archived-videos COPY PANTS- A comedy short.

MTsquared

MTsquared

Here is a comedy short I made.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A94YLOeuOX4

Some background: I've always wanted to make short films, but didn't want to settle for a handycam in my backyard kind of movie. So I waited until I could afford a better camera. I found one in a pawn shop in the bad part of town, and bought it. Before I found the camera, I took a 'challenge' to write a 100 page script in a month called "Script Frenzy". Which I did, in turn exposing myself to script writing. After I got my hands on the camera, I came up with this idea for a stupid movie about a couple of idiots that find some magical pants. I went home and wrote it. In true script fashion with characters, dialogue, scene settings etc. For some reason, my friends were stupid (and kind) enough to oblige me in this and volunteered their whole summer to the project. We set up scenes, recruited other people, and went for it. After a couple moths of missed shoots, mis-scheduling, and even a little bit of filming, we finished COPY PANTS, the day before I had a whole new full-time semester starting up. After awhile I edited it, and what you see up there is what came out of the other end. Don't get me wrong, I see the flaws. Most notably the obnoxious over exposure and the focusing problems. I make no (legitimate) excuses for them except for the fact that I blame them on my level of experience. Like I stated before, I had none. Nobody did. The actors were non-actors, which means they had never acted a day before in their lives. Other than exposure, focusing, and the occasional audio discrepancy caused by my low budget shotgun mic, I think it came out ok. Feel free to point out anything I could improve on. I already have another project in the works, so anything you guys point out will help. I also want to add that I designed the characters to be idiots, and therefore, the dialogue is stupid. Like really dumb, but intentionally so. I wanted a comedy somebody could sit back and (hopefully) laugh at. So don't say "Your dialogue was retarded", because I know, I wanted it that way. (FYI, it was originally supposed to be under 10 minutes, but came out to over 25!)
 
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Any suggestions on what to change? What was good, what was bad? Being my first short, I could really use some critique on it.
 
hey man i think there are some really funny parts, in fact i think you have a genuine funny bone that is quite natural. my fave line:

TONY: i'll buy the ring for 10 and probably sell it for 20 if i make it real shiney!
PHILLIPAE: but my grandfather gave my grandfather that ring!
TONY: then your grandfather pulled one over on your grandmother.

see what i like is that you are raw, you dont try too hard and yet you have raw talent to create likeable characters and funny jokes...from there is the foundation for you to make great films. its actually refreshing to see your film because its so pure and funny. seriously.

right im gonna be a little harsh now so here comes...the quality and editing was poor, audio too and IMO your material is too good to not be shot right so... my advise; get yourself a dslr that shoots 24p (cinema stylee) and some decent audio gear, you can maybe get both for about 1000 bucks. buy yourself a couple of books on directing (rules of scene composition etc) find yourself a photographer (graduate or studying or maybe a hobbyist) and get yourself a good video editor that can really flush out the quality of the material. then make another film and post it here because i can't wait to see what you have in store next as am i already a fan of yours. great stuff man. keep up the good work!!
 
I am quite glad you liked the film so much, and am very thankful for the advice! Being a student, I don't have a lot of money and therefore, could only get this camera. While normally it shoots pretty good footage (As visible in some shots where it comes out really clearly), there is something wrong with the anti-shake function and causes the lens to actually move inside of the camera independently. Which caused the glare guard to be in-shot on some scenes. I didn't notice while shooting, and had to zoom the footage in to cut it off, forcing some shots to be really blurry. (Some however were my fault) Could you by any chance point out what was off about the editing? Some stuff I did intentionally abrupt like song cuts and cuts into scenes, but what particularly was wrong with it, at least as an example? The audio.... Oh man the audio. At the time I could literally only afford the $50 mic I had, and due to my inexperience, got some crappy audio at times. Which caused me to have to try and fix it in the computer. Could you also expand on how it was shot wrong? Did some scenes (other than the grape-vine stare, which was intentional) go on for too long, not long enough etc? I don't mean to press you but any genuine advice is more than welcome. People I know have been saying they loved it, but have not gone any farther to helping me improve on it. With a very important project coming up (one that will be my entry film for film school) I could use help. Thanks for your comments!
 
MTsquared said:
I am quite glad you liked the film so much, and am very thankful for the advice! Being a student, I don't have a lot of money and therefore, could only get this camera. While normally it shoots pretty good footage (As visible in some shots where it comes out really clearly), there is something wrong with the anti-shake function and causes the lens to actually move inside of the camera independently. Which caused the glare guard to be in-shot on some scenes. I didn't notice while shooting, and had to zoom the footage in to cut it off, forcing some shots to be really blurry. (Some however were my fault) Could you by any chance point out what was off about the editing? Some stuff I did intentionally abrupt like song cuts and cuts into scenes, but what particularly was wrong with it, at least as an example? The audio.... Oh man the audio. At the time I could literally only afford the $50 mic I had, and due to my inexperience, got some crappy audio at times. Which caused me to have to try and fix it in the computer. Could you also expand on how it was shot wrong? Did some scenes (other than the grape-vine stare, which was intentional) go on for too long, not long enough etc? I don't mean to press you but any genuine advice is more than welcome. People I know have been saying they loved it, but have not gone any farther to helping me improve on it. With a very important project coming up (one that will be my entry film for film school) I could use help. Thanks for your comments!
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overall it just didnt look or sound like a film because of equipment. many of your shots were nice and once again you have a natural eye which is a great foundation, but a little fine tuning is needed and this is where a book or two can help. little things like scene composition and not crossing the line of action...just things you can do to tell the story as clearly as possible and in editing not using un-nessarcary shots and trimming the fat from the whole piece so the story is more watchable. The audio was the biggest problem, it is the main reason that someone will turn a film off, in my opinion it is more important than visuals. we NEED to hear them clearly, if it is a struggle to ear we get frustrated. maybe you should of ran an ADR (re-record all dialogue in sync with the film). even if it looked out of sync like an old chinese martial arts film, it would of still been way funnier because at least we can hear clearly. and yes there is alot of noise in the background so my advise would be run some noise removal.

and to get a film-look the camera should shoot at 24fps and this camera doesnt seem to do that which gives it that handycam feel. like when i started watching it was like a guy grabbed a camcorder and friends to have some fun but then i realized that you actually have a script and then i realized that you not only have a script but you are actually a good comedy writer and the fact that you concvinced everyone to partisipate, the fact you got all your locations sorted, the fact you finished and edited the film yourself tells me you are a true movie-maker and your work (despite all the technical ills) smells of confidence.

my advise it use the film you have to promote yourself to good people who have a bit of money. show them your plan for the future and maybe offer them a piece of you company as executive producer. get some doe and go bargain hunting for some new equipment. then make as many films as you can, from 2 minutes to 20mins.

and i dont want to influence any bad decitions but ask yourself the pro's and cons of film-school and do you really need it?? how much will that cost and could you not use that money to get you production company some equipment to make films...?? worth thinking about IMHO
 
Could you recommend any books? It seems to be a common theme that there is some unnecessary stuff in there, as in the film is 'bloated'. I'm glad multiple people have said that because it gives me one of the biggest problems of the film I can look at later and avoid. I think a good way to do so is set a time limit. COPY PANTS, being unlimited, gave me space to make it bloated. I think a good microphone would go a long way with the audio. And trust me, if I did any more noise removal, the characters would sound like they are in a tin can.

I did shoot in 24p actually. It's the Panasonic AG DVX-100. I used these settings: http://kino-eye.com/2005/02/16/dvx100settings/

But like I said, the camera is pretty beat up. Could you point me in the right direction of a good DSLR? I heard they are not as good for film, but is that incorrect as long as they shoot in 24p?

To be honest, no, I don't think I need film school. (as in I believe with enough practice and work, I could get good without it) BUT, I could use the connections the school offers. The connections to the studios, actors, producers etc... But here's the thing, I'm so poor, film school can't make me more poor. By that I mean that i will have to get grants for the school completely, or I can't go. I'm not going to poor my life savings into the school because I just plain don't have enough.
 
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