Does kissing up and brown-nosing work?

[Greggl]

Yea, Im not using any credit cards or anything.

Ok.. lets not consider this an attack.. lets think of it as an intervention.

You want to spend someone else's money.. that we're aware of. The
problem is that you don't want to have to pay it back. With a credit
card, they come after you if you can't cover the loan... You'd rather
take risks with cash that you can blow, guilt free.

I think that you need to get your priorities in line before making
any purchases or career moves

 

[Kegan]

Yeah, that's a great idea. I'm in Ontario and soon moving to London (Ontario) to go to school, but if you plan on doing this during the summer or next summer and have a place for me to crash I'd gladly work with you provided the script and stuff is good. Just gotta network yourself like already said. Where there's a will, there's a way.

Oh, and yes I do have a DVX100b haha.

-Kegan

 

[donkathon]

Yeah, that's a great idea. I'm in Ontario and soon moving to London (Ontario) to go to school, but if you plan on doing this during the summer or next summer and have a place for me to crash I'd gladly work with you provided the script and stuff is good. Just gotta network yourself like already said. Where there's a will, there's a way.

Oh, and yes I do have a DVX100b haha.

-Kegan

Thanks, but naw. I cant. And lets discuss why. Its the reason that I cant use a credit card, why I cant get help or use craigslist, and I cant do anything else. But that later.

The reason I dont want to spend my own money (which has amounted to about enough for a used DVX100B) are because I dont have to. I could go to my homeland, Canada, and relax on the farm and enjoy summer. But a month and a half can bring some boredom, and I've conjured a script, and I'd love to make something to give to some festivals and hopefully make a little cash. So why not?

Back to the reason I'm limited. Most of you will hate me for it, because of no real reason. Ill be shunned at these DVX Forums, most likely. Its because I'm fourteen years old.

Im not dumb- Im actually really smart (though I dont say that to sound stuck-up.) I have money, but I dont have to spend it. I cant get a job, folks, because I need a greencard in america, because you've learned that I lived in canada. But I'm a try-fail-try again kind of person. Like Bob Dylan said, "If you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose." If I ask, and I get nothing, I've got other studios to politely ask. If one says yes, I get the money, buy the camera guilt free (not wasting all my saved-up money), use my script, make a movie, and have fun with it. I've got nothing to lose. Im sure the studios dont need to know how old I am. Everyones allowed to have a dream.

So respond to this with either an attack, curses, compliments, or quesitons.

 

[zoostory]

You're age means little to me, though mark it up as another hurdle against you getting anything anytime soon. Still, if you are driven, you can make things happen. The problem isn't your age. It's your inability to listen. Nobody in any studio or anywhere cares that you have a farm and passion to make a great movie. For that matter, no studio cares about anything shot in video with a DVX or any other prosumer camera.

Unless your last name is Spielberg or Lucas or something, you're going to have to do things the hardway like the rest of us. Work, earn, meet and greet, write, rewrite, practice, learn.

I suggest you start humbly. Meet other people in your school that have the same passion you do. Form a team, and get going at a young age. Use whatever camera you have right now to learn and practice. You still have a lens, and you can still compose shots, edit them together, and tell a story. You'll find that it's not that easy, and a DVX isn't the miracle cure to making a good movie.

You're playing in a big game with a lot of competition. Use your age as an advantage, you have the time to shoot a lot, learn a lot, and develop life-long friendships with similar interests.

Then in 5 years, I'll see you in Los Angeles with the ten million other people from all over the world that have landed here thinking they are the next big thing

 

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

You're age means little to me, though mark it up as another hurdle against you getting anything anytime soon. Still, if you are driven, you can make things happen. The problem isn't your age. It's your inability to listen.

ditto

Nobody in any studio or anywhere cares that you have a farm and passion to make a great movie.

ditto

For that matter, no studio cares about anything shot in video with a DVX or any other prosumer camera.

humbly disagree and their are several examples that suggest otherwise

Unless your last name is Spielberg or Lucas or something, you're going to have to do things the hardway like the rest of us. Work, earn, meet and greet, write, rewrite, practice, learn.

I suggest you start humbly. Meet other people in your school that have the same passion you do. Form a team, and get going at a young age. Use whatever camera you have right now to learn and practice.

exactly!

You still have a lens, and you can still compose shots, edit them together, and tell a story. You'll find that it's not that easy, and a DVX isn't the miracle cure to making a good movie.

You're playing in a big game with a lot of competition. Use your age as an advantage, you have the time to shoot a lot, learn a lot, and develop life-long friendships with similar interests.

Then in 5 years, I'll see you in Los Angeles with the ten million other people from all over the world that have landed here thinking they are the next big thing

yes yes yes.

By the time you exhaust your list of studios to politely ask ... summer will be over.

Buy a DVX or use your current camera and make your film with no money this summer ... especially if its your first film.

NO studio is going to give ANY money to FOURTEEN year old on a first effort. You can accept that and make your movie anyway, or you can waste your summer soliciting studios for money.

• I'm 34.
• I had a 10 year career in the theatre.
• I've made three shorts each of which has placed in the top 3 in DVXuser festivals this year.
• Because of that, I have a producer backing a very low budget feature for me (less than 100K). I'm making a movie with someone else's money.

I got a very small piece of the pie by working my ass off showing what I can do. You're not going to get a crumb just because you are "plucky".

You MIGHT sell your screenplay or sell an option to it. But to do that you will more than likely need an agent and that will take a while.

I had a couple of friends shoot a zombie film on a $200 camera in their hometown. The premise was that in the future cloning was unstable and the clones eventually turned into zombies ... now cloning is illegal but clones which were originally created for slave labor are now highly valuable as research subjects on the black market. Enter our hero, a con just released from prison who is hired by a mob boss to make a simple delivery to a clone dealer. Oh .. also the clones eat humans ... so if you are trafficking in them, you have to kidnap and murder people to keep your business going. Of course the hero finds the clonde dealer dead from a clone attack and the compound overun with clones and he has to shoot his way out and rescue a pretty hostage in the process.

It's not very good but has some cool shots and parts in it. The thing that sucks most bout it was that the mob boss was played by a 17 year old. -- first note: cast age approraite actors.

BUT the POINT of this story .... they sold the damn thing for $30k. It was not airable or distributable, but some production company liked the idea of it enough to buy the rights to it, perhpas to make a movie with that same premise some day.

These guys had auditions in the highschool gym, paid no one, bought and returned rubber body parts and made their movie.

As a result of that less than Citizen Kane effort, they got some money off it, made their next thing, and have been part of a DVD festival available for a while in BlockBuster (or Hollywood video).

So make your movie.

Before I got mmy DVX I shot a Zombie Parody on a single chip $200 cam and went black and white and tried to make it look like old film ... so I turned the low production value into sinething integral to the story.

I felt like their were DVXes all around me ... tauntiing me ... seducing me with their 3 chips and and 24p frame rates. But I didn't let that keep me from making a movie when the opportunity arose. I dusted off my $200 canon, which was already 3 years old when I got it on eBay 3 years before that and made something.

Go make some shorts ... Go do a few things ... Go learn a few things ... who knows, maybe they'll be good enough to get you other people's money.

But right now you have the cart before the horse.

 

[donkathon]

Rightly so.

 

[D_and_G]

Great post Jack.

To add in my 3 pence...

Try and find a young or teen centered film center. In Ontario there are several foundations and festivals, and corporate sponsorships help with those. When it's an official organization you have more access to equipment and like minded chaps.

You might be in the countryside, but if you started a local youth film co-op in your area, maybe at a local community center, or library, then you might get help from people you didn't even know would want to. When it's just one person asking for a handout, I don't think you'd have much luck. If you tried to do something that would have positive results for more people than just yourself, you may get some corporate help, or community help. Anyway, there's been plenty of good advice from other posters, so you should be aaight. Good luck with your flick.

 

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

Rightly so.

Well have fun ramming your horse into the back of your cart and seeing how far down the road you get ... I thought you said you were smart.

Wanna take a personal bet that at the end f the summer you'll still be sitting around talking about making a movie?
(that is if you persist with this studio nonesense)

I'll put $20 on it.

Here's a thought. Email me your script and I'll tell you if there's even a prayer that another human being would put 2¢ into.

Don't mean to sound too harsh, but when 14 year olds come here and ask for advice and don't listen ... well it has to get a little tough.

No one here is trying to discourage you from making a movie. No one here is debating whether or not you are in fact the next [insert favorite director here].

We're just trying to tell you that you're wasiting your time ... that you are focused on the wrong thing. Right now you should be focusing on making the best film you can with the available materials.

They did a survey in LA where they randomly stopped people on the streets and asked them how their screenplay was going. One out of three had an answer.

But good luck to you as you push your cart into town by butting your horsehead into it past all the people that have training and experience and life experience that are already there. Maybe you'll be such a spectacle with your horse with a bloodied head and cracked falling apart cart that you'll get media coverage and sign a 3 picture deal somewhere :thumbsup:

 

[donkathon]

Hey, man. I was agreeing with you, and appreciated the answer. I thought that was what "Rightly So" meant. If it doesnt mean the same thing I thought, I really am sorry.

I really liked that post.

 

[Future user]

youthful ambition

youthful ambition

There is a girl who started shooting stuff and posting it on youtube. For whatever reason, it became insanely popular and now she is going off to work with MTV on something. Can't tell you what, because frankly I really don't care. The point of this is, you don't need equipment. You need persistence, and the ability to listen. If you're smart you will learn the latter and never forget to.
Go make something with whatever you have handy. If a $200 camera is all you have, then shoot with it.
I shot video riding my mootrcycle on some country roads, edited it on windows movie maker, showed it to my brother who works in the industry, and was told to work on the editing. He couldn't care less what it was shot on. It was the concept, the execution, and the editing he looked at.
Walk down the aisle at Block Buster. How many of the titles have you watched? For the most part they all had budgets and gear and stuff. But they sucked. So don't worry about what you have but what you're going to do with it.
Sorry for the ramble, just finished the Austin 48 hour film contest adn I'm still wiped out.

 

[donkathon]

48 hours. Wow, thats as ridiculous as the word Flange.

It's ridiculous.

 

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

Hey, man. I was agreeing with you, and appreciated the answer. I thought that was what "Rightly So" meant. If it doesnt mean the same thing I thought, I really am sorry.

I really liked that post.

sorry ... your "rightly so" came right after I said "you have the cart before the horse" which I took to mean that you wanted to have your cart before the horse.

There was a thread last month where a 17 year old kid was trying to get $500K to make a movie and was insisting on buying a varicam and learning how to use it in a weak.

He wouldn't listen to anyone and stirred up enough ruckus with his obstenance that the thread was finally locked due to its volitile nature.

Thought we were going down that road again.

My bad.

 

[TimurCivan]

Brown nosing gets you thinks like a discounts on contact lenses and some company letting you barrow a freeze dried rat to use as a prop in exchange for saying "freeze dried rat provided by"

BWAHAHAHAHAHAH!

 

[TimurCivan]

The only problem is: all I have is a tripod and a PV-GS31 (cheapo cam, cost me 200$)
And I have no money to buy anything.

If you light that PVgs31 the right way it will make a nice image.

there was this kid running arund a few years ago, Questionman31 or somethign.

He was making GORGEOUS videos with his Sony TRV70.

i have a TRV70. after seeing his work i descided to light somethign the right way and tape it. The TRV 70 ROCKED OUT.


Dude seriously. a 200$ camera, and 2000$ worth of lights, is better than a 3500$ camera and poor lighting gear. but the beauty isthat you dont need 2000$ worth of lights. Just get creative.

Home Depot, has 12$ 500Watt HAlogen work lights, as well as 7$ 250watters. 3 of thoes lights, 3 Basic 20$ lighting stands and a few hours garage time, with a drill and a some nuts and bolts and youve got a lighting kit. If youre REALLLLLY clever you will realise that you can glue, ( neatly) silvery shiny relfective cloth from a fabric store to the inside of n old umbrella and make an umbrella reflector..... (they even sell umbrella reflector holders online for like 20$ at B&H), or that while youre at home depot buying the lights you can also buy silver sided Tyvek board, which acts miraculously well as a reflector.......


use youre head. dont worry about technology, because if youre gonna make anythign god you will make it with whats at hand. Real artists will draw or make art wit hwhatever they have. not wait till they can get 3500$ worth of paint.

 

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

Brown nosing gets you thinks like a discounts on contact lenses and some company letting you barrow a freeze dried rat to use as a prop in exchange for saying "freeze dried rat provided by"

BWAHAHAHAHAHAH!

:cheesy: ladies and gentlemen ... exhibit "A"

 

[donkathon]

If you light that PVgs31 the right way it will make a nice image.

there was this kid running arund a few years ago, Questionman31 or somethign.

He was making GORGEOUS videos with his Sony TRV70.

i have a TRV70. after seeing his work i descided to light somethign the right way and tape it. The TRV 70 ROCKED OUT.


Dude seriously. a 200$ camera, and 2000$ worth of lights, is better than a 3500$ camera and poor lighting gear. but the beauty isthat you dont need 2000$ worth of lights. Just get creative.

Home Depot, has 12$ 500Watt HAlogen work lights, as well as 7$ 250watters. 3 of thoes lights, 3 Basic 20$ lighting stands and a few hours garage time, with a drill and a some nuts and bolts and youve got a lighting kit. If youre REALLLLLY clever you will realise that you can glue, ( neatly) silvery shiny relfective cloth from a fabric store to the inside of n old umbrella and make an umbrella reflector..... (they even sell umbrella reflector holders online for like 20$ at B&H), or that while youre at home depot buying the lights you can also buy silver sided Tyvek board, which acts miraculously well as a reflector.......


use youre head. dont worry about technology, because if youre gonna make anythign god you will make it with whats at hand. Real artists will draw or make art wit hwhatever they have. not wait till they can get 3500$ worth of paint.

I see where you are going. Its not the oicture I'm worried about, its the sound. I think we all know that every consumer Panasonic cam has the worst mic possible. Well, mine has no Mic input. I've been looking for two months at MD and DAT recorder, and they are all too expensive. To me, I would rather have good sound than good picture- its what seperates a cheap looking indie piece from a beautiful feature.

 

[Future user]

sound

sound

Worry about things in order...
Story
is it any good
is it worth watching
is it well written
will it make sense
Direction
location
sets
lights
believability
continuity
Acting
can they
are they
do they
Editing
practice your chops
don't rely on anything to "save" bad shots
consistancy is everything
Score
Sound
native sound
foley work
sound effects
Titles

additional stuff: pacing, timing, continuity (yes I'm saying it again)
Lot's of stuff can be done in the editing room. But you seem to be looking for limitations to stop you from doing something. Get out there with whatever you have and shoot, play, have fun, practice, work hard , study other filmmakers, study online, read books form the library. Ask questions about specific situations and then problem solve.
Honestly my young friend, it sounds a bit like your looking for a place to whine about not having the nice toys. Not trying to sound mean or anything. When I was fourteen I didn't have a video camera of any kind. Had I I would have been shooting everything. You have a world of opportunity in your hands. You can shoot on what you have, edit with windows movie maker, slide in a track from your favorite CD and see how it turns out. I shot the first thing anyone ever saw on a Mustek dv5, edited with WMM, and it's still getting looked at on another site.
The greatest tool you have lies between your ears and behind your eyes.

 

[Beat Takeshi]

If one says yes, I get the money, buy the camera guilt free (not wasting all my saved-up money),

This line says it all, if you cant bring yourself to invest in your own movie then why would you think someone else would.

 

[TimurCivan]

Pto do you have a job? get a summer job. and buy equpitment.

how old are you anyway.

 

[Jack Daniel Stanley]

He's 14 Timur ... which might make an "on the books" job a problem ... but there are ways around that and if he's mostly concerned about sound then he just needs to earn $400 to get into the neighborhood of "acceptible".

I see where you are going. Its not the oicture I'm worried about, its the sound. I think we all know that every consumer Panasonic cam has the worst mic possible. Well, mine has no Mic input. I've been looking for two months at MD and DAT recorder, and they are all too expensive. To me, I would rather have good sound than good picture- its what seperates a cheap looking indie piece from a beautiful feature.

well if the MD recorders are too expensive then you're SOL on a good mic.

We have talked a lot about working with what's at hand.

I do think you may be dissapointed if you can't do something about your audio however.

Simply put we will percieve low fi video as an aesthetic, grungey, intentional, or otherwise, and bad audio will always be ... bad audio.

Video game companies have done studies finding that great audio caused games with phenomenal graphics to be rated as mediocre and games with mediocre graphics to rate much higher, as high as the games with awesome graphics in some instances.

I think in that light, good audio is MORE important than video -- especially if you are not going to the big screen for a while. For George Lucas, sure audio and video are 50% each of the experience and to be treated with equal importance (he has said as much) but if you are going to the web or DVD for your final product now I would say its 60% audio 40% video in terms of polish and quality.

So believe it or not I am going to encourage you to spend money.

You can get set up with something that won't dissapoint you and will feel like a big leep from your on camera mic (because it will be) for less than $400 I think. (even less if you can find it on eBay -- which I would do if the seller had a high rating).

Seems like a big number, but an industrious 14 year old such as yourself can get a hold of that during a Summer if he so chooses.

METHOD 1
Can't remember what child labor laws are, but if you can get a job at McDonalds ... work there for three weeks and then quit. Or ask if you can go part time after three weeks (that way you'll have money for lights from the hardeware store, fake blood, trips to the thrift store, craft services "food" for your cast and crew, etc) Yes McDonalds sucks but, hey I did it for a Summer when I was 19.

METHOD 2
Barring the above or in addition too, ask for Christmas (or Hanukah or what have you) cash, and birthday cash all upfront from every family member that spends money on or gives money to you for those occasions. Tell them that you expect nothing under the tree or in a pile by your birthday cake when those days come. Your selling points are

• they don't have to go shopping
• they'll have more cash at Christamas (or Hanukah or what have you) because they won't have to deal with you while they are getting things for everyone.
• your good kid and this is impotant to you as you think you might want to be a filmmaker
• you are going to work with an old camera that you have, but its ill equiped for sound and based on your meticulous research (site some of the examples I listed about the necessity of good sound)

METHOD 3
Form a film collective with 3 like minded friends that you get a long well with and each of you raise $100 to get the sound gear. Then this summer you will shoot 4 shorts spending a week or two on each wherein each of you gets to be the "boss" or lead filmmaker.

METHOD 4
Send a letter to all your family and friends saying how important this is to you and $5or $10 will help.

METHOD 5
Throw a party with live music. Get a friend with a band to play at your party and charge $2 a head to get in.

METHOD 6
etc., etc.


Ok .... this as ghetto as it gets (for "good" sound anyway)

iRiver T30 $149 = 1gig, $99 = 512mb

+
Azden SGM X with mini output $99.95

The Iriver will record at CD quality like an MD. So you are all good there (a DAT is 24 bit vs 16 however)

the SGM X is not the greatest mic in the world, but I started on it and got better results than my Senheizzer ME-66/k6 on occasion because it has a wider pickup pattern which is bad for real pros who zero in on the sound they want with a super narrow pattern, but not always so good for uncle joe or your friend from algebra that are holding the boom mic for you off axis from what you want to record.

You will also need a shock mount
Azden SMH-1 $29

you can't get around this. Bumps from the camera, a hand, or boom pole touching the mic will be recorded and audible. Even just repositioning your hands or tightening your grip can be recorded without the shock mount.

Now BOOM POLE is one area you might be able to fudge ... they run from $69 - thousands of dollars ... but if you can figure out a way to attach the shock mount to a broom handle or dowel then maybe that will work.

Without the boom pole, you might as well attach the mic to your camera light shoe (assuming it has one) and call it a day, because chances are you will be able to get closer to your actors than a friend holding a mic without a boom pole. Once you get to closeups he can hold the shothun mount like a pistol just above camera view or to the side if necessary.