How does a filmmaker decide which aspect ratio to shoot in?

[Ryan Elder]

As for keep on making short films, I don't think I can do that. It's just I've saved up money for the feature and I can't afford to keep spending more on shorts, if I plan to make the feature.

Plus I feel I've been helping out on other people's projects and doing my own short films for years now, which is fine, but eventually, like the filmmakers I helped out, I think it's time I take the plunge and do a feature, cause I can't afford to do shorts forever, I feel.

[Brian Drysdale]

Regarding non actors, the secret is investing a lot of time into the casting, you may go through hundreds of people to find the right person. You also spend time working with them before the filming starts. especially young people. On one short film I made there was a child in the main role, we auditioned a nearly a hundred children for the part and then we auditioned every professional actor around who were suitable for the other parts.

How good a film is going be is 80% decided before a single frame is shot.

On "City of God" they used improvisation and had workshops before the filming. https://www.theguardian.com/film/201...de-city-of-god

If you want to make a feature, I would invest time in learning about acting. It's the quality of the acting (and the script) that tends gets a film selected for festivals, not the aspect ratio. The selectors are only going to give you five minutes viewing before moving onto the next film, if it doesn't grab them.

[Ryan Elder]

Okay thanks. How do you have hundreds of people show up though? When I cast my short film before, only about 1-5 people showed up for the parts. It's probably going to be more showing up for the feature, but I'm wondering how do you get hundreds to show up?

Also, how long should I wait between casting and production to prepare the actors, do you think then?

[Brian Drysdale]

We were proactive, we went around schools etc for the child.

I don't think we auditioned hundreds of actors, I think we had about 30 professional actors at the auditions. You can be very lucky with your small number, but if you don't have the right people showing up, you do need to keep looking. I was very lucky in that regard with one film, but usually it won't work out like that. For a feature film you'd see the actors agents and look through their actors and select some for auditions, a proactive agent may do this for you.

One difference is that we had a budget to pay union miniums to the actors, professional actors like to practice their craft and a short doesn't take much time, plus they may get a chance to play the leading roles. That's something they may not get to do in a larger production.

There are no rules, it depends on the production. If it's "City of God" months or even a year, a couple of weeks in advance of the shooting may be OK for a short. You do want to know you've got actors. plus a list possible reserves before shooting starts. Having the main actors booked at least a month in advance should be a target on a feature, if you wish to aviod last minute rushing around and even further in advance for name actors, who may be in demand. Rehearsal time in advance of the filming would need to be budgeted for on a feature.

[Paul R Johnson]

Some Directors shout a lot, some are blunt and rude, and some quieter, supportive and willing to listen - but they then ALL say we're doing it this way, and the actors have had their say, been listened to, and then adapt. If people 'smell' a fresh director, they abuse them - the I know best attitude, but equally, the director at some point says NO. We will do it this way. You lack the confidence in your decisions. This is where you struggle. In my role, I let people do their thing where possible, but at some point I just have to step in and get it done and much is down to respect. If they know you know your stuff, they'll do it your way. If they peg you as green, or worse - indecisive, the tail is wagging the dog.

[Ryan Elder]

Okay thanks. When it comes to telling actors we are going to do it this way, what if it's like in my example, where I wanted the actor to look into the camera, and I told him that is how we are doing it but he kept insisting that he cannot as it will ruin the scene. What do you do if they keep insisting?

There is also something I did understand in the advice on my short film here:

[Ryan Elder]

Originally Posted by Paul R Johnson

I think acting schools would be smiling. The processes of stage vs screen acting use exactly the same skills. The differences are in how they are used. Characterisation, voice, posture, facial expression and the acting core are exactly the same. An actor can act. Look at the big names, they may be movie or TV based and swap happily into theatre, or they could be Royal Shakespearian actors and become captain of a spaceship. Some people even have a totally different natural accent to their on screen one - it's called acting for a reason. They learn different techniques for theatre vs the others because the viewer is in a perpetual long shot wide angle vista. Film actors can convey with an eye twitch or glance so much, but they're taught all this. They do radio too don't forget.

Re: the crash edits - just watch it. There's no point me telling you the timecode of the non-sequential stuff because you need to learn to spot them. They are mainly edits where the flow is broken - maybe a cut at just the wrong moment, or one that makes you go 'what happened'. Leaning against a wall in one shot - being away in another, that kind of thing.

here's one though. "You found something, what's it going to cost me". He is on her right, stick in hand. It cuts to her facing 180 degrees around and now he is on her left. That's not crossing the line, the actors have actually moved and it goes BANG in my brain. Then it swaps back? Over and over again - every edit shots out. Did she then exit through a wall? Certainly not the entrance?

she leaves and we see her in a car. Then we saw the red soft top which didn't register at first was not her, second time, I saw the roof of the suv, and realised the red car was not her. the driver too small to identify. Who is it? No idea? The red car pulls in and just at the end I think it could be the fella who warned her? Probably, but not definitely.she walks up and suddenly we see an open space? I thought he parked at his home - looks like a suburban street? I've gone into teacher/essay mode, sorry. In the field with the two guys, what is the messy pile of junk on the right? What is it's importance? He says he thought he was being followed - we saw him drive out and her pull out to follow, just once, then he parked. just down the road? Miles away? what made him think she was following? No interior of him glancing in the mirror, or her trying to hide - we saw none of that? His secret raging process done in the open air, next to a busy road? Really? One bottle at a time? He can time travel and choses to age bottles of wine, one at a time, requiring a car journey?

There's another continuity error in the Is this a time machine section. He has the stick in his left hand, with the end visible at the bottom, the stick going up. Then in the next shot, he's probably let it slip down to the dangling position while out of frame, then it moves again. Very small slips but they jump out. He wasn't coached on the stick actions, so probably didn't even realise they were not continuous.

It's not bad Ryan - but the script is mangled in places, the locations simply odd, and the story so full of holes it's like Dutch cheese. However, so much was really fixable. You need to think hard about shooting two handers - continuity is really important, but messing up a head pointing direction was a big one. We also only got to see one view of the filing room - the second shot had a blank wall? So many shots had no need for camera movement apart from pan and tilt, so why hand hold them? Nothing in it made me even think about the aspect ratio. There were no vistas, or amazing locations. 16:9 would have been fine. The various over the shoulder shots were not that brilliant - especially the one where you didn't get all the reverse head in like in the office 34 secs in - did you even need her in the shot at all? A detailed shot of his face would have worked probably even better.

The killer for me is the time machine inventor telling her not to look in that particular filing cabinet as that one is the secret one. That stretches imagination just a little too far.

The story could have worked well, but the script was mangled to death, and I just don't think real people speak like that. You threw away the ending. Let's try a bottle of that time wine while we still can - you get her get out of frame, when the perfect ending would have been for her to say that to his face, and to finish on his silent response as it sinks in.The end edit is at a perfect cutting point to see him stand in the next clip - a kind of comma, for what comes next, when we wanted a full stop (period), exclamation mark final bump.

Don't take it to heart - but this is the kind of thing that people do on a media/film studies course in their first year. By year two and three, they don't make these mistakes any longer.

For what it is worth, I'm afraid I would not work with these actors again. After watching the thing two or three times, there are so many basic acting mistakes. actors make mistakes with lines, especially with re-writes, but you have to repeat it until they sink in before moving on. I got the impression these were probably take 4 or 5 and they were getting fed up, and you put up with the passes and odd bits because you could't face saying "and one more time".

One of my old jobs was floor manager for TV, and in your earpieces you'd have the director screaming "For F**ks sake, can't they get it right - do it again", and you'd translate this to "nearly there, if we could just have one more please, positions everyone'

There is also something I do not understand in the advice here. You said that when the woman leaves, where does she go, certainly not through the entrance.

She does in fact go out the exact same entrance when she came in. What did I do wrong to make it seem like she went out a different way, just so I know to avoid that in the future?

[Chris Hurd]

Originally Posted by Brian Drysdale

Another is "Performance" with the writer Donald Commell co directing with the film's DP Nicolas Roeg.

Pardon me, sir... I have a memo for you. It's from Turner.

YouTube (Short URL)

[Paul R Johnson]

I'm not sure I can explain Ryan. You either see it, or you don't. To the viewer they are in a room we have not seen, or could it be a corridor? We only see the view you present, we guess the rest, but in any shot the actors face a compass direction. When we see them move, we know which way they go. Watch it again and see if we, not you, know how she exits the room? I didn't.


You've still not got the directing idea. You gave the actor job. You wrote the script. You have the vision. You need them to do it a certain way. You have the option to stop and explain why you want them tondo a certain thing, or you just tell them to do it and assure hem it's what you want. It's clear you're letting your actors ignore you. If you are paying them, they must do what you say to get paid. If they are volunteering, then only your skill, personality and stature will work. They may be right or they may be wrong, but it's your call. If you have established a kind of cooperative not hierarchical structure, you've lost control. It's supposed to be a pyramid,neither you at the top. Anything else is a disaster in the making.

[Brian Drysdale]

Originally Posted by Ryan Elder

Okay thanks. When it comes to telling actors we are going to do it this way, what if it's like in my example, where I wanted the actor to look into the camera, and I told him that is how we are doing it but he kept insisting that he cannot as it will ruin the scene. What do you do if they keep insisting?

There is also something I did understand in the advice on my short film here:

There has to be reason for having them looking directly into the lens. For example. the camera has become a POV, that is it has become the character's view of the world - their point of view. Perhaps the other character is hypnotizing them, this should be communicated to the actor, so they know why they're doing it . Another is that the character is acknowledging the audience's existence and is communicating directly to them, for example the opening of "A Clockwork Orange".

In dialogue scenes actors don't usually look directly into the lens, but sometimes very close to the edge of the lens when doing a tight single. To assist, a camera tape mark can be placed on the matte box to give them an eye line.

Often the off screen actor is moved close to the camera to assist with these shots. I gather Micheal Caine goes into how the actors can deal with this in his book on acting, if not, you can google an old acting masterclass he did (I think it was for the BBC), where he goes into techniques to bring their eye line closer to the camera.

[Ryan Elder]

Originally Posted by Brian Drysdale

There has to be reason for having them looking directly into the lens. For example. the camera has become a POV, that is it has become the character's view of the world - their point of view. Perhaps the other character is hypnotizing them, this should be communicated to the actor, so they know why they're doing it . Another is that the character is acknowledging the audience's existence and is communicating directly to them, for example the opening of "A Clockwork Orange".

In dialogue scenes actors don't usually look directly into the lens, but sometimes very close to the edge of the lens when doing a tight single. To assist, a camera tape mark can be placed on the matte box to give them an eye line.

Often the off screen actor is moved close to the camera to assist with these shots. I gather Micheal Caine goes into how the actors can deal with this in his book on acting, if not, you can google an old acting masterclass he did (I think it was for the BBC), where he goes into techniques to bring their eye line closer to the camera.

Oh well I wanted it to be a tense scenes between to people kind like a scene like this where they appear to look towards the camera:

The Silence of the Lambs (9/12) Movie CLIP - Screaming Lambs (1991) HD - YouTube

Or are they not looking quite towards the camera. Hopkins looks like he is.

Originally Posted by Paul R Johnson

I'm not sure I can explain Ryan. You either see it, or you don't. To the viewer they are in a room we have not seen, or could it be a corridor? We only see the view you present, we guess the rest, but in any shot the actors face a compass direction. When we see them move, we know which way they go. Watch it again and see if we, not you, know how she exits the room? I didn't.


You've still not got the directing idea. You gave the actor job. You wrote the script. You have the vision. You need them to do it a certain way. You have the option to stop and explain why you want them tondo a certain thing, or you just tell them to do it and assure hem it's what you want. It's clear you're letting your actors ignore you. If you are paying them, they must do what you say to get paid. If they are volunteering, then only your skill, personality and stature will work. They may be right or they may be wrong, but it's your call. If you have established a kind of cooperative not hierarchical structure, you've lost control. It's supposed to be a pyramid,neither you at the top. Anything else is a disaster in the making.

Well as far as the audience not knowing where she went, there are other movies where it will show a character leave a room, but you don't see the character leave the room, you just see the other character's reaction to the person leaving. What are those movies doing differently?

[Josh Bass]

There ARE some precendents for people looking into the lens in dialogue scenes...I think there was some of that in Shayamalan's "Signs". Warranted? I don't know. But a (once) prominent filmmaker did it.

[Brian Drysdale]

Jody Foster is not looking directly into the lens, she's looking very close, just above the lens (eg the outer edge/filter holder). perhaps slightly off centre.

You do need to have a dramatic reason for them looking directly into lens, some come very close to doing so, but don't actually do so.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh okay thanks, I will have the actor not look directly in then but very close.

What about the scene in mine when the women leaves though? In other movies you will see a person leave a room, but you don't actually see the person leave the room, but the other person's reaction to it.

What did I differently that makes the viewer think she left a different way that she came in, when in fact, she went out the exact same way?

[Brian Drysdale]

The set up is key, if characters are going to do actions off camera the audience needs to know the geography of the location so they can form a mental image of where the off screen character is in relation to what they're seeing.

The secret is hiding the set up, so that the audience don't know it's a set up and then having the pay off later on.

Just because you know it doesn't mean the audience does. The set up prepares the audience.

This becomes even more important if you're going in for time travel, worm holes or inter-dimensional shifts. "Back to the Future" is jammed packed with set ups in the first act.