I'm pleased to announce that I have been offered a video production internship with SoulPancake for my last semester in LA. Which is a professional way of saying, I'M SO FREAKIN EXCITED TO WORK WITH SOULPANCAKE.
Honestly, since I knew I was going to be spending a semester in LA my number one choice has been SoulPancake. When I think about what I want to be doing after I graduate, working for their company is on the top of my list. Since it's such a small group of people, the interns are actually a key part of their team. They explained that while helping with all of their projects, they also have the interns collaborate on their own project as well. I don't know about you but that sounds a lot better to me than writing script coverage and fetching coffee all semester.
Some people may find it cheesy, but we all have that one tv show we watch that makes us smile no matter what else is going on in life. That show for me will always be The Office. That's how I actually discovered SoulPancake. And that's what I want to do for others; create something that inspires and creates happiness.
In the summer I found myself reaching for their book "Chew on Life's Big Questions" constantly. It's all about exploring the human experience and what it even means to be human. I'd highly suggest it.
Their slogan is "We make stuff that matters." All their content is positive and just makes you feel good. I feel like it sparks creativity and inspires others. That's what I want to do with my degree. Not make commercials or other mindless consumer content.
I'm going to work extremely hard next semester to show them I could be a great member of their team. *wink wink* To hire me after my internship. Everything they stand for is what I want to create.
Even though things this semester did not go exactly as planned, I'm just going to look forward to this next exciting chapter.
This past spring I spent a semester in Los Angeles. I interned
at a production company called SoulPancake which is what made my experience in
LA so amazing. I worked with five other interns and created two of our own videos while also assisting on other videos and shows with the rest of the SoulPancake team.
I definitely learned the most from creating videos with the
other interns because we weren’t just assistants. We were in charge of the
project start to finish. We had to produce, direct, edit, etc.
The video below is our first video. I co-produced and edited it. It was a four-camera shoot and we were very frazzled because it was our first one. We didn’t use a clapboard which made my job during post-production a little more difficult. We had three days to edit it until it was released on Valentine’s Day. One of those days was used to sync all of the footage without the magical software known as PluralEyes. The head of production and channel manager didn’t think we could get it done but we did! It may only be 3.5 minutes but it wasn’t scripted and there was A LOT of footage. We talked to real people strolling around the park and had to create a coherent story with the answers that they gave. It was a great learning experience! After making this video I became more interested in documentaries and the non-fiction side of production.
The Garden of Gratitude is the second video we created. I edited this video as well. We asked random people to come inside our courtyard and dedicate a plant to something or someone who had helped them grow. It was very challenging to convince random people to come into a place they weren't familiar with and answer questions. However, as a result I learned a lot about how to approach and talk to strangers.
SoulPancake has some amazing videos on their channel so I urge everyone to check them out here!
Video production crews are either successful, or they're not. They'll either produce a beautiful piece of collaborative work, or they won't. Surprisingly, the success of any given crew has little to do with how talented the individual members are. Instead, how the structure of the crew often proves to be the ultimate deciding factor when it comes to efficiency.
We as Americans have certain values instilled in us from an early age. Values like equality, individualism, and pride (just to name a few). Unfortunately, these values happen to be the key ingredients in creating a sloppy, unmotivated team. For example, according to J. Richard Hackman in his book, Theory and Research on Small Groups, democracyonly leads to role confusion and unnecessary stress.
Moreover, crews that possess a singular, unapologetic manager usually triumph. Here's the difference: Crews that value equality lack an executive figure with the final, determining say. Instead of choosing a direction and running with it, they are forced to waste time debating with one another until a consensus is reached. Furthermore, unsatisfiable debate leads to more internal conflicts within the group.
"When direction is absent or unclear, members may wallow in uncertainty about what they should be doing and may even have difficulty generating the motivation to do much of anything" Hackman (251).
In video production crews, it is the director's job to act as the authoritative figure. A good director tells each crew member exactly what he expects of him/her. This direction not only eliminates the time wasted on designating jobs, but also helps prevent blame from being tossed about unprofessionally. If the audio fails to record, the audio guy is fired. Furthermore, with clear direction, members of the team can focus on completing their job the best they can, without having to worry about whether or not they need to be helping with the something else.
Another part of how a crew is structured has to do with the composition of personalities. According to Dr. Meredith Belbin, the perfect small group should be composed of nine key roles.
Here's a video that not only explains all 9 of Belbin's team roles, but also happens to be the greatest thing I've seen in a while:
Although I doubt Belbin specifically had video production crews in mind, I found it surprisingly easy to assign certain roles to production positions.
For instance:
The producer should be an Implementer:
It's the producer's job to make sure that the project stays within budget throughout production and post-production. A good producer not only makes good films, but makes money for the investors. They must be practical, reliable, efficient, and organized.
The director should be a Coordinator:
To succeed as a director requires a persistence of vision and the ability to collaborate with an extensive team to bring that vision to life. They must be confident and respected as well as able to delegate tasks clearly and efficiently.
A great editor would be a Completer Finisher:
Editors spend their days (and some late nights) in front of a console of computer monitors, shaving seconds off of shots and painstakingly editing audio. Editors that aren't perfectionists don't win awards.
The Art Director is most certainly a Plant:
Art directors have to be both effective managers and creative artists, bringing a fictional world to life within the constraints of the film's budget.
The Director of Photography (DP) is most likely a Monitor Evaluator:
The DP is responsible for choosing the camera, lenses, booms and other equipment necessary to get the shot. They must possess a mastery of technology and technique of camerawork. On top of that, the DP must have the ability to see all of the potential shots and discern which of the possibilities would best translate the director's vision.
Of course these roles aren't set in stone. No one crew position requires a certain team role. The main point I extract from Belbin's theory is that diversity is one more contributor to the structure of an efficient group. Through extensive research on the subject I can now lay out to you the three main attributes of a successful group.
A Common Goal + A Strong Leader + Diverse Players = A Winning Team
Sierra, X-Pro II, Lo-Fi, Earlybird, Inkwell, Kelvin. Many of you recognize these color/luminance filters by name thanks to the well-known photo-sharing app; Instagram. Quite recently, I stumbled upon the realization that the photos posted on sites like Twitter, Tumblr, and even Facebook are, more often than not, corrected for color and/or luminance. When did it become natural for us to accept pictures like this:
Or this:
When in reality the scene probably looked more like this:
With the rise in color filters for photography, the increase in more dramatic video coloring was bound to follow. I mean, isn't video just a culmination of stills anyway? Despite this, editing color and luminance in post for video can prove slightly more difficult than editing for individual photos. For instance, most cameras' default settings are set to record only the bare minimum of information needed. (This is to reduce the size of the file; increasing the space on your SD card.) However, by failing to record the camera's full dynamic range, the amount of color, luminance, and contrast manipulation available to the editor is greatly depleted. This is where log gamma comes in.
Found on most modern-day digital cameras, log gamma offers the DP the option to shoot a scene as flat (color and luminance wise) as possible. Receiving footage shot in log gamma is pretty much an editor's dream come true; especially when consistent color throughout is essential to the piece.
Here you can see the increased amount of information recorded when shooting in "Canon Log" (flat) as opposed to shooting in the camera's "Normal 1" default settings.
The red gamma log line takes substantially longer to reach the top of the graph illustrating the increased amount of information recorded.
Unfortunately, there's a catch. While the final, edited footage shot in log gamma often looks incredible, the images you see on the camera beforehand don't. At all. Think shooting with a JVC-100 before you know anything about lighting and/or white balancing.
Here's a before and after shot of flat footage:
I don't know about you, but I don't think I could ever feel comfortable handing an editor video that looked anything like the picture on the left. Even if I knew that the ends would justify the means. To me, shooting in log gamma is like saying, "I'll fix it in post", before you even run into production problems. (Side-note: There are no production problems that cannot be fixed. Probably. So I've been told.) In conclusion, shooting in log gamma can greatly enhance the quality of your film. It is up to the DP to decide whether she can wait for the editor to reveal the beauty of her shots.
