One Group to Rule them All

I recently returned to the U.S. after studying abroad at the Ithaca College London Center last spring. It was an amazing experience, but I'm glad to be back in Ithaca for an entire year. I'm especially excited to be taking production classes again.

It really has been a while. Usually I try to balance my schedule with half of my classes in Park, and half out of Park. However, there are no production classes offered in London so I can't help but feel a little behind. This summer I interned for the Elvis Duran and the Morning Show and it was awesome, but I wasn't doing video production there either.

Woah. What a crazy flashback.

Arturo said we could choose our own groups or work in one huge group and I immediately had a flash back to when I took Fiction Field I last fall.

~It was a dark and stormy night~

Kidding. It was probably 2:00 in the afternoon and there were no windows in the classroom so I have no idea what the weather was like. Anyway, for our final project (we only did two projects total) we divided ourselves into three groups. At first, each group was super motivated. But then came The Dark Days.

#tbt to when we pulled our hair out. <3

Okay. I know that I'm being dramatic, but the fact of the matter is, even a short film (one that is ten minutes or less) requires a ton of hard work. When people started feeling the pressure and stress that comes along with a huge project, they would argue, freak out, and soon we were all on the verge of pulling out our own hair as well as every other group member's hair.

It was extremely difficult and when we eventually screened our projects in class, I didn't feel like it was my best work. I had this feeling of "well this is the best we could do given the circumstances." I don't want to have that feeling. That feeling is the worst feeling.

Arturo said we could work in one huge group. I don't know if it's this one experience or just a feeling in my gut, but something is telling me that one group might be the best option for all of us.

Yes, actually.

Pre-production, production, and post-production groups could work together and independently, potentially eliminating the need for all of us to meet at the same time. There would also be no need to run around Park, trying to fill crew positions if everyone has a specific job. For those of you in my class, please just consider it for a day. You know, let it marinate in your brain.

Obviously, this will take one great idea that everyone can get behind and coming up with said idea might be the hardest part of all. Yet I have confidence that if we combine our skills, we can make something truly spectacular.


Perhaps, as Arturo said, something that can be submitted to festivals.

Film Crew Positions and Pre-Production

One of the great things about the film industry is that there are so many different positions. And depending on the film, there could be thousands of crew members (like Disney movies), or only a few. But for all films, there are certain positions that are necessary and always present.

If you're someone like me, who enjoys lots of things and can't really make up her mind about what she wants to do with her life, it's helpful to learn about all the positions and try them out. You gotta see what you like, ya know?

Find out what position you should be with this extremely realistic flow chart:

As there are many positions, I won't go into each one right now. However, I will tell you a little bit about what I am most interested in, which is pre-production.

I feel as though a lot of students underestimate the importance of pre-production. If you take the time and effort to properly plan everything in advance, you are more likely to have a successful shoot. While it may not be the most exciting part of film-making, it's definitely necessary.

Pre-production includes: writing the script, making a schedule, creating a shot list and storyboard, gathering a crew, securing locations, making a list of and acquiring the equipment, finding actors, permitting, production design, coordinating food and drinks for cast and crew, and (whew - I already have a headache just talking about this) so on and so forth.

If you need production documents and templates, this website has free downloadable ones!

It's a lot of things to prepare, but without it, the shoot most likely will not go well. You cannot be over prepared when it comes to pre-production.

How to complete a proper equipment checkout

We all for sure will be working with equipment this semester, whether is is checking it out from PPECS, on set, or something else, knowing that the equipment is functioning properly and will continue to function properly is a must.

The first step to ensuring that your equipment won't fail out on you is when you're checking it out. You need to check and set up EVERY piece of equipment you are checking out. This doesn't mean just setting up the camera and turning it on. It means checking every filter and making sure they're all clean and not broken, as well as setting up and fully extending every level on each C-Stand and so on for every piece of equipment.

While this seems like an extremely tedious process, especially when the technicians at PPECS tell you that all the equipment is working properly, mistakes have been made, and they will be made again, and one little mistake may be the difference between getting the shot while still leaving the location by your hard out time. I work at PPECS, and we always check the equipment to the best of our abilities to ensure it will continue working, but sometimes we miss things, or equipment fails suddenly. Another set of eyes, specifically your  own eyes, will help make sure there is no faults.

Upon checkout you can always request an order form with the list of all the equipment you checked out with the specific numbers of each item, which I highly recommend. Give a copy to this list of each department head on your production so during any company moves you can make sure no equipment is left behind.

When checking out equipment to student productions I often notice it is only 1 or 2 people there for checkouts, and most often those are people in positions that won't be working closely with the equipment (director, producer). I strongly encourage productions to bring as many people as they can to PPECS upon time of checkout and checkin, not only to make the process go as fast as possible, but also to get more people to look at the equipment before it goes on set.

At PPECS we have counters lining all of the walls with outlets right on the counter tops. We encourage you to use this space to make checking all of your equipment easier. Checkout is a great time to become more familiar with the equipment you'll be using on set before you have to perform in a high stress environment. If you have any questions about how a piece of gear works or what its function is, I'm sure the counter workers will be more than happy to answer.

Here's a video from David Elkins, author of The Camera Assistant's Manual, on how to prep a camera package.




And always remember to have PPECS number in your phone in case anything goes wrong or you have any questions!

Here it is just in case: (607) 274-3636



*All views and opinions reflected in this blog post are my own and do not reflect the views and opinions of PPECS, it's employees, or any other members associated with PPECS or the Park School of Communications.*

Digital Viewfinder for Cinematography (DView)

       I am back again with another application that may be able to aid in you in your kit as a filmmaker. This week I am posting about an iTunes application called Digital Viewfinder after Arturo mentioned the The Wolf of Wall Street in the ASC and more specifically how the director chose from various camera's and lenses in order to achieve the final look of the scene. This app does just that by allowing you to easily visualize shot framing for a number of different cameras and lenses without having to actually bring all the equipment along to the location. By replacing the classic director's viewfinder this invaluable application not only mimics a wide variety of professional film equipment but it also gives desired aspect ratios, focal length, full meta-data and GPS coordinates. Additional features include being able to organize your location photos into projects, share your photos or create a PDF report and lastly if that isn't enough it also allows for the selection of 45 professional digital and film motion picture cameras including names like Panavision, RED, Sony and Phantom. Lastly the app allows for you to share your shots by sending them via iMessage, AirDrop, Email, Facebook and Twitter. Digital Viewfinder for Cinematography is $29.99 on the iTunes app store and is available for both the iPad and iPhone. This could be a handy tool for upcoming projects especially if you are involved with preproduction planning!

Here a few screen shots showing some of the features I have outlined above...

Adobe Kuler & pCAM Film + Digital Calculator Cinematic Applications

       This week for my post I have found a neat free application called Adobe Kuler which allows the individual to use their iPhone to capture color combinations and ultimately allow you to create a color series from the data. As I am currently working as the art director for my small production team on our short student film this nifty application can make choosing locations and set design color palates more organized and precise.

Here is some screen shots of what the application looks like and some of it capabilities...
                                 
                             

     The second application I'd like to mention in this post is an iTunes application called pCAM Film + Digital Calculator. This application is $29.99 and was developed by a Camera Assistant who understand the time sensitive calculations done on the set. This would be a great application during production to get the exact shots you have planned prior to the shoot, additionally the app has features such as gauging depth of field, relative size, field of view, focal length match and many more.

Here is some of the iPhone screen shots of this app...

Efficient Film Making

Probably about 90% of making a film work out in your favor is by planning ahead of time.
Never forget to plan for everything to go wrong most of the time it will.
Some things are unavoidable and unthinkable but unfortunately they do happen. It's always good to be willing to try and work with people rather than against them.
I think what helps me do well in any department is to have a little confidence in myself and my ability to figure things out, not being afraid to jump right in to something, over planning, giving myself enough time to do something that needs doing, and doing that part of film making as much as you can. I try to volunteer in the things I'm good at first and if someone asks for help on something that I know I have time for and can handle I try really hard to just do it. Helping hands that don't know all the ropes are better than no hands at all. When I was directing I always tried to just get people who are available first. In order to get anyone to do anything for you you have to plan out when you're doing things. Before that even It's a great idea to find locations first. Like an artist you have to think of the background before you can even begin thinking about the foreground. Think about what makes the scene possible first and then think about what makes it pretty. First, get your location and when it will be available and plan your schedule accordingly. Then think about the idea, what do we want the idea to look like shot-for shot. Again you want to over plan for this. Plan out every shot in detail! By the end of this pre-production process keep the ideas in mind but don't marry them. You can then decide what kind of equipment you'll need to make it look like it does in your head. Then you can think about the people available to you that can run all of that equipment, gather them and schedule them promptly. Then schedule back up people for them just in case your first person falls through. Remind those people that they are on-call. Then you should think about the talent. These people at some point will have a level of irreplaceable status. In order to progress and not work backwards you want to stress to these people how valuable they are to this production. Then you can start thinking about the Art-department aspect of it because then your art person(s) will have sizes of the actors to work with. It's ideal to assign a car+assistant/driver to the art department. Think of all the ways you can help them out by donating the clothes, props, make up, and set dressing you can offer to them. Don't be afraid of any stains (unless they're bleach stains) they can all be removed. Then think about all of the luxury items you will want of set; food, coffee, water, snacks, extra scripts, a screw driver, TAPE (ALL THE TAPE), etc.
Then shoot it and expect all of these things to not work out.
Then eventually you can sit down with someone fresh and have them edit all the crazy work you just did. Sometimes it helps to have someone who hasn't so intently worked on this project as much as you have editing the final film. You obviously shouldn't just leave it all up to them, you should watch and compromise and listen to their ideas too. Make some sacrifices  your audience will thank you because sometimes as much as you think it's the greatest idea in the world, others might see it differently and that's ok. 

Do we have time for this in a matter of 3 weeks. Absolutely not! There are sacrifices you will have to make. I'm not just talking about the pre-production and production stuff that you just planned out for either! Expect to lose money, expect to not eat, expect to have anxiety attacks, expect to have insomnia etc. Personal tolls. But also understand that this is all only temporary. A good film that you can submit to film festivals, that you can show to potential employers and be able to explain how you got to make this film, it makes it all worth the temporary hell you'll have to go through. Your film can last a long long time. Think about the films that literally almost everyone in the world has seen. Those films probably had all of the stress that you have! But they not only made a lot of money off of it, but they got to say hey, I made this and it's really going places! There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

Trust me if you plan like this, and even if everything that you couldn't have even fathomed went wrong, you'll probably most deff. have something worth bragging about. It will make you a better film maker. Your best work will only be your best film because you failed and learned in all the other films before it. Your first film may or may not be your worst. If you put in 100% of your effort, then that is literally all you can do, be proud of that and forgive yourself for being human. Just remember that you can always hug someone when you need to. Unless you're surrounded by cacti. In that case run!



Haven't watched very many films lately, I've watched some documentaries but nothing crazy good.

Grumpy cat

"The Sloth Made Some Smart Investments"

It may be a homework assignment, or it may just be the most tantalizing six word story you've ever heard. Regardless, "The Sloth Made Some Smart Investments" conjures a heart-wrenching tale of an unlikely hero. Who is this Sloth? How is he capable of making investments? And what financial secrets does he know that I could use to increase my own personal wealth?

I honestly don't know, but I'm sure these questions and more are sure to follow as Mr. Sloth takes on the stock market, checking his E-Trade while eating lunch, and being smart with his daily spending as he saves for the future.

-nickp