new reel

A lot of those shots were pretty nice.

I know you didn't care about the editing, but it's too long in my opinion.

Some of the lighting looked very "lit" if that makes sense. As a fan of naturalistic lighting, my favorite shots were the closeup at 2:52 and the ECU at 1:45.

Some of it also looked like it was in the wrong aspect ratio.

Despite that, nice. I think if you shortened it quite a bit you could have a really nice reel.
 
I think it needs to have the shots tightened up, and perhaps more fast cuts at the beginning.

Also, at about 3.24 (or so), you have a greenscreen demo. Several others have had similar, but what I'd like to see is to have the composite image fade up with the replacement media, and then fade down to the green screen, rather than a cut to a shot with the greenscreen. (Also I note a little 'wirdness' on the righthand shadow area of the woman's shoulder and arm... perhaps a bit of matte is needed...
 
Im not good at editing green screen I just shot it the editor will make it work for the film im not really sure why i put that in
 
I think you need to show more diverse footage.

Your reel will improve the more you shoot. Right now I think you have way to much footage of that guy running around. This is simply because you are just starting. Once you have more projects under the belt, your reel will become more diverse and look more like a reel.
 
I agree, the variety of footage goes from "unnaturally lit" to more realistic. Any reason for the variety in lighting? Are you using the same gear on all the shoots? (Asking because your vimeo page says you light and shot everything, so hopefully you can reflect back on the work)

As Ryan said, as you continue and progress along doing more videos you'll get more experience and develop a good eye. Look back and look over your mistakes and try to correct them in the future. Also, learn everything you can from others that you work with.
 
I still dont understand the unnatural lighting. The sscene where theres a pan of the people on the balcony was lit with one soft box and a red gelled ligth comeng through a door which was supposed to be a party scene with a well lit hosue and light comeing from the windows inside and a light on the balcony
 
lairhair said:
I still dont understand the unnatural lighting. The sscene where theres a pan of the people on the balcony was lit with one soft box and a red gelled ligth comeng through a door which was supposed to be a party scene with a well lit hosue and light comeing from the windows inside and a light on the balcony
Click to expand...

For me the 'unnatural' seems to indicate 'unmotivated', or 'uncontrolled', light. I give a couple of examples.

In the shot at (approx) 2:55, there is a line of guys, and the light is enveloping and quite high. One can also see the reflection of the soft box in the guy wearing sunglasses.

Since I don't know the context of that shot, nor why there is such a 'big light', it seem s pretty contrived. Are they at a club waiting to get in... most night clubs have their lines pretty much in the dark, and the bouncers wander around with flash lights... is it a party and the guys are just doing 'guy things'... don't know.

Another shot that strikes me as having some sort of lighting problem is at 2:00. A young woman behind a counter in what appears to be a cafe.

There are some unusual lighting effects, and I believe they are produced by having the light at nearly 'young woman's head height' or even lower, as the shadows on her arm suggest that the light is going through the display cases on the counter.

In a later shot of the girl, I didn't record the time, the light on the right side of her face really is bright.

Now again, I don't know if this was in the context of an evening or morning shoot and the early (or late afternoon) rays of sun are punching through the front windows, or what... but even so, some of the resulting shadows are 'disturbing'... and not in the aesthetic sense, but in the sense of whether the lighting was under control.

There's another shot at 00:45, where the resulting lighting setup puts a dark shadow on the left eye in the close up of the actor. Don't know if that was intentional, or not...
 
j1clark@ucsd.edu said:
Since I don't know the context of that shot, nor why there is such a 'big light', it seem s pretty contrived.

Now again, I don't know if this was in the context of an evening or morning shoot and the early (or late afternoon) rays of sun are punching through the front windows, or what... but even so, some of the resulting shadows are 'disturbing'... and not in the aesthetic sense, but in the sense of whether the lighting was under control.
Click to expand...

Well put J1, this was pretty much how I was going to respond but lacked the time to today. The biggest thing is that, especially out of context, it looks like there's a light inches from their head. Of course, if we saw the scene, that may work out perfectly but in this context it doesn't.

However, the line up of guys outside the club or whatever, to me, reads as poorly lit. Simply because they are all perfectly lit on a dark night ... then the light falls off behind them ... so either they are all standing under street lamps (even then, they'd have heavy eye shadows from a vertical light fixture) or there's a softbox a few feet infront of them.

That's all. Just criticism.
 
allot of the scenes would make sense if you saw the full scenes. The shots with the girl behind the counter and in the resturant were day for night indoor stuff so we faked window light which was actually bounced not leveled. The other scene with the softbox was under extreme pressure. It was for a 21 day film competition and we only had 4 hours for the whole scene and the director also sucked at letting me do my job.
 
I also noticed a few very shaky shots. Do you use a shoulder mount? It doesn't looked locked down a lot of the scenes.

For the greenscreen shot, the woman's lower body didn't exist and was just floating. As a general blocking note, the scene in the coffee shop was busy beyond belief. To a distracting level.

Just basic notes...
 
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