Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

disjecta

disjecta

Lucky Duck
Hello people,

Here's another little travelogue piece.

I just got back from a very brief visit to a little harbor town here in Washington called Mukilteo. It's right on the Puget Sound. My wife and I were there over three days but really just one full day to shoot... The weather was really bad so I did what I could with the time available to me.

Okay, I have a confession to make....I made two big screwups on the only day I had to shoot. The night before, I was experimenting with the camera and turned the gain up to high while trying to shoot a harbor seal from my hotel window...unsuccessfully.

The next day I went out shooting and towards the end, I noticed that the frickin' gain switch was still set to high. Because what I shot was kind of grip and rip for the day and given the fact that I NEVER usually use gain, I didn't notice the noise in the viewfinder and, towards the end of the day, I began to see it and realized what I had done. I am so pissed, so what you see here is some good footage and some that has a lot of noise. I've arranged to have the gain switch surgically removed from my DVX. :P

I also disabled the beep on the camera when I was experimenting and there were a number of shots where I was actually hitting pause and not record. The result was a lot of tape wasted with me changing lenses and carrying the camera around!!

Oh well, live and learn.

Here's what I put together. This is definitely a first edit, there's a lot that still needs to be tightened up and some color correction is necessary but, I want to share it with you in its current state.

http://www.pinelakefilms.com/mukilteo.html

It's about 3 1/2 minutes and is 26mb...sorry for those of you with slow connectivity. Enjoy.

p.s., couple of technical points:

The second to last shot was done at 30p 1/8 shutter speed. In case you can't figure out what it is, it's the rain being illuminated by a spotlight on the water below.

The third to last industrial night shot was 30P 1/4 shutter speed.

First shot was taken out my hotel window.

There is a blown out sky in a shot where I was following some pigeons and gulls..couldn't avoid it because of the nature of the shot.
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Beautifully done as always!

I was shocked to see birds in this one. Not your style. ;)
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Gain, Schmain...

I loved this. Especially when the sun started going dwon. SOme super nice imagery. Always what I expect; my wife loved it as well. Great job as always and no issue whatsoever on the gain.
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

maybe it's just me, i didn't see anything bad about it. of course, it' may be more noticeable on your television set.
great work as always!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

honestly, its rare you see gain used during well lit scenes, so in a way, the noise seemed to give the film an antiquated feel, like old filmstock, or sometheing. I kinda liked the Gain. if it were super clean it would read "now", the old buildings, felt older cause of the nature of the image. If you never told me it wasa mistake i would have been like, hey thats cool i like the film grain look.
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

I tip my hat to you, the gain did annoy me a bit... fix it now!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

ahhh...relaxed. falling asleep in front of the mac. ahhh

(interlacing showing up for anyone else?)
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

stunning as usual

I see you have a website now.. (or did you always have one? ???)
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

I was shocked to see birds in this one. Not your style.
Click to expand...
;D ;D ;D

Nice pictures! Need a little CC but I love the last 30 sek.!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

I agree with x2mag68 I liked the grain from the gain, crisp clean DVX footage always looks a bit 'made for TV' To me, I add grain to my work (dont ***** slap me DVX purests) :D

I liked this film when I thought it was gonna tell me a story, when I realised it was just shots of a place I felt an idiot (for thinking I was gonna see a film when it was blatently just a travelogue) and like all that style and cinimatography was worth more than some well edited 'wish you were here' style stock footage.

is that harsh? I dont mean to be harsh, I want you to go back and shoot a film about the little boy who lives in the lighthouse and how he cant quite have a normal life. ;)

my only real critisim as a designer and a filmmaker is I dont like that yellow font, I thought some subtle white or black font would have gone better with the mood.

Other than that, awesome, very very well shot and very emotive.

a bit too emotive for I dog apperently

fu*kin hardcore kids ;)
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Thanks for all the comments guys. As mentioned, CC is not complete yet.

I am in the midst of writing a script for an actual short film at the moment so I expect to be shooting that over the next few months....so I will be producing something with a story pretty soon. 8)

The yellow font....hmmmm. I'm on a yellow font kick right now....not sure why...I think it's IMAX that's influencing me. But I think you are right anyway....I made the change to the file. Looks better to me...thanks.

IDOG, I'm not sure what to say....I hope you cried for the right reasons... :P
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

You've got a great eye for composition. I like almost every one of your edit choices too as you've got a great feeling (even on this rough cut) for how long to hold an individual shot.

I'm also getting the interlacing on birds in flight and faster pans across landscapes with diagonal features.

I think this is a FCP thing or perhaps has something to do with your 2.35:1 stretch software? Otherwise, the compression is very clean.

I also vote for a *bit* of grain - give grain a chance! I used to shoot color print films and print them to black and white to achieve a really chaotic grain structure.

Motion picture films all exhibit a certain visible grain structure - even in the highlights. I don't like grain in my blacks, but it can really add subtle nuance to your images. Naturally, there is a point where too much grain is just noise!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

I don't think it is fair that the results of your bad day of filming is better than the results of my great day of filming. >:( But, I can't stay mad at you, this film is too beautiful ;D

Great job as always, looking forward to your future work!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

I did the same thing with the gain on Sunday ;D

STUPID! SO STUPID! [slamming head against desk].
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Another pretty good film from Disjecta. (even if not finish)

First of all, I don't think the grain from the gain disturbed me at all, may be because I came from photography background and always love the grain from 400 ASA film liked Tri-X or 400 reversal Fujichrome. For the subject and the conditions you were filming, grain was not a distraction at all, but a plus. Nice music as usual too.

I think, 1/8 shutter speed was a bit too slow effect for the rain however.

I'm glad you are in the midst of film project, sound like a very interesting way to start 2005...Bonne Chance !!!
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Thanks Shadow.

Regarding the rain shot, I wasn't really trying to convey rain, per se, I just liked the abstraction of the movement and the colors.
 
Re: Mukilteo (No Gain, No Pain)

Wow. Everything you do is beautiful. Watching things like this make me want to go outside and shoot.....just too cold right now. :D
 
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