Student One Take Video getting Huge Press

I like the one Mark posted because I like the song.

I'm pretty sure I could watch these all day if I liked the songs they chose.

I hated the first one because of the song, but it's a pretty cool accomplishment like most have already said.
 
I too, hate the song, however I think the pre-production that went into it was pretty damn amazing. To do it in a school too was also pretty wicked. I do agree that they could have done with a better camera op, HOWEVER...it kept me entertained until the end.

I think that was their goal anyway..and if so, they did a great job at it.

Kegan
 
Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
*Announcer Voice*: Jon Starr, champion and defender of the intro film student! I kid, I kid.

I think I upset the Canadians, even worse the french ones! :lipsrseal


It's a good intro to video project for a bunch of kids at film school. No doubt. But CNN homepage good? Feel good news piece BS 1o1. At it's terribly cheese and literal. Maybe that's why it's fun. I'm with Hawk... I like it and hate it all at the same time. It's an enigma from the land of enigmas.
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Heh, good thing I'm not French Canadian. :)

But look at it this way. Do you really think the 1 shot long take from atonement, with 1000 extras and a a few million dollar budget is going to go on the front page of CNN? I think the mere fact that this IS a student film is what makes it so damn impressive.

Cause let's be honest, most student films are the same crap over and over again. They're poorly planned, the cinematography sucks worse than this video, and it's clear they shouldn't try and make a career in film making.

So to see something where they put effort into the pre-prod, and they came out with something entertaining, especially for a student film, is why it's getting all this recognition.

Honestly, if they shot it on a better camera with a better camera op and an AC, and maybe even tried to light this place and get better actors... then people wouldn't be giving it as much attention, because then CNN and others would just say "oh it's just professionals with lots of money, nothing special"
 
It was obviously a fluff piece...

I understand what you are saying... and I think it was simply CNN's attitude which turned me negative... offering the student video as proof you don't need professional crew and/or money to make a good music video and stating that it is simply awesome. To throw back to a somewhat recent thread, that video seemed 'good enough' for CNN, 'good enough' for youtube, and apparently 'good enough' for me.

I guess the real disappointment was seeing the video headline on CNN "students make amazing one take video" and and thinking... "wow a student film featured on CNN? it must be amazing...", then listening to Tweedledee & Tweedledum discuss how it proves you don't need money and professional crew and how amazing the video is.... and then seeing 'that'.

I guess I'll wait until the day CNN's view on music videos becomes fullfilled moronic prophecy and all entertainment becomes cheap viral level youtube videos... then I'll be featured on CNN when I have a really polished, professional, and well lit video. Who'da thunk that technical execution performed well would be avant garde?
 
Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
I guess the real disappointment was seeing the video headline on CNN "students make amazing one take video" and and thinking... "wow a student film featured on CNN? it must be amazing...", then listening to Tweedledee & Tweedledum discuss how it proves you don't need money and professional crew and how amazing the video is.... and then seeing 'that'.

I guess I'll wait until the day CNN's view on music videos becomes fullfilled moronic prophecy and all entertainment becomes cheap viral level youtube videos... then I'll be featured on CNN when I have a really polished, professional, and well lit video. Who'da thunk that technical execution performed well would be avant garde?
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Yeah I hear you. A lot of non-filmmakers (and non film buffs) that I know don't care much whether it's shot on red or on a handycam. They don't see the poor mistakes, they're not pulled out by poorly executed films. So what does it mean for where we're headed? I'm not sure...

Nonetheless, they proved you don't need a big crew and lots of money to make something entertaining, which is I think they point they were trying to make.
 
Jon Starr said:
Nonetheless, they proved you don't need a big crew and lots of money to make something entertaining, which is I think they point they were trying to make.
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But this wasn't really that entertaining. It's a gimmick that wasn't even executed all that well, the only selling point was that it's done by students. Look at the OK Go treadmill video, that was something cool done on a very low budget that manages to impress amateur and professionals alike, whereas this was something that you can only appreciate if you make allowances for the fact that these are students.
 
What bugs me is the name of the song. "I Gotta Feeling"? Is that supposed to be short for "I Got a Feeling"? Usually, the slang "gotta" is a contraction of "got to" which is a substitute for the more grammatically correct "have to".
 
Huy Vu said:
But this wasn't really that entertaining. It's a gimmick that wasn't even executed all that well, the only selling point was that it's done by students. Look at the OK Go treadmill video, that was something cool done on a very low budget that manages to impress amateur and professionals alike, whereas this was something that you can only appreciate if you make allowances for the fact that these are students.
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I'm sorry, but 'Entertainment' is subjective.

Fact is some people find this entertaining, including people in this thread. Other's, like yourself, don't.
 
Some people love this thing, others don't.

Who cares whether they shot this with a high end camera vs. a cell phone cam and that they didn't have a professional crew with a seasoned stead-i-cam operator? You can tell they had fun making this. Maybe that is why it is resonating with people?

Maybe there are some other filmmakers out there in the world that deserve the attention more than these particular film students... in fact, I'm sure there probably are other filmmakers, whether they be students or pros who deserve this level of attention for their efforts. Hell, look at some of the talent on this forum. There are some here that are as talented or way more talented than these students that did this one take video.

Who knows, maybe there is some unknown cinematic genius wasting away on some potato farm in Idaho, someone whose films could blow Spielberg's out of the water? It's not impossible. But unless this hypothetical filmmaking mastermind gets their butt to Hollywood, or establishes some sort of professional contact with the film industry, they'll probably just have to stick to making HDV masterpieces that aren't shown beyond the borders of their small farm town, save for Youtube and Vimeo.

The cold hard facts are that success in this industry is a combination of skill, effort, connections, and just hitting the zeitgeist with your work. A classic like Star Wars might have been a complete dud had it come out a year earlier or later than it actually did. I like to imagine that in some parallel universe we are all making fun of it now on the XLUSER forum (in this parallel universe, Canon was the first to come out with 24p, in their XL-1s in fact) because it looks hokey and low budget... a cheesy B-grade sci-fi flick that only grossed 5 mil at the box office in 1976.

Same thing goes with any hit or classic film. Sure skill is important, but let's all face facts, actual skill and quality of the work is not the main determining factor in terms of success in the film industry. If you doubt me, look at all the crass and crappy films that rake in mountains of cash every year, while a lot of the time, a very daring and original film that has a well structured story and ace directing falls flat because it is too different for the mass audience. It sucks, it's not fair, but that's the truth. We just gotta keep on plugging away and enjoying the process whether we make it big or not.

The bottom line is that these "film" students got off their asses and made something that got them national attention. I've used the whole "my camera is not good enough" excuse in the past. Too bad because I know I've missed out on some opportunities to make some short films, that even if failures, I would've gotten some more practice and might've had a fun time making them. We only live once, so we need to just enjoy life and make our films with the best equipment we can reasonably get our hands on. The rest is just gravy.
 
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Nobody is putting them down because they used a crappy camera. The issue is what Ryan said: if this had been done by a professional crew w/ the right production value then it probably wouldn't have been featured. Why is that? The video was featured not because of the content, but because it was done by students. Therefore all the criticisms that can be leveled at it can be deflected with "Oh, they're just film students." If you're a working professional and you turn out unpolished works you don't have the luxury of using that excuse. If your work is good enough, the content will speak for itself regardless of how you do it; I don't care if you use crap equipment as long as you turn out good work in spite of it. Claiming that it's not perfect because they had bad equipments is in itself an excuse because they could have picked an easier concept to execute with the resources they have.
 
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