HELP How do I shoot this????????

S

spankyward

Member
I'm shooting a movie where one actor plays two rolls, talking to himself, where we see both in the shot at the same time. Does anyone know how this is done right? Please let me know, we shoot in three weeks. Thanks a bunch.
 
To make it easy, film the actor on both sides, make sure they don't overlap, then cut the screen in half, letting the layer below shine through. If you're doing an overt he shoulder shot, get a stand in to play the "shoulder." It's all about planning and camera placement. If you have a moving camera shot, it's going to be a bit more difficult.

But if you're just doing it locked off, then you can just use the split screen effect for the establishing shot and when you switch to over the shoulder shots and things like that, you can use a stand in/double.

Or you could clone your actor, but I don't recommend that. :-)
 
That's what I was thinking, but how do they do the one where they put something down on one side, and the other guy picks it up???? Thanks for the info.
 
i would guess putting something down and picking it up wouldn't be too difficult.

first shoot the scene with the guy putting it down
then leave the item in the exact position
shoot the scene again with the guy picking it up

as you composite the shots together you will need to mask the area where the item is placed to ensure its not there until its put down...you may want to shoot a plate (i.e. the location with no actors for this purpose)

you may have to do some track matting (i think thats the right term) if it is complicated, for example actor1 crosses a part of actor 2 to place the item down.

An hour or two with after effects tutorials will have you up to speed on this! simple matting can be done in your editor also.

i did something similar in a short film a few years back as the person fades in and out of the scene they remove birthday cards from around the room (approx 40 seconds in):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ss_AwtQOYH4
 
chroma screen - keying

eg: "sin city"

2 characters played by same actor example: "the one" (jet li)

check behind the scenes (special features) on dvds like that.

in short: post production = 'magic' whilst pre production = headaches

but can be done :)
 
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I have a great book called, "New Cinematographers" by Alexander Ballinger. In the book, he gets a great interview with one of my favorite DPs, Lance Accord. Lance goes into pages and pages of detail on how they did exactly this with Nicolas Cage in "Adaptation". If you have not seen the film, Cage plays a set of fraternal twin brothers and they had several shots that were like this.

Also, if you want to get the latest version (came out in 2005) of "The Parent Trap", I produced a featurette for Disney for it that also got into pretty detailed explanations of how Lindsay Lohan played twins. I interviewed the compositors and project manager at the VFX conpany in Hollywood that did all of the effects. The piece you want to see is called, "The Parent Trap: How Hallie Became Annie". Its a pretty good piece if I do say so myself, the VFX company still had all of the original elements that they loaded up and literally showed us how the composites were built, how they used body doubles to get the timing. If there is dialogue, you will need on set ProTools and an earwig so that the actor can hear him/herself and react with the correct timing. Basically, you need motion control if you are doing moves unless you have a wiz at Shake and compositing. To me, lockoffs are lame for these shots, I was doing a soft edged wipe back in film shool in the 80s, it's cheap looking and you don't sell anyone on the effect.

If you are serious, find a copy of the book and Netflix the Parent Trap special edition, make sure you get the one that came out in 2005, not the old Haley Mills version from the 60s.

Good luck,

Dan
 
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