Avoiding static filmmaking

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I may not have chosen the right words when talking about lingering shots versus cutting. I meant it when in the editing room, not when actually filmming. I was talking about cutting, as opposed to saying, "cut!"

 

I was talking about knowing when to cut, as in when to make the cut to the next shot. Sometimes it is necessary and sometimes all the magic happens in one long shot.

 

I realize what you are saying now and I was misunderstood.

[Jim Keller]

One of the biggest things that leads to these types of problems is simply a lack of comfort on the part of the participants. Especially on student films -- where people are unsure of their own abilities, desperately hoping to get their big break, wondering if they can ask to be excused to feed the meter -- people get tense and aren't able to relax and do what they do well.

 

When you watch someone who is truly great at something -- no matter what it is -- they make it look easy. I was remarking on this just yesterday watching old footage of Liberace. I play piano. I know how hard what he did is. And yet he makes it look easy.

 

When you're really thinking while you're working, you're not comfortable. And it won't look easy. When you're worrying about if you're doing it right, you're not comfortable, and it won't look easy. When you're trying to impress that really cute guy/girl over there, you're not comfortable, and it won't look easy. You have to make it look easy.

 

Now, that's easy (sorry, couldn't resist) for me to say. We can't all be Liberace. So how do you get comfortable and make it easy?

 

Well, the answer, I think, is in preparation and planning. If you've thought it through, if you know you can pull it off, and if you have a backup plan for anything that might go wrong, then you can relax. You don't need to worry. You can trust in your planning and your abilities.

 

So, when you're making your movie, whether you want to stick close to the script or improv doesn't matter. Whether you want a lot of movement or actors tied to chairs doesn't matter. Whether you want to rehearse it to death or shoot "raw" doesn't matter. What matters is encouraging everyone to trust in their abilities, to relax, and to just do it.

 

Because, really, if they can't do it relaxed, they can't do it tense, either.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Whether you want to rehearse it to death or shoot "raw" doesn't matter.

 

Wow! I wish I could be that carefree with resources. For me personally, shooting raw would be a disaster. I also don't think it shows much professionalism to be so unprepared. And before you give me the name of some iconic individual who shot raw and it turned out great, consider the many novices who are unprepared and get nowhere.

[Jim Keller]

Wow! I wish I could be that carefree with resources. For me personally, shooting raw would be a disaster. I also don't think it shows much professionalism to be so unprepared. And before you give me the name of some iconic individual who shot raw and it turned out great, consider the many novices who are unprepared and get nowhere.

 

Yes, obviously all those choices are made based on other considerations. I just mean that they're unrelated to the "static filmmaking" problem.

 

Since I work on digital and overwhelmingly with talent with very little experience, I find it useful to shoot everything, including rehearsal, looking for the moments where people's guard went down and I got something good, and it costs me nothing. Working on film with professionals would lead me to be very stingy on the footage and very strict with sticking to the plan.

[Jake Vander Ark]

Good stuff guys... thanks so much for the help.

 

Also, I'm glad to know there is life in this little section of cinematography.com. I've looked everywhere for good boards about directing, but they're all way too unprofessional.

 

Thanks for the good dialogue.

[Sam Javor]

I'm getting set to direct my first low budget feature... and it's the second feature I produced on... So coming from the perspective of a 'beginner':

 

Raw or rehersed is a creative choice... you have to actually know what you want. I think a lot of us young directors don't know what we really want and choose either Raw because it's 'cool' or rehearsed because it's 'professional.' ...and we don't make the distinction based on what the script or scene calls for.

 

example - my first feature I was the camera operator/ "Technical Director" (aka geek that owned everything :) ) Most of our shots were on a heavy tripod or garden wagon...err.. dolly... and sometimes we would take 3 hours shooting a page just to rehearse the camera movements ... On another shot we wanted to emulate a handycam (shooting on basically a betacam attached to AD/DA converter and an iMac) ...so we handed the camera to the writer and took away the viewfinder (actually it was an old camera (WV-F250) and the viewfinder fell off) ... we took 3 takes in 5 minutes and it was awesome...

 

So _I_ think... as an unskooled newbie... that the problem is that these students may be not breaking into their own "style"...because they're either focused on following the rules or breaking them... and not expressing their own feeling.

 

In other words, I guess they're trying to impress other filmmakers... not captivate the 'civilian' audience.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

I think a lot of us young directors don't know what we really want and choose either Raw because it's 'cool' or rehearsed because it's 'professional.' ...and we don't make the distinction based on what the script or scene calls for.

 

Well, I can want anything but that doesn't mean I can have it. Sadly my productions are limited in budget so that oft determines what path I take. I never do "raw" because I can't afford take after take until raw happens to look good. I prefer rehearsed because it is somewhat controllable. I don't like surprises when I'm working on a thread bare budget. Too many bad takes could result in my film not even being completed. Such is the peril of shooting on film.

 

I honestly think, more so than whether things are raw or rehearsed, that a big problem with young Directors (including myself in the past) is we don't devote enough attention to the "look" of our set and our film(whether it be the stock we use, or the camera we use, the mood we are trying to get across, the lighting, etc.) The right "mood" can create excitement to the viewer before the first line of dialog is spoken.

[David Auner aac]

I honestly think, more so than whether things are raw or rehearsed, that a big problem with young Directors (including myself in the past) is we don't devote enough attention to the "look" of our set and our film(whether it be the stock we use, or the camera we use, the mood we are trying to get across, the lighting, etc.) The right "mood" can create excitement to the viewer before the first line of dialog is spoken.

 

In my mind, most of these questions should be answered by your DP. The director tells the cinematographer the mood needed for the film/scene and she/he will decide how to create that mood technically. At least, that's the norm. Of course there are directors technically savvy and interested enough to specify camera and stock too!

 

Cheers, Dave

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Of course there are directors technically savvy and interested enough to specify camera and stock too!

 

Or poor enough to have to DP themselves!

[Rasmus Heise]

Check out director Lars von Trier's tv-series The Kingdom. In this he purposely brakes the 180 rule to confuse people and make it more scaring. It works.. But thats the only time I have seen it work.

[Guest Glen Alexander]

Or poor enough to have to DP themselves!

 

So when did Sean Penn go broke or need money?

[Guest Glen Alexander]

With all due respect, this being said by a fellow who is disregarding the 180° rule like it serves no purpose...along with every other convention.

 

I am not trying to be cynical but you remind me of many of the people who I met in the film classes I took in college. I am all about creativity but I also respect the system that has been in place for over 100 years. The biggest reason, I think, for many aspiring filmmaker's failure is that they think they are going to go take Hollywood by storm and change everything. Change happens slowly in any established field. Just like the RED-heads on here awhile back...they thought that a camera would create a paradigm shift and kill film. Everything in the film industry is not going to change over night. You MUST work within certain conventions to succeed...even Kubrick follows many conventions.

 

i could care less about taking Hollywood by storm or changing it. i care about telling the story, grabbing the audience and pulling them into a time and space for an emotional impact.

 

technology matters in that it must integrated into the story you want to tell. it is not just some dumb piece of gear. people getting caught up in film vs digital to me have missed the point of what great films can be, a gateway into a shared experience of humanity.

 

change happens slowly for those set in their ways otherwise there would not have been avant garde, nouvelle vague, expressionists...

 

disagree, no one MUST work within conventions. you can only be a slave if you agree to be one, i don't. we film for emotional impact, if a conventions conforms to our film style fine, if it doesn't fine.

Edited June 21, 2008 by Glen Alexander

[Matthew W. Phillips]

So when did Sean Penn go broke or need money?

 

I see this forum is turning into a place for hostility where disagreement in one thread leds to being followed in another and starting another arguement.

 

When did I say Sean Penn was poor? When did I say that people who DP themselves MUST be poor. I was actually making a joke with David in response to him talking about technically savvy Directors being heavily involved in the visual part of things. I made that statement to show that some indie filmmakers might not be able to even afford a DP for their production. I realize there are some like Sean Penn, Robert Rodriguez, etc who like to DP their own films. I don't know how you take what I said to mean that those sort of filmmakers are poor.

[David Auner aac]

Or poor enough to have to DP themselves!

 

Hehe! Of course you are right, that's another pretty good reason to DP yourself. But it shouldn't become the norm though ;)

 

Cheers, Dave

[Dylan Kress]

Being a student of cinema myself, I feel there are a few departments that always seem to fall short on many student films. Putting the obvious things like camera work, acting, and lighting aside, there are a few things that student films fail to do for me.

The first thing that will kill the mood of any film, in my opinion, is a lack of good production design. Because most students have no money, they end up shooting at boring locations which definitely doesn't help the audience's suspension of disbelief.

Another reason I find that many student films don't own up is because of their lack of a good sound. I know I'm not saying anything new, but sound is half of the reason we are captivated by the movies. It's just not focused on enough at film schools (well mine at least).

I'm sure there are many more variables that come into play, but I feel that those are some big reasons that many unexperienced student filmmakers don't achieve what they want.

 

Happy filmmaking,

Dylan

[Jorge Espinosa]

The little student crew has to get along and trust the student director´s vision. That rarely happens, so they end up producing a mess.

Edited June 24, 2008 by Jorge Espinosa

[Guest Glen Alexander]

Sur le haut de la dune, J est devenu le signe d'arrêt et a atteint un endroit.

un endroit qui est..

 

de loin du bourdonnement statique du moment

et vers la musique de sphères.

un espace d'où nous sommes venus

ou où nous nous retrouvons

 

ce n'est pas de maintenant, c'est de pour toujours,

c'est un endroit où vous venez pour avoir l'impression que les milliards d'années passent,

pour être pris les portes s'ouvrent sur le seuil d'éternité

sentir le poiniancy d'arrivées et départs, entrées et sorties,

sentir les nos naissances et les morts

l'utérus, le tombeau et tout entre

 

oui ce petit film va dire que cela veut dire d'être un être humain.

Peut-il changer votre vie ?

Peut-il changer le monde ?

À moi, oui. L'art doit avoir cet impact émotionnel.

[Jorge Espinosa]

Huh?

[Jake Vander Ark]

Yes this small film will say that it wants to be a human

being. Can it change your life? Can it change the world? For me, yes.

Art must have this emotional impact.

 

Beautiful. But I don't know what it has to do with this post...

[Guest Glen Alexander]

That is how to avoid static filmmaking.

[Guest Glen Alexander]

That is how to avoid static filmmaking.

[John Hoffler]

I am currently in school and am seeing the problems that have been discussed in this forum. The particular issue in our school is the "Directing by committee" aspect.

 

On the shoot next month, we have different directors for different scenes, that all take place on one location over the course of a few hours. I am kind of the de facto DP, along with another classmate who is very talented, and we've assigned "talent" directors so that the actors don't have 15 people telling them different things. We also all have to rotate and Boom Op, Camera Op and Direct different parts.

 

So that means that half of a 2-page conversation would technically be 'directed' by 2 directors...which is asinine.

 

You have a different director for the establishing shots and first CU and then a different director for the reversal!?!?!!?!?!?

 

They also are giving us a limit of 30 shots... regardless of whether we can get more or not. And when the script was broken down we needed around 37-38 shots to pull it off well.......

 

all in all......student films are more often than not hindered by the school and instructors. At least here.

[Brian Drysdale]

They also are giving us a limit of 30 shots... regardless of whether we can get more or not. And when the script was broken down we needed around 37-38 shots to pull it off well.......

 

Are you talking about camera set ups or shots? Certainly, there are always restrictions on how many camera set ups you can do on a scene because of time. On many productions, especially for TV, you wouldn't have time in the schedule to do 30 camera set ups on a 2 page conversation.

 

You can have 30 camera set ups, but still have 38 shots in the final cut. Although, at roughly 3 seconds per shot you could be in danger of playing ping pong with the head shots or over cutting.

 

Your first director could also do the whole scene in a clever single shot. However, you need good actors to pull it off, but I've seen it work really well.

[Keneu Luca]

I am currently in school and am seeing the problems that have been discussed in this forum. The particular issue in our school is the "Directing by committee" aspect.

 

On the shoot next month, we have different directors for different scenes, that all take place on one location over the course of a few hours. I am kind of the de facto DP, along with another classmate who is very talented, and we've assigned "talent" directors so that the actors don't have 15 people telling them different things. We also all have to rotate and Boom Op, Camera Op and Direct different parts.

 

So that means that half of a 2-page conversation would technically be 'directed' by 2 directors...which is asinine.

 

You have a different director for the establishing shots and first CU and then a different director for the reversal!?!?!!?!?!?

 

They also are giving us a limit of 30 shots... regardless of whether we can get more or not. And when the script was broken down we needed around 37-38 shots to pull it off well.......

 

all in all......student films are more often than not hindered by the school and instructors. At least here.

 

Is this Full Sail?

[John Hoffler]

Yes it is Full Sail! :rolleyes:

 

and to clarify Brian...

 

30 SHOTS! I asked if they meant setups b/c that made the most sense and he said SHOTS. So we had to cut out a few insert shots b/c even though we didn't have to move the camera or change any lighting it counted as a different "shot"........

 

though we can ask for a "wishlist" of shots...

 

we also took 2 or 3 separate shots and combined them into long dolly shots (and a jib shot) so we could fit everything in. They told us this info about multiple directors and limited shots after we chose the script and broke it down into shot lists.

 

I guess they expected us to not be as fast with our breakdown and scheduling, b/c we'd already done half our pre-pro work in the first week.