Selling DVD to Video Rental Centers...

[Guest]

If not, theres always wal-mart!!!!! lol  :blink:

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Walmart I'm sure is selling more DVDs than Blockbuster. The cheap prices for buying a DVD at Walmart vs renting the same one at Blockbuster, have seriously cut into Blockbuster's bottom line. Blockbuster ain't making money like they used to.

 

The future of the video store as a business model is in question. Video on demand via the web may one day prove viable, many say that day is already here.

 

Either way you've got to fight for shelf space against the big guys when it comes to Walmart or Blockbuster.

 

It's kind of refreshing to see Blockbuster with their feet to the fire and facing serious competition. Considering how many thousands of mom and pop video rental stores Blockbuster has driven out of business.

 

R.

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

Well there you have it Richard, young people *can* actually create work of much higher quality than older people.

 

Anyway, I'm bored of trying to make that point come clear, I'm just going to prove it. Looks like Landon's very close to proving it.

[Guest]

"Well there you have it Richard, young people *can* actually create work of much higher quality than older people."

 

Ahhhh, ok I guess I missed some thing here? I have no idea how you arrived at that conclusion.

 

Take note, most people here are just humoring you and Landon.

 

Do I think I'll see work from either of you that will be feature film quality, no I don't.

 

But as you also stated you'll just have to prove it, when you do, you can say "I told you so."

 

R.

[Jonathan Spear]

""Do I think I'll see work from either of you that will be feature film quality, no I don't.""

 

And why not?

What is feature film quality?

 

-proper lighting

-proper exposure

-good (not necessarily great) acting

-good directing

-good editing

 

Sure, using a 35mm panavision setup with superspeed primes and expensive lighting will ultimately give it the 'look' of LOTR - but there are movies out there with smaller budgets which are pleasing to the eye and even look semi-professional.

 

And there's the friend factor.

I've got my first shooting gig coming up this summer and I got most of my equipment (camera, lights, camera rigs, wardrobe, food, etc) from my friends.

 

It's really all about networking. He can make a pretty good movie (if he has the skills and talent -- you can't judge that yet, you haven't seen his work) if he really wants to.

[Max Jacoby]

This thread surely has run its course now. If people only manage to insult each other then I suggest they do so in private, since it is of no use to the other members of this forum to witness their silly pissing contest.

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

Ahhhh, ok I guess I missed some thing here? I have no idea how you arrived at that conclusion.

------>

Well... I think it depends on the 16 year old. I had a visual effects company for many years and for a while one of our main artists was 15 - and he was devastatingly talented and the artist that the clients liked the work of. Meanwhile there were 30, 40, even 50 year olds submitting their work and it wasn't as good.

 

 

Anyway, I haven't seen any of *your* work yet Richard, so for all I know you could just be some amateur saying you're a pro.

 

Do you actually have any work on the net to back yourself up on?

Edited May 12, 2005 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith

[Guest]

"Anyway, I haven't seen any of *your* work yet Richard, so for all I know you could just be some amateur saying you're a pro.

Do you actually have any work on the net to back yourself up on?"

 

We've already been around this one Daniel, you dismissed my awards as a "few bits of tin" remember? How do you think I won all of those bits of tin, home movies?

 

You insisted I had not done any thing note worthy because I was not on the exalted imdb, well now IMDB has listed a FEW of my productions. Not that IMDB means any thing.

 

Compare all this to where you are at, at least in your case we can verify with 100% certainty that you are a teenage amateur. At least until we see the film you are making which you have stated will be as good as Lord Of The Rings.

 

So, I won't have to see your film to be convinced, if there's an interview with you in Entertainment Weekly where you are discussing how you achieved the look of LOTR as a teenager with no money. That would be impressive enough for me.

 

Clearly the burden of proof is on you, not me.

 

R.

[Jonathan Spear]

""Anyway, I haven't seen any of *your* work yet Richard, so for all I know you could just be some amateur saying you're a pro.

Do you actually have any work on the net to back yourself up on?""

 

 

All aguments and "pissing contests" aside, I'd have to say that

"The Snowman who Saved Summer" looks not only pretty darn cool but I'll eventually rent it or buy it if it's available.

I dig movies like that.

[Guest]

""Anyway, I haven't seen any of *your* work yet Richard, so for all I know you could just be some amateur saying you're a pro.

Do you actually have any work on the net to back yourself up on?""

All aguments and "pissing contests" aside, I'd have to say that

"The Snowman who Saved Summer" looks not only pretty darn cool but I'll eventually rent it or buy it if it's available.

I dig movies like that.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Hmmm, gee Jonathan that sounds like a "compliment". Does this represent a turning point in Boddington/TSM relations? :D

 

That show is entirely stop motion animation, so if you like that kind of animation it's a fun little piece. The neat thing about stop motion is that it's filmmaking in miniature. You still have sets, lights, actors, and cameras, the same way you would making a regular movie.

 

Of course just getting a few seconds of useable footage is a long process. On that show we did the old technique of re-sculpting the mouths from frame-to-frame for the characters speech.

 

Any whoo it will air for it's fourth consecutive Christmas on a national network in Canada this year, and it's available on DVD via a variety of distributors in the USA.

 

R.

[Landon D. Parks]

Do I think I'll see work from either of you that will be feature film quality, no I don't.

Richard, on a friendly note: Exactly what do you consider cinematic? Being shot on film compared to DV, good acting, good directing, nice camera moves, nice cinematography? All of the above, some of the above?

 

This way I will know what I need to please you... :rolleyes:

[Guest]

Don't work to please me, I'm not any one big.

 

If I was Steven Spielberg then yes take my advice to heart, but I'm not :D

 

When I say "feature film" quality, I simply refer to the whole package. That would include all of the things you mention and then some. I'm talking about a level of filmmaking that you pay ten bucks to see on the big screen, you know what I mean.

 

That level requires years of training, experience, talent, luck, and of course money. Maybe not 100 million, but at least some budget.

 

And yes, let's face facts Hollywood features are not shot on DV. They are for now still mainly shot on 35mm.

 

Can you tell a good story on DV? Well read director's commentary for Primer and see what he says.

 

http://www.primermovie.com/

 

R.

[Josh Bass]

Landon, why do you insist on buying the gear instead of renting? I'm pretty sure you could spend less and get more by renting, and put the extra money toward better crew, etc., which would benefit you in the end. Rental houses do a lot of deals, where you get more than you're supposed to for less money. Seriously, that $16,000 and something you quoted for the camera and lights and whatever else could probably go a lot further if you weren't buying.

[Jonathan Spear]

Richard,

 

I saw the special feature 'making of' of the Nightmare Before Christmas.

Stop motion is no easy task and it seems like arduous work. How long is your film and how long did it take to shoot?

 

Cheers,

Jonathan

[Guest]

It's a half hour Christmas special, so 22 minutes of actual content.

 

It took 18 months to shoot, working part time in my basement.

 

R.

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

Landon, why do you insist on buying the gear instead of renting? I'm pretty sure you could spend less and get more by renting, and put the extra money toward better crew, etc., which would benefit you in the end.  Rental houses do a lot of deals, where you get more than you're supposed to for less money.  Seriously, that $16,000 and something you quoted for the camera and lights and whatever else could probably go a lot further if you weren't buying.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Great thing about buying the equipment is the fact that he might be able to keep it afterwards. Maybe anyway. Or atleast if they choose to setup some kind of a production company they will have all the equipment to use in the future.

Edited May 13, 2005 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith

[Guest]

With 35mm Arri systems going for 10-15k on ebay these days I would seriously consider buying one to shoot a feature with vs renting. I've seen some incredible packages on there that could easily be used to shoot a feature. Over the course of a five week shoot you would definately save money over renting. Then you could always stick it back on ebay when the shoot is over and get your money back.

 

So long as the camera body is quiet and runs perfectly, you can rent top quality Zeiss lenses for not a huge amount of money.

 

I have seriously considered buying one of these packages recently.

 

Sadly, the DOPs selling these cameras say they are moving to HD as the reason they are selling their gear.

 

R.

Edited May 13, 2005 by Guest

[David Mullen ASC]

If you had 15K, you could rent a state-of-the-art camera package with the lenses, etc. for a feature shoot rather than an old Arri-BL where you'd STILL have to rent the lenses and half your accessories...

 

The point is whether your MAIN priority is to make a low-budget feature in a set period of time (three to four weeks) within a set budget... or get into equipment ownership, spread your feature out over an indeterminate amount of time with a vague budget, and have a package to shoot whatever and whenever you want for a variety of projects.

 

If your goal is just to make the single feature, KEEP IT SIMPLE: rent the equipment and keep the shoot short and intense, and your costs VERY well planned and under control, which gets harder with these long-term piecemeal shoots.

 

If your goal is to always have a camera at hand to shoot your own little projects, or a long-term project, or for others, or for tests, etc., owning makes more sense.

[Landon D. Parks]

Biggest concern for renting the equipment is that since we have pretty much no money, we will be shooting after work / weekend, and that could mean we will be shooting for up to 2, maybe even 3 months. In which case buying becomes cheaper.

 

If I where just going to come in and wipe out the film in 4 or 5 weeks, I'd rent for sure.

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

Screw all the fancy cameras, for the money they cost it wont be worth it. I mean they shot 28 days later with an XL1s, do you think the film would have been a much bigger success if they shot with HD or film? Aslong as people can see clearly what's going on, they usually don't care. Hell with the kind of audience around today you might even get away with shooting it in interlaced, although, don't.

 

Once you have something like an XL2, lighting's really all you have to worry about.

 

Just wondering, are you actually basing the cinematography on an existing style? If so what one? If your just going to shoot it willy nilly, I'd suggest looking at some existing horror films and looking at the styles of lighting e.t.c. Just going ahead and shooting it might come out a bit cack.

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

Richard, just wondering, what camera did you use to shoot that film with? From watching behind the scenes from films like wallace and gromit, chicken run e.t.c. they all seem to use 35mm cine cameras. Personally if I were to shoot a frame by frame animation film I'd probably invest in a top of the range digital camera from Canon or something. Quality of those cameras is amazing, in the shop I work in we currently have a Canon 20D, I mean that's not even top of the range, but the quality is just out of this world.

[Guest]

Previous to that show all of my stop mo work was done on 35mm, using the Arri III.

 

The Snowman show was shot with a digital frame capture system, since the final output was to TV and DVD. Saved a lot of time and money, but oh the romance of hearing a 35mm film camera turn over to shoot a single frame.

 

There are many people now using digital stills cameras for stop motion, you are correct. With those cameras you can achieve higher than HD resolutions and print each frame out to 35mm for a theatrical print.

 

The biggest problem with DSC (digital stills camera) is the "flashing" that occurs from frame to frame. As DSC cameras are not designed to give a person the exact same luminance levels of the same scene from shot-to-shot. It's a real issue for people that try to do this method, many end up spending hours in After Effects correcting each frame so they match exactly.

 

It's tough enough to get perfect matching using a film camera, as a re-cycle in the electricty powering your lights, can cause a luminance change mid shot when projected. But you'd never notice while shooting.

 

R.

[David Mullen ASC]

While I agree you should spend not spend an unreasonable amount of your budget on the acquisition format, not enough to cripple the production overall, I think it's a bad idea to start down the path of "audiences don't care so neither should I" line of thinking. OF COURSE audiences don't care -- they aren't the filmmaker, they aren't the artist, they are just the consumer. They don't WANT to care -- they just want to enjoy the movie. But they just expect YOU to. They aren't the professional -- you are.

 

When you buy a house, you don't have to care about the details of how it was designed and built, what materials were used, etc. - you just want to live in something that won't fall down about your head, and you hope you enjoy the way it looks. When you visit a doctor, you don't have to care much about medicine -- but you sure hope your doctor cares A LOT about the subject.

 

If you are going to be a filmmaker, caring about the fine details is important. And by caring, I mean caring a lot more than the audience does.

 

Also, one shouldn't take films like "28 Days Later" or "Blair Witch Project" as some sort of validation of a technically crude recording format being acceptable for theatrical films since these are exceptions more than the rule. You create a hurdle for everyone -- audiences, distributors, critics, etc. -- to get around when you go too low in terms of technical quality. The question is how much of a hurdle do you want to create for yourself and can you surmount it by the quality of other aspects of the movie? Also, the cases I mentioned above are ones where the look of video was either appropriate to creating a grim apocalyptic atmosphere (28 Days) or motivated by the story (Blair Witch Project.)

[Matt Pacini]

"...16 year old James has directed 20 features ..."

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I admire your tenacity, but this statement above is evidence that you are PROFOUNDLY underestimating the time, difficulty and complexity of making a feature film.

"James" would need to have starting making features while still an embryo.

 

You just simply haven't done it, so you don't know what it takes yet.

One thing you learn with age & experience, is that the time it takes to "say something" is not proportional to the time it takes to complete the task.

It sounds bizarre, but I've come to learn that subconsciously, people frequently operate on this level, and it's responsible for a lot of problems in communication between individuals, and a problem of people getting into situations that are over their heads.

Sounds crazy, but think about it:

 

Mow the lawn.

Pull an engine.

Make a movie.

Clean the house.

Build a house.

 

All I can say is, don't so easily dismiss what you're hearing here from the chorus of "old farts". Most of us have one thing in common: we've done it before. You haven't.

The only way to prove us wrong, is to either get some pre-experience first, by shooting some short form material, and/or doing exhaustive pre-production; rehearsing, meticulous storyboarding & shot lists, being aware of everything that can go wrong (this is your Achillies heel, because you haven't gone through it yet), and having not just a "Plan B", but a C and a D as well.

 

Matt Pacini

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

The thing I find is that I seem to learn something new every time I do a shoot. Small things, but vital.

 

Silly things in a way, like getting the rest of the cast and crew's respect. On my first short (God Calling Rachel) I really didn't have a good time, I was 15 at the time and boy did I have one horrible experience. I was so unconfident back then for a start, plus it's kinda hard for a younger one to socialise properly with adults anyway, I just felt bored and bullied for the whole day, man did that suck...

 

But now that I've done a few more things, I know how to earn the cast and crew's respect. A few years ago I was just a walk over, but now I feel comfortable and confident on set. (Apart from when I'm shooting gay soap operas....)

 

Stuff like that doesn't only come with growing up, but it's knowing how to act on set. I've found that many first time directors chat the ears of the cast and crew, when usually it's best to let them do their thing. (I was doing a film once and the director drove me nuts cos he wouldn't shut the hell up)

[Guest Daniel J. Ashley-Smith]

While I agree you should spend not spend an unreasonable amount of your budget on the acquisition format, not enough to cripple the production overall, I think it's a bad idea to start down the path of "audiences don't care so neither should I" line of thinking. OF COURSE audiences don't care -- they aren't the filmmaker, they aren't the artist, they are just the consumer.  They don't WANT to care -- they just want to enjoy the movie.  But they just expect YOU to. They aren't the professional -- you are.

 

When you buy a house, you don't have to care about the details of how it was designed and built, what materials were used, etc. - you just want to live in something that won't fall down about your head, and you hope you enjoy the way it looks.  When you visit a doctor, you don't have to care much about medicine -- but you sure hope your doctor cares A LOT about the subject.

 

If you are going to be a filmmaker, caring about the fine details is important. And by caring, I mean caring a lot more than the audience does.

 

Also, one shouldn't take films like "28 Days Later" or "Blair Witch Project" as some sort of validation of a technically crude recording format being acceptable for theatrical films since these are exceptions more than the rule.  You create a hurdle for everyone -- audiences, distributors, critics, etc. -- to get around when you go too low in terms of technical quality.  The question is how much of a hurdle do you want to create for yourself and can you surmount it by the quality of other aspects of the movie? Also, the cases I mentioned above are ones where the look of video was either appropriate to creating a grim apocalyptic atmosphere (28 Days) or motivated by the story (Blair Witch Project.)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Yeh good point. One thing I find is that the idea of these films being shot on video or film, is physcological. For instance I probably wouldn't have guessed that 28 Days Later was shot on video, unless I was told and then looked out for it. It's because it's a feature length film, I automatically assume it's shot on 35mm film.

 

It's like when you see the out-takes from films, as soon as theres a mistake, the camera seems to do a quick zoom or something, it just brings it straight from a made up set to the realism of the world.

 

So, I usually find it doesn't matter what format it's shot on, aslong as everything is shot professionally and everything stays in character, your still watching an illusion which sucks you into believing it to be real.

 

(IIIIF that makes any sense...)

 

 

I used to be VERY pedantic about what format I shot on, but now, from seeing results from various films I've made, I'm happy with using a PD-150 and deinterlacing it in post. Obviously I'd *like* to shoot film, it looks very nice, but it's out of my league right now. But I won't go quite as far as shooting interlaced... (nooo nonono... don't want to do that)

Edited May 17, 2005 by Daniel J. Ashley-Smith