BOUNTY ON A DEAD MAN'S HEAD - By Matt "Defcon" Harris

Defcon said:
Marlon what up! Thanks for watching and reviewing. All good comments. For the running through the woods scene, I did undercrank it a touch just so he didn't look so pedestrian, I tried to rev him up a bit. I wanted to show him running because it tapped into his animalistic side, his aggressive desire to protect his land. But you aren't wrong, I think movie would still work with the scene cut. I just had to make the old man sweat a little. :)
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LOL!!! Yep, might as well make him sweat while you're out there. Yeah, I thought that was a possible reason why you sped it up. Excellent film though and you already know the cc was on point.
 
Defcon said:
The GH1 with the new (13) mod hack is way sharper than the T2i. Did you do the hack? Do it.
I use the Final Cut Pro suite, which comes with COLOR for color correcting. I cannot recommend it enough. It is so fun to color correct in COLOR. After you CC, you hit another tab and it says "secondary" colors and then you can boost the green and your leaves will pop. If you have COLOR, i can walk you through it.
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well yes it's sharper but I was talking about more the color information, colorspace, dynamic range, etc...all those things that give lushness to a rich forest environment. I'm not sure how t2i and gh1 compare in that regard, i thought they were mostly equal in that regard if not the advantage going to t2i
 
Hey Defcon. Another unique take on the western which is great. You had some really good locations and I really liked your opening sequence. I thought the ending established a good continuing story as well. The main character did a pretty good job of filling that 'retired gunslinger' archetype. It'd be interesting to see how things turn out. Sequel maybe?

Good job man!
 
Homunculus, your GH1 has pretty similar dynamic range and color space, watch the Zacutto shoot out where they compare all the DSLR's. You can definitely achieve the look i got with your GH1!

Brian, Sequel - yes, very possible! Maybe for next fest...
 
Watched this again and It is still one of my favorites. Your dad rocks. I'm scared of that guy. Great film. You should be real proud of this one. I loved it Def.
 
Thanks Rich, right back at you. I actually learned a lot from watching yours, techniques that i will be stealing blatantly. :)

As for my father, he really is in phenomenal shape, he's a beast.
 
just coming back to say that I rewatched this again for about the 3rd time. Can't get enough of it I think this film is very unique and one of the best of the fest so far. Can't believe I'm saying that, film on t2i competing with Reds etc LOL...shows what good filmmaking can do.

couple questions, did you use any filters?
and, I really liked all those tracking dolly shots, what did you use for that, do you have a real dolly or what was it?

also here is my favorite shot, made even better by the slow dolly in

mh67uq.jpg
 
Hom,
I'm no technical expert, but the RED is 4k and the T2i is 2k. The RED will always have more detail, and will look better on larger screens because of it's pixel count. But for the web? You are right, these DSLR's really do look great even compared to the RED when shrunk down for the web.

I can honestly say that 1080p is more then enough me. I am no longer worried about what has more resolution and what is sharper, all these cameras look great now. GH1 is great too.

Filters - I used a ND .6 Tiffen for many of the shots, a standard UV filter for lens protection, and a warming circular polarizer for water and sky shots.

Dolly - Indieslider with ballhead mount. This is my not-so-secret weapon because i set it on a tripod and can get dolly shots everywhere very quickly. The shot you like the best has a wood chair as a foreground element which makes the dolly move more cinematic.

The lenses I used: a $99 50mm f1.8 which converts to an 80mm after 1.6x conversion
and a $500 Tokina 12-24 wide angle zoom f4 which converts to a 19-30 (a GREAT range!)
 
It' s a west, different from the rest :p

I liked the sound of the saw and the axe to be more in front.

The guys in the white clothes is ADR ?... I miss the sound of there steps in the leaves.
You can use tape (you know, musictapes) for it.

I miss some more "west" elements in it.

The acting I find less... (of the white guys, the cowboy was ok)

The guy at the other side of the radio.... is he a monster ? :p

I like those type of titles which are a phrase somewhere in the story.
 
This was really good. A stand out in the fest. The story felt almost too big for this short, but not in a bad way. I just wanted more.

That was your dad? He did a really good job. I bought into his character completely.

The only thing that bothered me at all, was how the worker's in white voices sounded. It just didn't sound like it was actually coming from the actors.

Otherwise, good story. It looked great. Really good short.
 
Didn't have a chance to read this whole thread - so sorry if my comments are repeated...

I thought this was really well shot, and really well put together. Technically, one of the best in the fest. Loved the time lapse and the dolly shots. And what a great location too. The Fx worked wonderfully; I'm assuming almost everything was practical?

My issues with the film were the acting of everyone that wasn't the lead (thought he had a great look.) I think the ADR issues had to do with the dudes in white. Just didn't seem to match for the most part. ADR is tough to pull off and i think it was a little to "clean."

My other main criticism is that I don't really see how this is a western. I'm fine with the sci-fi aspect and that it's a contemporary film - but there are certain contrivances, certain themes that make up a western film and I just didn't see any. I'm sure you have an answer for me - so I'd love to hear what you have to say.

Overall - really great work.
 
Dre/Conlan/Soffcore, thank so much for taking the time to watch and review, I appreciate it and your comments and criticisms don't fall on deaf ears, i agree with most of them, here are some thoughts:

2. The voices from the hazmats: I completely changed the conversation in the first scene with the rusty barrels. So the clean ADR is a tough sell there, but in a few other scenes i think the ADR works when you see the mouths moving beneath the mask. But i agree with this and will learn for the next time.

2. The effects were practical for the most part Soffcore, thanks for asking because we had a lot of fun trying to create the "mental powers" in an old school way. If you look closely at the scene where the bottlecap pops off, you can see the string being pulled. I made fake blood, I had never done that before. The blood "burst" was CG but the blood on the suit was real. It took me hours of editing and matching up clips to achieve this.

3. So how was mine a western? I was watching a lot of "mountain man" movies like Jerimiah Johnson and Deliverance and Seripham falls. These movies are about "man vs. nature" and "man protecting his land", so i adopted these concepts. Also, as art imitates life, we do own that cabin and we do have to fend off environmental pollution so there is a unique truthfulness to the movie.

More specifically, when the carpenter faces off against the hazmat guys, it's supposed to be a "duel", with one using "mind over matter". The carpenter living off the land, protecting his land, standing up to external forces; these are classic western themes.

In closing, I'd have to ask how is Serenity a western? They have great costumes surely, but the music they used was very western and that carries the theme. Otherwise it's sci-fi. I was treading the same line, whether I was successful or not is your call.

Again, thank you for watching!
Matt
 
Defcon, the more i thought about it, the more i realized that the man protecting nature does fit in the western genre. i was actually on my way back here to say that and saw your reply! So you won me over on that for sure!!!

And about the ADR, in thinking more, it's less about the technical "hotness" or "crispness" and more about the naturalness of the dialogue and the reading. Were your booth actors in there together or did one do his lines, then the other? I think it's really hard to feel like they are naturally having a conversation when they are in such a controlled environment, and I think that's a skill that actors have to work on. It ain't easy.

Again though, I liked this one a lot - great work!
 
This was entertaining, fun, felt like a bigger story was at play, but it worked as a short. I loved the way it was shot, some shots were a bit dark, but seriously, looked like something I'd see in a movie theater or on TV. I wish you saved the dolly a couple times, because it is used a lot, and I think it could be used in more pressing scenes, sometimes I didn't understand the motivation for the use of the dolly shots, but overall man, a great movie. I understand the western element, feel like the cowboy hat was thrown in at the last second, but you got the element in there. Awesome job man, looking forward to seeing what you do next fest!
 
I loved how this opened up. I felt like I was going on a journey with the main character in discovering his new abilities with him. I would have liked to have just stuck with the main character the whole time. I didn't think we needed to know exactly why he had these new abilities. Just sticking with him and learning with him would have sold it for me. I think when the other characters were introduced it kind of fizzled for me but I still gave it a high rating. A great idea in there that just needed a little chisel. Good luck!
 
Man, this one was just starting. Definitely a Hero origin story. Reminded me of Spiderman where Peter Parker was testing out his new found powers. Now you have to go all Spiderman 2 and focus on the bounty hunter. Wish this one was twice as long to show the face off. Great establishing shots with the VO. I'm impressed with the camera work and shot selection.

Some small things bothered me:
I'm sure it was touched on the ADR for the clean up crew, maybe if you went MAH's route with chem masks. Plus I wish they had gloves on.
The hero looking through the telescope, why does he need a telescope if he has super vision? Small gripe, no biggie.
One goof, the phantom wood chop, I saw hands on the ax frame right.

Great job overall.
 
Thanks watching Mobie540, the ADR was a bit spotty and we were deep in the woods in the middle of nowhere when our costumes showed up... without gloves. nothing we could do, lol. As for the telescope, the carpenter is still learning and figuring out his powers so that's why he still used the telescope. My guess is he won't be needed the telescope anymore! But yes I did have a handful of movie mistakes with my short, I just had to make do. I appreciate you stopping by!
 
xxrotinivol2 - "cowboy hat at the last second" - that was part of the tension building: is this movie going to be DQ-ed or not?!

No but truthfully, we only had a walmart near us and it didn't have cowboy hats (?) or else my main character would have been wearing one the whole movie. I'm glad we didn't use one though because I think it would have cast a shadow on his face and we wouldnt have been able to do the "head flip" mental power technique as well.

thank you for watching my friend!
 
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