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action scene suggestion

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Firstly, I think it's brilliant that you've posted mid-post, Myself and Ernest were speaking not so long ago of the importance of showing an edit before its completion to an impartial viewer.

I thought the pacing sufficient, although i couldn't quite grasp the need for the split-screen. There was a real opportunity -on the back of the shot at 0:04- for us to stay with the Director, an OTS of her working, amongst others prolonged and anxious. Then, i believe, would the tension build, as the antics of the actor is audible, growing until it meets fever pitch and the point where the Director snaps. The seperation between the two Characters, for me, was too fine, i didn't feel the tension that should -even without sound, which is the most important factor in suspense- be ever present in the situation.

Action and tension go hand in hand for me. But it's merely personal preference.

Good job.
 
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The only suggestion I'd really make is maybe try a few quick cuts interchanging between guy and girl instead of the split screen? It's cool that you're trying something different though so feel free to ignore me!

Also, I think any pace issues you have could be fixed with the inclusion of appropriate audio, so it might be unfair to judge.
 
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papertwin:
Thanks for the tip! I was trying to figure out how to build the tension for this 30 second short, but having sort of a hard time.
I will definitely try ur suggestion, with shot from the back of the Director, and switching it to the front.

I'm also heavily relying on the sound scape of "busy studio set", since all i had was two friends to act for me.


WJD
Thanks for the idea. I do want to try something a bit different, with the split screen, and will finally decide if i like it or not when i ll do the sound. Never done anything with split screen so it kind of intrigued me.
 
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dlevanchuk said:
papertwin:
Thanks for the tip! I was trying to figure out how to build the tension for this 30 second short, but having sort of a hard time.
I will definitely try ur suggestion, with shot from the back of the Director, and switching it to the front.
Click to expand...

Not a problem at all. It's looking good, extremely hard to tell without sound. But as i said, i think we should feel the tension with the Director, even if it happened to be that the Actor is only audible throughout, and revealed at the point of action.

Just my suggestions. Very pleased you posted.
 
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Hey, nice work, so far.

Actually, yeah, I would cut that action considerably faster. But hey, maybe that's me. I like to keep my edits as tight as possible (especially something like this). I think the gunshot will have much more of an impact, if it is sudden, and unexpected.

Personally, I would make the following cuts:

After she's slapped him, and he falls to the ground, then turns around to look at her, for some reason she is walking towards him for a couple steps. First of all, this doesn't make sense, continuity-wise. She didn't slap him so hard that he flew across the room; she shouldn't be two steps away from him. Secondly, let's cut right to the chase. Cock that weapon, and point it at him. It's probably less than a second long, but we don't need to see her taking those steps. Every frame matters, and that's a lot of unnecessary frames.

After she cocks her weapon, we cut back to see him facing the ground again, and then he turns around to face her, again. Why? Again, it doesn't make sense, and it's just delaying the action. At this point, I think I'd prefer to cut right to that close-up of his eyes, then to her blasting the weapon.

I'd have to actually play with the footage, to know exactly where I'd wanna cut things, but I'm quite sure I would want to cut this action, significantly.
 
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Mr Funk: irayo, tsmukan! I'm on it like a fat kid on the cake.
For some reason i'm still in the mindset that i need to show where she gets the weapon, how people get from place to place etc..
I know that boring pointless actions are unnecessary frames, but I still manage do them! Need more practice :)
 
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Me, Id suggest you flip\flop the shots where the ACTOR is NOT facing to screen left...They should always be facing each other. This will add to the sense of conflict. Now if you have a shot where he starts OUT facing her, then turns his back, that would be even more confrontational, but with the cuts on youtube I would have them always face each other.

(I know with all the text on the shirt, my suggestion is incredibly painful!)
 
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wheatgrinder - thats a good idea. I ll see how it looks like. I haven't even thought about doing the split screen while I was shooting, just something that came into my head while I was shooting. I guess the moral of the story is either
a. Plan your shots and stick to the plan or
b. Don't wear clothes with words on it.

modern day - Unfortunately, those are the only angles I've got. I have several takes of the same angle, but pretty much what I have on youtube are all of my shots haha (even the eyes of the actor was just a test shot, and we were fooling around with the camera).
 
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I've watched it a few times, and the one thing that hits me as being most off balance is when she strikes him, and when she's racking the slide on her pistol.

Something about her entering the frame and striking him seems off, maybe its in the speed we went from "not here" to "suddenly here and smack" in such a quick move, or maybe its in her actual striking movement, how she comes off balance to reach up and strike him...

And then, just with my involvement with law enforcement I pick up on these areas, she seems very unnatural, uncomfortable even, with the gun. Assuming it's her pistol and she lives the *insert falsetto* "thug life" she seems to be holding it in the same regard as one would a TV remote, or an airsoft pistol, ie, a mostly harmless chunk of plastic. I would expect someone who pulls out a "piece to bust a cap in dat foo's ass" to have more of an idea of what parts move. I get, that it may be a solid piece replica in which the slide doesn't move, but in the movement of racking a slide I don't expect anyone to return the slide to the forward position by hand, the springs internally are rather strong, and in a hurry to chamber a round, I would expect to see someone yank the slide back and simply release it. To summerize, she looks almost like she's fumbling with it. Not a huge thing, just something I happened to notice, and may infact not even be an issue, but I feel with the focus on the gun at that point, its a noticable action. I debated also bringing up trigger discipline, but seeing as this is an "outside the law" type shooting, I wouldn't expect the real world counterpart to practice proper trigger discipline either.

Now, the whole thing did have an over all good feel though, please don't feel like I'm griping over the work! Your actress as the director had a good conveiance of mounting frustration, and your actor as the actor pulled off the douchebaggery very well, both with out being over the top, and all without sound! Perhaps, the sound added would pull away focus from the striking and the chambering, as well, since "Sound Fools the Eye"
 
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JohnNet:

Thats funny that you've picked up on girls discomfort with the gun. In the middle of the scene she confessed me that she never held a gun in her life, non less trying to shoot it!
I was thinking about having the guy "pull the trigger" to give it more natural kick back, but his hands were too manly, and change was too noticable :-S

My lesson from this short is I need to figure out what critical moments of the film, and audition my friends to see which one can pull off that scene.. Oh well, lesson learned!

I did some editing with the slap, and the gun thing, to cut off some extra frames, but as soon as I added some sound in there - everything seems to be falling in place.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKtHoOH_PDo

Still ADRing male lines, and need to add several more sounds, and fix the levels.. but it slowly coming together.
 
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I just watched your second version, and the slap actually made me wince back slightly and go "ouch" quietly, even after seeing this scene already, nicely done!

And in a side, I caught your post abot looking for a voice-actor, and man, I would kill if I had a nice thick Russian accent naturally...would fit the original pronounciation of my name, "yitz-lav" which was written at Ellis Island as "Netzlaw" and changed to "Netzlof" shortly after, to keep the "lav" sound at the end, and I used to know the original Cyrillic spelling, but have since lost that. I was once told it translates loosely as "Boxy Framed" which, given my build, makes sense, however the person telling me that knows very little of Russia...

There, more than anyone ever cares to know about me lol
 
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