Is this normal when it comes to editing?

H

harmonica44

Being a newbie, I find myself having to cut to an actors face in a scene, in order to cover up a mistake I made. Like for example, I don't like a shot I did when an actor says his line. It was from a bad angle and the camera shakes too much. Didn't notice it till later. So what I would do is cut to another actors face, while that actor talked, and just leave out the shot. In another scene, in one of the shots, it started raining, but had to cut out the rain shot in order, to match it up with the other shots. So I had to cut to another actor, during dialogue.

The problem with doing this is that you ruin the money shots of the dialogue. I have an ideal shot list, of who's face the camera is on, during what line, but finding myself having to cut away quite a bit, cause it didn't turn out that way in shooting.

Is this normal in filmmaking or am I suppose to get money shots only, and shouldn't need to have other choices in editing, cause those choices are not the money shots?

Even though I have storyboards, I have been shooting from different angles to get coverage. But perhaps I should focus on ONLY getting the storyboard shots, over and over, so therefore, I will have more good shots, that are money shots?
 
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Cracker Funk said:
:)

My editor is awesome! I wouldn't let anyone else edit my work. Plus, it's rather convenient that we live in the same house, and work on the same computer.

Have you seen "Fight Club"?
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hahaha! niiiice

im jacks greatest editor.

my editor and i do everything together. eat, sleep, take showers.. my editor knows exactly what i want!
 
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You should see when they disagree about shots in the edit ;)

@indietalk: yes, I'm very patient with questions. Growing up, mine were always answered (Father was a teacher) -- even the dumb ones. Giving someone the room to ask the questions allows them to keep thinking about the process. I've seen alot of threads where folks accuse H44 of asking too many questions, I disagree; somewhat.

I think asking the questions is fantastic, but more focus needs to be on getting H44 to answer the questions for himself as a first resort... and that process starts with answering every question asked, then watching for repeats and encouraging him to search for the answers on the ones that have already been answered, and eventually, answering with the obvious question: "what do you think."

Getting upset about someone asking too many questions is silly... if there were no questions, there'd be no reason for anyone to come to this forum in the first place... I came here to get questions answered (perhaps not as many ;) ) 6 years ago. If I hadn't found this supportive community full of people with answers, I wouldn't have stayed... I have accounts on dozens of film related boards, 6 years later, I only visit 3 of them. Those are the ones that answered the questions and didn't insult me while I was searching for them.

Other than my photography background and the mechanics of editing, everything else I've learned has been online asking questions... I owe the answers to anyone here who asks... because no one charged me for the answers. This is why I'm patient with questions.

Side Note: My kids loved trying to ask me questions that I wouldn't know the answers to... in doing so, they enabled me to exercise my interest in everything and even to find ways to get it all to fit together while I was considering answers for them. They always (even when very young) got complete answers and very few times asked questions that I had to go research (which I always did in those instances).

@H44: Keep asking questions, even the "dumb" ones, as they are only dumb to people who already know the answer. When you ask, come prepared with a solution to present -- you're at that next stage of question asking which is when you start asking the question of yourself first, then asking if your solution is workable (I don't say right, because there's always multiple solutions to a problem). Time to start having confidence in yourself.

Next?!
 
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You made some great points, knightly. I think this may be a good point for me to take a break for a while and examine exactly what I'm contributing (or not) to this forum. Peace.
 
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Okay. I could be being too much of a perfectionist too. Even though I storyboarded everything and had every shot planned out to when the cuts will be and why, it still doesn't turn out that way, and I'm forced to cut to other things to mask errors. But I guess that's normal and have to have that once in a while, which is why we have coverage. Before in another thread, I was told to reshoot a scene cause I didn't get a piece of continuity right. I had an actor sit, then all of a sudden he's standing in the next takes, and I forgot to show him get up, in scene angle changes.

I reshot the scene again, but actually ended up making the same mistake it looks like. I made the same mistake in another scene too. Even though I thought I storyboarded everything, I really have to watch the sitting/standings. Now I'm forced to intercut, and not actually show the actors get up, or sit down in a couple of takes, at least so far. But that's okay. I'll try to watch it more for it next time, and highlight in the storyboards, every time someone sits or gets up, and always get some extra coverage takes of it.
 
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I cant remember but should you at least have 3 takes for each? And that dosent mean the same exact set up either...
I try to have at least 3 takes for each scean and at least 1 of thoes is a different setup .. like camera angle, lighting, and the actors position.
 
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The shoot took about 7 hours. Let's say I have intercutting between three different actors. If I shoot three takes, of each, at the three different angles, that comes out to at least 9 takes, of each. How long should that take? I was able to get one angle for each in 7 hours. This is when they are stationary while sitting. When they get up, the walk around, and I change angles according to their position, in the desired storyboards. But it seems I only have time to choose 1 angle for each, at my speed so far, which is why I like to get the angle right in the storyboards.

I wasn't able to get three for each for every one. I didn't have enough time. Even in that sitting scene, I have three takes, but none actually show the actual sit. I had to shoot that part in a hurry, as we were getting close to closing time on the location. So I will have to have that flaw. Maybe I can do something to the actors eyes to fix that, or something. But perhaps a good editor can make the lack of showing the sits and stands, and it will intercut well still.
 
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I must admit: I'm glad you are busy.

And yes, these things happen when you shoot your first short without prior experience with shooting and editing ;)
They also happen to more experienced people, but experience is something you have to gain by doing.
 
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Part of the continuity issue is that you don't have someone watching for continuity issues and making sure you cover everything in the script you need (Script Supervisor). For Scheduling, we started out at 10 pages (10 screen minutes) / Day of shooting. We're now at 4-5 Pages/day. Hollywood blockbusters shoot at 1-2pgs./day. We always schedule 30-45 minutes for lighting an area, then shoot every scene at that area (with any lighting changes scheduled in as well). Each shot (angle) gets a 15-30 minute reset time. If we have dolly, crane shots or any non-tripod shots, we add time to the shoot.

Our current project is 25 pages and we've added 2 days to our previously 6 day shoot... so 25pgs/8 days = 3.125 pgs/day. That said, we've got really good footage and fantastic performances better than we've been able to get in the past.

For the sitting/standing issue, what's the scene/setting... and why is the actor standing up during their performance?
 
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One in one an actor sits up cause he has to go over and console another character. In another scene an actor gets up cause he's frustrated at someone. I can take a shot of him standing before, and perhaps remove a section of his head and collar, from the other shot. Then attach his talking head to the previous standing shot, to look like he's standing all the time, maybe? Just a thought.
 
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Throw the mindset out of the window at this point of "how it's supposed to go"... and work with the reality of what you have. Figure it out, that's the wonder of editing... now you're a sculptor... the sphinx folks had to work around cracks in the rocks and still managed to create a piece that had withstood the test of time. Work around it.
 
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Okay. I won't try to do the cutting exact, and instead just do the best I can then glady accept what I have to work with after. So how do some movies edit out section of scenes? Some movies, on the deleted scenes, they will cut out a paragraph of dialogue the scene if they realize they don't like it. How do they get the continuity to match up if a whole section has been cut. I tried doing this with mine, and the only way to get it too match is to leave all the dialogue in, since characters will be in different positions and places, if I try.
 
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Hope so too. I have had two actors drop out so I will have to still find two more. And all the work to do so has had me very fatigued, plus my other day job, plus trouble sleeping, cause of stress of problems for the movie lol. So I hope that doesn't cause me to screw up any more scenes.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Hope so too. I have had two actors drop out so I will have to still find two more. And all the work to do so has had me very fatigued, plus my other day job, plus trouble sleeping, cause of stress of problems for the movie lol. So I hope that doesn't cause me to screw up any more scenes.
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But this experience, no matter what happens in the end, will prepare you for your next project. No film school can teach you the juggling act you're doing now: job-film-sleep-stress. Already you're one step ahead of many "filmmakers" -- you're actually filmming something, not just talking about it. Just do the best you can.
 
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