SHORT: The Milk Man

D

David Topete

Member
Hello DVXuser's! This is my first short in a really long time, so I would like to know your input.

WARNING: There is a bit of swearing, so keep that in mind if you guy's are at work.


Synopsis:
A mentally divorced couple use their son as a scapegoat for their problems.

Starring Lee Ron Chan and Samantha Pitts

Film on a Canon T3i w/ Nikkor Ai and AiS Primes
Sound via a Zoom H1

Post in Premiere CS5 and MB Looks.

*One thing that I know for the next time is that actor's move!! A lot of shots were soft because I wasn't follow focusing. Will do for the next time.
 
Technically well done. Nice image quality and sound. Editing was nice, though it begins too quickly.

Biggest issue I had was that the actors simply don't appear to be old enough to be married or especially have a kid that age. I know it can be hard to find older actors, but you have to plan a story around what you have access to.

I also would have liked a lot more action in the piece. There's too much standing around, talking. Add some action in there, make it 2-3 minutes longer, and I think it would be a much stronger piece.
 
jghenderson said:
Technically well done. Nice image quality and sound. Editing was nice, though it begins too quickly.

Biggest issue I had was that the actors simply don't appear to be old enough to be married or especially have a kid that age. I know it can be hard to find older actors, but you have to plan a story around what you have access to.

I also would have liked a lot more action in the piece. There's too much standing around, talking. Add some action in there, make it 2-3 minutes longer, and I think it would be a much stronger piece.
Click to expand...

Agreed, lighting was good, sound was good, editing was superb. The actors were a little lacking; it seemed like they rushed their lines a bit. Cut aways in select spots would have been nice. Over all, it was a nice piece for the length.. Good work
 
Alright, first of all thanks for taking the time to watch and respond! I appreciate it!

Now for my response.

jghenderson said:
Technically well done. Nice image quality and sound. Editing was nice, though it begins too quickly.

Biggest issue I had was that the actors simply don't appear to be old enough to be married or especially have a kid that age. I know it can be hard to find older actors, but you have to plan a story around what you have access to.

I also would have liked a lot more action in the piece. There's too much standing around, talking. Add some action in there, make it 2-3 minutes longer, and I think it would be a much stronger piece.
Click to expand...

To begin, let me just say this was a group project given to my girlfriend as a final for her Intro to Film class-- I'm not in the class. She initially wanted to do this herself, but her other group members totally ditched her so she asked me if I could help out. I of course said yes, even though I wanted to since the beginning haha

The project was to create a story based around a family. It needed to be around 2 minutes. That's why it starts quickly and continues hastily throughout. I helped her rewrite the script and we were on our way.

Okay, I know the actors are way too young. I told her that from the beginning, but this was the project so I just let it go.

Now, by the time she asked me to help her, the due date was around the corner. Now we had to rush things. She said we could film it at her house and that's what we did. However, to make matters worse, when I got there we only had a time frame of about 2 hours to film before guests arrived-- it was a last minute thing the she didn't know about. I had planned to have cut aways and other miscellaneous shots but I just decided to get what minimally was needed to tell the story for the sake of our time constraints.

Now when you say action, what kind are you talking about? Because if you're talking about maybe adding guns and stuff, I'm trying to steer away from that. Almost every video out there has guns haha.

eyeBOX said:
Agreed, lighting was good, sound was good, editing was superb. The actors were a little lacking; it seemed like they rushed their lines a bit. Cut aways in select spots would have been nice. Over all, it was a nice piece for the length.. Good work
Click to expand...

To elaborate on your statement, yes, the actors were rushing their lines and I would have liked to have had more shots to cut away to. I explained above why. There really wasn't that much time to get the best takes possible.

Given the time frame I was given I think it went quite well. I know there's room for improvement but I literally had 2 hours to set up and shoot everything. Shooting on a different day was out of the question because the due date was near and the actors would be busy.

P.S. The actors aren't part of the group project either. They're just our friends from the Theatre department that we asked to help us out on the last minute.



Anyways! Thanks once again for taking the time to watch and respond!

Cheers!
 
Last edited:
the sound is good yes. Although it has some "room-reverb" in it... but ok, it's because of the room

it's good you didn't had disturbing sounds like refrigerators, heaters, coolers, airco, dogs, neighbours doing construction works, moawers, cows, chickens..., donkeys, peacocks...
 
When I say action I don't mean guns at all. I just would have liked for the characters to actually "do" something, aside from just sitting/standing and talking.

For instance, you could have had the male character be playing a video game when he get's approached. Even as she is yelling at him, he's still trying to play the game. This would add a physical action to the scene, and would include real conflict because the females goal would be to get him to pay attention to her, and his goal would be to get her to shut up so he can play his game in peace.

As it is, there doesn't really seem to be a goal for the characters except to berate each other.
 
jghenderson said:
When I say action I don't mean guns at all. I just would have liked for the characters to actually "do" something, aside from just sitting/standing and talking.

For instance, you could have had the male character be playing a video game when he get's approached. Even as she is yelling at him, he's still trying to play the game. This would add a physical action to the scene, and would include real conflict because the females goal would be to get him to pay attention to her, and his goal would be to get her to shut up so he can play his game in peace.

As it is, there doesn't really seem to be a goal for the characters except to berate each other.
Click to expand...

Okay, I see what you're saying. You're completely right and it's a valid point. While shooting I was contemplating on what I wanted them to be doing, because I didn't want them to just stand there. I could have just faked him playing a video game or watching a movie but since I was rushing things, my mind was just focused on getting things done. I found a newspaper in the next room and so I just gave him it to him to read. It was better than nothing I suppose.

Thanks for your response and will keep these things in mind for the next time!
 
Like some of the others, I didn't find the acting very convincing, and it had nothing to do with their age.
I thought the female was a little better in her delivery, better emotion. The guy has a long ways to go. Well... in this piece anyways. He may be better at a prefered genre. Everything else was good as far as production goes.
I didn't find the story very good. But if you had fun, learned from it, then it was a success, and a very good exercise.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top