Gear VS Content. What actually matters?

There’s a lot of hubbub about which camera is “the best”. Is it the 5DmkII? The FS100? The F3? My iPhone 4? Honestly, it’s hard for anyone to try and get a handle on all the cameras and specs with all the BS floating around. And I’m here to tell you it doesn’t matter.

 

I’m not going to pretend I’m an expert; infact, I’m quite the opposite. Barely a year out of my Bachelor of Film and Digital Media course and a handful of short films under my belt. Now I’m out in the big, bad world. As any creative person would tell you, to succeed you must do. Make things. Shoot things. Edit things. It’s the only way you’ll learn. So that’s what I’m doing.

The thing that bothers me though, is that every “filmmaker” with $1500 to spare, buys a DSLR and thinks his or her short film is going to be the next “The Social Network”. What I want to know is what happened to a good story? Without a good story (along with a quality script and actors) to back up your footage, you’re just left with some pretty pictures and shallow DOF. You may as well have shot meaningless vistas and timelapses and called it filmmaking.

Here’s an example: I know a guy who has a lot of money, and is into making films. He recently wrote and directed a short film and wanted to make it the best it could be. So he hired a RED One, got the whole thing professionally graded and mixed and entered it into festivals. It didn’t do well anywhere (and everyone who I’ve spoken to says much the same). I had a chat with him once, and the film came up in conversation so I asked him “Why don’t you think it worked for an audience?” and his reply was along the lines of “Well, I wrote it in a night, cast my friends as the actors and shot it that weekend. I don’t see why no one else gets it.”.

Over time it became very clear that the script was his baby. One draft with no feedback from others. But that’s all it was – a baby. No development, thought or time put into it. On set, all of his attention was devoted to the camera and getting a “film” look instead of working with the actors and getting good performances.

That story (and the myriad of others just like it) shows that technical wizardry doesn’t make a great film. Shooting on a DSLR isn’t going to save your script from plot holes and undevelopment. David O’Russell’s “The Fighter” was brilliant in my opinion. But because of the story and the performances. There’s no tricky camera work. No flashy special effects (I think from memory the title screen is Arial font over a shot).

Hollywood is filled with style over substance. Early reports for “Sucker Punch” say it’s a visual feast but so incoherent it’s not enjoyable. And everything has to be in 3D! But that’s another story.

My point is, early on, when you’re still learning and developing a style and a knack for filmmaking – the thing that will stand out is a well crafted story that people want to watch. It doesn’t matter what you shoot on. Sure, if you can afford it, shoot on RED. But only if it supports your story. Heck, shoot it on a JVC camcorder for $800! You could spend tens of thousands of dollars on cameras, rigs, lenses and more – but it will be useless if no one cares about your film.

You don’t buy a F1 racecar when you learn to drive. You get the shitty little bomb that costs more to insure than to buy and you learn with that. It does the same thing as the F1 car, but if you make a mistake, it’s not going to be expensive. And trust me, you will make mistakes. I’m the first one to admit that my films aren’t perfect, but I’m not deluding myself into thinking it was because of what they were shot on (16mm Kodak film if you’re wondering). It’s because of oversights with character development, pacing, plotting and the story that these films aren’t all they could have been. Don’t get me wrong, I’m immensely proud of them, but more so of what they have taught me.

To finish up, I want to apologise. This has been more of a ramble than a planned out argument, but I’m fine with that. As I said at the top of the post, there is a lot of BS out there and I wanted to share my thoughts on what DOES and really SHOULD matter.

I want to leave you with a short film that was made by a 17 year old (at the time of it’s completion). While yes, it was shot on a 7D, what makes the film so endearing and successful is its narrative. It has been featured in Nino Leitner’s blog, which also supports the idea that content > the camera it has been shot on. Enjoy.

 

Here’s to 2011! With a new showreel!

Well happy holidays folks!

It’s awfully close to the end of the year, and with the little spare time I had, I decided to put together a new showreel going into the new year. It’s exciting because my old one (while I loved it dearly) definetely lacked the excitement and energy of this new one – plus I got to put “Blackwood” and “Double Date” in (which I’ve been banging on about for quite some time now).

Anyway, I don’t want to blow my own horn, but just wanted to share it with you.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZeEWC_rm4s]

I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas, and I’ll see you all next year!!!

Matt

48 Hour Film Project

48 hours is a long time. It’s two full days. It’s also the name of an Eddie Murphy/Nick Nolte film from 1982 (see here). But now I know it’s enough time to make a film. Just.

Basically, for those who don’t know the premise, you register a team. Then at 7pm on a Friday evening you are given a genre (unique to all teams) and character, prop and line of dialogue to be included in the film. Then you’re given 48 hours to write, shoot, edit and deliver the film back to the starting point (7pm on a Sunday night). Everything must be made/created within those 48 hours.

When I first heard about the competition, I was immediately intrigued. I love a bit of a challenge, and the pressure cooker environment of a time restricted event was all that I needed to sign up.

So I wrangled a team of misfits. Actors, writers, crew and more. We were all eager and full of energy. Until we started.

Below are the key points we needed to include:

Genre: Sci-Fi
Character: Dan/Danielle Sagan
Prop: Box
Line: From now on, you call the shots

As you can probably imagine, Sci-Fi is not the easiest thing to write or shoot EVEN WITHOUT the limitations of no money and no time. So we struggled with various concepts and ideas (one involved an entirely white room where people tried to date each other!). After much deliberation however we settled on clone comedy and began to write. And write… and write some more. Until it was 4am.

Jump ahead to 4 hours later, and we were waking up and getting ready to start shooting. I won’t bore you with intricate details during shooting, but I will tell you this – it’s very difficult shooting a script and story you have not planned for and are not entirely familiar with. There was one scene written into the script set at the beach. This is all well and good, but we realised that 35 minutes into our drive to the beach, it really could have been set somewhere closer like a park. Watching the film now, it does look good, but it could have been done more efficiently if we weren’t stupidly tired. Anyway, we wrapped at 9:30pm (ish). Big day.

The next day, I was up at 8am editing (never stopping for long breaks, just toilet and drink breaks) and didn’t finish until 4pm (again, ish. (it was a long weekend, I was very tired, I cannot recall specifics)). We handed it in, had a celebratory beer and went home.

All things considered, I’m extremely happy with the film. It works, it makes sense, it looks nice and we satisfied what we needed to. I’ll keep you updated on the success of the film (and whether or not it achieves anything in the competition). In the meantime, if you are interested in learning more about the festival, go here. I’ve embedded both the actual film and the bloopers below for your enjoyment. Check it out, let me know what you think.

Also if you did enter yourself, I’d love to see your entries! It would be nice to know we’re not the only crazy one’s entering!

Until next time, happy filmmaking!

Matt

Double Date is Done!

It has been one heck of a journey – but finally Double Date is finished.

I’ll miss the film, the people and the process. I feel so privileged to have been able to take my humble little story from a real event, and follow it through to a finished product. I could not express enough thanks and congratulations to everyone involved.

The premiere screening was a fantastic way to bring the whole process to an end. Sharing it in front of 400+ people was both terrifying and exciting. We were lucky enough to get the coveted position of last film of the night, and the audience went along for the ride. Very satisfying knowing that what we had worked so hard to make, was so entertaining.

I don’t really want to sit here and keep reminiscing, or saying glowing things about the experience. Rather, I’d like to extend an invitation for you to see the film.

For various reasons I won’t post it here, but if you are keen to see the film let me know via twitter (@mattsmolen), Facebook oremail.

I’d love you all to see it, and share in one of the most satisfying experiences of my life.

Here’s to the next one!

Double-sized home stretch!

It’s approaching faster than we anticipated, but the Double Date post-production is drawing to a close very soon. We’re in the final week of working on it, and let me tell you, nothing has been more exciting than seeing bits and pieces of it come together.

There was a rough cut, and from that came the lengthy process of ADR. For those who don’t know, ADR stands for Additional Dialogue Recording and is a process where the actors repeat their lines in a sound studio to get a better quality recording. Because we shot the majority of the film outside AND in a noisy public area, Double Date is about 80% ADR. Which means about 7 and a half minutes of dialogue re-recorded. In sync with the original image. If it sounds like a mighty task, thats because it is. All up we spent around 18-20 hours re-recording the dialogue. But it sounds so much better now. Credit to the cast too – every single cast member performed amazingly and didn’t complain once – plus they’ve improved their performances too!

See this short clip about our first ADR session:

That wrapped up on Sunday evening. Since then, we’ve finely cut the film to picture-lock quality. The graphics are being approved one-by-one and the music is being recorded this week. All the samples and rough edits of both the graphics and music have excited me to the point of being a child again (who said I ever grew up?). The foley and SFX are being recorded and inserted later this week and we’re putting everything together on the weekend for a final mix on monday.

Until then, I’ll tweak the colour grading until it looks perfect. It’s looking like a saturated cartoon at the moment, and the colour is refreshing to see (as opposed to dark and moody colour schemes). Here’s a little sneak peek at a before and after:

It’s very exciting and daunting seeing a project I have spent the better part of a year working on come to life, but I can safely say I’m more proud of this than anything before. It’s different, it’s challenging and a whole lot of fun – and I can’t wait to share it with you.

Double Date Teaser Trailer is now online!

Well, it has been for a week or so now. That said, it’s still worth watching. It’s not like the news where if it’s not read or digested immediately it becomes boring and irrelevant. Completely the opposite for this teaser trailer.

In fact, I’m going so far as to say it becomes more relevant the longer you wait to watch it. The release date is closer, and excitement is higher!

So below is the trailer. And if the above words suggest anything – it’s don’t watch it yet (but please do)!

Matt

Absolutely Wrapped

Just like that, the shoot is over. A blink and-you’ll-miss-it affair. So much build up to such an intense few days. Then it’s over – well, production is – and the exciting post-production can begin.

With weather concerns at an all time high, you’d be mistaken for thinking the shoot went horribly. However in reality, the shoot went as well as anyone could hope. The cast were showcasing their talent, and the crew worked professionally and dilligently on both days. They weren’t easy days either – the schedule didn’t really offer much time for rest at all.

We did have a few spotty patches of rain, and the schedule inevitably changed on the fly, but overall it was a seamless and fantastically executed shoot.

Then came processing and telecine at Deluxe in Elsternwick. It’s always one of those nerve-wracking moments, when you step in their doors awaiting the telecine process, praying to the heavens that your footage worked out. Thankfully, the footage was remarkable – all developed, nicely framed and in focus. Phew.

So all in all, I couldn’t be happier at this stage. We’ve met composer, will have a rough cut down by the end of next week and will get started on all the crazy special effects and sound recordings. I’ll leave you with a short behind the scenes clip, of one of the takes from the shoot.