Scary Boy Project 5

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Policar

Carbonite Member
I'm kind of embarassed to post this here, but here it is anyhow:

This was shot over the course of a few two hour days with a couple of days for really quick pick ups. Edited in Final Cut Pro. It's mostly really stupid, but I've decided to upload it just for kicks:

http://homepage.mac.com/daven/scaryboy.avi

It's 150mb, but it's 20 minutes. DIVX avi.

The compression kills it, by the way. Yikes. And it's not for all tastes....
 
Damn. 150 MB. I almost was no way but then saw it was you and said to myself; he's a regular and long time member. So I went and smoked a cigarette while doing the DL.

Now forget all that 'emarrassment' talk; how can we all learn and grow if we cant share? Not everything can be as EPIC as my undead films or green screen tests.

That was a joke.

Dude. I am cracking up watching this; I mean, it's rough as all hell in every sense of the word but it has some shining moments; there is a 'filmmaker' in this. The fact you made this is no easy task.

There are some good things in this short; there are some interesting comps, lighting and camera work; loving the steadicam but most of all.

I love the humor. I was literally laughing out loud more than once; the platoon music, the vomit, the nuclear conspiracy. Serious. Great humor. You have a flair for comedy writing. The dialogue, the fight scenes sound effects; hilarious.

The comps ranges from really bad and average to very nice. Study up and practice some more on this subject; framing and definatley the use of letterbox with headroom. The editing I thought was fairly tight; good job on that.

For the most part; it was nicely exposed. You have a good understanding of this I think and your use of what appears to be limited lighting is really usuable.

JAKE the actor was hilarious; he did great; rough but fun.

Good job. Now its time to up the ante and make another one. Damn that snow was crazy. Blows me away to think people live in the snow.
 
Thanks for the feedback. I totally agree with you about there being a bunch of bad compositions (we didn't have time to set up more than three or four shots for many scenes), but what made me happy was that most of the worst compositions were in the scenes that were shot first. Framing in squeeze mode is also a pain; I think I'll frame stuff in letterbox then shoot in squeeze as you seem to suggest in the future. And thanks for the comment on editing, that's what I put the most work into.

The snow was sort of a fluke, but it was great luck. We actually shot a decent amount of it almost two months after the rest, and there was still snow which worked well. The hat is another issue. In a few scenes it's orange and I had to painstakingly color it red. You can tell sometimes. The lighting was limited in the sense that we only had light bulbs and work lights to work with, but most scenes (except exterior day) were lit with at least two or three lights.

Anyhow, I really appreciate the feedback and the fact that you went out of your way to watch this. I agree that Jake is hilarious, by the way.
 
At 20 minutes, it wouldn't be much smaller.

I'll see if I can output a low res divx file, though.
 
Hmm...divx is sucking right now. Apple's releasing a new codec (h264) at the end of the month. I'll upload a smaller file then.
 
CLASSIC LOL!!!! Slow to start and end, but the middle was like a twinkie! I was rolling at the dialogue when he is biking in and then pukes on the tape. I laughed even harder at the refrence of the empire strikes back to his demo reel! I won't say anything about lighting and compsure because I know you know I saw that other vid you made with jake in it. But this definitly made the top ten funniest vids on DVXuser!
 
Yo, this was kind of funny. "yes" conversation, good stuff. Question... towards the end of the piece you started using a lot more handheld, which looked to me like steadicam. Particularly the shot where he's wearing orange and we're going in behind him into the woods. It looked really professionally done. Can you tell me what you used to get that shot (plus most of the shots in the final confrontation sequence, which also looked smooth).

c.g.
 
Thanks for the compliments. I'm feeling kind of sick right now, so my response may not be the most coherent, but I'll try to answer your questions anyhow. (And regarding the "Empire Strikes Back" line, it's also one of my favorites, and I agree that the beginning and end are a little slow since we shot them first, and they were roughest.)

Anyhow, I used a glidecam 2000 for a lot of the movie. It was my first day of actual shooting with one so my first scenes with it were pretty bad (the early exterior conversation). I learned how to use it by the time we shot the woods scene, and the orange coat shot was the first we did after I re-balanced the glidecam very carefully. Balance counts for a lot. As we continued to shoot and the balance became imperfect (it's super sensetive) the shots got shakier and shakier.

Besides this, I'd say multiple takes are key. You'll always screw it up a little from time to time, so be very careful to make sure you have the footage you need. There were plenty of times where I should have done more takes but was too sloppy to care (as you can tell, this was a rushed production!) Practice makes perfect, too, so while I can't really offer any advice on operating besides making sure balance is perfect and your hands are in the correct position, just practicing a bit will help. Resting your arm helps, too...it's tiring.
 
Glidecam

Glidecam

hey man those glidecam shots had me fooled for steadycam! How does that thing work? Is it just a stick with counterweights or is there some kind of spring system?
 
It actually is very close to a "real" steadicam in terms of how it works. It's a gimbal with counterweights (the sticks with counterweights, IMO, are completely useless compared with a true gimbal system.) The ergonomics are not the best, but when balanced correctly it provides very nice results.

At work we have a glidecam 4000 and a cheap vest. I've never used it, but I played around a little and it seems even better. To be honest, though, the spring/vest really helps more with the issue of weight than of stability. If you're just doing quick shots and don't have any accessories, the glidecam 2000 will get the job done pretty well if you're low on cash. (Then again, I wouldn't recommend it with a camera any heavier than the DVX and it's not so stable that shooting at anything but full wide angle is recommended.)
 
I use the same; It is murder, I say MURDER, on the forearm. But...

For a tool in the box and quick shots it works great. I do not agree Policar on the 'Useless' take; your shots were super smooth thanks to these components.

The problem with this GC2000 Set-up is you have to literally phsyche up for the shot; get those breathing excercises going! Murder I tell ya!
 
I play "Chester MacMarvin" since my friend who was supposed to play him is unreliable (he ended up hating the movie anyhow, so it's probably for the best.) I wrote it, too, though there was a lot of semi-ad libbed stuff.

I shot a lot of the glidecam stuff with a fever, by the way, and wow does it get tiring. It really is brutal sometimes. Thankfull the DVX is pretty light. I saw a guy with a Varicam (he had a whole vest, of course) and that looked pretty impossible to work with.
 
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