"Id". A short to enjoy.

armisiano

Veteran
So I went out one morning to shoot a short with my friend Dawn, and despite noisy (but nice) homeless people residing nearby and watching VERY closely, I think it turned out alright. It was my first time doing something with my 35mm adapter besides god forsaken test footage. For those curious I used a Nikon 28mm, 50mm, 85mm, and 100mm lens. I had a few goals, first, I didn't want to necessarily "milk" the 35mm adapter with too many extremely shallow DOF shots, because I don't think that's the point. So with the exception of a couple special shots, the DOF is pretty subtle. I also always wanted to do something in the 2.35:1 aspect ratio, so I did. Although since it was shot with my DVX100 (neither A nor B), the resolution is a bit low. There is one shot I was very unhappy with, and that's a handheld you'll see toward the end. It KIND OF works since it's supposed to be a walking POV, but it's too unstable (a culmination of the weight from the DVX, rails, adapter & lens, and the fact that I had to mentally flip the image as I try to stay in that tight 2.35:1 framing). Ah well.
It was fully storyboarded, which I find for me always helps a lot, and to my delight it turned out looking exactly like my storyboards. So yay. I did notice ONE flaw with my adapter (a DIY), the footage on the right edge is a bit soft. But please, for the sake of entertainment, look past the flaw and just enjoy the funny little short, "Id". It stars my friend Dawn Vasey as both the Ego and her Id, and is about a person who meets, well, their Id. I think we get it. Shot one afternoon in Balboa Park here in San Diego (me olde stomping grounds). It's short and simple. Enjoy. Comment. Thanks.

"Id"
 
Thanks. I enjoy awkward humor. Always a little worried most people won't be as amused as I am. Oh well, more fun for me.
 
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Hmm. I don't think anyone seems to like it, or even have any thoughts on it for that matter. Or any criticisms. At all. Which is sad.

Interesting technical point though, with the exception of the "HA!", all sound was done in post. The wind/air, birds, rustling in the leaves and walking, etc.
 
I really liked it and thought that it was beautiful to look at, nice job with the 2.35:1, a very difficult task to keep the ratio and shoot "upside down"

The effects were seemless, very impressive.

Quick question, what post production software did you use for the effects? I especially liked the first "two shot" with Id peeking out from behind the screen and then following across the frame.

Good job. I was quite impressed and even a little inspired, thank you.
 
Thanks a lot. I'm glad you liked it. It's a bit quirky and awkward, but honestly that's what I was going for. The 2.35:1 framing was really just accomplished by 2 strips of electrical tape over the LCD. Since it was all still shots it wasn't too hard to adjust when shooting. If you notice the one moving shot kinda sucks a bit (didn't bring my dolly). I've since made a cool little clear cover for my LCD with lines marking out where 1.85:1 and 2.35:1 are. Believe it or not the effects were all done in an old version of Adobe Premiere. It was really simple, just some split screening and playing with the gamma correction, brightness & contrast so they'd match up. I also had (in the first split screen shot) the 2nd video layer (with the Id) fade in over the first layer before the charcter entered, and then crossed (the other half of the frame), that way you wouldn't notice that the clouds had actually moved a bit, changing the lighting on the background.

Although Adobe Premiere 6.0 (version I currently have) sucks. Really. It can't even flip the image without the end product looking like a disgustingly compressed old school jpeg. I had to go to a friends house with the file to get it flipped. He has Premiere Pro 2.0 (latest version) which I'm working on getting soon.

But again, thank you.
 
i think the hand held was fine since you had the id bouncing around before. pretty cool little film. throw in some dialog between the two, that's if you ask me. what might dawn say to her id?

cool effects too, nice use of the sign and nice way to frame the end shot in between the two large trees. cool looking park to film.
 
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