Video quality less important when you enjoy content
- Thread starter DChang
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Jon Starr
Veteran
While I do agree average viewers are our audience, and they don't see things the way we see things, and that story always comes first...
But filmmakers and film buffs are also your audience.
Not to mention that if you're starting up, most likely this will be your main audience. What average audience member goes to a film festival?
But filmmakers and film buffs are also your audience.
Not to mention that if you're starting up, most likely this will be your main audience. What average audience member goes to a film festival?
Burn2Earn pro.
Well-known member
when I said bad looking I meant that you couldn't make out the picture.. what good is content if you can't see what it is for?
I made my first 6 films on a home video camera. 1 which made it into a couple of film festivals. Its not really about the picture of the film as long as it is visible but more of the story that you can tell. I had one women at the festival tell me it was one of the best films she has seen there. just based off of how the actor portraied his feelings on screen. we have all seen home made movies and million dollar pictures and we have said good and bad about them both.
just make sure you can see and hear the story you are trying to tell.
Production quality, too.
My particular favorite example is this.
There are fans of the new Doctor Who who simply hate the original.
They always say that it looks so cheesy.
But if you take away the new FX, the new budget, the new production quality, and just get into "content" -- writing, etc., -- it's exactly the same show. And in many ways, on those terms, the original is better. The new one just looks slicker.
I guess what sometimes worries me when I see these threads, though I absolutely agree that content is king, is that some will take it as an excuse not to try their best with every aspect of film production. Obviously the seasoned pros don't think that way and don't mean it that way. I just worry for the newbies.
In film you tell a story with visuals and with sound. Content is not just story, it is the film itself and how that story is presented. Visual presentation that is appropriate to the film influences the dramatic impact of the story on the audience. Some films demand quality visual presentation, perhaps others do not. Some films tell their story almost entirely through incredible visuals.
What may work well for Blair Witch, or Crank, or 28 days would not work well at all for The Black Stallion for instance. Some films require meticulous high quality cinematography for suitably dramatic content presentation.
It is not something to discount or ignore. The visual choices you make ultimately determine to a significant degree how compelling your "content" is.
The audience won't know or care about the technical differences, but their overall experience of the film will nonetheless be affected by it.
What may work well for Blair Witch, or Crank, or 28 days would not work well at all for The Black Stallion for instance. Some films require meticulous high quality cinematography for suitably dramatic content presentation.
It is not something to discount or ignore. The visual choices you make ultimately determine to a significant degree how compelling your "content" is.
The audience won't know or care about the technical differences, but their overall experience of the film will nonetheless be affected by it.
Ryan Patrick O'Hara
Veteran
Content is king... but visual subtext adds so much to that content, it's hard to discount.
If you have good content, you'd be an idiot to not give it a 100% with good visuals, audio, acting, etc. It will make good content, GREAT content. What cinema is worthy of. Remember what movie making is about? Content is king, but cinema is visuals. If you have good content but horrible cinematography, you might as well get the actors in a sound booth and make an audio book! We're not making audible books for lazy people, we are making stories with images. You need images. That is the soul of film making.
Good content and good visuals shouldn't even be an argument. It's sad that the importance of both isn't realized all the time. If a story in a book is told with words... a story in a film is told with visuals. Simple and done. One without the other is garbage...
ps: when i say 'good', I mean appropriate. A gritty story may need gritty visuals. An epic landscape may need pretty visuals. A thriller may need strange visuals. I'm not supporting everything be 24p, dolly-crane moves of sunsets and silhouettes. Raw handheld at 30p and unsaturated low contrast images can be just as powerful.. and that is what I mean. The wrong visuals can ruin the subtext of a scene... so shooting that love-comedy in a green-flourescent bulb office building with a handycam might speak wrongly of your 'great' content, no matter how great the writing/content is.
Bottom line: If you're gonna tell a story, you need good content, or it's a useless effort. If you're going to tell that story with CINEMA... you need to then have appropriate and supporting visuals... or cinema is a useless effort.
If you have good content, you'd be an idiot to not give it a 100% with good visuals, audio, acting, etc. It will make good content, GREAT content. What cinema is worthy of. Remember what movie making is about? Content is king, but cinema is visuals. If you have good content but horrible cinematography, you might as well get the actors in a sound booth and make an audio book! We're not making audible books for lazy people, we are making stories with images. You need images. That is the soul of film making.
Good content and good visuals shouldn't even be an argument. It's sad that the importance of both isn't realized all the time. If a story in a book is told with words... a story in a film is told with visuals. Simple and done. One without the other is garbage...
ps: when i say 'good', I mean appropriate. A gritty story may need gritty visuals. An epic landscape may need pretty visuals. A thriller may need strange visuals. I'm not supporting everything be 24p, dolly-crane moves of sunsets and silhouettes. Raw handheld at 30p and unsaturated low contrast images can be just as powerful.. and that is what I mean. The wrong visuals can ruin the subtext of a scene... so shooting that love-comedy in a green-flourescent bulb office building with a handycam might speak wrongly of your 'great' content, no matter how great the writing/content is.
Bottom line: If you're gonna tell a story, you need good content, or it's a useless effort. If you're going to tell that story with CINEMA... you need to then have appropriate and supporting visuals... or cinema is a useless effort.
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Zak Forsman
Major Contributor
Certainly, we should strive for a marriage of form and content that represents the best we can do. But this "study" is a good reminder that when you find yourself in a tough situation, forced to choose between one or the other, this could serve as a guide.
It's not much different from Walter Murch's guiding principles that put emotional continuity and performance ahead of everything else (physical continuity, technical prowess) when editing a film.
flaws and missteps in form are more forgivable than they are in content. imo.
It's not much different from Walter Murch's guiding principles that put emotional continuity and performance ahead of everything else (physical continuity, technical prowess) when editing a film.
flaws and missteps in form are more forgivable than they are in content. imo.