Sara & Suzi and the DVX100B

D

drdimento

Well-known member
Well, shot my second and last SD movie . . "Sara & Suzi"

Would love to have some people watch this little 9'8" movie and at the end, click the "Click Here" link at top of the movie page to rate it anonymously or ID'd . . your decision.

The link: Sara & Suzi (Then Click "Watch The Movie"

BACKGROUND

The movie was produced for film festivals and has already been entered in several, none of which have ended juding yet.

The movie was shot with one DVX100B (our oldest one) in 16:9 Squeeze in 24p and edited on Avid Liquid Pro. An upconverted HD version was also produced but basically is just an SD image in HD size. I figured that's what we'd see but hey, it was fun thinking it might work :o)

The Panasonic once again as with our last years production of "The Crimson Rose" which won three awards has held true to its' workhorse claims and accordingly we use them in 100% of our television productions, commercials, infomercials, and documentary materials and it is this backbone that I will regret turning from as we (along with the entire industry) moves to HD.

For those who check the movie out, thank you for watching it, and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did making it. AND, please rate the movie and don't feel you have to be kind, if something is amiss, I'd love to know it. I want to be a better Director and Producer and I will when I correct my weaknesses.

For those interested in last year's movie it is at this link: The Crimson Rose
 
drdimento said:
Well, shot my second and last SD movie . . "Sara & Suzi"

Would love to have some people watch this little 9'8" movie and at the end, click the "Click Here" link at top of the movie page to rate it anonymously or ID'd . . your decision.

The link: Sara & Suzi (Then Click "Watch The Movie"

BACKGROUND

The movie was produced for film festivals and has already been entered in several, none of which have ended juding yet.

The movie was shot with one DVX100B (our oldest one) in 16:9 Squeeze in 24p and edited on Avid Liquid Pro. An upconverted HD version was also produced but basically is just an SD image in HD size. I figured that's what we'd see but hey, it was fun thinking it might work :o)

The Panasonic once again as with our last years production of "The Crimson Rose" which won three awards has held true to its' workhorse claims and accordingly we use them in 100% of our television productions, commercials, infomercials, and documentary materials and it is this backbone that I will regret turning from as we (along with the entire industry) moves to HD.

For those who check the movie out, thank you for watching it, and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did making it. AND, please rate the movie and don't feel you have to be kind, if something is amiss, I'd love to know it. I want to be a better Director and Producer and I will when I correct my weaknesses.

For those interested in last year's movie it is at this link: The Crimson Rose
Click to expand...

Also, for those with questions that they would like to have public (if any) just ask them here and I'll respond here accordingly.
 
Hi!

Your HTML won't work on Mozilla. You should fix the file name, adding the extension of the file in the EMBED tag. Explanatory image follows:

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Wow. Can't believe it's been up there like that for two weeks. Wonder why it played for me?

Anyways, fixed it . . try it again. Thanks "NoFatChips" . . . appreciate it so kindly :o)
 
drdimento said:
For those who check the movie out, thank you for watching it, and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did making it. AND, please rate the movie and don't feel you have to be kind, if something is amiss, I'd love to know it. I want to be a better Director and Producer and I will when I correct my weaknesses.
Click to expand...

Filled out the form afterwards, but I figure I'll be more descriptive here. I'm going to be honest here as I try and help people.

Now drama is hard to pull off. It's very dark, gets to people's emotions, and if anything gets in the way of that happening, it'll go from being heartfelt to cheesy in the blink of an eye.

Now it seems like every aspect of the film has a small thing wrong with it. Let me break it down.

Cinematography:

Seems like in several if not most shot you would zoom in or out to reframe. The problem with zooming in or out is that sometimes it won't be very smooth, and you can tell when it's a zoom as opposed to a dolley in or out. It just doesn't look good. Very few zoom shots do. Although there are exceptions, one great zoom out shot was in lord of the rings. It was an ariel view of the fellowship of the ring, and as the helicopter curved around the actors, it zoomed out steadily, creating a beautiful shot. Of course this is the team behind Lord of the Ring, of course they can make a zoom out look amazing.

This is where coverage comes in. You did a shot where it's on suzi, then zooms in onto her bread. However you should have done a shot of suzi, reset, then done a CU of the bread, and cut between them. It would have been smoother and looked more proffesional. Zooming in and out just seemed like a cheap way of trying to work around that. Makes it look very unproffesional.

Acting/Directing:

Okay, well you have a young actress, so I forgive her for not being the best actress, however it also translates to the main actress as well. Now the main problem isn't the acting, it's the directing. Only other directors/filmmakers pick up when it's the direction that's lacking.

First of all I see that you're both the DP and the Director. This is a big no-no. Now some people I know can do that, be both the DP and Director. One member I know on these boards that does an exceptional job at that. However generally it's a bad idea. You can only focus your attention on one thing. On a set while the DP is setting up you should be doing rehearsals with the actors, and working on why they are saying what they are saying. The performances were lacking and one dimensional, it almost seemed like you told them "be sad" or "be angry". If you avoided this and told them "You're trying to enjoy yourself with suzie, having fun, but deep inside you still know, and that's what's keeping you from having fun," and if the actors still gave a bland performance, well then you shouldn't have casted her.

Remember that there are layers to an actors performance. If you tell them directly what to do, it'll be bland and one dimensional and they'll be thinking "I gotta yell, gotta be angry!" rather than "I can't beleive I did this! how could I?!"

Script/Editing:

Okay, well the editing was a bit rough. Fades and cross fades when you didn't need them. However the major issue with the editing is the pacing. Seems like it wasn't taken into account. Two major areas just drag. The picnic/ripping off bread crust, and the intro car driving. When hardly anything happens, remember that an audience will get bored. There's nothing for them, not any spectacular lord of the rings landscapes, or interesting dialogue. It's just one action that could have been cut down in editing considerably.

Rememeber, the audience doesn't need to see things happen in realtime. This was soemthing done in the 1920s in early silent films. They would follow someone walking along for a minute just ebcause it's realtime. Now in films we realize that you can cut from the begining of a walk to the end of a walk and people fill in the missing parts without any confusion.

Now the dialogue was heavy and rough. This is where lots and lots of revisions come in handy. Work off of other people, have people read it (who will be honest, so no best friends, spouses or family members (although siblings can be an exception)). Maybe read it aloud several times, usually works better with other people. If it gets cluncky, or wierd, then it needs to be revised. Work on natural dialogue, the way people actually speak or stumble over words.

The last point of dialogue is that film is a visual medium, so if it can be conveyed through visuals, then do so. This is especially important for drama. Heck I've made this mistake myself several times. A good way to think of this is to take out ALL dialogue from the movie. Then as you go along the script, only place dialogue where it's absolutely needed to drive the story forward.

The story, well not a lot happened. Where's the conflict? All we had were two people go for a picnic and then a twist at the end. A story needs conflict near the begining, something to drive them to do something, or else we're just watching people doing things, not all too exciting. Then there are small moments where you go huh? For example, Suzi goes to climb a tree and Sara freaks out. Why? Okay she's worried about her, but why the tree? What's it have to do with the fact that suzi was in a car crash? Just seems like it was a bit poorly put in there. It could have worked, but just seemed like something was missing.

Effects/Music:

Last section here is to describe the two aspects together because, well, they're both very cheesy. The music sounds like something out of a low budget 80's show, or some b-movie 80's movie. The electirc guitar, drums and simple tunes are really what made it sound that way. Not sure how to give advice for this, but maybe just work with other music/another composer in the future?

Effects as well. When Suzi appeared over the grave, it just looked cheesy and over the top. The fact that she's in a white dress, says "saaaaaaraaaaaa" just like a ghost would, and stands there riggid over her grave, just adds to this cheesiness. Not to mention the poor greenscreen cutout effect where you clearly see the pixels. I think we got that she was talking to a ghost or her imagination, so if you had the same girl that was about to climb the tree say she forgives her, then it would have worked a lot better.


I hope this helps! Be sure to keep improving!
 
Jon Starr said:
Filled out the form afterwards, . . .!
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Thanks so kindly for doing so. Appreciate it, this whole evaluation process is very helpful.

Jon Starr said:
. . . .so if you had the same girl that was about to climb the tree say she forgives her, then it would have worked a lot better. . . . !
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Actually it was the same girl. Guess we did a poor job on that one. I had actually written the script with a different girl and others said that was a bad idea so did it with the same girl.

And just so you know, I can't even begin to say how much I appreciate the candor and honesty on this eval. I need to know where the film is and where I am on the process of movie production let alone whether I should even invest my time and effort therein.

To all who are submitting the evaluation after watching the movie thank you soooooooo much. Keep 'em comin. Maybe I should post a general eval "results" at the conclusion?
 
drdimento said:
Actually it was the same girl. Guess we did a poor job on that one. I had actually written the script with a different girl and others said that was a bad idea so did it with the same girl.
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Guess I didn't write it out properly, but yes, I got it was the same girl. Just meant in terms of ghost suzi or other suzi.
 
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