Composing Images

[Josh Gallegos]

Sorry if this isn't the right place to post this, but where do most of you begin when you think about the composition of a scene? Do you begin with movement? I know generally the "look" is captured through the way the scene is lit and nowadays professionals use LUTs to maintain a consistent look throughout a film. I know lenses are a major component, added to the aspect ratio. What I do know is that what ever is shot, it is done for the purpose of shaping the idea in the editing phase. I was reading an article today from the ASC instagram page about the making of Full Metal Jacket, and it jumped into the intricate process of how they rated the film stock at 800 ASA to give the movie a flat, documentary-style look, it's all very methodical, and they didn't even use a day filter to have an extra stop to work with, when I read it I was amazed at the level of knowledge that they have as image makers.

When I read that cinematographers are the "authors of an image", I realized that everything I did before was completely wrong, I think without the technical knowledge and knowing what it is exactly that you are striving for, the whole thing becomes an exercise in futility. Added to this, there is the requirement of creating balanced shots that are interesting and evocative, a skill that requires a photographer's eye. It's all so connected, it's all technique and story, and you cannot tell a story if you don't know the technique. That's where problems arise, because I don't have a photographer's eye, at the moment I realize that I have to decide on an idea and stick to it consistently, in order to see results. The thing about filmmaking is that you can't be wishy-washy, because the whole story depends on your authorship to at the very least keep the look consistent, if there isn't any consistency it will cause distractions or jarring effects that don't fit into the mosaic. It's like the film 'HUGO', it's something of a clockwork, which made me realize how truly difficult filmmaking really is. I suppose the first step is to work on how the action is covered, I was revisiting Martin Scorsese's storyboard for Taxi Driver, and he's already seeing the movie in his head through a rhythm, the composition of shots build, I know it's generic information, but somehow it's a good reminder to remember to keep it simple and tell the story. 

Edited October 8, 2020 by Josh Gallegos

[David Mullen ASC]

If the shot has to move for some reason, you have to start with that while then starting to compose it while in motion. Since composition is about the balance of elements in the frame, for aesthetic effect and storytelling purposes. if the elements are shifting all the time, it makes it harder to arrange them.

LUTs don't make shots more consistent, lighting and exposing for consistency makes them more consistent, the LUT would add an overall shift in gamma (contrast, saturation, etc.) to everything (if one LUT was used) but not eliminate shot-by-shot inconsistencies, they would be evident with or without the LUT. Post color-correction, however, can smooth over mismatched shots.

Sure, creating a flow of images that feel part of a whole is a learned skill but everyone starts somewhere.  Consistency and continuity take some time to master but it's not impossible for a beginner.  If you light a room once for a wide shot and then go in closer in a similar direction and shoot pieces in the same lighting and the same exposure, it would all cut together and look consistent. The skill comes when you start adjusting the lighting for each set-up to make it look better but yet not make it feel like a mismatch compared to the wide shot. So if you are a beginner, don't change the lighting so much from wide to close.

I was always good at drawing but I was not a photographer when I started making movies, so I would draw them out on paper like a comic strip, then I could see how they flowed from one cut to another. I actually found the book "How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way" a good introduction into breaking up a scene into angles that told the story effectively in the fewest number of shots possible.

I wouldn't call the process that "Full Metal Jacket" used "intricate", they just underexposed the film and push-processed to compensate, for more speed and grain. And they skipped the 85 correction filter for day work on tungsten film, which was not an unusual technique. Kubrick had already done that on "Barry Lyndon". It was an effective approach but hardly complicated or even hard. Filmmaking is hard, of course, and Kubrick worked very hard on his movies, but picking an overall exposure/processing/filtering approach like that in prep and then doing it everyday is more or less what most people shooting film have to do.

[Josh Gallegos]

Thanks David, I find it difficult to get back in to it, it’s been such a long time, it feels like I’m starting from ground zero again. 

[Josh Gallegos]

I found one of Reed Morano’s short films, I think it’s a good general rule to have a master shot and then build within it, I think that’s how I approached my other short films, from wide and working my way in. Maybe I’m overthinking it, but it’s just about capturing the action in a way that tells the story. 
 

 

I like this short film, the timing is really quite perfect, and she creates energy when she she goes handheld or over the shoulder. 

[Satsuki Murashige]

I would begin the shot listing process by figuring out what the action and blocking is - that is, what the actors will be doing. What’s happening in the scene? Where will they be positioned, and how will they be moving throughout? What are the key story beats that need to be emphasized? 

This kinda speaks toward your previous posts about craft vs ideas. When we first pick up a camera, none of us have any craft - we need to pick it up over time as we gain experience. You can’t gain that experience if you don’t shoot and make mistakes, so don’t worry too much about about what you don’t know yet. You must use whatever skills you have at the time, that’s all any of us can do. The Clash and U2 weren’t amazing technically when they first started either. The ideas are the important thing that need to be nurtured and developed right now. 

Composition-wise, I would advise to keep it simple. Make simple shots that each fulfill a single story purpose, with each cut moving the story along to the next cut. Decide the whole shape of the story ahead of time, and don’t shoot excessive coverage. Once you get into the editing stage, you’ll learn a lot about what actually works vs what you thought would work. You’ll see what shots you’re missing and need to prepare for next time. That’s how you learn craft, one mistake at a time. 

[Josh Gallegos]

I already finished storyboarding, in total there's going to be 44 cuts, so I know how the images should be assembled together, I wanted to try some effects, for instance the "ghosting" effect from Lady Blue Shanghai and I wanted to purposely overexpose some shots. I think the general idea now is the guilt that this person (a pastor) carries with him of being a with a younger girl and the impending consequences of his actions haunting him for the rest of his life. And that's pretty much what it is, maybe there's something more happening subconsciously but I wouldn't know. Now the issue is when I'm filming it, I won't know if it's going to translate well in black and white, because the screen is in color. My thought was to just shoot in the b&w picture settings so I can see what's happening within the frame. 

[David Mullen ASC]

Sure, you can also dial down the color on the monitor.

[Josh Gallegos]

I haven't touched a camera in 5 years, so I don't remember what I can and can't do on a Canon camera in terms of dialing down the overall color. I remember I shot in a neutral setting with custom settings so that there would be more room for color-correcting, but when I look at my past two short films I realized that "color grading" was the worst thing I did, and I did a lot of bad stuff, I overdid it and it looks completely splotchy and unnatural, so this time I didn't want to mess too much with the image and just leave it as is. Maybe manipulate it slightly to make the image look grainy. I was going to do it in Academy Ratio, but I'm concerned about how to frame it properly, I was looking at David Lynch's earlier short films in that aspect ratio and it just feels better, maybe I'll just add some tape to the screen to shoot it in academy frame 1.37, but I realize if I frame it that way I won't be able to reverse it if it looks bad, so maybe I'll play it safe and do it in 1.85. 

[David Mullen ASC]

I don’t know that particular camera but most allow you to adjust Saturation, Contrast, and Sharpness for each profile like Standard, Vivid, Neutral, Portrait, Landscape, etc. — basically you can turn one into the other.

[Josh Gallegos]

It's a Canon RP Mirrorless, it's supposedly more powerful than the Sony a7ii, so it's good for low-light shooting, but yes I suppose it's not as complicated as I'm making it out to be. It's really just about getting the rhythm right, my biggest concern this time was in perfecting movement, have enough for the editing. Thanks for the help, I'll just post it on youtube when it's done and move on to the next thing.