Africa! In 24P...

That was really neat! I liked the music a lot! This seems more like a trailer than an intro, but I think I could see it as the introduction. I liked the map trace during the "3 continents" title. You had some great footage!

Make sure you post the final video when it's done. :)
 
Wow, that was really cool. Makes me wunna go there. What'd you use for the motion graphics? It looked like after effects to me.
 
Thanks for the comments!

dj: The music was actually from the "Network Music" library believe it or not! Usually their stuff sounds like some 80's garage band but they have some newer stuff that's a bit better...

I agree...it does kind of feel like a trailer. I kind of wanted a short piece that I could multipurpose and I hate re-editing so I figured I would make the Intro/Trailer one and the same. I think it works ok as an intro once you see it lead into the rest of the footage.

Shep: You should definitely go! The people of Kenya are amazing! And yes...the graphics were done in After Effects...with overly-gratuitous use of the Shine plugin! :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG) I know a lot of people say it is overused but I still like it and use it on occasion....

More comments/critiques welcome...
 
Nice vid pia, hard to see the shots as they were cut together so fast. But your editing was great.
 
Hey that looked pretty awesome! I was really excited to see this post in particular because I am actually going to Africa (Uganda) for 3 weeks at the end of May. I'm going on a missions trip with my church and am going to document our journey during that time. (Is that what you were doing?)

Well I was hoping you might be able to give some advice about the shooting situation out there (any equip info, do's and don'ts, tips, etc):
- for equip: what did you bring? (batteries, dust covers, mics, on cam lights, cases, tripod, etc)
- did you have any trouble with bringing your equip in and out of the country?
- how much footage did you actually shoot? any complications? recommendations?

Thanks for any help you can give me. I'm even more excited now that I've seen your footage!
 
Great job ! Kind of tiny but still nicely done. Felt like Survivor. Man, that DVX just rocks.

(Check your IRE levels on the final edit as alot of these cuts did not match)
 
Good shots. I agree with the other guy that said your shots go too fast though. When I think of Kenya and a church group helping out I don't think of super fast action shots like that. Maybe for a portion like 10 seconds of the video but not 60 seconds straight.

Also I like the after effect light effect. I don't think that's overdone. It's more a standard.

Could you elaborate further on how you did that map thing? I think it's really good and I need to do something like that -
 
Hey Everybody,

Thanks for posting! :dankk2:

ncje (and others): I know what you are saying about the shots being so quick...I think the tiny little video makes it kind of difficult to appreciate really quick edits! :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG) And, maybe in a few days once I have finished the rest of the video I can come back and take a look at it. After watching the same 60sec. about 1,000,000 times it becomes hard to be objective...so, it is good to hear an outside perspective!

I may be able to post a higher res version (with a better frame rate) for download at some point...


Hudson: Wow! I got a post from "The Man" himself! :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG) I agree, the DVX does rock!!!! If I hadn't been able to borrow it I probably would have just done photography and given up on the video idea... Also, how do I check IRE levels in Premiere? Any idea? (IRE...sounds so familiar...I think my professor talked about that when I was in school....it has to do with white levels or black levels eh? I'm retarded...)

Tbagg: Yes, I did the map animations with pieces I created in Photoshop and animated in After Effects. I just took the map pieces in Photoshop and drew the line on a seperate layer. I imported it into After Effects as a Composition (so it would preserve the layers) and then animated a mask over the line to reveal it "moving" across the map. Hope that helps! I'm sure there are people on this board who could explain it better or tell you a quicker/easier way to do it! :)

Kevin B: That is exactly what we did...I led a team of 14 from our church and we worked with Food for the Hungry in Northern Kenya. Uganda huh? Sweet!!!!

As far as equipment/shooting advice....

Equipment list:
- Camera
- Batteries (I had 3 and bought one of the long-life ones from the DVX ad you see sometimes...worth it!!! The electricity was down about half the time we were there and if I had not bought that battery I would have been out of luck for a day or two waiting to charge my other batteries!)
- Shotgun microphone and short XLR (it had a short XLR that is just long enough to go from the mic into the camera...about 8-10 inches long) I just gaffer taped this onto the top of the handle. One thing I would RECOMMEND that I did not do is get a good wind sock (a dead cat or something) to go on there. I had the default foam windscreen and the wind killed me in a lot of places...
- MiniDV tape...I brought 20...way overkill (it's the way I do things!) :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG) I ended up shooting 8.5 hours during a 10 day trip (including traveling, in country etc.)
- Tripod (kinda glad I brought it...I used it mostly for timelapse stuff...shot most of the rest of it handheld with a pretty wide lens)
- Headphones (didn't use much while shooting except to listen back to stuff at night...just rode the levels visually...kinda dangerous I know!)
- Charger and AC CONVERTER! Remember the AC Converter or at least a plug adapter (if your charger does the conversion internally)
- Things I brought, didn't use, but maybe should have: polarizer, tape cleaner, lens cleaner, longer XLR, medical tape (it's all I had!) :)

I didn't have any trouble getting it in and out of the country but I kept all the important stuff in my carry on (camera, batteries, tapes etc.). It is pretty common for travelers to Africa to have their baggage lost/delayed and I didn't want to be kept from shooting if that happened...of course, I wouldn't have had any clean clothes to wear but at least I would have "gotten the shot"! :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)

Hope that helps.

Thanks all! Any other thoughts/comments appreciated!

Also, any other advice for our friend Kevin I'm sure would be welcome! (Feel free to post in this thread if you want!) :)
 
Great job on the video. I am leaving for Europe and Kenya/Uganda May 1 for three weeks (serperate film projects). Just starting a non-profit media org with a passion for global stories (faith based missions media, humanitarian, justice issues). I will include a camera gear pic for Kevin Thursday on the .mac site from my trip last year to India and Malaysia. Good to see so many using the DVX for missions media. Here is the link, web site will not come online until summer (just going over "almost" final logo design tonight!). Keep up the good work!
john

www.mediaserveinternational.org
 
pia - Hey thanks for your in depth response. I really do appreciate it!

fatdaddy - I look forward to checking your site. And I might PM you later and ask you a few questions about your trips, if you don't mind....
 
Really cool! I went to Kenya about three years ago... didn't bring the DVX though, just my lil' Hi-8. It looks great! Can't wait to see more!
 
Hey FatDaddy,

I checked out your link...you've got some really nice stuff in there! I watched the India clip...great footage! Well edited as well!

Post some of your footage from the Europe/Uganda trip when you get back...and let me know if you ever need help on one of your trips to shoot global stories! :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)

Later!
 
Thanks. I will post some footage. Just got the stedicam merlin today (and a whole bunch of other goodies), now I gotta get in shape to lug 50 pounds of gear!

Keep checking the web site. It will be up at the end of may.

Thanks and blessings on your work.
 
Hey Fat Daddy,
I checked out your website... great stuff!!
Question.. do you use a wide angle, squeeze mode, or crop to get the 16x9?
 
MAY BE THIS WILL OPEN YA'ALL EYES ABOUT AFRICA.

DO YOU KNOW THAT AFRICA HAS THE THIRD LARGEST FILMING INDUSTRY IN THE WORLD (COUGH COUGH), ACTUALLY NIGERIA.


Nollywood - the rise of the film industry of Nigeria
London, March 23, (Guardian news Service): Nigeria now has the world's third largest film industry after Hollywood and Bollywood. Most of the movies are dirt cheap, straight-to-video voodoo horror flicks - but millions of fans can't get enough of them. Jeevan Vasagar reports from Lagos

It is late afternoon, and the crew and cast of a film called 'American Dream' are on location in an office block in suburban Lagos. An office here, borrowed for the day, is doubling as a flashy advertising agency, and on set the male lead is busy ironing his pink shirt on a desk, while the producer is shouting for the props man. The crew was meant to have wrapped these scenes up by midday and the director, Tony Abulu, is anxious. "We don't have much time," he says. "We've only got an hour and then we have to get out of here."

In a country where movies are made on shoestring budgets and cracked out in an average of 10 days, slips in the schedule can be disastrous.

In response to the producer's hollering, a man in flip-flops staggers into the room beneath a giant plant pot. Another member of the crew brings in a flat-screen computer. The scene is set and the cameras can roll.

Nigeria is home to one of the world's youngest film industries, but it's booming. In just 13 years it has gone from nothing to estimated earnings of US$200m a year - making it the world's third biggest film industry after that of America and India. The films are made on the cheap, but they are big box office.


Except that there is no box office, of course. In Nollywood, as it has inevitably been dubbed, movies are shot on video and copied straight on to tapes or DVDs and then sold on from thousands of street stalls and hole-in-the-wall shops, not just in Nigeria but across the continent, as well to the African diaspora via markets in the west.

"They sell a lot of our films in Peckham and in Dalston market [in London]," says Paul Obazele, the veteran producer on American Dream, who has already turned out four movies this year, and plans a US cinema opening for this latest effort. "But Peckham is becoming too small for us. We have decided to take on the world."

There are signs that the world is taking an interest - the Hollywood actor Wesley Snipes came to check out investment opportunities last September. You might argue that Nollywood needs to do something about its hackneyed plots, hammy acting and appalling sound quality if it's to become a real rival to Hollywood. But for African audiences, Nollywood films have one unique selling point.

If Hollywood's forte is jaw-dropping spectacle and Bollywood's is heart-warming musical slush, then Nollywood's special draw is a genre that might be described as the voodoo horror flick: films that revolve around witchcraft and demonic possession.

Most observers agree that it all began in 1992, with Living in Bondage, a cautionary tale about a man who gets sucked into a cult that demands the sacrifice of his wife in exchange for riches. The title refers to spiritual rather than sexual bondage. Since then, the genre has gone from strength to strength.

The movies can be read as fantasies; they allow the powerless to feel vicariously powerful. The stories tell of poor men getting rich, of errant husbands who find their penises shrinking, of love rivals who go blind or crazy and end up running naked and shrieking into the streets.

There is the occasional humorous twist. One classic features a controlling girlfriend who miniaturises her man and traps him inside a bottle. But the films always end with the practitioners of witchcraft being punished (although sometimes they are redeemed by finding Jesus) and the virtuous being rewarded.

One of the reasons this is such a powerful draw is that in Nigeria, as elsewhere in Africa, Christianity lies like a veneer over much older beliefs. The occult movies give people a chance to thrill once again to the power of the old religion, but then celebrate the victory of the new faith as the credits roll.

"The average human being wants to see that which is hidden," says Okechukwu Ogunjiofor, producer of Living in Bondage. "But we didn't glamorise it. We made people sit down and think, and opened up their minds. After that film came out, a lot of people left these [witchcraft] cults."

The power of the genre is evident during a visit to one of Nigeria's improvised backstreet cinemas. The cinema is essentially a grimy concrete shelter with a billygoat tied up by the door. Inside, a dozen or so men and women are watching a Nollywood video on a small TV.

The crowd sway and click their fingers during musical interludes, and giggle and shove each other during comic passages. But they watch enthralled when a woman in the grip of an occult mania is exorcised by a man in a giant blue turban and flowing robe.


Back on the set of American Dream, the make-up artist, Benjamin Ejimnkeonye, finishes powdering the noses of two mountainous henchmen and passes around photos from voodoo thrillers he has worked on.

One of the pictures shows women made up as witches, their hair wild, white clay smeared on their faces and circles of red lipstick around their lips and eyes. "I like occultic films," says Ejimnkeonye, who goes by the trade-name Oben Imaginations. "When you watch an occultic film, you wonder, wow, is that really happening? That's when I like my job."

Not all Nollywood movies are about the occult, of course. Nigeria is a country of startling inequality; in Lagos, skinny fishermen in pirogues skim past the skyscrapers of Victoria Island, the palm-studded local equivalent of Manhattan, and slums sprawl under flyovers. But as is true of Bollywood, Nollywood likes to eschew the grit of everyday life for a more upbeat vision.

As well as occult movies, and gangster movies, another popular genre involves straightforwardly aspirational tales. American Dream is typical. It's the story of a driven advertising executive who falls in love with an American woman and then jeopardises his high-flying career with increasingly desperate attempts to get a visa for America.

In the movies, characters are always dashing from the gym to the boardroom in chauffeur-driven cars, or ordering champagne in chic restaurants. Budgets usually dictate that the champagne bottle isn't actually shown - film budgets typically range from US$15,000 to US$40,000, which means that star names only earn between US$2,000 and US$3,200 a film - but none the less, the movies generally manage to give an impression of glamour.

On the shoot, there are more delays. The cast and crew are waiting for one of the lead actors who is hours late. As some of the actors swig Guinness in the sweltering heat, I talk to Segun Arinze, a portly veteran actor who has a key role in the scene to be shot today. "Nigerian producers and directors want to put people in a certain kind of role," Arinze says. "Everybody knows me as the 'bad boy', always with the gun." He cocks his fingers into a pistol shape. "This is different because I get to play the father figure here, the dad.

"I see myself as a method actor," he adds.

A short while later, however, with impeccable professionalism, Arinze is cheerfully swaggering through an entirely different role - as an underworld loan shark. With this last-minute switch, there has been no time to learn his lines, and barely minutes to get into character. Most of his dialogue is improvised.

Such fluidity is commonplace. With little time to rehearse, the actors frequently read from scripts left open on the floor during filming and most of the emphasis is placed on moving the plot forwards.

Nollywood directors are sanguine about long passages of improvisation, and the dialogue that results is a clunky and sometimes bizarre mix of western movie cliches and Nigerian references. Take, for example, the following fragment of dialogue from a film about a chieftain's son who is forbidden by his family to marry his girlfriend:

He: My love for you cannot break, but the people and gods of my land want me to break it.

She [in floods of tears]: They want you to send me away.

He: Angel, don't cry. Let's try to find a solution to this problem.

[Moment later, after he has tried to bribe her to break off the relationship . . .]

She: You want to pay me in exchange for the love I have for you? Oh God, how did I get myself into this mess? Have you forgotten our promises and dreams?

Nigeria has perhaps the most distinguished literary tradition in Africa; Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Ben Okri and Ken Saro-Wiwa are the best-known writers, but it is clear that Nigeria's home video industry has no pretensions to high art.

What it's all about is money. Nollywood movies were originally financed by importers of blank video tapes as a way of promoting sales of their product - and commerce remains king.

About 30 new titles arrive weekly at Lagos's giant open-air markets, where canvas banners with gaudy portraits of movie stars flap above the mediaeval hubbub. A new movie costs the equivalent of US$3.20 to buy, and only about 47 US cents to rent from a video club.

For the most part, Nigerians are proud of their movie industry and other African nations are envious. "I think there's a lot of things that converge to make this possible in Nigeria," says Femi Odugbemi, president of the Independent Television Producers' Association. "By tradition, we're a storytelling people. We have more than 230 languages, different cultures, all unique in themselves."

Nigeria is an African giant - it is the continent's most populous nation, with 133 million people. But it's also a country that appears to be constantly on the verge of a breakdown.

It is a British colonial creation, knitting together a Christian south and Muslim north, scores of ethnic groups and struggling to deal with festering discontent in the oil-rich delta region. That makes the film censor's job a tricky one.

"Sometimes we have movies that caricature certain ethnic groups - which say that Igbos are only looking for money, or that people up north are not very educated," says Emeka Mba, director-general of the National Film and Video Censors Board. "Depending on the context, that can be passed, as long as the entire movie is not about that theme."

Lagos, the commercial capital, is a microcosm of Nigeria's volatile mix. It is a monster: already home to 15 million and growing so fast that by 2010 the UN estimates it will be home to as many as 24 million, making it the third biggest city in the world. There is a sense of natural theatre on the streets of the city; even asking for directions leads to raised voices and urgent hand signals.


"We have a very expressive culture, and that affects our acting," says Richard Mofe Damijo, a broad-shouldered actor with a greying goatee. A popular romantic lead, he is sometimes described as "the Denzel of Nollywood".

"If I was working for a British director, I would play a lot calmer and internalise more. Here, the ability of an actor to portray emotion with tears is a plus. If you can't cry at the drop of a hat you're seen as a bad actor."

Award plaques are stacked on the floor of Mofe Damijo's office; he has collected dozens in the course of a 40-movie career - Nollywood may be largely ignored by western film festivals, but it shows no hesitation in patting itself on the back.

On the American Dream shoot, filming has transferred to a poor quarter of Lagos, where the streets are lined with stained concrete houses with tin roofs, and chickens peck at rubbish heaps. A crowd gathers as the female lead, played by Maryam Basir, an African-American actor and model, teeters across a narrow wooden footbridge wearing a zebra-print summer dress and stacked heels.

The male lead, Nigerian actor Karibi Fubara, is being filmed making a long-distance call to his girlfriend at a public booth, a wooden table where a handset offers a crackly connection.

When his allotted time runs out he tries to hang on to the phone, squeezing in a few extra seconds and ignoring the impatient queue behind. This is the cue for a female extra in a luminous green dress to seize the handset and berate him with a string of Hausa swearwords.

The woman's tirade mingles with the hoots of a watching crowd of small boys and the growl of passing motorbike taxis. Almost miraculously, the production seems to be somehow coming together.

"Nollywood is only 13 years old," says Ogunjiofor, producer of Living in bondage, who is now making TV soap operas, as well as preaching as an evangelical pastor. "If it's a child, it's not yet an adolescent. Wait until we're an adult, and then those who criticise us will come back and learn
from us."



Hey Pia/others, I am thinking of going to Nigeria later this year to shoot one of the most thrilling Vampire flick, I know for a fact it is the cheapest place to shoot an Hollywood movie, cuz they have all the eqiptments (35mm) there already. Gonna be fun :)
 
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(that has to be the longest post I have ever seen...)

I used a circular polarizer and shot full frame F5 and cropped in post (AXP on a mac). I will at some point post my equipment pics soon on the website. The next trip (one month) I am going to document alot of behind the scenes stuff to help others doing international work.
 
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