meet in Ravensbourne.

 

I'd just love to make a 'Bad Taste' style film... I saw it the other day for the first time, awesome...

Edited September 4, 2007 by Daniel Ashley-Smith

[Phil Rhodes]

The only people I know who have shortends tend to be quite keen to hold on to them, as I've said. Both the major promo production places I've had any contact with jealously guarded them, and only gave away stuff that was so far out of date as to be not worth testing (which happened exactly once in five years). And when you say "dozens", you're probably quite accurate - there might just be two dozen regular working DPs in the UK. There's certainly no more than that. We simply don't produce enough to need them.

 

Getting an XTR or SR3 is not a big deal, no, it's just extremely expensive.

 

All I'm doing is describing the situation that exists. Unless you are exceptional in some noticeable away - you have family in the business, you have done a lot of very prominent work, you are one of the three people a year on the LFS cinematography course - you are simply not important enough to blip the radar of the big businesses. Most professional facilities here exist to service American imported productions, TV ads, and the very occasional music promo. If you are not one of those, if you do not walk in the door throwing thousands of pounds around, and believe me I've done it both ways - you do not exist.

 

No this is not what it's like in LA or New York, no this is not what it's like in Sydney or Toronto or wherever else. If you have found it to be otherwise, you were either lucky or, much more likely, extremely well-funded.

 

Dan, you can probably take an SR2 out for a day for £2500 if you can find one. Budget a couple of hundred quid for a loader off Shooting People who's worked with the camera before, or you will have problems. It's kind of liberating in some ways because while you won't be able to afford to transfer more than two or three rolls, that does mean you only have to buy two or three rolls. The breakdown is more or less 1000 for transfer, 500 for camera/head/legs/lenses/mags IF you can find a very good deal, say 350 for stock, 200 for loader, rest of it on lights and whatever else you need. Any camera you can get for those kind of rates is likely to be one of those ones I described above - you know, the sort of thing that rattles as you turn it over...

 

Anyway you'll have 30 minutes of stock and you'll have to find some way of recording audio. Use a miniDV camcorder if all else fails.

 

But no I don't think it's worth doing as an unconnected individual - what you'll learn over shooting some careful video is not worth the swingeing expense. I have done a couple of very small scale shoots on 16 but only under circumstances where I was paying for nothing (which is why I've only ever done it about twice). On one of those we did get more or less everything given to us, but as I related above, there were serious technical problems and as you surmise it's never been seen by anyone beyond those who made it.

 

By way of comparison I shot a two day short on 35 in LA about a year and a half ago and it cost me about 300 quid. This place blows.

 

Phil

[Daniel Smith]

The only people I know who have shortends tend to be quite keen to hold on to them, as I've said. Both the major promo production places I've had any contact with jealously guarded them, and only gave away stuff that was so far out of date as to be not worth testing (which happened exactly once in five years). And when you say "dozens", you're probably quite accurate - there might just be two dozen regular working DPs in the UK. There's certainly no more than that. We simply don't produce enough to need them.

 

Getting an XTR or SR3 is not a big deal, no, it's just extremely expensive.

 

All I'm doing is describing the situation that exists. Unless you are exceptional in some noticeable away - you have family in the business, you have done a lot of very prominent work, you are one of the three people a year on the LFS cinematography course - you are simply not important enough to blip the radar of the big businesses. Most professional facilities here exist to service American imported productions, TV ads, and the very occasional music promo. If you are not one of those, if you do not walk in the door throwing thousands of pounds around, and believe me I've done it both ways - you do not exist.

 

No this is not what it's like in LA or New York, no this is not what it's like in Sydney or Toronto or wherever else. If you have found it to be otherwise, you were either lucky or, much more likely, extremely well-funded.

 

Dan, you can probably take an SR2 out for a day for £2500 if you can find one. Budget a couple of hundred quid for a loader off Shooting People who's worked with the camera before, or you will have problems. It's kind of liberating in some ways because while you won't be able to afford to transfer more than two or three rolls, that does mean you only have to buy two or three rolls. The breakdown is more or less 1000 for transfer, 500 for camera/head/legs/lenses/mags IF you can find a very good deal, say 350 for stock, 200 for loader, rest of it on lights and whatever else you need. Any camera you can get for those kind of rates is likely to be one of those ones I described above - you know, the sort of thing that rattles as you turn it over...

 

Anyway you'll have 30 minutes of stock and you'll have to find some way of recording audio. Use a miniDV camcorder if all else fails.

 

But no I don't think it's worth doing as an unconnected individual - what you'll learn over shooting some careful video is not worth the swingeing expense. I have done a couple of very small scale shoots on 16 but only under circumstances where I was paying for nothing (which is why I've only ever done it about twice). On one of those we did get more or less everything given to us, but as I related above, there were serious technical problems and as you surmise it's never been seen by anyone beyond those who made it.

 

By way of comparison I shot a two day short on 35 in LA about a year and a half ago and it cost me about 300 quid. This place blows.

 

Phil

Out of interest Phil, are there other good places to shoot film? i.e. not America, places like Bulgaria, Spain etc.

 

A friend of mine had a budget of about 5k, and they managed to fly the entire cast and crew over to Bulgaria, provide accomodation and feed them. Ok fair enough, they were shooting MiniDV on a camera they already owned. But I'm wondering how the film prices compare with places in America.

 

And the reason I say, not America, is because it would cost too much to fly everyone out there.

 

£300 for a 35mm shoot is mental. If prices like that can be found in europe, then I think it will probably just be worth shooting it out there.

[Jon Kukla]

Please do not listen to Phil wrt prices. http://www.take2films.co.uk/Services/16mmCameras/SR3A.htm - that's a brand new SR3 kit at full price of 350 a day with most common accessories included. You will not be paying that rate even.

 

If you wanna make a Wes Anderson AMEX commercial for a 16mm short, that's probably gonna be a bite. But if you just wanna do some simpler work, you're not going to need crazy money for that. And I'm not even saying to use the SR3 - you can buy a K3 at a good price if you just wanna shoot some MOS stuff for yourself. But don't let the "pros" scare you off - it's not cheap, but it's not too expensive either. Certainly not 2500 a day, unless you want a Technocrane added in.

[Phil Rhodes]

Out of interest Phil, are there other good places to shoot film? i.e. not America, places like Bulgaria, Spain etc.

 

There seem to be three ways to make or save money by travelling with your production:

 

- Economic factors provoking lower cost of consumables/equipment/facilities:

 

This applies to everywhere in the world, compared to the UK, with the possible exception of Tokyo, and LA if you are a union production which makes things extremely expensive (but extremely good).

 

However this is not as easy to leverage as it might seem. I'm necessarily passing on hearsay here, but I understand that places like the Czech Republic, Morocco and Poland, where the cost of living can be much lower, are actually getting quite wise to productions coming into the country. Studio space and crew can no longer be had in Prague, for instance, for the knockdown rates of yore.

 

- Lower cost of living, saving money on subsistence:

 

This might be where the low-budget (but probably not microbudget) filmmaker can probably do quite well. Food, travel and accomodation is expensive in the UK. It is much cheaper in other places, particularly eastern Europe.

 

- Tax breaks:

 

This is not something that anyone other than fairly big productions looks at, because you're going to spend more on clever tax accountants than you save unless you are spending millions anyway - but even going to the Isle of Man is apparently worth it, even though you'll have to spend a pretty penny putting your crew up in the seafront hotels. But this probably isn't really applicable to you or me.

 

- Locations, extras, etc:

 

Robert Rodriguez borrowed MAC-10s from the Mexican police. Rules, regulations, and expectations of compensation can be very different in other areas. Obviously, this sort of thing requires excellent local contacts and language skills.

 

So.

 

Naturally there are factors which apply universally to any production that's travelling internationally to save money - particularly if you leave the EU. Travel and accomodation fees, the applicability and obtaining of work permits (with possibly attendant legal bills), insurances, possibly transporting large amounts of equipment, costume, props, hiring supernumerary locals to act as translators or guides, shipping unprocessed neg, etc. all increase costs over what you'd have paid if you'd just stayed at home.

 

That said if you are contemplating spending more than about three hours in a telecine suite, you will save money if you hop on the next Virgin flight to New York, and do it there, and get a nice weekend in Manhattan into the bargain.

 

Phil

 

PS - Oh yeah, that's four ways, I thought of another one while I was rambling. And anyone who can get a Technocrane for 2500 a day has my respect as a haggler.

[Freya Black]

Phil always makes me giggle because for the most part what he says is actually true, but theres something about the air of depression that surrounds it all that adds a little more of a special atmosphere. Usually there is a dig about the weather here at some point, I think it's raining in Phils heart. Maybe the remains of the film and tv industry here broke it.

 

Theres also something a bit tongue in cheek about it all but I think that goes over a lot of peoples heads.

 

I am in the u.k. and I do sort of shoot film, in the way that a few people do.

 

I have to say that I have had trouble even getting Kodak to talk to me here in England. I've called loads of times and they have promised to send me something in the post or ring me back, but I never hear from them again. The last time I spoke to Kodak U.K. They kind of implied they wouldn't be prepared to sell me the paticular stock I was intrested in anyway. Some of it probably depends what you sound like on the phone tho I'm sure. I've given up on them for the time being.

 

As for telecine. Ooooh! you were very lucky to hit the BBC quote first, I guess thats because B is early in the alphabet! The BBC telecine is reknoned for being very cheap for the u.k. It's only an old rank III but apparently they do a really good job on the transfers. Theres another even more secret rank in Birmingham apparently but that ones really secret. I don't know of any other cheap telecine in the u.k.

 

Phil is right about the availability of old 16mm equipment too. Theres little here and everyones fighting over it. I did manage to snag an old 16mm camera off ebay for £1 once tho. It's a 30's thing and a lot of people told me it looked like it had sat in a muddy ditch since that time, but I cleaned it up, filed out the gate to super16 and had a hand crank made up for it (it was missing it's crank). So I do have a hand crank S16 camera! It even has a taylor hobson lens! Uncoated of course! I've never shot film with it yet but I have a good feeling. ;)

 

Sometimes other junky cameras turn up but you have to watch like a hawk.

 

However there is a simple answer to all this, just import stuff from the U.S.A. where they have all those old filmo and keystone cameras to play with. When you have shot your film, post it back out to the states too and get it transferred there. :)

 

Another answer is just to ignore 16mm and go with S8. There are a few nice neg stocks available now and it's even easier to post to the states.

 

So I guess the answer is that yeah it is a bit crap here but you can just ignore the nasty scene here to a limited extent and do the import export thing. Of course if the dollar goes back up, we are stuffed! ;)

 

I know and accept all the crap stuff and I work around it as best I can, but I still love it when Phil has a good moan. I just feel like "Yeah you tell them Phil!"

 

"I'm just a little black rain cloud..." :)

 

love

 

Freya

Edited September 4, 2007 by Freya Black