Great camera+talented artist=fantastic work!

[Dylan Couper]

Looks great, and very nice website BTW!

[Adam Wakely]

I haven't posted for a while (due to work load) but I like what I saw! Nice work with such my simple set up! Quality truely isn't always the equipment! The talent shows! :)

[Marc Betz]

Great Job,

Looks very good. I liked your framing and composition.

3 minor MINOR negatives

1) The pan and zoom off the mirror shot when the two characters walk past seperated by the flash/Pops doesn't fit the rest of the production. It doesn't have the same feel (looked a little camcorderish)

2) I missed the punchline at the end. It may be my connection but it wasn't clear to me what he said. Upon replay I got it and it was quite amusing. You may to try to punch up the sound a bit because if someone watching it that can immediately rewind might just end up going HUH? I think a little more idle chatting at the end would help the joke a bit as the final music comes up as well.

3) I would have liked to see you catch and frame sonny on the right hand pan from Kim as the train leaves the station. That would have been agreat shot with kim facing away from the camera, pan as the train starts moving and framing sonny facing the camera looking concerned as it picks up speed and moves into the darkness. I think this is what you were going for and I don't know how many takes you were allowed to shoot.

The Blur filter from Kims point of view is a great touch! I really enjoyed it and have watched it several times. All in all far more positives and I am impressed with your abilities and creativity.

You should be proud of your work.

ps the only issue I noticed the first time though was the dialog. The other observations were after a couple of critical viewings.

Thanks for sharing that with us

Great Job

[John Locke]

Thanks a lot for the feedback, guys!

Donatello...thanks for the very positive feedback! About the trailer, tucked away at the far end of the "Production Notes," in about as hard to find place as possible on my site, unfortunately, I explain that I'm actually poking fun at how cliché Hollywood trailers have become (overly dramatic, plus always using the "One man..." beginning). So really, I think we're of the same frame of mind in some ways...although I don't mind music-driven trailers so much as I do over-the-top melodramatic trailers.

Adam...thanks to you also for your comments. By the way, I went to the URL you have listed in your membership and watched the short film "Blind Date"...what a riot!

Marc...thanks for all the details and the nice comments! Regarding the "pan and zoom off the mirror"....you aren't the only one that doesn't like it. Since this whole short is an homage to "The French Connection" I originally tried to shoot it in more of a 70s style...funky, "lingering" shots...and for some reason, that shot seemed 70s-ish. When I changed the editing style later to more of a "Snatch" style, I left it in because I didn't have another shot showing the lead character being followed as he headed down the last escalator. But to be honest, I still liked it...didn't realize others wouldn't care for it. Live and learn! (It's good to know).

I've already punched up the volume quite a bit on the punchline. Any more may cause the background noise that accompanies the dialogue to spike unnaturally also (already filtered out as much as I could of that). I had recorded the dialogue wild and had planned to layer it over, but with this particular line, the lip movement wasn't close at all. Audio is something I'll really have to improve on before the next project. To be honest, I'd never dreamed that audio would take as much time as it did...but it also turned out to be more fun to do than I'd previously thought.

As for number 3, that was exactly what I had intended to do! I thought for sure I'd be able to catch Sonny and pan with him a bit. But chalk it up to inexperience and only one take (we were already on the run from the subway cops then and just trying to get all the shots we could and get out of there). I just missed the shot in that case...plain and simple.

[Marc Betz]

I didn't get the 70's look, OK the pan and zoom can stay but sonny will have to grow a mustache and sideburns

Still loved it

Marc

[John Locke]

Okay...now that that first film is in the can, it's time to learn from my mistakes. I'll be posting some question in appropriate forums about how white levels affect text in FCP, about the suggested dynamic range for audio, and about 16:9. Thanks for everyone's input on this film. Time to roll up my sleeves for the second.

[Tom Christensen]

Very cool. I like the B&W as well. Did you shoot in Frame mode or normal mode and did you shoot in B&W or shoot in color, then go to B&W in post?

Tom

[John Locke]

Thanks, Tom.

You would have to ask that question...aargh. I don't know if anyone has noticed, but I made the mistake of shooting some shots in Frame mode and others in Normal. Like I said, I made just about every mistake possible on this first film. But I spent a lot of time in post trying to get them to match more. Maybe it isn't too noticeable on a computer moniter, but it's pretty obvious on a TV monitor. I tend to like the crispness of the normal mode better on my computer monitor, but just the opposite on the TV.

I used the "desaturate" filter in FCP in post to get B&W.

[Peter Koller]

Hi John , just watched it:

Artistically I liked it, except that the editing remains the same through the film and does not build up to a climax, maybe a few nervous close-ups would have heightened the tension. The music was great!

The only "mistake" I found that has not been mentioned yet is that inside the subway train you are cutting between close-ups of the two guys and it seems both of them are looking in the same direction instead at each other. I guess one wide shot to clear up where both are standing or a different framing (one on the left sid of the frame looking right and vice-versa) would have fixed that.

Another thing (don´t know if it was already addressed in the thread already - I´m a lazy reader): Did you shoot with existing light? The shooting style implies it, looks like it was a shoot and run production, but who knows?

How did the color look like on the original? Was the B&W a style decision or an emergency exit from bad colors? Would love to see a version in full color, because when I think of asian cinema the first thing that comes to my mind ist the great colors.

Cheers, Peter

[John Locke]

Ha! Bob, tell Peter what he's won! A beautiful lounge suite!

I wondered why no one ever mentioned that, Peter. You win the prize. Thanks for bringing that up...really. You're right, that's a big mistake. I had the two characters stand on opposite sides of the car...problem being that when I stood in the middle to shoot both, they appeared on the same side of the frame. I should've kept them on the same side of the subway car in order to get the left to right back-and-forth look.

This was definitely a shoot and run production...they're pretty paranoid about life in general there (they have posters in the subway warning that spies are everywhere). Plus, that particular subway station, the one closest to my house, is also running right under the U.S. military base. We actually got stopped a couple of times by the guys in uniform...and we just kept sneaking back in until we had what I thought were all the shots. Total shooting time was less than 40 minutes. We had to keep it short because I was afraid of getting my camera confiscated.

The biggest mistake on this was the fact that we shot it with virtually no planning. We had no script, a storyboard consisting of only about 10 shots...and so all the continuity and story had to be done mentally on the spot. In retrospect, it was a good exercise, but not something I'm keen on doing again.

It was all shot with existing light, which was pretty good except that they mixed all sorts of light together. Daylight poured in through skylights, fluorescents were used down walkways, then halogens highlighted certain areas. Color-wise, it just looked messy. So, I just made it B&W. I have something coming up later this spring that I hope will capture all the great lighting here...à la "Black Rain" and "Kill Bill."

Thanks for checking it out and the feedback, Peter!

[Rob Lohman]

Hey John. Sounds like you had the same experience as me more
or less. Pre-production work and script etc. is everything.

[John Locke]

You said it, Rob. I've just finished the script and am in the middle of storyboarding my next project now. And although it's a pain, it's making all the difference from the first film above. Also, having a complete shot list, location list, character reports, etc. may seem excessive for what's going to be a simple 10-minute web movie, but it's really helping out in getting everyone organized and especially helping out to relieve the stress-level of the actors.

For one thing, I guess it gives them more confidence in me and the production as a whole, but also allows them to target quickly their responsibilities and helps them to visualize how it all will gel.

In "Shadow" above, everyone had only two responsibilites...1) keep an eye out for "official-looking" types, and 2) keep up with me as we literally ran through the subway and try to do what I'm asking them to do in one take (which was made more difficult by the fact that one of the main characters barely spoke English).

[Zac Stein]

John,

I dunno if this will help you, but it sure helped me out, at the end of the shoot, give everyone who helped out a little present. What i did was have pen's made, with their name/title/movie title and gave them to each person. It is little, it is cheap, and you know what they all are extremely willing to work with me again.

Another good present is zippo lighters with engravements for the core members (if they smoke).

zac

[John Locke]

That's a good idea, Kermie.

I'm already on that angle. Check out http://www.cafeshops.com/sf_shadow/. I send each one either a "Cast" or "Crew" t-shirt, maybe a mug or something, too. (if you create the store, you get them at cost which is really cheap). Usually, they wind up buying more for family and friends, so that can help (in a very small way) to offset some of the production costs.

[Zac Stein]

John,

Wow that was a quick response, one other thing, this is the most important thing of all.

YOU MUST FEED EVERYONE, and feed them alot.

Sounds stupid, but geez it saves time and money to just do it, and makes everyone much much happier.

zac