Show Your Work 2005

[Chris Ivanovskis]

your sense of humor amuses me. you may live...

art film. gotta love it. a friend of mine is an art major @ OU and i went to one of the art film screenings one night just because. the theme was gender inequality or something. the gem of the night was watching the entire godfather part 1 upside down and in reverse in black and white for about 5 minutes. wow.

[Michael Bernstein]

Looks like a bad art film.

I've watched maybe ten or twenty abstract collages and non-linear "visual narratives" that film students and passionate nutcases have put together.

When these things go seriously wrong--too much innovation, not enough talent--films like this are truly painful to watch. When they're done well, there's a method to the madness. You end up with a film that's beautiful, hypnotic, or even watchable.

Yours looks like it was badly on purpose. If you took out the random titles (which for all I know, came from your original project), I think you would have more success sneaking in under the radar at film festivals. Hell, if you took out the pitch change and the jazz, you might have something pleasant to watch.

Michael

PS: I love falling teddy bears. There's something poetic in the slight shimmying motion that your bear has, as the air currents catch in its synthetic fur on its flight down toward the camera lens.

[Brandon Tweed]

Hey everyone, I just got the website up for my new film called "Matchbook Morning". Check it out and watch the trailer and let me know what you think! You can find it under the media page, then videos. I would suggest watching the 23 meg mpeg1 , it should stream pretty well if you have cable internet.

As for equipment, we are shooting with a Canon XL2 and Sony VX2100, and lighting with canned lights from home depot. Also using standard condenser mics. We're pretty low budget...but pleased with how it's all turning out.

Any feedback would be great! Thanks!

www.dropframefeatures.com

Brandon

[Christian Hede Madsen]

Congratulations with the film.
I think it was great! Good framing and look to it all, but the thing that really struck me was the feel!
It was very moody and gave you a very interesting impression of the story.
I am looking forward to seeing the final project.
Great job!

[Brandon Tweed]

Thanks for the response! I'm glad you enjoyed it. Any other thoughts?

[Josh Marx]

I tried to edit to say this, but could not...I just wanted to clear up, I'm not trying to promote the band or spam on here, I just wanted feedback on the video, they are just hosting it on their site. That's why I put the link on there to the video the way I did. I just thought I'd clear that up because a friend of mine pointed out that it may have came across that way from the way I posted the link, etc. Anyway, I apologize if it did come across that way. Once again, any feedback would be appreciated.

[Joshua Provost]

Josh,

I really enjoyed the video. Some good ideas and execution. I liked the lighting on the band setups (band playing, piano, etc.).

Constructive criticism: I would have liked to see some close-ups of the band. The same couple wide shots over and over again got a little old. In a few of the angles, the singer was obscuring the drummer, that shot could have been composed better to show everyone as I found myself trying to look around the singer to see the drummer. In the band setups, the singer would be facing one direction in the shot from the left, and backwards in the shot from the right, it was a little distracting, discontinuous.

Anyway, that could be overly picky, but I really liked it (and the music, too).

Josh (another one who has two music videos under his belt)

[Barry Goyette]

Brandon

I watched your trailer with interest. I think you have a nack for combining moody music with arresting snippets. Initially the first few cuts turned me off with the shaky camera and not so terrific lighting, but as it progressed I started wondering about the characters. The shots of the actors reactions are particularly affecting. There appears to be natural-ness to your directing style that will help this feature along (centering your student film with a student cast at a school is a good idea).

My biggest concern is your camera work: Needlessly shakey at times...especially the wide shots where the horizon is moving all over the place, and a couple of the follow shots (I know steadycams are expensive)...it will really depend on the strength of the acting and story as to whether this will be a problem or not. I've seen great films shot exclusively hand-held that work; too many others that just make me dizzy.

Regardless, it's inspiring. Just the kind of film I wish I could make if I wasn't so old and tired!!.

Barry

(one note..I'd consider reshooting the shot of the guy in the car with the reflections...the reflections are too strong. Try a polarizer to lessen them slightly, or add some reflected light to the interior to bring him up a little...I knew he was in there, but I really had to search for him.)

[Brandon Tweed]

Barry,

Thanks so much for the response. Yes, we have some shaky camera work...actually, most all of it is purposeful. I draw a lot of inspiration from DV films such as Manic, and Pieces of April, where there is a little shake to the camera on hand held shots to give it that "documentary" feel.

Ha, you're right, steady cams are expensive...we are doing what we can on the college student budget. I probably will look at getting a polarizing filter for some of the car stuff, that's a good suggestion.

Thanks again for the response!

[Spencer Houck]

Hey everyone,
It's been awhile since I've posted anything, we've been in the process of doing post-pro on a lot of projects and are finally beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

We recently participated in Ohio University's 3rd annual 48 hour film competition, Shoot Out. Teams received an assigned prop, line of dialogue, and genre and had 48 hours to write/shoot/and edit a piece. (Some of you may remember Detonate, a crazy short musical we made last year for this competition, which although was DQ'd for being 5 minutes late, went on to take MTVu's Best Film on Campus award)

This year our promps were: a robe, "fast-forward through this", and Action/Adventure.

We ended up with CLIMAX:
http://pleasure.par-t-com.net/projects.html

In other news, we entered that 5 second Cadillac film competition and to our suprise got aired during the Oscars in the commercial breaks. It was suprising, 'cause we didn't move on to the finalist round, but somehow were chosen to be placed into the 15 second Cadillac spot that aired twice during the Academy Awards. It featured a guy getting ready to go sledding only to realize it's not winter...Maybe you saw it, but if you blinked, you may not have.

Hope you enjoy CLIMAX, and we'll be sure to post more projects as they are finally completed.

EDIT: Forgot to say, we ended up winning with Climax but the competition was rough. Last year there were only something like 6 entries, this year there were 27!

[Jon Fordham]

If you're in New York this week, this is a rare and comprehensive presentation of works by and about the legendary artist Jack Smith.

Three rooms of works by Jack Smith presented by filmmaker Mary Jordan and Tongue Press/Lobster Penguin Films March 12–14, 2005.

NEW YORK, NY – March 12, 2005 - Mythical Jack Smith returns to New York through several evenings of performance, film and photography projections. This exhibition was conceived and organized by Mary Jordan, director of the soon to be completed documentary film JACK SMITH & THE DESTRUCTION OF ATLANTIS. Using custom programmed interactive controls, source elements from Jordan's upcoming film will be presented in several unique display environments.

This broad presentation of Smith's repertoire will be the most comprehensive since the 1997 PS.1 retrospective that occurred eight years after his death. On display will be rare films, photographs and audio recordings by and of Smith. Also included are original interview commentaries from Smith’s friends and collaborators that cinematographer Jon Fordham and Jordan shot in 25P with 2 PAL DVX100's for her documentary.

Open to Public:
Saturday and Sunday, March 12 - 13, 2:00 – 9:00 PM
Monday, March 14, 12:00 – 5:00 PM

The Old Chelsea Y.M.C.A.
213 West 23rd. Street (between 7th & 8th Avenues)
4th Floor, New York, NY 10011

[Charles Papert]

Hey Spencer, wondering if you ever received emails I sent you and Devin last year regarding Instant Films...?

Congratulations on the Cadillac spot!

[Spencer Houck]

Hey Charles,
It's been a while but yes, I do believe I received your email regarding the Instant Films competition. I apologize for the lack of response, we've been entirely swamped as of late. For a long time I thought going to California for a 48-hour competition was merely a pipe dream, but suprisingly enough, as it turns out, around June 17th-ish I will be out in LA for my MTV Films internship (which I received from the MTVu Best Film on Campus award.)

Hopefully at that time Devin, our resident DP, and our Producer, John Swartz, will also be out in LA (hopefully living with me...so we can actually afford to live out there) for their own internships. (any tips/info would be greatly appreciated on apartments/cars!) If we are all out there at the time of your next Instant Films competition I know we'd love to be a part of it. Let's keep in touch, these next few weeks will be very integral in our planning of next summer's "vacation."

-Spencer / All of Par-T-Com

[Mike Lott Jr]

Hello everyone! We just uploaded our most recent short film, called Bad Connection. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.


Here is the link:

http://mjdoubled.com/bad_c/index.html

Also feel free to browse our website, located at www.mjdoubled.com

[Jose di Cani]

I see the webpage but I can't see any quicktime/mpg link anywhere.