Blue in Green // trailer for my first feature

[Zak Forsman]

myself and a group of filmmakers recently shot a feature with three dvx100's and we are currently in post. i've been lurking thru this forum for the last six months and learned a great deal from it. *once i even logged on to solve an audio issue we were having during the shoot.

the feature was shot as follows:
24P normal
cinelike gamma
cinelike matrix
master ped -4
underexposed everything 1.5 to 2 stops and will "push" it in post

* http://www.blue-in-green.com/gfx/carla.jpg * http://www.blue-in-green.com/gfx/chuck.jpg * http://www.blue-in-green.com/gfx/sam.jpg

anyway, i've been eager to share the footage with the board. you can view the trailer (still a wip and not color corrected) at the link below.

Blue in Green - trailer link (http://www.blue-in-green.com)


zak forsman
...

[Zoomforce]

Great to hear you have found some good tips here.

The trailer looked great.. seemed a little bright on my system but thats probally just my settings. One thing really that stood out was the talent though.. looked like you got a pretty good cast together.

Constructive advice, the car scene needed to be lit a little better, *but the rest of it looked great. I liked your titles and the edits at the end of the trailer. Good work!

[J.R. Hudson]

Great job!

I second J's comments; it seems as if you have a very talented cast. *Shows what a difference that makes when you watch other trailers that do not. *Reminds me of how important every element is in this process.

It did look BRIGHT on my side as well and I don't think it's my system! *I'm always wishing the DELL FLATSCREEN complimented VIDEO better. *For example, the thumbnails on the left look more balanced in terms of CONTRAST as oppossed to the clip. You do mention that you will PUSH it in POST, so no worries, right?

Any 2 cents I have is more movement in the camera as oppossed to TRIPOD shots. *That's just a personal opinion and I know that requires some lengthy set-ups and planning.

Great job!

[Anhar_Miah]

cool work :) , one question though, did you have any problems with calibrating the three dvx's ? i.e keeping them in sync(like what kinda tecniques did you use) i only ask cause i wanna learn! and shot like you guys oneday ;D

[Zak Forsman]

thank you for the encouraging words regarding the actors. the cast deserves more credit than you know. prior to shooting, we went thru six months of videotaped improvisation sessions developing character, exploring possible character arcs. everyone contributed to the form and content of the film... from the sound crew to the guy who organized our catering... everyone came to these meetings to offer their ideas, thoughts, insights.

from there we structured the story, individual characters arcs, and gave opposing objectives (for lack of a better label) to the two or three characters in each scene. not a single line of dialogue was written. when it came to shooting. the actors new their characters so well they just took their objectives and ran. admittedly, this was an experiment to see if it could be done this way so we kept the budget low ($5,000) and the shooting schedule tight (we shot it in 7 days). much was learned and the results were surprisingly good. there are moments in the film so truthful, no writer could have conjured them.

this 'community effort' is why the cast and crew all share the 'a film by' credit in the billing block. no one takes a credit for anything specific because no one's contributions were that limited.

no problems syncing the camera's in post. i calibrated three rented cameras at the beginning of each day, created matching scene files, and all were white balanced simultaneously and exposures were set. cinetrack ran to camera A and camera's B & C were sync'd in final cut by lining up the slate/marker/PA-clapping-his-hands-together.

anyway, thanks again. the cast will love to hear what you've had to say. many of them have appeared on tv shows and commercials (i live in los angeles). six feet under fans may recognize the guy who says 'who is he?'... rainn wilson did a few episodes wearing glasses. and bart tinapp 'i'd be jumping out of my skin' played a detective on two episodes of nypd blue. but i've never seen them, i dont watch television.

thanks again,


zak forsman

ps//i've uploaded a new qt of the trailer, the previous one said to be 'too bright' was due to the gamma correction filter in compressor set too low. should be better now.

[Guest]

Hi Zak,

Can you share what you used for sound? Like the microphone etc?

[Zak Forsman]

Hi Zak,

Can you share what you used for sound? Like the microphone etc?

we hired a sound crew which comprised of two boom operators and one man on the mixer sending an EQ'd cinetrack to channel 1 on camera A, and a safety cinetrack (a few decibals lower) to channel 2. they were using audio technica AT4051a's on the booms and occasionally went to wireless lavs for the more soft-spoken actors. i dont know what make/model those were. anyway, these guys were great, and we will be hiring them again on our next shoot this summer. if anyone in the los angeles area is looking for an affordable sound crew, let me know. i'll pass you their number.