A-Wake - a dramatic short

K

Kent OGP

Active member
This was a big project for me and my crew last summer. It has been denied by the first 2 festivals I submitted it to, but let me know what you guys think.

Watch in HD!
http://vimeo.com/5568524


Shot mostly on a HVX-200 w/Red Rock adapter. Some shots and a whole scene were done on a XH-A1 without an adapter. Bonus points if you can guess which scene...
 
You have some good shots and some good moments, but the story is a bit derivative, especially within the realm of indie shorts, I swear every indie short I see has a fatal car accident in it - that doesn't mean these aren't stories worth telling, but there's got to be a new angle. Considering this was made just after your freshman year in college, I think there is a good chance you're going to make something very good in the next few years. You did a lot well, but there is room for improvement. Overall, pretty well produced, but weak story. Acting wasn't bad at all. Needs some focus work too.
 
Nice work, overall. I respect the fact that you guys are working so hard to make so many movies so rapidly. Your lead actor has a great look and always gives strong performances (your audio is always top notch as well). Your shot choices are also well-crafted.

As the previous poster said, the story is derivative...car crashes are something (along with suicide /depression) that drive me nuts with short films.

As for festivals, don't let rejection get ya' down...you're gonna get rejected more often then your accepted. The key is to find the right festival at the right time.

I know you guys are based out in Richmond...I live in DC. If you ever wanted to collaborate on a project some time, I'd be down.
 
Thanks for the honest feedback guys. I didn't realize car crashes were so common. I'm starting to realize the importance of getting lots of feedback from people in the film world...

Thanks about the acting, I think that's one of our strengths as well.

Funny you mention the audio, I actually had to ADR about 80% of the dialogue in the movie! It was a horrendous process, now I always make sure to get great audio on set so I never have to do that again.

And I may take you up on that offer sometime ikander!
 
Kent OGP said:
Thanks for the honest feedback guys. I didn't realize car crashes were so common. I'm starting to realize the importance of getting lots of feedback from people in the film world...

Thanks about the acting, I think that's one of our strengths as well.

Funny you mention the audio, I actually had to ADR about 80% of the dialogue in the movie! It was a horrendous process, now I always make sure to get great audio on set so I never have to do that again.

And I may take you up on that offer sometime ikander!
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Indeed - you had good sound, very decent acting performances, and overall good shot design (a few issues but nothing that would keep you out of a festival, in my estimation) - you really are not far off at all., I'm confident that with a really good script that you could absolutely get into a festival.
 
Thanks thisisapocalypse, I'm making a short film in a couple of weeks with what I hope is a better script (there's no car crashes haha)! It's a 12 page script, if anyone wants to take a look at it and give me some criticism, that would be really great.
 
I liked this but it did have some problems.

First, you open with a slightly shaky shot, this right away is a turnoff, i would take that out, or reshoot, or something and start with the much nicer DOF shot of the guy with the alarm clock to the side.

I know you probably made it shaky to emphasize that its a dream but i dont like it in this case. Also you had some shaky running and other shots to. It worked in your last short becuase of the fast pace and the urgency you were trying to convey, but this film has a much different tone and i feel that it hurts you in this case.

Your actor is pretty good once again, and looks like he has a bit of range as this is somewhat of a departure from his last role.

I like the concept of the sleep lab etc... (i actually support one in IT for my day job), seems original and the dreaming stuff was cool and interesting.

One of my fav sequences was actually the car wrecks. yeah its been done a lot, but honestly i dont have so much of a problem with it because i felt you put a slightly unique spin on it.

What was your workflow? Budget, time taken for shooting and post? What did you use for lighting etc..?

Overall, good job and keep shooting.
 
jonE5 said:
What was your workflow? Budget, time taken for shooting and post? What did you use for lighting etc..?
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Thanks a lot Jon, I really liked the crash scene too!

The budget for this was a little over $2000 I think. I made most of that by selling my old XL-1 so I could afford to rent a HVX-200 and DOF adapter for a week. It was a tough decision to make but I really wanted to shoot in HD for the first time. There was a lot of time spent in preproduction... a few days of rehearsals, a lot of time location scouting, storyboarding, making lighting diagrams, etc because we only were able to rent the equipment for a week. So it was probably about 3 intensive weeks of preproduction, followed by an extremely intensive week of shooting.

Editing took a long time on this, probably at least a month. Getting all of the ADR from the actors was a major hassle. A lot of this movie had to be told through the editing too, which made for some difficult choices. I edited this on Premiere CS4, and did some effects like the light coming through the door in After Effects and Photoshop.

We thought the whole movie was done, but realized the movie was too incomprehensible when we showed it to people, so we decided to shoot an extra scene and a few extra shots. For that I used my friend's XH-A1.

My lighting kit was a Victor-Smith tungsten light kit and one of those round fold-up reflectors. Each light is 650 watts I think, and they have barndoors and gels which came in handy. I also had a couple of Home Depot lights to help with the night scenes. For the night scenes I couldn't use the DOF adapter because it hogged up to much light, and my lights just were not strong enough. I gotta give a lot of credit to the main actor Chris, who was also producing and co-DP'ing with me on this movie, so in between shots he was adjusting lights!
 
Strange, are you sure? Try just going to vimeo.com and searching for A-Wake. It's the one with a guy holding flowers as the thumbnail picture.
 
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