You should check out www.shortscriptsonline.com
There are a lot of short scripts on that site you could produce, broken up into genre. Most of the good ones are snatched up quickly but there are some you might want to use.

They have the sluglines there and you can email the writer and ask for a copy. A lot of these guys aren't filmmakers and just want to see their work produced. Some of them expect Steven Speilberg to cut them a 1 million dollar deal on their poorly written short but just be honest and tell them your independent and can make their movie. If you want, send them a release form and have them sign it if you plan on reading any of them so you aren't obligated to make it and they can't sue you if you come out with an idea with similar themes.

Other than that, my suggestion would be to do some short comedy spec ads for fake products. Most of the things you and you're buddies joke around about every day can be filmed for a short ad.

Thought I'd share this. With bad luck the first 2 times I tried doing a panaroma, I finally pulled it off. I forgot that the lens had to be centered on the tripod (I had it flipped up sideways so it wasn't anywhere near center).

The bottom line is panaromas are cool, I just have yet to perfect doing it...

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/panaroma3.jpg

http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/1.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/21.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/22.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/23.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/24.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/25.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/18.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/19.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/20.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/15.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/16.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/17.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/5.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/8.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/9.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/4.jpg
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2003-6/252285/11.jpg

You may be interested in learning how to achieve a 360° panorama using a shiny chrome ball as a light probe. There's tons of fun to be had in making high dynamic range light probes and then using the resultant luminance map as a light source to light 3D models and environments with using a 3D modeling/rendering application.

Here are some links to get started.

Panorama Tools (http://www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~dersch/)
Dr. Paul Debevec's web site (http://www.debevec.org) - download HDR Shop and learn how to stitch light probe images together with it, then paint out the camera from two light probe pictures taken 90° apart from each other!

There is a new 3D storyboard program out called FrameForge3D. It looks like a great tool for the drawing challenged.

Their web site said they would be demoing at the LA Expo. Just wondering if anyone stopped by and took a look?

If it's any good, the intro price is right.

http://www.frameforge3d.com

It is Canada Day and in celebration of that great day upon which I have almost always worked I am presenting forthwith this list of great Canadian films in no particular order.

DEAD RINGERS - David Cronenberg's strange but true story about two twin gynecologists who live together and die together features Jeremy Irons in a marvellously creepy performance that established him as an intellectual weirdo for the rest of his career. The props for the gynecology scenes deserved star billing, as well.

IF YOU LOVE THIS PLANET - Along with "The Atomic Cafe" one of the great propaganda pieces of the 80s attacking the nuclear age. Based upon the book by Helen Caldicott, it is a totally slanted National Film Board of Canada short that won the Academy Award with its emotional, slamming message. Today Caldicott is a bitter radical. No surprise.

MANUFACTURING CONSENT - Canadians do very good straight documentaries but this one is very stylishly put together. An examination of the work and thoughts of political critic Noam Chomksy, this is really one of the great political documentaries and a staple for media junkies. Chomsky's critique of the mainstream media's reporting of the United States' influence on human rights in various countries that fall within its geopolitical sphere (or out of it) is damning. A very entertaining film as well with nice devices. The one shot everyone remembers if the big Noam Chomsky head lecturing down from the jumbotron in a football stadium about how Americans treat war as sports as football players high five.

EXOTICA - Atom Egoyan's film is structured like rose with each layer unplucked slowly to reveal the truths of the past. Oddly marketed as a sexploitation movie, actually it's a film about grief. Bruce Greenwood stars as a Revenue Canada auditor who has seen his life fall apart after the murder of his daughter. He returns night after night to a stripper bar where the pretty Mia Kirshner (the lesbian assassin in "24") performs for him in a schoolgirl's uniform. Why he does this is the question. A wonderfully structured movie and my favourite Canadian movie.

THE SWEET HEREAFTER - Atom Egoyan's adaptation of Russel Bank's novel about a school bus tragedy investigated by an 'ambulance chasing' lawyer. Egoyan sets the novel in a B.C. town and uses his same ensemble of actors (Sarah Polley, Bruce Greenwoood, Murray Chaykin, Arsinee Karijian, Elias Koteas) and adds Ian Holm as the lawyer. A nicely structured plot that winds ever inward to expose the relationships and pasts of the villagers.


CUBE - basically a graduate film school project by the Canadian Film Center that turned into a cult SF rental standard. Take a single rotating cube set, change the lighting and you have a psychological futuristic mystery about a group of strangers who wake up in a 3-dimensional puzzle. Avoid the sequel, HYPERCUBE.

HARD CORE LOGO - You can describe this as a punk "Spinal Tap" but it's not really a parody. It's the story of a Canadian punk band that comes together for one last benefit tour. A road trip film (like other Bruce Mcdonald films), it is very funny in parts but turns very serious as the punk band begins to unravel as the trip wears on.

ATANARJUAT: THE FAST RUNNER - Last year's festival darling was the fresh pairing of new technology (digital video) with an ancient Inuit myth. The stark lines of digital video present the high contrast beauty of the arctic icescape in an environment that hasn't seen much treatment since Nanook of the North (which I have not seen). The story about two brothers and their conflict with a rival group of brothers is both brutal and funny. Weird weird humour. It features one of the most memorable images in film, the naked 'fast runner' of the title being chased over ice floes by hunters.

BLACK ROBE - One of the best films about Canadian history, Black Robe came out around the same time as Dances With Wolves and to my mind is a far superior movie about aboriginals and definitely avoids the golden interpretation of Indian lives that the Kevin Costner film spoons out. Set in 16th century Quebec, it is the story of a young and fanatical Jesuit (Lothaire Bluteau) assigned to bring the word of god to the Huron. To get to the Huron mission he must travel with a company of Algonquin (lead by August Schellenberg) through epic lakes, forests and through a cordon of fierce Iroquois. The Iroquois are skeptical of 'the black robe's attempts to convert them. At once a gritty survival film and a spiritual, cultural clash, it is one of the glossiest historical films about Canada you will see. Impressive photography showing the tiny, liliputian humans paddling amidst the immense geography that was and is Canada.

CLEARCUT - A grim thriller starring Graham Greene (from Dances With Wolves) about a white liberal who is kidnapped by an Indian activist and taken for a tour of the forest. The politics are a bit strange and not very well laid out but there is something deliciously fierce about Greene's performance. I don't know how it was received among aboriginal audiences but I wonder if they cheered when Greene blows away the RCMP and begins carving into the leg of the white liberal.

JESUS DE MONTREAL - the sole Quebecois film on my list (purely because of my own ignorance of Quebec film) is one of the best known films from Denys Arcand. Winner of the Jury Prize at Cannes in 1990 it is a modern parable about the life and sacrifice of Jesus as experienced by a group staging a passion play. Lothaire Bluteau is the title character. Frequently shown in religious studies because of its uncynical examination of religiosity in modern life. Denys Arcand is a past Cannes favourite, having made a splash previously with The Decline fo the American Empire and its sequel this year.

32 SHORT FILMS ABOUT GLENN GOULD - An inventive and never boring fanciful examination of the life of pianist Glenn Gould who is forever enshrined in the performer pantheon for his recordings of the Goldberg Variations. I'm not a classical music fan (had enough of that learning piano when I grew up) but this is excellent filmmaking. Indeed, it is 32 short films in one package, each film encapsulating a certain point in Gould's life or a certain work. Playing Gould as an adult is Colm Feore who you will recognize in quite a few international films usually playing a stately middle aged man. Director Francois Girard also made The Red Violin.

Other Canadian films worth seeing: HIGHWAY 61, STRANGE BREW, THE NAKED LUNCH, ROADKILL, THE GREY FOX, THE BAY BOY, VIDEODROME

So as some of you probably know by now, we won the Olympic Bid! The 2010 Winter Games will be in Vancouver :)

I'm really excited about it, and I know we have a few other people from Vancouver on these boards. What's everyone's opinion on the bid?

Can't wait to be able to quintuple my rates...
I mean, I'm proud to host the Olympics!

:)

In seven years I hope to be in a successful career.

Which is about the only way I'll be able to buy tickets for a Canada hockey game.

Interesting stuff indeed Robert! Now if someone would pay so I
can play with this kind of stuff all day long and quit my day job <grin>

I see that Gateway has a HDTV compatiable plasma TV. What would be a good set to go with that has s-video and all the bells and whistles. Am I to understand you have the choice of 16.9 or 4.3 but not both? I read that the life expectancy of a plasma was somewhere around 25000 hrs before picture degeneration occurs. That is suppose to equal 24/7 viewing for app. 2 years.

tks, charles

I'm a plasma newbiw, but I'll recap after shopping for one.

There is an issue with image burn-in, which seems to happen
very quickly. I passed on plasma displays after learning about this. As a consumer, this simply isn't acceptible. All of my original DVDs have static menus, so I would probably trash the set quickly. The 25000 hr picture degeneration figure needs more explanation. It's probably the "half life" of the tube, which is
GoodGuys-speak for the # hours required for the full-output tube to degenerate to half. The plasma displays in the show room are
dialed up to full output. I was told that the "half-life" figure referred to an output level much lower than that of the showroom.

I recently watched Chris Roe's docu, Pop and Me, and would highly recommend everyone to see it. It portrays Chris and his dad's journey around the world, meeting pops and sons. The film was shot in DV (a sony vx1000 I believe) and 16mm. The combination of film doesn't distract from the content, as I thought it would. The interchanging styles serve more as a relief between shots. Anyway, I enjoyed it (watched it 3 times) and I hope you do as well - enjoy it that is, you don't need to watch it 3 times ; )

http://www.adn.com/business/story/3479489p-3510499c.html

A small part of what I manage in my real life outside of DV.

There's an article in the current issue of Videography magazine about the 110' wide by 34' high LCD backdrop at Ceasar's Palace in Las Vegas, currently in use for a Celine Dion show. Unbelievable. 5 megapixels total, 1280 high by 4160 wide, at an 8mm dot pitch; the first row of seats is 80' from the screen. Total weight is 24 tons and it has a 6KVA power supply!

The little photos in the article make the image look great - has anyone seen this in person?

And all that technology goes to waste on Celine Dion.... :P

Ouch!

With so much talk about film this film look that, it's good to see that some people are doing interesting work that is meant to remain as video. Hope some of you New York people will get out to see some of these and report back:

The New York Video Festival
July 23 – 27, 2003
At the Walter Reade Theatre
sponsored by the FilmSociety of Lincoln Centre ("Film Comment" magazine)


http://www.filmlinc.com/nyvf/nyvf.htm

Looks amazing. To bad I have no way to get there and see these films. Please go and see I want to know what some of these are about.


Rob:D

Link to this on IMDB (http://us.imdb.com/Title?0196002)

That sure is something completely different, but interesting. I
for one don't know a lof about "recycling"....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3095385.stm

That's interesting... not long ago I was on a website that was apparently collecting money to buy the Star Wars kid an iBook. They were claiming that they did indeed collect enough to give him one. I wonder if that was a scam?

Hey, it's been sucking around here for me, nothing to do, and i'm thinking about doing a local public access tv show for fun, and I don't know if it's worth all the work/effort to put a half hour show together every week to play on our little local public access tv station, even if it sucks. It would have to be better then anything on there now though, since the only thing on there is mostly church videos (VERY VERY bad ones, words can't describe how bad) and i've seen some other bad "sketch comedy" show on there.

The main thing that has me bummed about it, is actually how BAD our local tv access is. The ONLY format they support is VHS, so you have to take your nicely put together quality minidv tape down to VHS to send to them to play, thats ridiculous. A internet buddy of mine, his local access TV station is awesome, they have $7000 DVCAM cameras for you to use, a full featured edit suite, support many formats...etc..etc. I'm not asking for all that, but atleast they could support MiniDV, atleast, thats just sad.

Good idea, or not?

I would definately do it. It will be a great learning experience, where you will be under preassure (obviously your own) to provide quality material. Even if they don't have the best gear, you can still get an impression of what running a regular broadcast show is like. Im guessing you will be working solo, so you will also learn about being a producer, editor, writer, and not to mention camera man. If you have the chance to do it, and you have the time, Go for it. Just have fun.

If you have the opportunity then go for it! You could do just about anything you want - your own scripts, etc. You could even do tutorials on mini-dv and how to shoot things, what not to do, how to edit, etc. I'm sure there are plenty of people in Dayton with consumer cams that don't know how to properly use them and might appreciate the input.

Also, I agree that you'll learn a great deal - even if the equipment isn't top-notch!

Let us know if you do it and how it goes.

Hi All
I was wondering if anyone who lives in my area might have the name of a good photo shop--one that would have a nice selection of stuff in stock that you can inspect. Nothing really like that in my town anymore (Frederick, Maryland USA). I'm not really talking about the national chain stores or mall stores...

Mail order is OK, but it's nice sometimes to actually see the items in person...

Hope this is the best place to post this.

Thanks!
Chris

May I get this off my chest, once and for now? Can I, huh? Oh, thank you thank you. Ahem. Uh, a small list of favorite dv shot films:

1. Julien Donkey Boy, by Harmony Korine, 1999.
Best film of the 90's. Cinema's last stand. Cover your bleedin' HDTV with gas and set it on fire. Breakthrough in Grey Room.

2. Waking Life, by Richard Linklater, 01?02?
Refreshingingly overtly, colorfully :) intellectual, AND an American film. Go figger.

3. The Cruise, by......blank....blank...?, 1999.
Inspiring in many ways. Genius on either end of that vx1000. These guys make the modern age wholly worthwhile after all. The fool and the madman!

4. Hmm, those might have been them. The xl1s work in Pinero was just fine. Very good movie. Bamboozled cannot be ignored, with the exception of a few warped w/a shots. Not a great dv film, but adequate enough to speak it's mind, loudly, and enunciating every syllable. Didn't need anniversary party, personal velocity, full frontal, blair witch (we don't owe this ffflick a thing, folks).......Dancer in the Dark was an almost, thanks to bjork's lack of trust in a vision other than her own. Any others, anyone? I'm not looking for a list of everything dv when I ask. What blows your mind? Why do you care about film? DV? Have you grown as a person because of them? Or is it the mere techno race thrill that drives you wild, along with the next camera to come out, the next next next......


some films that have radically altered my concept of cinema, art, the universe and my self percieved place in all of it, not necessarily in that order:

Stalker 1979 Andrei Tarkovsky Russia
The Mirror 1974 Andrei Tarkovsky Russia
Sans Soleil 1982 Chris Marker France
Persona 1967 Ingmar Bergman Sweden
Blood Wedding 1981 Carlos Saura Spain
The Color of Pomegranates 1969? Sergei Paradjanov Russia
The Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting 1979 Raul Ruiz France
Tetsuo: The Iron Man 1992 Shinya Tsukamoto Japan
La Belle Noiseuse early nineties Jacque Rivette France
Koyaanisqatsi 1983 Godfrey Reggio USA
Heart of Glass 1975 Werner Herzog Germany
Badlands 1975 Terrence Mallick USA

Here's a link to the new look. I think it's killer and easy to navigate. Plus the logo is cool and unique, as is the color scheme!

www.mpsdigital.com (http://www.mpsdigital.com)

What do you all think? If you like, the guy who designed it hails from England and makes high quality websites and can work within your budget. (He deserves the plug, because he worked well within my budget.)

His email is angelo@mpsdigital.com

Thanks all,

heath

MoonRocket (http://www.moon-rocket.com) is the name of my production company. A school project motivated me to work on the web site. And it's sort of complete. The site is meant to advertise my video production services, showcase my work and offer yet another online community for those who are interesting in all the happenings of 'the biz'.

I've been working on some short films but I would like to become more agreessive in the next few months. I'm excited about some of the ideas I hope to explore in the future, but for now most of the stuff I've done is nothing more than an excercise.

Moon-Rocket.com will be closely related to my blog, vectormatrix.net - With my blog I hope to explore my thoughts and lessons learned from my attempts at short filmmaking.

I also got my first paid video project as a videographer for a wedding. And I'll be sharing this experience and the final product in the next few weeks.

If anyone from Toronto or the GTA is seriously interested in working on some short film stuff, get in contact with me. I've tried using those posting boards for crew and casting jobs, but I end up getting 40 emails from people who end up bailing out just as I'm ready to begin filmming.

I like the horizontal composition of your website, and the Moonrocket identity is good. I think you should standardize on the fonts that appear on that page, though.

Hmmm, I haven't had the luck of actually seeing anything that
was shot with a DV camera. I hope to catch 28 days later on
DVD when it comes out here.

from what i have seen it seems that the Denecke SMPTE time code slate is an industry standard for shooting music videos. my question is...why do they need time code slates when most new 16mm ann 35mm cameras have time code counters built right in? I also see that most other types of slates have room for more information (roll number, scene, take, etc.) would one of these slates be more useful?

See and post to this thread (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=12683), please.

Thanks

I've got the same problem from down here in Fredericksburg, VA. Before deciding on and purchasing the Sony VX2000, I was desperate to try it hands on, and after searching the internet, and making multiple phone calls, I could only come up with a single shop (a RITZ camera store in DC) that claimed to have the vx2k on display, but upon further conversation, they mentioned that they would have to try to find the battery or power cord if I wanted to turn it on! I didn't bother making the hour trip up there. I've had to rely HEAVILY on reviews and comments from excellent sites like dvinfo, for everything including lighting, audio, tripods, etc., making all my purchases online. Only one deal went totally sour, through ebay, and the credit card company says they'll handle that for me. That was my shot at a pd150.

Can anyone tell me how to change the spacing between lines of text in Photoshop 7.0 for Mac?

In the older versions, it was an option in the popup box when you created the text layer. Now...I can't find where to change it.

Never mind...digging around on the internet I found my answer. Amazing how I've gotten by this long without knowing this!

For those of you that don't... highlight the text, then click the newly appeared button up on the toolbar for preferences (next to the curve on a path button) and a popup window will appear. There, you'll see all the controls for text.

Howdy. I know the code to make text automatically appear in the subject line when you click on the e-mail address. How do I make text appear in the body of the e-mail so all the sender has to do is click on the e-mail address and press send? Thanks.

mailto:someone@somewhere.com?subject=thank you very much

See this page for full details:

http://www.ianr.unl.edu/internet/mailto.html

Bottom line use:

?&body=Your message here

This was e-mailed to me, I also found the same thing on photo.net. Pretty funny, you should all get a laugh out of it.

How many discussion group posters does it take to change a lightbulb?


1 to change the light bulb and to post that the light bulb has been changed


14 to share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently


7 to caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs


7 to point out spelling/grammar errors in posts about changing light bulbs


5 to flame the spell checkers


3 to correct spelling/grammar flames


6 to argue over whether it's "lightbulb" or "light bulb"


... another 6 to condemn those 6 as anal-retentive


2 industry professionals to inform the group that the proper term is "lamp"


15 know-it-alls who claim they were in the industry, and that "light bulb" is perfectly correct


19 to post that this forum is not about light bulbs and to please take this discussion to a lightbulb forum


11 to defend the posting to this forum saying that we all use light bulbs and therefore the posts are relevant to this forum


36 to debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this technique and what brands are faulty


7 to post URL's where one can see examples of different light bulbs


4 to post that the URL's were posted incorrectly and then post the corrected URL's


3 to post about links they found from the URL's that are relevant to this group which makes light bulbs relevant to this group


13 to link all posts to date, quote them in their entirety including all headers and signatures, and add "Me too"


5 to post to the group that they will no longer post because they cannot handle the light bulb controversy


4 to say "didn't we go through this already a short time ago?"


13 to say "do a Google search on light bulbs before posting questions about light bulbs"


1 forum lurker to respond to the original post 6 months from now and start it all over again.

Here is my take on the same matter:

How many vx2000/pdx150 group posters does it take to change a lightbulb?

None. PDX150 does not need light bulbs. It shoots excellent movies in the dark.

How many trv950/pdx10 group posters does it take to change a lightbulb?

None. They become completely non-operational in the dark.

How many GL1/2 group posters does it take to change a lightbulb?

None. They have so many stacked pixels on their LCDs that they can lit a night with them.

Hope this does not sound offensive.

I've been watching the photos come in from the forest fire threatening Kelowna. Let us know you guys are okay.

http://www.bcsportbikes.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=21866

http://www.apple.com/trailers/mgm/pieces_of_april/

Check it out for yourselves. i was very pleasantly surprised. i goto quicktime's movie trailers quite often and usually they're all in pristine filmic quality. when i recognized the 'dv nature' of the movie i was like, "WHOA MAN!" things are changing =). i know i know it's the not first certainly but it's just more and more of it are appearing =).

We may be the smallest state, but we're the best at something! You think this would come out of someplace closer to a foreign border instead of the middle of the ocean.

"FBI officials said it is the largest illegal operation in the country busted by law enforcement involving video compact disc and digital versatile disc production."

http://starbulletin.com/2003/08/22/news/index2.html

Dean Sensui
Base Two Productions

You can't tell by looking at a quicktime 6" wide screen. You have to blow it up 80x to judge that.

Yes it was done in digital on a $160k budget. It's only 81 minutes so that's a tad short for a feature.

Thanks, that is interesting, here's a direct link (http://starbulletin.com/2003/08/22/news/story5.html)

Anyone else have one?

I received a series 3, 30 hour unit for my b-day......and now that i have it, I don't know how I ever lived without it......

Comments or suggestions on how to get the most out of it (other than the obvious) ??????

I'm on my second TiVo, first one was a standard 30 hour Series 1, and then I upgraded to a Sony DirecTiVo when they came out. I can't imagine watching TV without one. I've got both tuners plugged in, so I can record two shows at once, while watching something else that's already on the TiVo. I haven't upgraded the drive space in mine yet, but I did put an ethernet card in, since the only reason I was keeping my phone line was to let the TiVo call home. Now the TiVo phones home over my DSL connection, and I'm happy as a clam.

Hi!!!

We have a local cinema, mainly used by the film club of Jerez (200.000 souls) where they show films in the Original Version (not dubbed into Spanish).
They have a 35 mm projector and I have noticed that on many occasions microphones are visible at the top and sometimes bottom of the frame of films they show ("The Piano Teacher" - Michael Haneke and "Bend it like Beckham" recently).
I think this is due to the fact that the original framing of the film doesn't co-incide with the projected framing, but is there anyone who knows how to solve this problem, because the projector operator has no idea and says he's doing nothing wrong...
Should this be solved at the screen end by blacking off the borders or in the projector?

Thanks! Not very DV this question....

Dan.

As you have found, most films are recorded with the full frame height and width. This could be matted off on the camera or when the film is printed but that's not usually done. Nowadays there is a hard matte on the projector at the theatre to block this out.