archived-videos Forced Survival Trailer

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Timberwolf

FORCED SURVIVAL TRAILER ONLINE

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Detour Into Madness Vol. 2 is on the way very soon from Timberwolf Entertainment, and today we have the FORCED SURVIVAL TRAILER available for your very first sneak peek at the set!

FORCED SURVIVAL is a 40min black and white dramatic story about a suicidal girl and a cold blooded rapist who meet late one night in a hotel room, and their lives are changed forever. The short subject stars Jillian Swanson in a standout performance as 'Katie' and Kevin Cirone as the quiet, but unpredictable 'Robert Richardson'.

Windows Media:
Windows Media (right click 'save as')


Quicktime:
Quicktime Theatre
 
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It looks interesting, but the one thing I would say is that there is a real art in lighting for B&W. It's about getting a contrast range between having a white white and a black black. It requires a DOP who can think in terms of contrast instead overall exposure. The best ones are ones that started off as stills photgraphers (especially the old lads), simply because they were trained to expose shots that way. If you can find somebody who can talk sensibly about Ansel Adams' zone exposure and turns up for the first day with a grey card you've got a good shot of getting the job done.

If you're looking to do it yourself, the book to read is Ansel Adam's "The negative." Then all you have to do is find out the contrast ranges of the camera you are working with and light your sets with a hand held meter, instead of doing it by eye. It's all about the number of stops between your mid-grey, your white and your black.

It takes an age to light properly. I understand the theory and I'm a really good stills photgrapher, but I'd always hire someone who has the knack for B&W.

Actually, when I think of it, indietalk has a real eye for this .. his short is great example of using B&W to effect.

Even though I'm a major fan of video over film, for B&W I just think that film handles the contrast ranges better.
 
In general I definatly agree. And there are many shots I wish I could do in this again ...lol. However, for this particular short I wanted a kinda grey muddy look (don't ask why) However, I didn't get a consistant look throughout, and I am disapointed. I am also adding film danmge and shit.

I actually have a great DP/Director friend who does color. But this short had no crew, just me and the actors. Kind of a experiment thing.

But yea,. its not 100% what I was going for as far as look.

Thanks for the tips and the info!
 
what an interesting premise...can't wait to see the finished product.
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Same here.

However, for this particular short I wanted a kinda grey muddy look
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Ah, you mean like the early French Novelle Vague, Breathless, Jules et Jim etc. They used to keep the iris wide open, which gave the image a very flat look, plus Breathless was shot only using natural light.

I did wonder whether that was your influence.

If you could get the footage into FCP the colour correction tools ought to be able to help you even stuff out, especially with the look you're going for.
 
Yea.. if I could just get it 'consistant' with itself I would be more happy...lol

Basicly what happend was we had a hotel room that was much more interesting, better to light etc.. but we lost it and had to switch last minute. So I never got it too work the way I wanted too. It was too nice a room. the othe rone had a real Bates motel look to it with dark tacky wallpaper etc. Would have helped in contrast to the actors.

There is talk we may remake it as a feature on a bigger budget. However, we would probably go color for distribution reasons.
 
Good job

Nice job on the trailer. Being new to this, I have a couple of questions. Was there a thought process behind the cuts you selected? Were you going for a specific length? Did you choose to avoid including dialogue for a specific reason, technical or otherwise?

Thanks for sharing your work - and any insight into your process!
 
Well, this is how it started.

There was a trailer for Saving Private Ryan. Not the original trailer, but a second one right around Oscar time. it was only images and music from the film, maybe one line or two, and i just rember thinking how moving it was and maybe I wanted to try that.

I've made mostly horror type films, so its fairly easy to make a trailer. Show some talking scenes that build up the action, hit em with a half naked girl and a ton of horror/action moments and you got a winner.

However, with this while the dialouge is effective in the short, I didn't feel it could tell the story in the trailer. Since it is more natural and real, there isn't many moments of 'storytelling' or set up like you might get in the dialuge of a horror or action, or a punchline like in comedy. I felt maybe the images would be more interesting and effective. Also, Jillian doesn't talk for the first part of the movie anyway, its all her by herself acting. Since she does half the film without talking, she acts with her body more anyway. I thought I would show that.

Finally, the music cue is actually from the movie and I thought it sounded 'trailerish' and I layed that down and just choose shots I felt told the story and placed them, moved them till the worked.

Thats pretty much it!


I have to say from a young age I have loved trailers. When I was a young teen in the 80's I actually had a VHS tape full of trailers I copied of rental tapes. I eventually had two full tapes of trailers by the early 90's. Thankfully in the days of DVD now we have many orignal trailers on the discs. I really do the enjoy the art of a good trailer.
 
Music

Lilith said:
I loved the music. Was it original? Interesting concept, I too am intrigued. :)
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The music was original and written for the short.

The composers name is Mark D'Errico. He is an amazing up and commer. He did all 5 shorts on my DVD "Detour Into Madness Vol 1" (on sale now in the DVD store on this MB and my site! :) ) On Detour Vol 2 he only did Forced Survival due to time constraints (He was doing a feature, plus I have a feature Shadows Fall which he will probably do). Anyway he is amazing.

He has a website markderrico.com and he is listed on the IMDB.

He is definatly worth using, and his prices are more than reasonable.
 
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