Video StudentGuy

The ummm, ah episode. I'm trying really hard to streamline and shorten the production process for podcasting. That means working off of short notes, instead of a finished script and not spending so much time editing, removing annoying ahs and spaces. And as much as I've tried, I've still spent too much time editing the audio. I can't stand listening to me stumbling along, why should you. Still it's a little rougher that usual. Let me know what you think.

This episode includes notes about a documentary preview, So Much | So Fast,  and Q&A with the filmmaker, Steven Asher. His comments on how to make a living as a documentary filmmaker were interesting.

Thursday and Saturday we prepared and shot an interview which I describe as well as give up some pointers on how to conduct an interview.

Finally I talk about the RED One camera. It's the one to watch at NAB this year.

Another quick set of notes for this podcast.

This week begins the class on documentary and interview. This podcast is only about Tuesday night's class. I'm going to put out a second podcast covering Thursday nights special topic where we screen a just released documentary and get to question the filmmaker, and then Saturday's class where we set up lighting for an interview and then interview someone we don't know.

I also take the time to bleed all the humor out of David Brenner's jokes with my sad delivery

I discuss the sad lot of Julie Amero

Check out Errol Morris' films, and the commercials on his site. He's the one who did the original Apple ads about switchers.

Just a brief note, hopefully I can update the show notes on the blog soon. This podcast closes the last classes of the Filmmaking Fundamentals module. I also give a run down of things to see at the National Association of Broadcaster's show in Las Vegas, coming up in April.

I'll see you there.

I'm talking about a variety of shoots this week. We're shooting an action scene using a dolly and shooting a dialog scene with a variety of OTS (over the shoulder) angles, including dirty and clean singles. Once all the camera work is done we'll be editing it into rough cuts next week.

I also discuss a number of Filmmaking events taking place in the next couple months. In Boston the Independent Film Festival will be taking place, April 25 - 30. They're looking for volunteers. Another film festival is online, called the One Minute Film Festival.

The 48 hour film project is closed in Boston, but it's a wicked cool event you should look into to get a complete tour of the video production experience.

I will be attending  NAB  mid April and while I talk a little bit about the things I plan to see and learn at the show, including training by FMC, I'll talk about at more length in the next podcast.

Some of the updated announcements I expect to see  are Adobe CS and Production suite, Apple FCP and an update to  Avid for the Mac/Intel processor.

Red camera is going to make a big noise with a demonstration and possibly a limited sale of it's new camera that shoots 4k video.

Creating a Short Narrative

This module is all about putting into action what we've been taught to date about light, camera work and sound. After a brief introduction by our instructor Tom Robothan we were thrust into the preproduction process. Our goal was to shoot five scenes from interviews to action and dialog and then cut it together.

It's an excellent example of the team-orientated learning that is a big part of CDIA's curriculum. This week is all about planning and next week we'll do the bulk of the shooting. The last week is for editing.

I'm way behind so I'm posting this fast and short. This show is less than 5 minutes long.

This week we finished the lighting module. We did an exercise with 3 point lighting on 2 people and another exercise outside using daylight and reflectors.

Saturday and Sunday I shot video of a reception and awards ceremony at Brandeis University for their annual film festival, Sundeis.

Here are some links mentioned in the audio:

Matters of Light and Depth
American Film Institute
Vision of Light
Cinematographer's Style
All That Jazz
Roy Scheider

Practical Lighting

Tuesday night's class began with how to set up 3 Point lighting, the classic TV news lighting. 3 point lighting consists of the main light, Key; secondary light, Fill; Backlight or Kicker, which separates the subject from the background and Background light.

3 points of light, 4 lights, an amazing paradox. I describe our efforts setting up the scene. By the way, I mistakenly used the term "baffle" when referring to a fabric grid we use on the Rifa to direct light forward. I don't know what it is called and I couldn't find it on the Lowel site.
 
Thursday night we used the same lighting techniques to recreate a night scene and I include pointers on how to do that.

Podcasts for filmmakers

Finally, I introduce a new segment, reviewing podcasts that I feel are valuable learning tools for anyone interested in working in the motion graphics field. Tonight I'm profiling the VFX Show. Mentioned briefly is episode 5 where the hosts talk about their favorite DVD extras that include helpful movies on production techniques.

Take a look at DVD Breakdown for reviews of DVDs and descriptions of the extras. I also mentioned a book by Robert Rodriquez, the guy who gave us El Mariachi and Spy Kids. It's called Rebel without a Crew.

Chapter Titles

00:07  This Week
00:45  3 Point Lighting
01:53  Key
02:18  Fill
03:29  Backlight
04:00  Kicker
05:19  Background
06:55  Exercise: News Lighting
08:54  Night Light
12:22  Exercise: Night Lighting
14:07  What is Podcasting?
18:07  The VFX Show
22:49  DVD Extras
25:25  Close

This is a special mid week episode of the Video StudentGuy podcast. Thursday night we had a special topic presentation by Franco Sacchi, a filmmaker and instructor at CDIA. He presented his documentary, American Eunuch, as an example of how to create a documentary.    

 
The class covered every step of the production process beginning with finding the idea, preproduction, the shoot, post and promotion. Check out IFP.org for help marketing your film.

Franco briefly referred to the Long Tail marketing concept which I try to explain in a nutshell. This was a term popularized by Chris Anderson of Wired and he went on to write a book about it as well. He also has a blog on it. I believe this business model has significant impact on all content producers and will continue to gain mind-share over the next several years.    

Everything about the film should be rolled up into a website for promotional purposes. Include budget, proposal and treatment to demonstrate your organizational skills. You should contrast the earlier American Eunuch site to the more current This is Nollywood website to see how he is using the web to create buzz about his movies. Nollywood is a documentary about the growing film industry in Nigeria. That film is currently in post.

 Towards the end of the show I present a few of my thoughts about the movie. Keep in mind I only saw a portion of the film. All the same I give it a thumbs up. I close out with some production notes about this podcast.    
     
 Chapter Titles    
     
 00:08  This Week    
 01:25  Franco Sacchi    
 01:50  Costs    
 03:44  Find the story    
 06:31  Preproduction    
 07:41  The Shoot    
 08:43 Post    
 10:03  Promotion    
 11:40  The Long Tail    
 13:36  Websites    
 15:23  Film Commentary    
 18:10  Close - Production Notes    

about the character of light and lighting hardware. To our eyes light is white,

but light is always changing color and knowing how to describe it and measure

it is very important to filmmaking.

color temperature. CRI measures the strength of light and how consistent it is.

CRI values are on each piece of professional lighting equipment and the best

piece of information you can learn is to never buy a lamp that has a CRI below

90%. You can find useful information about CRI on GE's site, including graphs

displaying the color consistency.

lights used most frequently in filmmaking are tungsten and daylight. Tungsten,

which is a red/orange color, is about 3200 degrees Kelvin, Daylight, which is bluish is about 5600 degrees Kelvin.

These values are not heat temperatures, they measure  color in a range from black on the low end to

white on the high end.

at school. Arri are tungsten lights

and they use Fresnel lenses, Lowell are also Tungsten lights and Kino lights are fluorescent lights that

are color accurate to either daylight or tungsten. The key thing is to not

trust your eyes or the LCD on the camera, trust the monitor.

such as barn doors, scrims, gels, gobos and diffusers.

dealing with electricity and make sure you understand how to handle lights

before using them. I'm giving you a brief overview, don't rely on what I say

alone.

load your lights are putting on your electrical system. Watts, Amps and Volts

are the three variables. You get to do the math everytime you set up lights so

that you never blow out the circuit.

Amps

Watts

matching the color of lights. Don't be so precise, Leave a little room for

variation in color within a scene. As long as it matches your intentions, bear

in mind that in the real world, we're looking at multiple colored light sources

all the time and don't think anything of it.

times

This week

Lighting terminology

The color of light

Kelvin color temperature

Light kits

Changing color with gels

Electricity

Don't try to match exactly

close

The Sound and the Frustration

This is the last week for the Camera and Sound module. The class broke up into 2 teams of 5 and continued to use the boom mic and lavalier mic. Tuesday we recorded an interview, and a narrative short on Thursday. I spend a few moments explaining the advantages of a Boom over a lav mic.

We're also using a sound mixer which provides more control than is available through the camera alone. I explain why it is both simple and hard

We experienced difficulties working with the audio that put us under a lot of pressure to meet our end of class deadline. The big lesson is that no matter what the source of your equipment, it makes sense and can really save your butt if you check the working status before you begin setting up the shot.

Of course all the preparation in the world won't save you if you don't pay attention to details. Despite my best efforts to avoid problems, by coming into class an hour early to prep the equipment, I still managed to miss the fact that the video gain was turned on through our entire shoot.
"Wakey, wakey" as a friend used to say.

We worked up a short story that we would shoot as an in-camera edit, where each scene is shot in one take, as it occurs in the story. Each shot is filmed so that the end and beginning fit in with the next and previous shot. No extra footage because you aren't editing it in the computer, it's all in the camera. It took a lot of planning and discussion to shoot, but it was fun and it worked out rather well. It helped that it was a simple story and it was short,  only 3 minutes long.

On the last day of the class we were introduced to optical stabilization, which makes shooting hand held practical. We didn't get a chance to use it this week, so I'll talk about it in a future episode.

I also discuss the need to develop a process for double checking, not only the working status of equipment, but also the settings on the equipment.

Howard Phillips, the associate director of the Film program will be teaching the next module on lighting, which begins next week.

Chapter times

00:07  Last week recap
00:54  This week
01:19  Boom vs Lav mic
03:24  Reel to reel memories
04:20  Mixer revealed
05:18  Production problems
07:08  Shooting In-Camera edit
07:52  Deciding on a story
08:26  The other team's story
09:21  Our shoot
10:17  Critique of video
11:16  Optical stabilization
12:06  Composition concerns
12:46  Checklists
13:40  Editorial: Order order
15:30  Close