Jump to content

'Remi' - S16mm Short Film


Recommended Posts

Hi All,

 

I am looking for some feedback on a recent short film I shot entitled 'Remi'. This film was made for a very low budget. Despite this, we managed to shoot on Super 16mm with a small lighting package, and I am interested in finding out what people think!

 

The film can be viewed here: http://www.nickeriksson.com/remi

 

Thank you for your valuable feedback / advice!

 

Best,

 

Nick Eriksson

 

Director of Photography

www.nickeriksson.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Not sure what kind of feedback you are looking for, but here goes:

 

The lighting is fantastically natural.

The "Newspaper" scene looked like a bit TOO much light was coming from that candle, but still looked good!

I like the camera movemnts, which felt very natural. Even though I HATE shakey cam, I thought

it added stress to the conversation on the phone. Very ell done.

 

Some of it however looked a little under exposed, but that may be the digital compression or color grade.

I felt a little jarred by the sudden change to florescence lights. Color wise I didn't work for me, and the

skin tones were a little washed out.

 

The theatre sequence was fantastic, and very natural feeling.

The texture on the bear fur was great! I would love to see a digital shot of that to see if it could

cope with the chiffon/translucent orange and green dresses and the great silky texture of the black bear.

 

My complements to you, Nick, it was very good work!

I'm going to watch the rest of your films as soon as I get back from rehearsal!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Not sure what kind of feedback you are looking for, but here goes:

 

The lighting is fantastically natural.

The "Newspaper" scene looked like a bit TOO much light was coming from that candle, but still looked good!

I like the camera movemnts, which felt very natural. Even though I HATE shakey cam, I thought

it added stress to the conversation on the phone. Very ell done.

 

Some of it however looked a little under exposed, but that may be the digital compression or color grade.

I felt a little jarred by the sudden change to florescence lights. Color wise I didn't work for me, and the

skin tones were a little washed out.

 

The theatre sequence was fantastic, and very natural feeling.

The texture on the bear fur was great! I would love to see a digital shot of that to see if it could

cope with the chiffon/translucent orange and green dresses and the great silky texture of the black bear.

 

My complements to you, Nick, it was very good work!

I'm going to watch the rest of your films as soon as I get back from rehearsal!

 

 

Dear John,

 

Thank you very much for your feedback. Your response is greatly valued, and it is interesting to read your notes on the project.

 

The aesthetic that I brought to the film was to have Remi's home as a place of warmth and comfort (very warm colours + skin tones). This would be in stark contrast to the bleak London winter landscape (a cold uncorrected tungsten blue). I then decided that when we were in any location requiring illumination with artificial lights, I would go with a sickly fluorescent green. This approach was designed to help illustrate Remi's uncomfortable position, as he attempts to navigate the new foreign landscape and battle with homesickness.

 

With regard to the candle + his makeshift home, I was actually a little worried I wasn't getting enough light, so I think maybe I played it a little too safe and consequently had a bit too much. This didn't jump out at me in the grade, but in retrospect, maybe we should have spent a little more time on that scene. Another element regarding his makeshift home that I played too safe was the warmth of the light. I would have liked the interior of his home to be even warmer than it looks in the final film.

 

I completely agree with you regarding handheld camera movement, I am not a fan myself. I think in many cases the handheld approach is a very lazy way of composing an image and blocking action. However, despite this, some handheld was present in Remi, and I think myself and the Director did decide on a healthy balance of setups in the end.

 

I am glad you like the handheld shots. However, I am unhappy with the dance scene, because I frequently lose the composition and should have stayed on the bear throughout the performance. This is not entirely my fault! Due to a problem with the SR3, the heated eyepiece function wasn't working, and so after 20 seconds, I couldn't see anything!!! I would have loved to have shot another performance, but unfortunately we just didn't have enough stock left!

 

You are right, some of this is underexposed, although I also made the creative choice to keep some scenes darker than normal. Fortunately, we were able to bring this back up in the grade, but I didn't want to make it too bright, as this would detract from the original approach. I have to say that it looks great on a CRT monitor in a pitch black room. I can understand it being a little too dark on a laptop lcd screen, and the compression won't help matters much either :)

 

Still, I am happy with the final film. We were working with very limited resources on this project, shooting on a 1:1 ratio! Pretty much everything in the film is one-take, apart from some short details / inserts, which we had a couple of quick takes.

 

Thank you again for taking a look,

 

Hope to hear from you again at some point in the future.

 

Best wishes,

 

Nick Eriksson

 

Director of Photography

www.nickeriksson.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...