Anyone else notice the 'DVXUser Look'?

Shawn Philip Nelson

Shawn Philip Nelson

Veteran
I've been watching fests since Dramafest, and ordered the SciFiFest DVD and watched that.

I've noticed that the styles are blurring into what I'd call...the "DVXUser Look'. It's recipe includes:

-35mm adaptor with tons of rack-focuses, half of which are un-motivated
-'wandering-eye' camera work. Sort of a shoulder-mount/hand-held on crack. The frame just sort of wanders around and then
-Tons of jump cuts, usually combined with rack focuses and wandering eye.
-Non-linear. Even though it's just 6 minutes, there will invariably be multiple flash-forwards or flash-backs.

Optional:
-Gratuitious Crane Shots. (Usually the fest immediately after the user has boughten his/her first Kessler crane).
-Twist endings that have no-build up and aren't really supported by the previous 05:30 of runtime.

Anyone else? :) Just pokin some fun here, I enjoy watching.
 
Just poking fun at bagging on all of the shorts.

Hmmmmmmmmm.

-

I suppose I see this trend but can't chalk it up to a DVX look; much of what we see is very indicative of what is featured on network television and feature films.

I am still obsessed with more traditional visual techniques and will continue to try and understand that.
 
Hey man, buy me a drink and I'll bag on my sh1t all day long. I'm just noticing a trend here and thought I'd have a bit of fun, without being specific at anyone in particular, to see if others have noticed the same thing.

I agree with you, I'm more about the traditional look. I'd rather learn 50 ways to use a dolly and track than how to handheld and shake.
 
Well I notice certain trends, mainly thing thing with overmoving camera. But also transitions. Like in one fest, someone might do something that people like, then next fest, other people grab at it. I"m still working with a lot of static camera, because a) I like it and b) I think in my next film I will be ready to start adding much more motivated moving camera. I tend to work from the ground up and try to get certain things down before adding more.
 
To be honest, I think Blind Date had a HUGE dvxuser look. ESPECIALLY the story.

It's funny...I thought I was the only one who saw this "look"

Maybe it's the 24p.
 
It's tied to low/no budget run and gun filmmaking. Things change when you have a large budget and time to work on shorts.

It's not limited to DVX or HVX, either. I've seen beginners shoot film and end up with a similar look.

I guess that's why we call it learning.
 
The two big trends I noticed in this fest are:

- A majority of the films are using 35mm adapters (sometimes a great thing but not always)

- The quality of the stories improved dramatically in this Fest (and that is always a good thing)
 
I can only see using a 35mm adapter as a bad thing when you don't have a dedicated DP around or your own eye for composition and lighting.

If we were all shooting with film it would be the same thing. Only, you wouldn't have a choice.
 
haha! well, I employed an aggressive handheld approach AND gave it more than two seconds of thought as to why. :) pretty novel approach, right? you can read all about it here. making the assumption that handheld camerawork is just a "stylistic" choice and inherently lacks motivation is profoundly ignorant and presumptuous.
 
Having watched almost all of them now, I really dont see a common look. Even with most using a 35mm adapter the looks all varied from clean and natural to gritty and heavily graded and everything in between. The handheld thing is interesting - I love the way it looks when it has a purpose. I think if IFHY was shot on a tripod with "classic" camera moves and was in focus the whole time the impact would be lost. With that handheld gritty in and out of focus feel I immediately felt how lost and desperate Ron was for this girl - to the point of being pretty sure Zak had spied on me in high school and had based this entire short on me. Talk about drawing you into the picture. Steady shots wouldn't have pulled it off and drug me in like that.

Then there's Bourne Identity handheld that works during the action sequences but it would be nice if they used a tripod during the production for some of the slower scenes. But this is all just what I think. And I sure as hell dont know what I'm talking about. Pulling off good handheld work that fits the story is just as hard if not harder in some cases than using camera supports and traditional camera moves. Now bad handheld work is just lazy :)
 
Well, the handheld is only distracting to me every once in a while. The crossing the line thing is a huge distraction and I noticed it in more films during this fest than many of the previous ones.

Just saying.

e
 
Y'know? There's a scene in NO RESERVATIONS ( Catherine Zeta Jones ) where the young girl and guy are making a certain dish together and it's ALL handheld.

Dutch angles, very excited camera movement. It made me go "damn that's nice".

Just a random thought about handheld.
 
Zak Forsman said:
for the next fest i'm going to experiment with foot-held camerawork.... or maybe elbow-held.
Click to expand...

I think Im a little more visionary than you Zac - Ive been getting fatter and fatter over the winter, so I can do a purely fat held shoot. Of course Ill be using a small format camera - hey maybe the scarlet will be the way to go. Just jam it between the folds. Just wait, this is stuff of the future.
 
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