AID1#17

I subscribe to and am quick to watch new videos posted on

The YouTube channel ” Creative North“. The channel is the work

of Swedish filmmaker Jonny Von Wallstrom. Jonny is a very

successful YouTuber but not a megastar with 28,000 subscribers 

gained over more than 2 years of regular posting. He Also has a 

Facebook an Instagram and a Twitter account,

Because he is a filmmaker it makes sense that YouTube is his 

Main platform allowing him to showcase his work as a professional 

Filmmaker. He is an award winning and I think talented filmmaker.

In the intro to his YouTube videos he states that ” For 10 years

I’ve been struggling to make films,I’ve tried to make stuff I believe 

in but I’m always let down.Instead I’ve decided to document my life 

And the struggle to create”. His downbeat delivery of these lines

accompanied by filmic footage gives the impression of a low-key,

Thoughtful intelligent filmmaker with a touch of melancholy (in a 

gloomy Scandinavian way) but cool with it,

His content 

The channel has several themes running through it which are sorted into 

“Created playlists”. Many of these films have a political edge and are

Liberal / progressive in nature. Films about individuals usually artists with

The background of the Arab Spring playing out. Telling us about their 

Struggle to assert freedom of artistic expression in the face of the real

danger of arrest and torture.

“The right to freedom of artistic expression”

This fits nicely with the thread that runs through the whole channel, that

Of the struggle to create.

 Another playlist consists of 8 films “Born in 1980 something”. Presumably

the decade he was born into. Again they are the stories of individual artists 

 – musicians, graphic artists, dancers, photographers telling the story of

their creative life.

These videos typically have around 8,000 views, not a lot by YouTube 

Standards. However these well shot well, made short films get a lot of likes and

unbroken positive comments.

By along way at 285,000 views his most popular video is “How to become 

A master of colour grading “

This is tutorial on how he colour grades on Devinci Resolve his footage shot

on his BMPCC to give that washed out look beloved by Art College Lecturers.

So he only got big numbers of views when he moved away from his actual 

films to make a tutorial of the sort that already exist in great numbers on

YouTube. But presumably it brought him a good number of new subscribers.

Also he gained a lot of negative feedback through the comments when he

went outside of his usual fan base.

OTHER SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS HE USES

Facebook 

Instagram 

He uses neither of these platforms in a prolific way and they are not particularly 

Well followed. They seem to be there to support his main social media venture 

i.e. YouTube. He posts video,stills and comment on both to promote his next 

video to be posted on YouTube.

Jonny Von Wallstrom outlines his strategy for using YouTube to promote his

Work in the video “How to get discovered as a filmmaker”

In this video he charts and describes how he uses personal projects to boost

his commercial career. Off the back of the channel he claims to get commercial 

work in documentary and advertising. So he counts it as having two careers 

firstly having the freedom to develop his own personal style which has the 

additional advantage of managing client expectation. They know what his 

work looks like so they know what are getting so are more likely to leave him

alone to create.

Although the YouTube channel has not been a great money spinner for him in 

terms of view driven advertising he claims by showcasing his work this way

he has no need to do any other marketing to drive a successful commercial 

Practice.His best example of this is ………

“I sold my film to Netflix”

The film is:

“The Pearl of Africa”

This is a feature length documentary that he completed 4 years ago about 

a transgender man reconfiguring as a woman in Uganda a country that has

draconian laws forbidding homosexuality. Jonny has promoted his film around 

the world for the last 4 years at film festivals. He feels that his YouTube 

presence made a huge contribution to his eventual sale to Netflix.

MY OWN USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA 

I’m 54 and my feelings about social media are deeply ambivalent. It is only in the

last year that I have had any real involvement with it. I struggle with the whole

Concept of sharing my life with strangers or people I part know. It seems mainly 

to be shallow, time wasting nonsense and I swipe away the great majority of

notifications without looking at them.

I do engage with people who I’m close to within a family Facebook group and 

that’s simply because I care about them and what they are doing.

There’s another caveat to this. I’m a student filmmaker now and if your making

films then you’ve got to want people to see them and the way films are 

distributed, marketed and consumed now is online. My first attempt at this

turned out to be very powerful. The 90 second short I made prior to starting 

College was a very personal film about the memory of my brother John who

died suddenly when he was 29. I put it on my Facebook page and it got over

100 views which is more than the number of friends I have on Facebook .

Also it got a lot of nice comments from people who didn’t know John and 

People who did, shared memories of him. I was deeply touched by this and

It’s very possible that despite its technical shortcomings I won’t 

make another film with the same emotional impact.

My Facebook

Beyond getting my films seen I also recognize that I need to connect with

other filmmakers. So in that spirit I’ve just requested the “friendship” of

other filmmakers on my course 👍😀wtf lol

USING SOCIAL MEDIA TO RAISE YOUR PROFILE AS A FILMMAKER 

This is basically marketing.This cheesy video sets out what it calls

“10 laws of social media marketing”

It might be interesting to see if Jonny Von Wallstrom complies with these

10 laws.

1.The law of listening.

Rather than just posting messages,statements and videos listen to what

the customer says.

How does Jonny do?

Jonny certainly answers a few comments and is gracious and cool with 

criticism.But generally his whole philosophy is be true to yourself do

What you want to do and get the customer to listen to you.

2.Be focused.

It’s better to specialise than be a jack of all trades.

How does Jonny do?

Jonny is very focused.His message has that constant refrain of its

all a bit of a struggle.He sticks to his style of filmmaking ensuring its

you soon come to recognise his style.

3.The law of quality.

It’s better to have 1000 online connections who read,talk about and

Share your content than 10,000 connections who disappear after

connecting with you for the first time.

How does Jonny do?

Jonny has a loyal fan base myself included who watch his content with

a regular steady number of views.After a break out video like his colour

correction tutorial which enjoyed over 250,000 views his views settled

down to nearer their usual levels less than 10,000

4.The law of patience.

Social media and content success doesn’t come overnight,it’s far more

likely that you will need to commit to the long haul.

How does Jonny do?

Jonny has not gone viral. 67 videos and 2 years later and his views are

typically less than 10,000 but patience has paid off he has sold his film

to Netflix.

5.The law of compounding.

If you publish quality content and work to build your online audience of

quality followers they’ll share it with their own audience on Facebook,

Twitter and so on.

How does Jonny do?

I’m sharing Jonny’s stuff on this blog.

6.The law of influence.

Spend time finding the online influencers in your market who have

quality audience and are likely to be interested in your product.

How does Jonny do?

I see this in reverse on Jonny’s channel. A filmmaker called Levi Allen 

who I also follow crops up in Jonny’s comments obviously trying to

tap into Jonny’s ” influence”

7.The law of value.

If you spend all your time just directly promoting your products,people 

will stop listening.You must add value to the conversation.

How does Jonny do?

I watch Jonny’s because I enjoy and learn from his films.

8.The law of acknowledgment.

Build relationships by accepting attempts to contact you.

How does Jonny do?

I’ve never reached out to Jonny so I’m not to sure on that.

9.The law of accessibility.

Don’t publish your content then disappear.

How does Jonny do?

Jonny publishes fairly regularly every 10 – 14 days it’s good

quality content so that’s reasonable. Its also one of the important 

Reasons for getting subscribers, then if you have a break from

publishing then when you return your subscribers will be made 

Aware of your return.

10.The law of reciprocity.

You can’t expect others to share your content if you don’t spend

time promoting theirs.

How does Jonny do?

I’ve no evidence of how good Jonny is on this but he is actually 

very true to most of the above laws. Could do with investing more

time in some of them, but there again he needs to leave time to 

Make films.

SFC3#17 – ‘Remembrance Day’

CHANGE OF TITLE – My film “Not every day” has been re-titled “Remembrance Day”

This is to reflect the fact that for an ex-soldier With PTSD Remembrance Day could be every day and not just once a year.It also reflects the element of ceremony in the film,so much a part of the official Remembrance Day on the 11th of November.

PTSD AND ORIGINALITY IN FILMMAKING

We are so influenced by our surroundings,experience – real life and Media that I believe it is probably impossible to create something that is truly original.All the stories have already been told.”Books are made of books” – Cormack McCarthy,

so it would follow that films are made of films,

Even Picasso had the humility to realise that he was not creating out of nothing.

“Good artists copy,great artists steal” – Pablo Picasso.

Another spin on this might be  – great artists steal from a wide number of places so that nobody notices.

So if if we can’t do stories that are “original” perhaps what we should aim for is “interesting”. Martin Scorsese commented on the importance of making whatever 

It is you want to make “interesting” He emphasised how a topic is never a guarantee 

People will be enticed but the way we tell it might just be.He cites the example of

Filming someone while he or she eats an apple.He says “do it but make it interesting”.

Many great films have been made by great directors that explore PTSD.These films

have found interesting ways and different slants to tell a familiar story.

THE DEER HUNTER

The Deer Hunter (1979) directed by Michael Camino and starring Robert De Niro,Christopher Walker and Meryl Streep tells the story of three young Americans from a small steel town before,during and after their service in the Vietnam war.

The film gives a harrowing depiction of the psychological effects of war and its impact on them and in turn their friends and family.

During the war sequences there is graphic violence.Women and children are 

deliberately killed by soldiers,prisoners are tortured and most famously forced to play Russian Roulette for the amusement of their captors gambling on the outcome.

After the war some of the men descend into a world of violence,alcoholism and drug addiction.Destructive lifestyles for them and those around them,

In my film “Remembrance Day”the protagonist Rob tries to deal with his PTSD in a more controlled way.His drinking is ceremonial in nature and is designed to trigger and honour traumatic memories in a cathartic way,that is away from other people and does not impinge on them.

AMERICAN SNIPER 

American Sniper(2014) was directed by Clint Eastwood.It is a biographical war film loosely based on the story of Chris Kyle who completed four tours of duty in Iraq and scored a record number of kills as a sniper.The film follows a familiar and unoriginal formula.It follows him through his war experience and then we watch the effects of that play out when he gets home.He has a new born baby we see him distracted and removed from his home life.

In real life another ex-Marine shot dead Chris Kyle in 2014 ,that ex- Marine had been diagnosed with PTSD.

I’VE GOT THE CHANCE TO USE A DRONE – SHOULD I USE IT ?

A work colleague has a husband who has a drone and he’s happy to collaborate with

me in my filmmaking.My initial reaction was that’s fantastic! that’s cool! I’ve got access to a drone and all the possibilities that opens up.

Sexy drone Footage

So sexy drone footage is it going to serve my story?

Behind the mind-boggling shots captured by BBC drones

This article from 2014 talks about the BBC establishing it’s own in house drone 

Journalism team.The footage shows a news presenter talking about the future of

The HS2 rail project.As he stands in the Old Oak Common train depot and starts 

To describe how the project will transform the area a drone lifts off to reveal the area

He is talking about.Adding visual interest and illustrating his story.

News organisations now routinely use drone footage to illustrate and cover news

Stories.Riots in Russia,Poland,Argentina and other places have been captured by

Drone and posted online,

As far as cinematography goes dronesshould be thought of as flying cameras.Just 

Another film-making tool like a jib or a dolly,a way of moving a camera.Like those other tools they allow us to archive transitions and observe different camera angles.With this in mind I intend to use the drone for an establishing shot and then an air to ground transition.Time will tell if the drone adds anything to the story or if I used it 

Just because I could.

APOCALYPSE NOW – OPENING SCENE 

I love the opening from Apocalypse Now.The scene depicts the mental trauma of a soldier experiencing flashbacks after drinking, exactly the same scenario as my short film.So there was clearly inspiration to be taken from Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece.

• The use of close ups of the actor’s face to give intensity and emphasize that it is their inner thoughts that we are interested in.
• The use of different elements in the sound design to convey the disturbed mental state of the soldiers.
• Walter Murch the editor and sound designer on Apocalypse Now broke down the sound of a helicopter and used it over the footage of the ceiling fan.In doing this he blended the present with the past/future.
• The use of changing and vivid colours to illustrate the mental turmoil going on.
• The confines of a small room to contain and isolate the protagonist and lend a sense of claustrophobia.
• The basic composition of the shot.One half of the screen to accommodate the actors face and the other half as room for the flashback footage.
• The bands of light from the blinds on Martin Sheens face finding an echo in the bands of light that come through the log walls.

• The wall of fire as the jungle erupts in the largest practical explosion ever in film history. I used YouTube footage of some boys throwing petrol bombs ( N.Ireland’s napalm) against a Barn wall.

My Film

 

SFC3#17 – “Not everyday”

Aim

To realise a 3 -5 minute short narrative film in with line course requirements. Which is of sufficient quality for it to be shown at the  2017 Aesthetica Short Film Festival. It is my intention to achieve this with a step up in my story telling skills, though improvements in the things that support story in film, such as cinematography, colour design and audio design.

Synopsis 

An ex-soldier with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) uses drink to deal with his demons. However, this is not in an out of control life destroying manner. He does it in a highly considered way. He has built a ceremony around the act of drinking himself into oblivion. He has turned it into an act of remembrance that in his eyes honours his former life and his actions.

People

 Rob (muse) is a 54 year old British ex-soldier. He suffers from PTSD stemming from his service in Northern Ireland during the troubles. He holds down a job in which he is highly competent and has a conventional family life. While he shows no outwards sign of his PTSD he has all the traits of an archetypal ex-soldier from the ways he presents himself, down to the way he walks and the way he arranges his possessions. That is Rob the character. This is Rob the “actor” in real life:

Place 

The place (physical location) where Rob takes himself to deal with his demons is an isolated cabin in a wood where he will not be disturbed. The place Rob takes himself psychologically and emotionally is detailed below in Plot.

Plot 

Ex-soldier Rob occasionally goes to a cabin in a wood and shuts himself in. He then goes through an elaborate ceremony. He carefully arranges, with military precision, his drinking paraphernalia on a table. This ceremony is a mix of Japanese tea ceremony and putting his kit ready for inspection. This puts him in a place of sober reflection. There is then a gear change as Rob quickly and efficiently knocks back the drinks he has poured. Rob rapidly descends in to a place of remembered trauma as he suffers flashbacks and altered state of mind brought on by the alcohol (The back story of his PTSD is revealed by the flashbacks). Then, when the drink takes full hold Rob collapses and sleeps it off. He wakes to the sound of an alarm he has set on his watch, gets up and leaves the cabin. That’s him sorted for another month.

Purpose 

This film explores how an individual with PTSD has found his own quirky way of living with his trauma. He has turned the drinking in to a highly ritualised ceremony that draws on his army ways. He does this to stay in control of his drinking so that it does not impinge on his everyday life. Though the use of ceremony he has almost tempered his trauma and guilt with an act of remembrance, perhaps making it bearable. Think of the role a funeral plays, it provides a structure and a practical safe place to express our grief. From a film-making point of view I feel this project gives me ample scope to stretch myself. Just about every facet of film-making can be brought to bear in telling and serving this story:

• Cinematography – camera movement and lighting.
• Sound design
• Colour design 
• Set design 
• Costume design
• Directing – drawing an emotional performance from a non-actor.

So my research will be about maximising my success with the above.

Research 

What is PTSD? Post traumatic stress disorder is -“An anxiety disorder that develops in reaction to physical injury or severe mental or emotional distress “.

“When the distress was at its worst, I had three or four flashbacks a day. I would sweat and become very nervous as I remembered the events 20 years ago. All the smells were there and I even felt the heat of the fire moving across my face. People who saw me say that I sometimes walked about and mouthed words. But I was completely detached from my surroundings”

This is the testimony of a firefighter from the NHS choices website.

 

The ceremony

Rob’s unpacking and laying out of his drinking paraphernalia is essentially him putting his kit out for inspection (it is immaculate). But it also has elements of a Japanese tea ceremony.

The tea ceremony developed as a transformative practice and evolved its own aesthetic. Important elements which may find their way into the film include the Chatkin which is a small white linen cloth used to wipe the tea bowls. As well as a box  called a Chabak in which to pack everything. Rob’s ceremony will only have hints of the 30 minute ceremony.

EP1

This is an external module that involves making a short film for a local charity. To start the research process a critique of 2 charity films.

This film made for Trinity College Student union is actually a political call to action. In May 2015 Ireland held a referendum  on marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples. It was generally assumed that the young were in favour but it was not clear how older, more conservative, people would vote. So the message is to young people if you want this to happen you have to talk to the older generation and try to influence their vote. I don’t know if this influenced the vote, which went 62% in favour, but it does seem a very positive  campaign message, promoting debate and understanding.

This is a lovely “sting in the tail” short, with a lot of impact evoking empathy by putting a face to the suffering.

SFC2 Collaboration – Sweded Film

A collaboration with Performing Art students

I was in the ET group. We produced a film in a timely fashion, and generally the collaboration worked well. Working with the first year PA students who had little to no experience of acting (perhaps an advantage in a sweded film) brings up the question of how to work with non-actors. I explored this issue in SFC1 – Story as I used non-actors in that film. But here I would like to look at this in more depth, as non-actors are likely to be a reoccurring theme over the next 3 years.

Outstanding performances by non-professional actors 

Loves of a blonde is a 1965 Czechoslovakian feature film (nominated for Golden Globes best foreign film) directed by Milos Forman. The cast was chosen largely from friends and family of the crew. The lead (seen in the above clip) Hanna Brejchova was the 18 year old ex-sister in law of Forman. Of whom he said “she had an amazing ability for free expression, but with the risk that she didn’t recognise the extent”. Milda’s mother was played by a factory lathe operator who one of the writers, Pepousek, discovered after he had met her on a streetcar, “She seemed so interested in the things around her, no matter how silly” he said.

Bicycle Thieves is one of my favourite films (as I’ve mentioned before). The director Vittorio De Sica drew great performances out of Lambert Maggiorani as Antonio Ricci (Maggiorani was a factory worker), and Enzo Staiola as his son Bruno (Staiola was seen helping his father sell flowers on the street near to the film set). It was an industry jokethat De Sica, himself an actor and matinee idol, could get a performance out of a stone. Their performances are so authentic that Pierre Leprohon, writing for Cinema D’Aujound, said “one only has to look at his face, his uncertain gait, his hesitant or fearful attitudes to understand that Ricci is already a victim a diminished man who has lost his confidence”. Whether or not he is a diminished man, he brings a grave dignity to the role.

In the film The Killing Fields the role of the interpreter Dith Pai is played by a Cambodian gynaecologist Haing S.Ngor. He basically relives his real life experience as a survivor of the Khmer Rouge genocide in Cambodia. He had lived through brutal  imprisonment, torture, and the execution of members of his family. He won the Oscar for best supporting actor or his role. He took on the role in order to fulfill a promise to his wife to tell the world the story of the genocide.

How do you cast and direct non-professional actors

I couldn’t find a definitive guide on casting and directing non-actors so I have compiled this guide from various film-making articles, blogs, and video.

• Casting is all important, the consensus seems to be the performance you get is, 70% casting, 20% performance, and 10% on-set.
• Cast for the look and the personality type you want.
• Cast for the skills/profession the character has. If the character is a teacher then it’s a good chance a real teacher would have a head start.
• Don’t be precious about your script if they struggle with the lines, allow for their own words as well as some improvisation.
• Be prepared to physically show them what you want done.
• Manipulate the environment. Set up situations e.g if they are talking on the phone have someone on the other end talking to them. If you want them exhausted ask them to run up the stairs a few times. If you want them to lift a heavy box make it heavy.
• Accept that they are likely to have a limited range. If the story needs someone to cry work around that – shoot from behind, go to a wide shot, just have the sound.
• Try to get what you want off the first take. They are unlikely to see a great need for re-takes and can become discouraged and fed up.
• Be patient.

   

The late Abbas Kiarostami, Iranian filmmaker who made the Palm d’Or winning Taste a Cherry, explains one of the guiding principles when casting your non-actors.

SFC2 Collaboration – Digitopia

This was a collaboration between film-makers and performance art students to produce 6 x 30 second shorts which would be screened as a backdrop for the PA students to dance in front of at the Digitopia event at the Courtyard theatre. Under my own initiative I paid a visit to the Courtyard and met with the projectionist, where we had a look at the space where the performance would take place. I measured the space, the dimensions of the screen and height from the floor of the screen and fed this back to the group via Basecamp. I was able to arrange a group visit and meet with the head projectionist. He was able to answer technical questions and the filmmakers were able to get a sense of the space. This approach of meeting as a group at the location early in a project was exactly the advice I heard from the producer of the TV program Poldark at his session I attended at the Aesthetica Short Film Festival in York.

Unfortunately because of work commitments and sickness, the PA student and myself were not able to meet outside of the classroom so collaboration on this project was minimal. This included the film being shot without the dancer. This blog post will try to re-imagine how the collaboration may have been in another world, where real life does not get in the way.

Expression through contemporary dance

Contemporary dance is a genre of dance that incoprparates elements of classic ballet and modern dance. The dancer expresses themselves through dramatic movement. The video, Painted, below is a beautiful piece of expressive dancing by Dorotea Saykaly.

This short film piece is the first of a trilogy of Screendance films (awarded best dance film at the 2012 Fastnet Short Film Festival) about a tug of war with wilderness. It explores the buildings decay as nature starts to take the building back. The dancing and the music gradually wind down to reflect the buildings winding down. The dancer interacts with the building (at one point dragging her hand through the peeling paint to bring it from the wall. It is interesting to read some of the comments below this YouTube video to gauge the audience reaction (not always the best thing to do on YouTube). “..beautiful dancing with beautiful display of emotion..”. This interaction of the dancer with her location both in a symbolic and a real sense is something Beth and I could have considered.

Our chosen location was an orchard. It was the end of October so the trees were laden with apples and the leaves were just starting to fall. So, how might Beth have used that space? The geometric rows of trees casting geometric rows of shadows on the ground at the beginning and end of the day. How could she move and interact with that space? How could she use an individual tree as something to interact with? How would that interaction look on film? Would a close up of her hand reaching for fruit on the tree work? Or would it look too much of a cliche? A way we could have tested these questions out would have been to have gone to the orchard and done a rough test shoot just using our phones then looked at a rough edit and picked out the shots that worked, storyboard them and re-shoot them. See this approach to film-making outlined in the following video:

This is from a brilliant channel “This guy edits” by Sven Pape which explores the craft of editing. In this video Sven explores the idea of onscreen drafting. The hypothesis is that because an editor sees and controls movement of story, movement of emotion, and movement of image and sound then a useful process is this onscreen drafting. Martin Scorsese said “The editor writes the final draft” so why not bring in the editor sooner to the process. The contention is that when you see a movement on screen we respond to it (it’s what we mean when we say something looks right) in a way we can’t on paper. I think looking at such footage together for me and Beth could have been a real point of collaboration. The dancer and the filmmaker meeting on equal terms with their roles carrying equal weight. So we would have got away from the “You do the filming and I’ll do the dancing or visa versa”. I think onscreen drafting would be a useful process to bring to my film-making practice.

Just as a further reflection on the above it’s my experience that with interviewing (I’ve done many audio life story recordings with patients) is that you often hear the best bits that are difficult to redo before the record button is pressed. So always be recording for “real” in an interview situation.

How to film and edit dance

How to film and edit dance

In brief:

1. Lens choice – A long lens will allow you to get expressive close ups but will compress the image so you lose effect of dancer reaching towards the camera. A wide lens will exaggerate this movement. So a normal lens is the usual choice with close ups kept to a minimum so as not to disorientate the viewer.
2. Camera movement – The emphasis must remain on the dance, so while dance TV programs such as Strictly come Dancing make use of cranes and Steadicams to enhance the effect, remember only to use it if it serves to show off the dance in a better manner. So perhaps I should go easy with my new glidecam (see technical development section).

 

Editing

You are as always telling a story. The story here is “The essence of Beth” which she expresses though the choreography and the strength of her performance. Visual continuity is obviously important in dance film, otherwise the movement disorientates the viewer. The story is told by the movement of the dancer so it is movement that must be shown off to best effect. Fast cutting can be used to mask poor dance technique and make boring movement more exciting but risks disorientating the viewer. Long uninterrupted shots can create an hypnotic effect. So that is an exploration of the imagined collaboration. Back in the real world how can a creative collaboration be given the best chance of working?

How to make collaboration work

This blog outlines six ways to promote collaboration:

1.Engage in, and value, conversation.

2.Find ways to draw out creativity in yourself and others (such as onscreen drafting).

3.Actively seek self-knowledge and learning (write a blog).

4.Invite contribution and accept what is offered without judgement.

5.Make others look good.

6.Manage disagreement well.

In other words be nice to each other.

SFC2 – Technical Development

This has by necessity been and will continue to be a steep learning curve. My first films, memory and relationship, were shot using the iPad I am writing this blog on. Since then I have made the transition to using “proper”cameras. Getting to grips with camera stabilisation, movement, exposure, focusing, lighting, and audio.

Then moving towards the post production side there is media management and digital editing to master. I recognise the latter IT aspects as presenting the greatest challenge to the limits of my film-making. I am 53 so have not grown up in the digital age and come from a nursing background working in a hospice for the last 20 years, which is not a tech heavy environment, and thus my IT skills are somewhat limited. Obviously, this is a challenge I must rise to.

Cameras 

I’m now using either a Blackmagic pocket camera or my own Panasonic

FZ1000. To make the transition to using more advanced cameras, in terms of learning, I have relied heavily on certain excellent YouTube channels made by filmmakers. We are lucky as filmmakers because this free resource not only allows us take the technical and craft aspects from the films content but at the same time see how that particular filmmaker constructs their films.

A curated list of film-making channels I obsessively watch are listed below:

Camera know how:

Wolfcrow

DSLR Video

Griffin Hammond

DSLR Guide

General film-making:

Andyax

Leftcoast Media House

Creative North

Ash Tailor

Cinematography:

Channel Criswell

Cinematography Database Fan

Technical Editting:

Ripple Training

Editting craft:

This Guy Edits

Folding Ideas

Camera stabilisation and movement 

For the memory film shot on the iPad I stabilised the scene of the boys swimming down the river by mounting the the iPad on a tripod using a mount I had built myself, having found a mount I had bought to be too flimsy especially for use in a river.

My first use of a slider was in the detail film to move across the food. My favourite use is during the window shot in Trafficked when the two figures are tracked up the steps, through the window. Having seen this video by Andyax, a glidecam seemed like a worthwhile investment:

At £60 this seemed a good way to give me more options with camera movement, here’s my effort at following the family around the house at Christmas.

Collaboration with a drone pilot

A work colleague put me in touch with her husband who flies drones, we are currently planning a collaborative project on an ongoing basis. I am hoping that the use of a drone in one of my films will allow the use of a number of different perspectives for my shots.

Lighting

If you don’t have enough natural light to make your film look good then you need to enhance with artificial lighting. The video below does a great job of not only explaining the

‘three’ lighting system (key, fill and back) but also the relationship between ISO and

aperture and how that effects the look of your film.

My first use of artificial lighting was in the Detail film. I used LED panels to light the food,

I’ve since picked up a couple of  LED building site lights in a Screwfix promotion for £20 each. They are rechargeable by either mains or 12volt with a 5 hour battery life. They have a diffuser on the front, are dimmable, and weather proof. I used them to light the interior of the cabin in the Location film.

Audio 

It’s said that audio is 50% of your film. My bedside reading at the moment is David

Sonnenschein’s book “Sound Design the expressive power of music, voice and

Sound effects in cinema”.

He says in his introduction “Giving meaning to noise, sound becomes communication. Humans have used sound for eons to alert one another, organise activities, exchange messages, entertain, love and battle. Through sound we can trace the evolution of religion, music, language, weaponry, medicine, architecture, and psychology, not to mention cinema”

I love this video by Ash Tailor “Bable” he use a binaural microphone to produce 3D

Audio (wear earphones to watch it) which gives a rich sonic landscape. This is something to try. You can apparently get the same effect using 2 microphones plugged in to a mixer instead of buying an expensive binaural mic (I’m wondering if I could tape a lav mic to each side of my head?).

I’ve had mixed results with my audio across my SFC1 films particularly when recording

Voice. Therefore, this is an area that definitely needs more attention.

Post production

“The mysterious part of it, though, is that the joining of these pieces –  actually does seem to work, even though it represents a total and instantaneous displacement of one field of vision with another, a displacement that sometimes also entails a jump forward or backward in time as well as space”, Walter Murch.

So it’s that ability editing brings to your story. I edit with Final Cut Pro 10.3, I suspect as yet I’m only scratching the surface of what can be done with this powerful software. Even so I find editing an exciting process, where you find yourself delighted and surprised by what happens when you rearrange your footage. It’s my hope that my films over this first module show technical progression.

SFC1 Story

Initial Story – Face Value

Synopsis and dual roles

“Face value” is a 90 seconds documentary film exploring facial disfigurement. The subject has significant facial disfigurement caused by ongoing skin cancer. His life has been greatly impacted by his change of appearance, in terms of his confidence in dealing with the outside world, largely based on how he perceives others see him.
There is also the question of how film and popular culture portray facial disfigurement. How does this impact on his predicament?
For this project I have to reconcile two roles. That of filmmaker and registered nurse. I am part of the nursing team that looks after the subject in the treatment of his disease. As such my duty of care to the subject is informed primarily by my role as a nurse and not my role as a filmmaker.
Is there a conflict of interest between these two roles? As a nurse my conduct is guided by a  professional code of conduct issued by the National Council of Nurses and Midwives, called in rather a self-important way, “The Code“. The code sets out my duty of care to my patient and to my profession. If I break this code I risk losing my registration and would no longer be able to practice as a nurse.

There are certainly codes of conduct/ethics designed to guide the actions of documentary filmmakers as Elisabeth Kasson discusses. The research reported on above identifies filmmakers as a group who in many ways and circumstances include people who “could play by their own rules”. However the study notes that when it comes to their relationship with their subject, filmmakers had widely shared notions of “do no harm” and “protect the vulnerable”. These notions are certainly a good fit with the core values of the nursing code of conduct, it is certainly my intention to use my nursing code of conduct as my filmmaking code of conduct for this project. It will be interesting to look back on this decision once the project is realised and reflect on whether this has impacted on me been able to make the film I wanted.

Story telling

“Story is king” and “everything in your film should serve the story”. These are truisms you will hear repeated when you read, hear or watch anything about the part the story plays in film-making, as discussed in the above podcasts by John August.

There are many formalised models for story structure, the most commonly quoted is the three act structure:

1. The beginning (the set up)
2. The middle (the confrontation/conflict)
3. The ending (the resolution)

Other more detailed structures include “The eight point arc”, described by Nigel Watts:

1. Stasis
2. Trigger
3. The quest
4. Surprise
5. Critical choice
6. Climax
7. Reversal
8. Resolution

I follow a young, professional filmmaker from British Columbia called Levi Allen on his YouTube vlog “Leftcoast“. He has just started to do a series of blogs focussing on story telling. Where he explains some interesting ideas that inform his filmmaking.

If you want to make your story interesting then it’s important to keep a sense of forward motion and momentum. “If the moment takes longer to show than it would to describe verbally then it’s too long”. Everything on the screen should have a purpose, it’s not just there because you like it or because it looks good. Always ask “why am I showing this”, “what point is it serving”?

In a similar vein when you are shooting a scene think of it in terms of a “sentence”

It has a start, middle and end giving it a context. Importantly that allows for a flow between scenes giving you more forward motion, i.e. have each event/scene unfolding in to the next. This helps to keep your film from becoming a montage.

He talks about another device to keep your audience interested, that of creating a series of open loops in your narrative, looking to create intrigue by introducing an idea and then going on to address it later. Ideally having these loops overlapping.

Keeping your audience in a state of anticipation but at the same time being satisfied with what has already happened.

In “Face value” it may be possible to hint of a happy ending/resolution by introducing the idea of a planned wedding.

He brings in the idea of conflict/struggle being central to any story and identifying where that conflict is.

In “Face value” the conflict that Dennis faces is between him and his self. Can he find the confidence to face the world?, and do the things that he wants to do?

Second Story – Trafficked

My initial story, Face Value, ran into some difficulties that meant that for the time being it would not be possible to continue with it. This necessitated a switch to another film, Trafficked, the processes for this are described below.

When my original project “Face Value” had to be put on hold I had to find a replacement project. Using a family holiday to Brittany seemed a good opportunity in terms of a journey a location and a cast.

2016 has been a tumultuous year politically. In Britain we have voted to take a big leap into the dark by leaving the EU. In France Marine Le Pen leader of the far right National Front looks to have a strong chance in this years presidential election.

BBC article about Marine Le Pen
Migration into and around Europe and the fears founded and unfounded around that seem to have played a big part in the above. People trafficking is where criminality meets migration, feeding off desperation of people, leading to exploitation and harm, as the National Crime Agency describes below:

NCA article on human trafficking
So given the trip I was going on and the political situation in both countries a story of cross border trafficking seemed like a good idea.

Films about trafficking:

Films about trafficking
Their are many film documenting trafficking around the world. It’s also for better or worse a prime subject for fiction. Being so innately loaded with drama in terms of the conflict and emotion makes for compelling stories. A notable Hollywood treatment of trafficking is the film Taken.

This Luc Besson film starring Liam Neeson has a father “with special skills” chasing down the traffickers who have taken his daughter. The main simularity with my film is purely that it happens to be set in France. But perhaps I can at least try to achieve something of the pace and dark feel that is typical of such films.
Authenticity
My main concern was working with non actors. (Miranda who plays the girl is however a theatre/English student with a lot of experience in amateur dramatics – so has much more experience and know how than myself of the acting craft). As student films have probably a well deserved reputation for poor and stilted acting. There is though a fine tradition of using non actors in independent and mainstream film to great effect. Spike Lee and Ken Loach are top rank filmmakers who have used non actors.

Casting non-actors

Director Diego Ontario  of Bob and the Trees (above) said “It was essential to have as much veracity as possible so that we wouldn’t have to train an actor on how to log or how to gut a pig”.
One of my all time favourite films is the classic Italian neorealism film Bicycle Thieves (my choice for PIC 1).

The Director Vittorio De Sica drew incredible performances from Lambert Maggiorani as the father Antonio and Enzo Staiola as his son Bruno. Maggiorani was a factory worker. De Sica said (echoing what Diego Ontario says above), “He moved and had the gestures of a worker which he played in the film”. So it seems that is where you can find authenticity with non actors.
I didn’t give my actors lines, looking I think to limit the damage of “poor” acting (not very brave of me and probably unfair to the actors). My direction was simple, to Oli the passport taker “Your’re indifferent to her, it’s just business.”.

 
Framing the shots
It was a conscious decision to frame so many shots using doors and windows.

An influence here was my awareness of the Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu.

As the below essayist Lewis Bond explains Ozu captures the cinematic in everyday life. Using spatial divides as an ascetic to explain more of the film than the narrative.

 

Editting descisions

I based some of my edits on the ideas set out by the great editor and sound designer Walter Murch in his book “In the blink of an eye”.

 

This first cut in the film is as the girl blinks. Murch contends that blinks are more than a mechanism to keep our eyes clean, moist and protected,  but that they also punctuate and signalled our thoughts.

Murch has come up with a hierarchy of reasons to make a cut even giving them a weighting in what they add:

1.Emotion                                                        51%
2.Story.                                                            23%
3.Rhythm.                                                      10%
4.Eye – trace                                                   7%
5.Two dimensional plane of screen.       5%
6.Three dimensional space of action      4%

So this is a list of priorities i.e. don’t give up emotion for story.

Sound track and story structure
As I’ve already said I didn’t give the actors dialogue. I had planned instead to either use a constructed soundtrack using actors on a radio phone in which would tell the unfolding story through a mother’s plea to help find her daughter or to build a story from found audio of radio phone ins. I recorded the version using non-actors but it didn’t form a plausible story. The second idea was abandoned when I couldn’t find enough audio of radio phone ins. It would seem as well as being cheap, radio is also disposable. So I went for a music soundtrack that was I think dark, driving and carried foreboding.

This meant I had to make adjustments to the edit so that the viewer was not left to wonder what was going on until two thirds of the way through the film (this would not be suspense but simple keeping your audience in the dark). So a change was made to briefly show the girl looking out of a cellar window right at the beginning. This along with the obvious title gives the watcher a head start in what is going on.

SFC1 Character

 

The brief

A 90 seconds short about character.

This was an interview of a man who following a kidney transplant had made a good recovery then went on to compete in several Transplant Games and won multiple medals in swimming. This is where character comes into it, he had undergone a major operation and gone on to be a sporting success. He also talks in an interesting way about his relationship and debt of gratitude to the kidney donor. I deal with some of the ethical issues that arise for me in this film in the SFC1 Story post on this blog.

 
What worked well

Dennis talks interestingly about his transplant his triumphs at the Transplant Games. But what speaks of his character equally is that he was happy to make this film despite his facial disfigurement and slight speech impediment, a brave thing to do. I also successfully used a B camera.

 
What didn’t work so well and lessons to learn

The audio was poor, this was particularly disappointing given the subjects unclear speech. I used a shotgun mic for the first time. I’m not sure if I set it up incorrectly or else didn’t have a clear understanding of its capability.

SFC1 Relationships

The brief

A 90 seconds short on relationships.

This is a film about a woman’s relationship with her Gran who died many years ago.She keeps her Gran’s dress as a prized possession hung in her wardrobe. It’s a tangible link with the memory of her Gran who she loved dearly and held in great esteem. So it’s interesting to reflect on how such an object might trigger memory.We are all familiar with memory been triggered by our senses such as the smell of newly cut grass for example, so it seems reasonable that an object such as a dress which speaks very directly of its owner/wearer through its size, shape and era could be powerfully evocative. It is also a very tactile object.

 
What worked well

The lady spoke very eloquently and directly about her Gran, as well as the dress working well as a reference and added visual interest to the film.

 
What didn’t work so well and lessons to learn

I used my iPad to film this as from previous experience I knew I could rely on the audio via the lav mic I had for it. I set up a smartphone as a B camera to get better coverage alongside this. However, this B footage consisting of a face closeup was not used as I knew that the subject would find it unflattering, an issue to work around in future films. Balancing the needs of the subject alongside my needs as a film-maker.