BONE HAND by Jack Daniel Stanley

Jack

I love that you shoot Scope but wonder what the process is for you ? Some of the comps look crowded as if the 2:35:1 mask is merely laid over the frame and not thought out. It is like the image is competing for space

Do you you shoot freely in 4:3 and eyeball it or do you use reference frames for 2:35:1 ?

Some of the comps look perfect while other's look crowded and squashed (sp?) by the tight ratio. I noticed a similiar problem in ODD

Can you elaborate on this ?
 
Good question John...I was wondering about this too (not in Jack's in particular, but in general wondering the right/best way to handle this).
 
John_Hudson said:
Jack

I love that you shoot Scope but wonder what the process is for you ? Some of the comps look crowded as if the 2:35:1 mask is merely laid over the frame and not thought out. It is like the image is competing for space

Do you you shoot freely in 4:3 and eyeball it or do you use reference frames for 2:35:1 ?

Some of the comps look perfect while other's look crowded and squashed (sp?) by the tight ratio. I noticed a similiar problem in ODD

Can you elaborate on this ?
Click to expand...

I record 2:35 black bars to the camera as reference and put gaff tape over the LCD

almost everything is framed right where I want it because I do a ton of rescaling in post.
 
Your 2:3:5 did look good... how did you crop it like that and maintain quality? Was that because you uprezzed?
 
I understand using gaff tape to cut the frame on the LCD, but what do you mean by "rescaling in post"? If you are framing based on your referenced LCD why would you need to rescale anything?
 
briceman said:
Your 2:3:5 did look good... how did you crop it like that and maintain quality? Was that because you uprezzed?
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its just cropped for the web. it would be letteboxed on a TV so its not blown up anymore than 16X9, but for the web I just set it to crop in compressor so I'm not wasting data flow or bandwidth rendering black bars. Cropping it like this doesn't hurt it just like letterbox doesn't hurt the resolution, you're just watching a smaller area.

and you misunderstood John, he wasn't complimenting my 2:35.1 framing, he's now gone back to rewatching my movies from past contests and finding ways to pick them all apart as a body of work. :cheesy:
 
Larry R said:
I understand using gaff tape to cut the frame on the LCD, but what do you mean by "rescaling in post"? If you are framing based on your referenced LCD why would you need to rescale anything?
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well this go around we had a lot of shooters where usually I shoot everything.

i did more this time than others.

but I usually use some.

If you want to slide up and down, no problem, you have those bars there to slide behind, but if you want to adjust left right or rotate then you have to blow up a little.

the shot of easter bleeding on the couch for exanple was a stagnant shot, but a pull back withe a pretty Vertigo-esque rotation was addded in post.

I find you can blow up 135% with no noticible loss, and sometime as much as 150% if its lit and exposed well with no noise.
 
John_Hudson said:
Jack
Some of the comps look crowded as if the 2:35:1 mask is merely laid over the frame and not thought out.
Click to expand...
everysingle frame is meticulously thought out, usually storyboarded, thought out and masked on set, and then mainpulated to no end in post, shifted left right, up down, rotated, flipped re-scaled, camera movement added, etc.

its all very thought out I assure you

do you really think I would just shoot crap without thinking about it or how it's framed?
 
Jack Daniel Stanley said:
I find you can blow up 135% with no noticible loss, and sometime as much as 150% if its lit and exposed well with no noise.
Click to expand...

That's pretty cool man! I never thought about that... Yeah, sometimes I want to move closer to a shot and can't... thanks for that tip!
 
Jack Daniel Stanley said:
I find you can blow up 135% with no noticible loss, and sometime as much as 150% if its lit and exposed well with no noise.
Click to expand...
I know what you mean. I've had to blow up and reposition a couple of times to get rid of unwanted boom shadows or a Pepsi can :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)
 
briceman said:
And, also, can you rescale because you uprezzed? That'd be sweet to be able to do that!
Click to expand...
I wanted to do that this time but I could never get anything to work.

So I just scaled on a 16X9 timeline in FCP. FCP's scaling is better than a lot of others. But this is what Timur said about watching me edit and kind of having his mind blow, he was talking about post camera blow up and movement.

The shot of the deliveryboy riding up is about 150% scale and there is no camera movement in the original shot

the shot of the glove being thrown to the couch which racks up and down with the toss of the glove is also done in post.

again, in FCP at least, you can go to 135% no problem and sometimes as much as 150%
 
That's cool man... see in Avid I do it different. I shoot 4x3 then I go edit my film, then put a 16:9 mask on everything, then I raise/lower my shots where I want them, then I put a resize filter on a layer and make it 133 length for the height so the 16:9 image fills a 4x3 frame, then I take it into my compressing program and render an anamorphic 16:9 file... how would I increase the size of the frame before resizing for 16:9 output though?
 
Jack Daniel Stanley said:
everysingle frame is meticulously thought out, usually storyboarded, thought out and masked on set, and then mainpulated to no end in post, shifted left right, up down, rotated, flipped re-scaled, camera movement added, etc.

its all very thought out I assure you

do you really think I would just shoot crap without thinking about it or how it's framed?
Click to expand...


Cough cough! i have mny cramps to attest to this...... Pneumonia too.....


;) its cool man. i had a great time.
 
and you misunderstood John, he wasn't complimenting my 2:35.1 framing, he's now gone back to rewatching my movies from past contests and finding ways to pick them all apart as a body of work.
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No no no; crazy ass fool.

I do not go back and rewatch things unless I am interested; never to pick apart. Incidentally, I have ODD on my desktop. It is a frequent favorite of mine !

everysingle frame is meticulously thought out, usually storyboarded, thought out and masked on set, and then mainpulated to no end in post, shifted left right, up down, rotated, flipped re-scaled, camera movement added, etc.
Click to expand...

Do you try to get the shot in-camera first and foremost or do you rely on post trickery to pull them off ? I understand all of the shots are meticulously planned; do you plan to shoot static in the first place knowing you're gonna tweak it too hell and back later on ?

its all very thought out I assure you
Click to expand...

I did not meen to imply it was not.

do you really think I would just shoot crap without thinking about it or how it's framed?
Click to expand...

It is of my opinion that not every shot shares the 2:35:1 space equally. Some of the shots seem claustrophobic, which is the basis of my question.

I'd like to see more of the world in your frame; the Mise-en-scene so-to-speak. I find a bit of that lost in the post craze technique.

-

Thanks for clarifying Jack ! I only hope my Horrorfest entry can compete with what you'll offer.
 
JDS. Just watched it for a third time. Great work. It has a very specific style to it. Your computer must be smokin' while you are editing.

I love the fact that it seems you pushed some boundaries for yourself and in general. I say "boundaries for yourself" only based on your other work, so that is, in part, an assumption. Anything that might have come across as a mistake or misjudgement to some, I'm certain had a specific plan.

Of course any movie will have characteristic of its predecessors, it is the nature of art and invention. But... the #1 thing that I love about Bone Hand and your style is that it takes the information from other movies and tweaks it to a whole new level. It has a feel of organized chaos... and it works. It is much easier to mimic that which has already been done.

I would love to see you in action in post (or any stage for that matter), but I fear I would need to be behind some sort of protective glass.

At any rate, good stuff!
 
Just watched this a couple times. I enjoyed it. It had it's strengths and it had some weaknesses.

I liked the setup, the beginning action. It was done very well. I really liked the relationship with the girl, it's funny and touching. I think some of the transitions are a little fast, but nothing I couldn't follow.

I had trouble with the scene with the mother. My beef was with one shot. You cut from the mother to a hallway shot. It looks like this.


woman4jc.jpg
cutaway8fy.jpg


It's disorienting for the audience because they're attention is focused on the mother on the right side of the frame. And then cutting to the hallway suddenly throws their attention off balance. I watched this several times, and then I focused just on the actual cut. Everytime my line of sight was lost. It's hard to pick out the hero in the darkness on the left side. I would cut out the cutaway entirely to keep things clear.

In the next scene between the girl and Bone Hand you've got a straight on shot of the girl and a profile of Bone Hand. I liked the profile of Bone Hand, but I was hoping you'd cut to a straight on of Bone Hand. I know using a profile tends to keep him removed and aloof, but a straight on shot would be good to show that the girl is getting past his walls to touch him. Also, the actor is pretty good, but I think some of his performance is lost in that profile shot.

I found the ambush scene slightly confusing. I think because a lot happens in a short period of time. I think what made it confusing was the quick cuts. I'm not sure if there's enough time for the audience to put all the information together. It took me a couple viewings to fully understand it. I think that might just be my tiredness though.

I thought the music was great. I loved the vibe and grittiness of the piece, and your audio/music mix is pretty polished. Good Work Jdan. :)
 
You guys are crackin me up.

I feel like someone's gonna bust out with a 60 page dissertation paper on the evolution of my work here in a second.

I DO appreciate all the in depth looks and multiple views and I get that you are taking it apart because you like it on some level -- so thanks.

Gonna have to respond to some of these tomorrow though.

I will say this -- about 30 percent of the editing choices are damage control in a shoot like this where you never get the coverage you need or want.

The apartment shoot ended with the little girl going home in tears after being covered in syrup for two hours and being told to imagine what it would be like to never see her best friend again because her best friend had died to save her life.

We had the one angle of Bone Hand and the one angle of the girl and just could never go back to that scene.

Same for the hallway scene. That cut is a rug that's been thrown over some dirt.

Not making excuses -- well yes I am actually -- the film kind of stands out for seeming like a real movie, but it ain't. Its just a guerilla joint like the rest of the flicks around here and we barely got it on tape.

Just some perspective -- its not like I have a magic wand that makes them look like this, there's bullshit and chicanery at every corner and cut just BARELY holding the thing together.

And yet all the notes on this page are good and well thought out and I do appreciate them
however and I will discuss them tomorrow along with the "racist" thing.

night all :thumbsup:

Jack

I'll respond to some of these tomorrow, but I gotta hit the hay because I am totally drained.
 
Woohoo! Bone hand may develop a cult following from the sheer amount of views alone! Once again...loved it. This is the one I show to people first when they ask me which films will beat mine......:crybaby: .................................:)
 
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