short student film: Fingers

J

jkerfeld

New member
hello!

I recently finished a 6min short called Fingers that I completed as my last project at the University of Missouri-Kansas City...I'm trying to get it in festivals right now but for a limited time (7-10 days) I'm streaming it on my website, and am looking for honest, brutal if needed feedback about the project. I'm just trying to get better, and must say this film has created the most all-around satisfaction I've ever had on any of my work (and I've had some festival experiences in the past, as well as PBS airings)...hopefully that will translate into festival acceptances. Its unique, and visually challenging , so I dont expect 100% acceptance ratio but i hope it plays SOMEWHERE. (been targeting student/alternative/underground fests.) Do you think it'll find a home somewhere?

http://www.jordankerfeld.com/fsecret

Shot the film on the EX-1, no outside lenses or filtering. Edited on Final Cut Studio 2. The streaming is 35mb; please be patient!:)

Thanks in advance for your feedback!
 
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I feel like you're real good, and attempted to do sort of an experimental narrative, and it worked well. Very clean green screen (looked like green screen at least :)! )
good cinematography. You truly did a great job as sound design goes, congrats.

Hoping to see some of your other work
 
It's funny you mentioned greenscreen. I should have mentioned in my first post about no lenses, filters OR greenscreen! No compositing here, though obviously the open and close was shot in front of a psych in a nice small studio that had a pretty good lighting grid.

Thank you for your kind words! It does kind of present itself as an experimental narrative...hopefully it isn't too avant-garde or off-putting. I want it to sort of be digested by everyone. hopefully others enjoy it...the kind of ideas and subtext I wanted lended itself to a more experimental approach. :)

Thanks again!
 
This looks amazing, I wish I had faster internet to watch the entire short. For the opening credits, is the 35mm adapter off? Whatever it is I like it.
 
Go home, wait for it to load, and check it out! HAHA :) Joking...but I'm super hungry for feedback...

No 35mm lenses period. I think the trick is that the items are fairly far away and kind of small, and since the environment doesn't establish depth (it's literally a large white "space"...physically and mentally in regards to the character), there's kind of a trick perspective taking place as the camera moves down and reveals our hero.

The opening shot was a dolphin shot. For some reason the EX-1 wouldn't mount right due to the hand grip, so we could only do moves on a vertical axis and have them come out reasonably balanced. Everything else would have looked Dutch which I didn't want, in a way I like the small amount of dolly/dolphin shots; there's very few in this short and I think that is a good thing...ive seen films where there is way too much moving camera (mostly unmotivated completely)...and happy that production limitations occured to stop my instincts to do a dolly shot when it was unnecessary.
 
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Hey jkerfeld,

I like the shots and the rack focusing, but to be honest, I didn't get the story... I'm sure everyone else got it, so don't take this critique to heart lol. Overall nice footage and angles. I would of loved to hear dialog. When it ended, I felt like there was something missing... Maybe an explanation of some kind.

In my opinion, the first scene with the grayish background I felt was too bland. If your looking for that usual "mental institution color" pure white, or maybe a pinkish tone pale-ish white would of worked.
If lighting was the issue, I would of just made it a different color tone. Imho, the grayish environment looks like a light kit set-up.

The lighting with the other shots I thought worked very well. The first scene just bothered me a little.

I don't know the limitations you had, but overall I liked your rack focusing, angles, and green screen quality. I didn't get the whole finger idea, but thats probably just me.

Take care man and keep it up!
Carlos
 
Thanks Carlos-- And your response isn't one I haven't heard already. This film is challenging to some, and others pick up on it. I don't really know how to go about explaining it (hate V.O.) It's kind of a weird film for me because story-wise it tens to suggest to me different things on repeated viewings, i.e. relationships, communication, connections, etc.

the premise of the story was simple...I had this idea that what if losing a finger is a lot like a break-up, you know, when every song you hear and everything you see reminds you of the one that got away? I've seen several movies where a character loses a finger and it usually happens in a mob movie, or as some sort of punchline (the dog eating the finger in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang for example).

I've never lost a finger, but I imagine its kind of a personal and serious event for a while after it happens. Self-consciousness, etc. The film is an experimental narrative in that he returns from the hospital, and his mind is going every which way, and he can't stop thinking about his finger, and fingers in general. Time and space is never defined and, the dialogue would've gotten in the way because like a breakup, its nearly impossible to fully understand in words and these scenes are more like snapshots so its hard to establish anything using dialogue. Its more about feeling and coping in a personal way.

If you watch it a second time you'll see 12+ different uses/appearances of the finger, so people who like visual puzzles might like the "Where's Waldo" approach.

Charlie--point taken but something weird happens a few frames later in that take... it cuts on the audio beat to hopefully smooth things out...good catch though it bugs me as well...

Just a question: Which parts do you think are greenscreened?
 
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