SHORT: AKITA - Short Film

[analog_addict]

I want to share a rough cut of my short film for feedback. I wanted to make something very quiet without dialogue. The film is about loneliness, frustration and companionship.

Total production cost was £250. Shot on a C100 mk1 with a Tamron 17-50 and Canon 55-250. Shot over a weekend.

 

[charliemcdanger]

Hey, thanks for this. I watched yesterday and have a few reactions.

-Love the premise and the writing generally.
-Despite some good technical edits, I find the pacing slow and you almost lost me early in the film.
-He somewhat overacts. Heavy sighs, extra wistful looks, etc. In the tracking shot at 0:30, it appears his pace is dictated by the pace of the track, rather than the reverse.
-I don't love his throwing the work jacket into pristine nature. Perhaps another angle would be to have him throw his last load of trash into the bin, a moment of contemplation, and then his jacket right in after it.

You show talent and promise. Please keep at it!

 

[StrobelPhotography]

hey, great job. I def can say that I felt some stuff there watching your film. two best shots for me were the long shot of down the alley, the third time he sees the dog. and in the car after the country trip, there was a unstable shot looking at the driver. really loved those two. good edit. right off the bat tho I felt like the sound design could be a little more three dimensional. I don't know sound but it felt cheap right off the bat. I don't know how to correct that. the gimbal shots were really nice. showed nice production value. The story was good but I didn't like him leaving his vest in the water. that seemed weird, not that he was a naturalist but he def appreciated nature. also the playing with the dog with the plastic bottle. for some reason those moments stood out. great work man! good luck with finishing your edit.

 

[analog_addict]

Hey, thanks for this. I watched yesterday and have a few reactions.

-Love the premise and the writing generally.
-Despite some good technical edits, I find the pacing slow and you almost lost me early in the film.
-He somewhat overacts. Heavy sighs, extra wistful looks, etc. In the tracking shot at 0:30, it appears his pace is dictated by the pace of the track, rather than the reverse.
-I don't love his throwing the work jacket into pristine nature. Perhaps another angle would be to have him throw his last load of trash into the bin, a moment of contemplation, and then his jacket right in after it.

You show talent and promise. Please keep at it!

Thank you for watching the film. I have gone back and forth with the opening pacing. I think it's important to show how mundane his life has become but to do this and not create a pacing problem is difficult.

You are correct with the tracking shot. We used a car as a dolly, which was a bit clunky.

Our idea for the jacket was that in a hollywood movie, you might have this really cheesy, grand gesture of throwing his jacket off, to free himself. We tried to capture the reality of it. He doesn't throw it very far and it's anti-climatic. It's all a bit pathetic.

I will take your notes on-board.

hey, great job. I def can say that I felt some stuff there watching your film. two best shots for me were the long shot of down the alley, the third time he sees the dog. and in the car after the country trip, there was a unstable shot looking at the driver. really loved those two. good edit. right off the bat tho I felt like the sound design could be a little more three dimensional. I don't know sound but it felt cheap right off the bat. I don't know how to correct that. the gimbal shots were really nice. showed nice production value. The story was good but I didn't like him leaving his vest in the water. that seemed weird, not that he was a naturalist but he def appreciated nature. also the playing with the dog with the plastic bottle. for some reason those moments stood out. great work man! good luck with finishing your edit.

Thank you for the feedback.

Sound was an issue and I made a VERY rookie mistake of not recording sound properly. I just had an NTG2 on-top of the camera when really we should have boomed everything. I could have also done with a much longer shotgun for ambience. I simply though no dialogue? No problem! Unfortunately I'm not sure I can fix it without money, as it's a bit out of my skill set. I'd love to give the film to a sound designer to complete.

We didn't have a gimbal. Just a car and some suction cups

I understand about the jacket, see above. The actor picked up the plastic bottle and the dog loved it so I kept shooting. The dog belongs to the actor so I wanted to try and capture their relationship as realistically as possible. Around that body of water was lots of trash, oil cans etc. I guess it's hard to tell by the camera angles.