What do you find the hardest when staging your scenes?

That's great emergency planning for you. It is Television after all with it's time restraints. Covering basic action, shows stylistic elements (glamour springs to mind vs the streets) and always covering your ass in edit (easier cutting with movement) and a solid script that doesn’t require deviation. A good cameraman will enhance/ understand most aspects of thematic composition, even if only subconsciously.
1:3 ratio sounds about right, unless it's a heavy action sequence.
I bet it was great experience working with a tight crew. Very early on I started working with a really conscientious/ creative DP and I love that work ethic.
First and last on set.
J.P.
 
As far as blocking and pre-vis, I still think the best exercise is still photography. You can't get the dimention and nuance from a computer program. If you want to learn how to assemble shots get a few people together and have them drink coffee around a table. Grab your Digital Still camera and start taking pictures. Angles and compositions will start apperaing in front of you. Shoot them. Then begin to move your subjects and direct them into other configurations. You will begin to see what works and what dosen't. As well as what you like and what you don't. Also you don't wave to have a crew to do this or a script. Just some friends and a camera. Play with depth of field, play with arragments of one, two or all three people. Try to get inserts of cups, fingers, cigarettes, eyes. Your imagination will start to take over and eventually you will have a clear vision of how you would shoot it in motion. When you look at all these images start to make mental notes as to wich go together. Try to edit in your head and create a photo story board. After that exercise start carrying your sill camera everywhere. When you see a composition you like snap it. Try to figure out what about it works and what doesn't. Then see if you can translate it into a moving shot. You can read for years about Two Ts, Cowboys, MCUs, pushzooms and the like but nothing compares to the act of seeing and capturing images from your own eye. Your vision is what makes you the director.
Develop that and your much closer to your goal.
 
they are difficult

they are difficult

maybe that's why there's more of an emphasis on cu and ms's now adays, it is difficult to get ws to look good. just watching the (especially first 15 minutes of)
the good, the bad and the ugly the other day, and noticed in most of the
wide shot's leone(?) had the characters disappear, a leg here or there obscured for a
few moments by a bush, 4 charaters walking towards each other in a large expanse,
hidden behind some wagons and then reappearing again, 2 men seen passing at the end of an alley. break it up, that was good to realize, cause somehow i'm
always wanting to make sure the audience can see everything? why? i think i was overly concerned for them, 'oh no, they might miss something'. let them wonder, plus it hides the sometimes bareness of a ws while making it more dynamic.
 
Recently, I finnished a short Western with 30+ actors. During the shoot, I used the same approuch as Rsbush; payed attention to the shape of action, lines, perspective and things came out great! The trick is to let everyone involved to contribuit, yet not run things.
 
Staging shots is pretty difficult and the best way to get around this barrier is to rehearse. Rehearsing a scene will give you a sense of how it plays out and when the natural areas for actions and pauses are in the conversation and you can almost block it like a play. Then if one is doing a master, just move the camera so one can see all the actors and action and shoot away. Of course you're probably going to want to go into coverage too, so as a director when the actors are rehearsing the scene, it's probably a good idea to walk around the scene and get a feel for which angles will tell the story the best. Of course you have to juggle the performance aspect as well, and the sound, and the... well you get the point. Directing's tough, guys!
 
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