Spy Master

Ted:

Good job on the film. I'm glad you went with your original score/music, as it gives it that quirky, "it's a Ted Arabian film" thing about it.

I actually like the zooms. A little cliche, but I think it works.

Without revealing too much, I definitely feel the little changes/additions you made helped A LOT in making the story clearer.

A fun and funky little film. A like your style.
 
i actually wasn't sure where this flick was going, nice one buddy boy! I liked how you incorporated teh iPod with it...
 
Thanks John, I appreciate the kind words. And I really appreciate the help you gave and offered me.

Yeah, the quick zooms are cliche but I have to do them once in my lifetime... might as well be at a time when my films are in their infantile stages!!!

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Dustin, that's too bad. I was trying to weave a simple story of cat and mouse. There is a lot of understated elements woven into this story... I am hoping that they do come through. I really didn't want to make a "cliche cat and mouse" film... But I also didn't want to over complicate things.

I know that it is not a "perfect" film. I was just trying to create something entertaining.

Thanks for watching!

-Ted
 
Loved the movie. Felt there was a great concept there, but I didn't get the flashy light out of no where kind of thing. But I loved the rest of it!
 
Ted -

I remember seeing something with a van and a flash of light in a Verizon FiOS commercial - care to elaborate? :silly:

I felt, mainly, in my review format that

there was a very high production value beginning, big sweeping shots, then a long shot of the van, looking good. I liked how the music was motivated from the iPod. We even get to see a Ted Arabian cameo! I was captivated until the very last frame! nice job, really great. The part with the bullets was very cool, but my favorite part was when he identified the leak, great cutting and sound.

The acting in this one was a plus, and your BTS was also a really great motivator for me to watch this one!
 
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Arnold has, "I'll be back!" Jerry Lewis has, "Laaaaady!" Ted has, "F%$#! F%$#! F%$#!"

Nice film Ted, I enjoyed it. I loved the soundtrack, and the iPod was very clever. Congrats and good luck!
 
Hey Ted,

Great job...i liked it.

The opening shot of the film was awesome. I loved the layers of branches you got in that shot as it keeps going down. Definately the best opening shot I've seen so far....and the transition to the van shot is nice.

I liked the zooms your doing. I think it fits well with the genre. I've been messing around with the manual zoom alot lately...and it really works well at certain points in your movie. I did notice some of the zooms look like you did them in post. I dont think those worked as well...i dunno...they just dont have the natural feel to them that the real ones do. The shots that I enjoyed were the first couple....the zoom to the folder and the zoom onto the lock.

The editing was nice. I liked how you did a few quick sequences of edits. My favorite is when she first looks at the Ipod and it goes ipod/her face/ipod/herface....zooming into each other quickly. I was wondering if that might be even more effective with a slight sound effect to go with it. Maybe not though...

Your driving shots were very well done. It looks like the rig you set up works well.

The performances were pretty good. I liked your acting as the gunman...and the f*ck f*ck f*ck...haha! Erica and Rob were ok and I thought some scenes were better than others for them. Hes better when hes acting like he doesnt know whats going on...and shes better when shes freaking out near the end.

As far as the story....I didnt quite get whatever the (SPOILER) glowing, flashing, face zapping thing was. I assume is some sort of spy badassery, but I was a little confused. The plot twists were cool.

The one thing i wasnt really too keen on was the music. And going back to the beginning shot.....I didnt like how the music was the same as the sound effect for the titles. It reminded me of a rap video....where pieces of the music come in...and they the whole thing breaks open. I dont watch too many rap videos...but that was the feel I got.

Your direction was very good. Like I said... I enjoyed the zooms and i think the shots and cutting style kept the story interesting as most of it took place in a very limited amount of space.

The look of the film was pretty plain...but I assume thats what you were going for. Sometimes people go overboard with magic bullet..and I'm glad you keep yours clean.

Overall it was an enjoyable film. As you said its not perfect but you definately have your own style and thats quite the asset. I'm looking forward to seeing whatever you make next. Great job!
 
Theodore J Arabian said:
Dustin, that's too bad. I was trying to weave a simple story of cat and mouse. There is a lot of understated elements woven into this story... I am hoping that they do come through. I really didn't want to make a "cliche cat and mouse" film... But I also didn't want to over complicate things.

I know that it is not a "perfect" film. I was just trying to create something entertaining.

Thanks for watching!

-Ted
Click to expand...

Entertaining it was!
 
Weston said:
Hey Ted,

Great job...i liked it.
Click to expand...
Thank you so much for such a detailed and analysed report. Seriously... I learn a lot from reading the feedback!

Yeah, music feel short for me as well and really missed not getting time to work on a better scoring for the "realization" phase of the film.

Seriously enjoyed reading your comments. Thanks Weston!

-Ted

Hootzie said:
Loved the movie. Felt there was a great concept there, but I didn't get the flashy light out of no where kind of thing. But I loved the rest of it!
Click to expand...
Yeah, I didn't want to go with a "brutal" death and the guy is supposed to have many unanswered questions about him... magical-like.

Anyway, it's a 6 minute short and in a 20 minute version, I could see a lot of character development happening.

Thanks for the critique! Glad you enjoyed the film!

-zach- said:
Ted -

I remember seeing something with a van and a flash of light in a Verizon FiOS commercial - care to elaborate? :silly:

I felt, mainly, in my review format that

there was a very high production value beginning, big sweeping shots, then a long shot of the van, looking good. I liked how the music was motivated from the iPod. We even get to see a Ted Arabian cameo! I was captivated until the very last frame! nice job, really great. The part with the bullets was very cool, but my favorite part was when he identified the leak, great cutting and sound.

The acting in this one was a plus, and your BTS was also a really great motivator for me to watch this one!
Click to expand...
Thanks you so much for the critique, Zach. Awesome.

Yeah, I played around with Magic Bullet but I don't love the "pre-loaded looks" and didn't have time to really create the kind of look I really wanted. I was going for a 70's vibe to it.

Thanks again! Pleasure to read!

tamazeen said:
Arnold has, "I'll be back!" Jerry Lewis has, "Laaaaady!" Ted has, "F%$#! F%$#! F%$#!"

Nice film Ted, I enjoyed it. I loved the soundtrack, and the iPod was very clever. Congrats and good luck!
Click to expand...
Thanks Tod! :thumbsup: I appreciate the kuddos all around! Great Job on your film as well!
 
tamazeen said:
Ted has, "F%$#! F%$#! F%$#!"
Click to expand...
Weston said:
and the f*ck f*ck f*ck...haha!
Click to expand...

This may be like the infamous Star Wars quote.

It's actually "F*CK! ... F*CK, F*CK, F*CK" So you're getting four actual f-bombs there.

Well, I keep thinking ":silly:" is a smiley face but it's actually ":cheesy" so....

:cheesy:
 
ted you gotta get SPY MASTER on the apple page. for real, my friend did an ipod movie last year and was able to do some sort of a cross promotion with the (local) apple store.
just an idea, and i thought your ipod use within the plot was clever and inventive.
 
Thanks Matt... hmmmm, may look into that. I am definitely looking forward to bringing SPY MASTER into the shop for a little maintance but after that.... onto the world! :grin:

Thanks Matt!
 
Man... posts jump back and forth so fast here.
Ted, I watched your film and it had me laughing the whole time. The Ipod thingy was clever I thought. It felt like I was watching a Gomer Pyle style Bond joint.
My only quirk was that, you know what they say, the brightest part of the image draws your eye... there was something right above the girls shirt that was distracting. I really liked this and thought it hit the mark with its humor. ( I hope it was supposed to be funny) ;)
 
Ted,

Great job. I loved the Ipod music cues. The effects looked great. I loved the opening shot of the Truck appearing.
 
Ted!!!!!!!!!!!!

Loved the cameo... by far the best part of the film!!!

Oh, and the rest of the film was good too. :)
 
Hey Ted, finally getting around to a review... sorry it took some time... yours was one of the first one's I checked out!

Here ya go.

Some Positives:

Acting. Overall the acting was quite good. I felt you were going for a little over-the-top with the characters, and they achieved it.

Music. Ok... it's totally corny music, but it worked for the film, haha! It just did!

Exterior shots. Some of those car shots outside were really cool man... that crane rocked!

Some Negatives.

Script and story. Ok, I was confused, and I didn't really feel the film went anywhere... I appreciated the use of the Ipod, etc. but felt like it was a gimick to save an otherwise boring story...

Editing. I felt the pace was a little off, and some of the edits could have just been tightened up.

Overall look. It looked really home-videoy to me... maybe some better color grading would have helped. I don't know... just my thought :)


Anyway Ted, thanks for showing! And hope you'll be out to CA again sometime, and we can meet up! Good luck in the fest!
 
Ted Ted Ted, very entertaining. I loved the style that you applied to this and I was happy to see it was consistent from start to end.

I read a couple of comments about the flashy thing - didnt bother me at all as I got that this was a quirky movie and anything can happen especially for the "SPY MASTER". The twists kept me watching, and in between those small things kept me entertained. Well thought out.

Loved your cameo. Music was perfect for what you were doing. Some lines were not quite there in the acting, but I hardly noticed because I was enjoying it too much.

Most likely in your conversion process but came up a little bright and milky my end. I just had a job professionally graded - looked brilliant - but I kept having it wash out when I compressed it for web. I ended up getting someone else to do it same process, almost same system and it was fine?
 
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Thanks Aram, yes.... it is supoosed to be a quircky little film.

Thanks Joe! Yeah, the opening crane shot maybe the best thing in my film!

Thanks John! I do believe that we have killed off the last of my cameos here! (I hope that I have something else that I can fall back on! :grin:

Thanks Brandon! I appreciate your critique and share some of your observations... especially the "home-made video look" to it. I must learn how to use this camera! I know that CC can do many things for me and I played around with Magic Bullet but I want to learn how to adjust the settings in camera to get a better look.

Anyway, I set a goal for me to concentrate on a few elements of filmmaking and I achieved those. I hope as I continue to grow as a filmmaker, I can keep filling in the gaps.

Sorry that the story was boring. I actually like the simplicity of this story. And to me there are a lot of layers to it.

ncje, Thank you for watching and commenting. I am glad that you enjoyed the twists. I guess I was relying too much on them to make my film work.

Thanks again all for watching and commenting!

-Ted
 
Yo Ted,

Finally got to start downloading and watching films and I gotta hand it to you, my man. Bravo. Also, you look way damn good on camera and I hope you do more acting in future productions. I totally loved your VFX too. This little short truly represents the spirit of dvxuser and the fests. You very deliberately set out to acquire new skillsets and techniques for yourself -- that's what shooting is all about.

I'm interesting in seeing more of the rig you used to shoot the van scenes. I haven't finished going through your thread so I'm hoping you've got good bts scenes there so I can see the different approaches you used. Good car interiors are a ***** and yours are very nice.

You have good actors working here and the ipod plot device was way way way cool.

Once more the T-man astonishes with his innovation, enthusiasm and cleverness. You simply MUST keep shooting, Ted. I can't wait to see what new stuff comes out of your head.
 
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