www.smiley-films.com is my site.... I recently had my film CHOICE screen at the minidvfestival in cali, it recieved a direcors pick- best cinematography nod. Anyways i was hopeing you may check out a few of the scenes from it. One being a brutal beating that takes place in a highschool, and the other being a vandalism scene.

I also just shot my first music video for the band DRIST, and i am most proud of this. Its recieved 500 downloads this month!!!pretty good for my little site.

Thanks for taking the time.... if you have any words of advice or anything please post a responce.

Colin Minihan

Hey Colin, nice work my friend. Glad to read that you shoot with a VX2k. The stuff looks very nice, especially the lighting in that music video. Tell me, did you just use practicals to light that scene, the single hanging bulb, or were you working somethin else? Also it appears as though it was color corrected(maybe 24p'd?) whats the word on that?

Anyway, I like seeing good work from others around my age, not to cross-promote, but my friend Devin and I are both around your age and have a site up at www.par-t-com.net. I'd love to hear what another filmmaker my age thinks about it.

Thanks, and good work,
Spencer Houck

hey thanks!

In the music video around 30% of the light if just coming from the swining light.. The other light was just a low end construcion light and it was pushed way back just to flood the area a wee bit.
Magic bullet was used on the music video aswell.

and i will try check out your stuff right now, but im on 56k, so i may not be able to untill after the 4th of jan (when i go back).

colin,

Love your shiznat! where abouts in Vancity you live in.

Colin, nice stuff!
Where did you shoot your paintball movies?
I shot two paintball tournaments in the Vancouver area for Badlands Paintball last year, and am an avid player.

How old are you anyway? I remember seeing your paintball video pick up best young entry (or something like that) in Videomaker magazine 2 years ago.

That bathroom beating scene was particularily brutal. Excellent work.

Very good, I love the action and the pace.

Keep it up

thanks for all the positive feedback!

-I shot those OLD paintball movies in my hometown of Port McNeill B.C, its on the nothern tip of Vancouver Island.

-Im living in Burnaby... where do you live in van? oh and im 18years old

And thats sweet you remember Open Fire from Videomaker magazine a few years ago haha. I didnt manage to send anything to them this year, but last year a different short of mine got the comedy award and now i can finally use the lav mics they gave me because i just got a senhieser boom and an xlr adapter for my vx2000 ! !

I live in the North Van... just turned 20!

Hey Colin! Just downloaded your Drist video (took a while being stuck on this 56k!!) But it was well worth the wait. Awesome video. Great use of color and good cutting!! I really liked the beginning with the swinging light effect. A polished piece indeed!

I was just wondering what camera(s) you were using. Did you use color filters or did you color correct in post? And how did you get to do a video for the band? :]

thanks Randy!

i didnt use any in camera color correction. I just used Magic Bullet in post.... LONG render times!

And the way i got to shoot the bands video was because i got permission to use a few of their songs in CHOICE, and then when i finished Choice their manager saw it and told them to get me to start writing treatments for their single Normalcy asap.

I think I saw all of the movies on the site. Some excellent work
indeed, althought I think in Choice there's a bit too much blood.
Nice work though.

What I was wondering from seeing most of the stuff is that you
don't seem to have trouble getting locations (especially indoor
like department store [twice] etc. etc.) and people and things
(like police/fire/medical + all equipment). How are you getting all
of that?

I got some interesting stories I want to make, but having a hard
time getting things like that.

Hey dude, just wanted to say your stuff is awesome. The acting's not top notch, but that's not exactly within your control... The editing and cinematography are brilliant. I like your style. Looking forward to your next works.

i used to have no problem getting locations for JEt and CHOICE because they were made in association with national crime prevention , icbc, and the rcmp (canadian police). They wanted me to make a few movies that could be shown to public schools for a kinda anti crime thing. They wont show CHOICE though, because they say its too violent.....sucks...... For the locations it was easy because the town i was living in and making the movies in only has 2500ppl in it .. everyone knows everyone and ppl just did favors, like letting me shoot in fields at night and make it look like the place gets trashed. Usually i was only given about 2 hours to get the job done..... like in JEt, i only could use the er room for 10 minutes... so i shot it all in one take with 2 cameras and let the doctor (who is a real doc) do what he would do. I really wrote the scripts with all this in mind too..like i only wrote a scene i thought i could film, and could think of the location... now that im in the city and going to school i have NO WAY of making a film like CHOICE, i just wish that when i made CHOICE, there was more effort from the actors.

Nice to have such things available. Here in Holland movie making
is almost never seen and people are much more like "ehm.. what
you want to do?" and "why?". Oh well.

Good luck on your future projects!

anyone else care to give any feedback on my music video please??

Dood! thats some great work!

The video was really good, I really appreciate "Dad" hehe he's a good actor (god i hope he was acting)

Choice, looks pretty good so far, fight scene was INTENSE, Great cinematography, congratulations!

What NLE?

Colin, you wanted feedback. Here ya go. :)

I was pretty pleased to see a decent music video made by someone my age. Very good. Only a few things to pick at.

You have a video composed of band footage, that crosses between a story concept. The beginning of these types of videos are important to have set up the feel for both parts. If I were doing it I probably would have had a couple more shots of the story between each swinging light closeup... quickly though.

Close up of the singer, cuts to the kid standing looking cold or numb in the mirror, maybe spins his head to the side fast like he heard something disturbing in the kitchen. Cuts back to second closeup of other band member. Then after, goes back to seeing the mother screaming at the guy. Another close up, then back to him swinging at the beer bottles in the kitchen and looking at the mom. Last close up, and he swings and hits the lady. Just as his fist hits.. back to band shots where their energy is high.. that way the hit climaxes the viewer's emotions then takes that energy and converts it into the band's energy.. creating a "kick in".

As far as the story line, good concept if done well. You did it well. I just thought it could have maybe been more chronologically ordered. In the beginning of it you cut strait to the lady on the ground with some guy dripping beer onto her. Then after more band footage, you see the same lady up and about, arguing with the dad... but without a wet face or shirt or anything. Seemed out of order. Maybe intentional, but from the viewer's standpoint it may have needed the order to make sense. Everything else, I liked. Maybe could have used a farther away shot for when the kid's being drug outside. Just one. Probably best placed somewhere halfway between what seemed to be a bit of a long "being dragged" shot.

Durring the band shots, there were a couple things I felt didn't carry the momentum of the feel for the song. When it's a side view head closeup of the singer.. he seems to step forward then sway back. Other shots.. might have been good.. for the closeups, it would have been better to see I think him.. not sway back, but to keep walking forward. That's just me being very picky, though. :)

Lighting was great, execution was great. Story idea, cool. Beginning, alright. Middle, energetic and emotional.. good. Ending, loved the panning out for the very last shot, good.

Camera work.. great for some parts.. alright for others.. some things in there I would have liked to see more steady. Like when the guy is moving towards the lady that's down on the floor.. and he picks up the bottle. I would think a steadicam or some other form of personal stabilization device would be a solid investment for your works in the future... which I look greatly to seeing more of. Congratulations on the job well done.

thanks for the positive comments!!

Yeah its not in chronological order on purpose. This came about in the editing process as the original treatment was in order. For me, it just worked better to start the broll in media res.

I really enjoy reading your feedback. Very constructive, its helping me keep inspired while i write more treatments for another music video i hopefully am going to do for the same band, DRIST.

I use ULEAD media studio pro to edit. ULEAD makes great products, completely overlooked by the profesional community.
They also treat there costumers very well. They saw "5 minutes" at a videomaker magazine expo and gave me ULEAD studio quartet for free.... its work 1k! and there is an article they wrote about my work that is on there website. http://www.ulead.com/userstory/msp/colinM.htm (artlcle is a bit cheesy)

Hey guys,

I'm another teenager who loves to do this filmmaking thing, but I'm obviously nowhere near the levels you guys are at. The advice in this thread has been great and Colin, your video's have been very inspiring. I was especially blown away by your music video, which I can easily see playing on MTV (and being just as good, if not better, then most of the videos that they are currently showing).

I hope to maybe keep in contact with a few of you, since the filmmaking population in my community is non-existent, and I found it very helpful and interesting to see what others my age were doing with video.

Anyways, keep up the awesome work (especially you Colin, I loved what I saw) and look out for possible e-mails from me, lol. Hopefully I won't bother you guys too much =)

- Chris Yi

THANKS MAN!

Email me whenever, ill be glad to help out with whatever it is you want to know.

smileyfilms@hotmail.com

Never a bother. Too bad you don't seem to hold the videos playing on Mtv right now in high esteem. I made a couple that are airing.

Email, anytime kevin@kmdstudios.com

Colin, looking forward to the next Drist video, and if you want any feedback/advice on a treatment for extra input before you take it to production, email me.

Colin. I somehow came across your web site late last summer. Great work! I love all the action in your movies. The Drist video was excellent. I have yet to see the full version of Choice though...

yeah, i cant fit choice on my site... its a 65 minute movie....

sorry about that.