Butterflies in the Wind in pursuit of happiness

Hey Vic.

I like this one! I think this is my favorite one so far. I like it a lot. I think you could add some sound effects, something to try, maybe just some subtle low end ones but otherwise I think it works fine the way it is. I agree with Nate, number nine ended on what seemed like a funny note, where as number 10 works really well I think. Also the trailer jumps in quite quickly, it's hard to make out that first line, is there a good line before that one so it could be extended? I like the opening shot.
 
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Vic give yourself a bigger buffer there in the beginning. Let us slowly slide into the trailer. It kind of just STARTS and it cuts off what she's saying. Something like a title page with, "From award winning director Vic Alexander." And then jump into it.
 
Will do. I'm editing the opening.... Here comes version 11 :-)
It's amazing when one listens to advice. There's so much to learn. Attitude is so important. Please keep it coming. I'm really appreciative.

Also, I'll throw in some Soundtrack Pro effects.
 
Real nice. I agree with aurantaurant about the opening and I think you should end the trailer on "Peter doesn't love you, he wants to marry money then leave" then add the end credits. The way it's said cuts to the heart of the matter and the look on the actress' face sells it. We should be left with that emotion as the music fades. Once you do this I think you're done. I think I'm going to buy a copy of this when I get paid.

-Nate
 
Oops, I didn't read this last comment, Nate.

But here is version 11, it's at: http://www.releasing.net

I could end on "Peter doesn't love you, he wants to marry money then leave" of course.

It was Chris I think who suggested ending on something else, a shot to linger and make us wonder...?

I'd like some more comments on the endings. Otherwise, I hope the opening is better now.

What's the final verdict? :-)
 
The intro is so much better now. I like that! You could make it so the first line doesnt come in at exactly the beginning though, move it along even half a second just so when you click play it doesnt just immediately start.

The ending. Hmm. I think with the way it is now, with the music like that, I like it ending that way. However - ending on "Peter doesn't love you...." would work if you cut the music off a little earlier and had the trailer end with some low, subtle (maybe slightly eerie) music, giving it a change of feel and leaving us on a slightly more serious note. After thinking about it a while I think this would be my favorite option. It won't work so well over the end of that music track though so IMO you would have to cut the music before that line somehow (fade out maybe/transition into the low strings or whatever, something simple, like just a held note on the strings with maybe some subtle ambient stuff in the background, hopefully you can find something fairly easily).

One more thing to try could be the fade on that music track at the beginning. It works but i'm not 100% sold on it, one thing I'd try is leave that new opening music going until just before about 14-15secs when he says "you think i deserved to lose my parents..." etc. The part of the music track that comes in there is good, picks up the momentum of the trailer.

Might change the feel a bit too much though so maybe just something to try.

These things might be a bit picky, I think you've got a great trailer now, and it is definitely a big improvement on your first cut. It's come a long way and sells the film to me a lot more than it did before, I will definitely order a copy.
 
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ChrisHurn said:
The intro is so much better now. I like that! You could make it so the first line doesnt come in at exactly the beginning though, move it along even half a second just so when you click play it doesnt just immediately start.

The ending. Hmm. I think with the way it is now, with the music like that, I like it ending that way. However - ending on "Peter doesn't love you...." would work if you cut the music off a little earlier and had the trailer end with some low, subtle (maybe slightly eerie) music, giving it a change of feel and leaving us on a slightly more serious note.
Click to expand...

I can agree with this. And yes, when I first saw the original trailer I was like "What is this?" and with that 70's vibe going I was like "Crazy experimental piece, let me get the heck out of here." But these trailers sold me. The acting is good, not so sold on the way you recorded the dialogue but it works well enough. I think more than anything the story sales it. This seems like a hard film with some real stuff going on. The blonde is such a great actress, so expressive but not over the top. Is she theater?

My biggest issue is the camera stays on dude with the guitar which is way too long. We only need to see a second or so of him, camera stays on him for about 4 seconds, plus it lets us notice his mouth isn't in sync with the song. You may want to fade into him instead of cutting then cut to the bar scenes as you've done.

After she says the line about "Peter" you can cut to a credit screen, white letters on black like in the movies or whatever. Nice intro too, letting people know where it was shown. That's basically all I would change. I think you'd have a totally pro trailer there. People are left thinking WTF. The trailer can be a bit addictive actually. By the way, the part where he says "The ends justifies the means" That look on her face. That's one heck of an edit.

-Nate
 
Thanks Nate! Everyone, you guys are great. Here is trailer #13 :-)

http://www.releasing.net

I skipped 12; there was a slight change I had to make after I'd encoded it. Oh, well, tell me more.... This is closest to what has been recommended by everyone. Of course, art isn't perfect, so at a certain point maybe I have to call it quits on this phase of the editing.

The blond actress is Heather Coburn. She had only done high school theater when I discovered her at one of my auditions in Hollywood. She was raw but good. Working alone was difficult on the cast who had never seen anybody work alone the way I did and shooting 35mm too.LOL The funny thing is that they stayed only because I was shooting 35mm. I had to actually show them the film before they believed it.

One of my actors kept asking me to plug the video cable in the back of the Arri 2c.LOL He said, "I have a monitor." He wanted to see what his acting was like. *Sight* I had to finally explain to him that it was not a magnetic signal but celluloid!

Now comes the hard part: the movie isn't as good as the trailer.LOL What do I do now?

Just kidding. Cutting trailers is a whole other thing. It's a different style of editing altogether. I've learned SOOO much. I'm amazed and grateful....
 
As long as you keep the female stuff in there about selling sex, and include all the sexy shots you have, then you're putting your best foot forward.

I bought the DVD a while back just because I was curious what people were making on DVXUser and because it's good to support fellow filmmakers. The movie has a completely different vibe than what you'd normally expect. It feels foreign, it feels 70's, it's grainy, and there is some spotty coverage on certain scenes. But as I've said before it just added to the essence of the movie. I've watched it twice and there's just something about it that keeps you watching.

I say just focus on the sexy stuff and you'll be okay.
 
I'm speechless, Aurant. LOL Next movie I make will be super sexy. I don't like violence so this is it -- sexy! Just kidding; I didn't write the script. In fact it was a script that was sent to me over the internet.

Acutally I'm gearing up for my next feature film and I'm torn down the middle.LOL I have screenplays. I have great screenplays! But I don't have money and I'm getting too old for begging.LOL So, maybe I'll remain felliniesque once more....

This trailer editing process has energized me. I'm breathing film again. I want to shoot like there are a hundred DVXusers breathing down my neck: do it like this, do it like that, more of this, less of that -- lose that shot, don't you have another like that?LOL. I love it. Would you guys consider being my crew on the next movie? I don't have money but I promise it will be fun.LOL

Well, you've already been my crew on this one. Thanks! Now that I have more or less finalized the trailer for my feature film BUTTERFLIES IN THE WIND, I'm going to go on to Felliniesque Players and see if I can cut a new trailer for that movie.

Perhaps you'll help me with that as well? I'm going to start a new thread for Felliniesque Players. The first thing I'm going to look for is a new title. Nobody seems to know what felliniesque means.LOL Federico Fellini never made a movie in the US ... in fact anywhere else than Italy! Aside for Rimini, where he was born and raised, I don't think he shot anywhere else but in Rome.

So I'm kind of happy that BUTTERFLIES IN THE WIND came off as a European film. All those years in film school and shooting film all over the world didn't go to waste.LOL

Thanks again, fellas~~~
 
Damn dude, that's tight. The car driving away at the end, nice touch. I already want to whoop this guy's butt.

-Nate
 
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Thanks, Nate! I'm glad you like the trailer. I can see the improvements myself and that's the hardest thing to see for the person who shot and edited the movie.

BUTTERFLIES IN THE WIND is on Amazon.com

You can rent to watch it (VOD) online for $2.99

You can also buy it for $19.95, but I recommend the $2.99 (you've suffered enough already advising me how to cut it) LOL
 
13 was the lucky number for you.

filmman said:
Acutally I'm gearing up for my next feature film and I'm torn down the middle.LOL I have screenplays. I have great screenplays! But I don't have money and I'm getting too old for begging.LOL So, maybe I'll remain felliniesque once more....
Click to expand...

I say save the cash. Time to go digital. You're doing dramas. You don't need special performers or squib hits or anything like that, just good actors and willing location providers. Shoot it at 1080/24p. You can make it look anyway you want in post and have greater output while keeping the quality. I will admit it took me a minute to get used to that 70s vibe. It reminded me of that old television show "The Courtship of Eddie's Father" for some reason.

-Nate
 
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13 is my lucky number!
There is a lot to what you say.
I enjoy shooting digital more than film because I can shoot digital by myself much easier and the results are better.
The only thing I'm not sure about is the 24p. I think 1080 is alright; all it means that there is adequate resolution. But 24p seems to mean that a movie looks better, and this for the life of me I don't see when I shoot my Sony Z1: I don't see the difference in 24 or 30 frames per second.

Ok, maybe I see that 24 is jerkier. But I don't think that's the look of film anyway. LOL

What's also intriguing is the 70s look. Apparently everything I shoot is the 70s look. I started out in the 70s. LOL I'm stuck in the 70s? Oh, no!
 
I shot "The 4th Beast" in 30p. Everyone says 24p is the thing. Granted if you're going to get a film print 24p is a must and you never know, by some miracle someone may want to do a film print, but honestly if I'm shooting for myself and know I'm headed direct to DVD I haven't had one person come up to me and say, "You shoot that at 30p." If I turned the DVXs Cinegamma on, no body knew the difference and infact most were excited because they never saw a video camera with that look before.

And amazingly 30p didn't stop the 4th Beast from getting picked up for distribution either. I would shoot 24p if I have it but if your z1 does 30p, I see no reason not to shoot unless you know you're going to get picked up. If it's an issue why not simply buy an HF100 or something (they're cheap). People are doing great work with the small cameras and aren't compromising much of anything save for some professional controls.

-Nate
 
I believe it. So many people get all excited about 24p and there are so many threads where people go a little nuts arguing over 24p looking more like film. But when I call the post production houses, all the experts tell me, shoot whatever you want. Of course, they might say that to make more money doing this and that to the image, but I don't think that's it.

The experts tell me shoot 1080i 60i. From that they can go 24 frames per second when outputting to 35mm film masters or to all the various formats of digital production and broadcast.

So, I tell myself don't drive yourself crazy over digital technology. Shoot with your Sony Z1 and do the best job you can with photography, but remember it's the movie itself and how you make it that matters most -- the acting, the directing, etc.

Another thing, Nate, is that I honestly believe we're going through a major transition in technology. I think this "film look" thing is just the labor pains of changing over to digital. People are driving themselves nuts (spending all kinds of money) to make digital look like film.

What really fascinates me is that many digital filmmakers are trying to reproduce the look of the 16mm Bell & Howell cameras when you stopped and started the camera there were all these flashed frames. They blink on the screen and people go gaga over them.

The scratches and dust of home movies, the roll-outs of 16mm, the flashes that occurred accidentally -- all these things have plugins.LOL And people spend a fortune on plugins! Just shoot 16mm. Ebay is full of Bell & Howell and Bolex cameras. They can be bought for peanutes. A few rolls of 16mm film is better than spending months on plugin research :-)

Anyway, everything's going digital. The avalanche is upon us!
 
Filmman,

Just make sure you shoot 1080i with the Z1U and do not use the pseudo 24p that camera offers. The Z1U can shoot amazing footage (despite the HDV codec) and can be made into 24p with decent results.

I also believe we are going through a major transition at this point and as far as the 'film look', I too spent thousands of dollars on adapters, lenses, etc. to achieve the look but I think the look is unique in itself (not digital, but not film either) and will come into it's own.

Todd
www.drawingchalkpictures.com
 
This is very true. The "looks" of digital imitating film are astounding. Film was never so versatile.LOL

We used to try to mute the look of film in the days when film was the only medium for cinema. DPs used to underexpose the film to the point that the labs couldn't reproduce the colors that they were in so in love with.

We used to rate the film twice and three times its speed to give it that washed out look. Finally, Kodak even gave up and came up with its "stone washed" look Vision series.LOL

And then suddenly when DPs found out they weren't going to be excommunicated for shooting digital, they began to reproduce of "bleach bipass" look. I worked as a lab technician. We went through hell making sure the bleech wasn't contaminated. Then to see people making digital look like the bleech was bypassed altogether....LOL What insanity, but there it was -- artsy look.

Every "cheap lab messed up film" look became a plugin.LOL

But it looks so much better with digital. Truly digital looks have transformed cinematography, and I agree, there are many interesting and downright fascinating looks to digital now.

I might even begin exploring them, just as soon as I made my first Slum Dog Millionaire movie :-) Right now I must concentrate on producing some of the great projects I have lined up for this year.
 
hey filmman. I had a few questions about doing music videos on films. Should I start a thread or do you mind if I send you a PM?

Trying to get an estimate for shooting a music video on film for under $10,000 if it's even possible. Thank you sir.
 
A thread would be great because I could sell a lot of 35mm short ends. LOL

But the short answer is yes, shooting 35mm is a great way to shoot music videos. Rent an Arri 2c (or even better buy one :-) from eBay and shoot all your music videos with it.

200 footers 35mm sell for about 10 cents per foot. The price jumps for longer ends, but I figure around 15 cents per foot you can get a nice package of film to shoot your music video.

Film runs through the camera and projects at 90 ft per minute. So if your music video is 3 minutes, then your finished film strip is 270 ft plus the leader -- say 300 ft.

If you want to shoot a lot of footage, say 10 times more for coverage, you're looking at 2,700 ft. That's $405. Processing is ten cents per foot at DeLuxe Labs. That's $270. Subtotal=$675. Add telecine and you will be still under $1000.

You have $9000 left to play with. Email me if you're serious. vic@felliniesque.com
 
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