Just bought a New HD Video Cam...What should I Film

S

SojiRo

.....So I just bough this camera. nothing huge, something a tourist would buy but it's great.

My plan is to just buy equiptment over the next few years before I am ready to shoot my first film, talking lights, mics, cameras, etc....this is my first HD camera....I treated myself.;)


Only problem is that I dont know what to shoot first...it's really bugging me. I wanted to shoot something and edit it, but I have no idea what to film....

I'm in the Air Force, a lowly 23 yr old A1C....The first thing I shot was a festival. I edited it rather well with Sony Vegas and Adobe Premier...put a Kings of Leon song in the background.

Anyway...like I said, I have NO idea what to do next. My camera has just been sitting there in it's case and I feel so bad about it. Filmaking is something I plan to do after my term in the military ends. I'm writing a lot right now, but I feel I need some experience other than reading Filmaking for Dummies.


Any suggestions?
 
Think of a story, something simple, that uses locations and things you have available to you. Write the story down. Think about how you would tell that story using mostly images. Write those images down or draw them out, even if just 3rd grade notebook doodles quality. Think about how you could film something that looks like the images you imagined to tell the story. Film them. Edit them together. You just made a movie. It's all refining the process from there.
 
In the film classes I took in college, they had us shoot very simple shorts to get us used to telling a story visually. They had no sound, dialog, or music. The only instructions we were given is that one person has a problem and then solves it in 2 minutes max. We also were not allowed to move the camera (pan/tilt/dolly) or zoom.

For example, one thing I shot was a girl at a miniature golf course who wanted to play, but had no money. The owner rubbed his fingers together to indicate he wanted money, and she pulled out her pockets to show they were empty. So, she gave the owner a wink and kissed him. He paused for a second, and then shook his head with a disgusted look. She then took out her car keys and gave them to him. He agrees and then gives her a club and ball and she runs out to the course happily and hits a hole-in-one, as he drives away in her car. It was really lame, but story wasn't as critical as getting the class to understand what was happening visually.

We also had to have at least one creative shot. It could be anything. For example, when the girl hits the ball, I cut to a shot from within the hole, seeing the ball fall into the lens. Did this by painting a light, hollow plastic golf ball the same color as the real ball. I then used a Pringles can with cardboard taped around the opening. Stuck the can over the CP-16's lens (old-school 16mm film camera) and turned it so it was facing up. Rolled the ball into the can and into the lens as I shot at a high frame rate. Looked very convincing. My teacher made me explain the shot in detail because everyone, including the teacher, thought I had actually dropped a real golf ball onto the lens.

So, think of simple problem-solving sequences and film them. Don't worry about it being some masterpiece. You first need to learn to think visually. Then, learn composition, lighting, and motion.

And if you really want to test your visual storytelling, try shooting the same sequence, but only use a still camera and limit yourself to maybe 9 frames.

Hope this helps.
 
I think anyone will tell you, just get out there and shoot anything, even if its terrible. The more you shoot, the better you'll get and by the time you gather all the right equipment over the years, you'll know how to use it and you'll be ready to make something good.

Being in the military you have a lot of opportunities to make friends with people with similar interests and most of them should be pretty dependable. A lot of actors to choose from, even if all of them have the same haircut, lol.

Congrats on the camera, and good luck.
 
This evening go shoot the sunset, cityscape, and the highway headlights and tail lights.

Bring your instruction manual and screw around with all the settings you have:
- different resolutions
- different frame rates
- play with manual focus, aperture, & shutter speed
- set your shutter to 1/60, swish camera back and forth and see if you can get some jello going on.
then set it to 1/100 and swish again.
then set it to 1/200 and swish again.
- set your aperture down to 1.8f, find a fence or long surface, set your manual focus at a meter out then optical zoom in to note how your field of focus narrows.
Then zoom out so see how it broadens.
Reset the manual focus to 2 or more meters. Repeat.

The primary point to all of this is to learn the limitations of your equipment AS YOU familiarize yourself with mostly the camera but also the instruction manual.

At some point you'll have people waiting on you to shoot your shhhstuff.
They don't wanna wait on you to figure WTH you're doing.
They want you to pay attention to them, not your equipment.

GL!

Ray
 
voodoogmr said:
In the film classes I took in college, they had us shoot very simple shorts to get us used to telling a story visually. They had no sound, dialog, or music. The only instructions we were given is that one person has a problem and then solves it in 2 minutes max. We also were not allowed to move the camera (pan/tilt/dolly) or zoom.

For example, one thing I shot was a girl at a miniature golf course who wanted to play, but had no money. The owner rubbed his fingers together to indicate he wanted money, and she pulled out her pockets to show they were empty. So, she gave the owner a wink and kissed him. He paused for a second, and then shook his head with a disgusted look. She then took out her car keys and gave them to him. He agrees and then gives her a club and ball and she runs out to the course happily and hits a hole-in-one, as he drives away in her car. It was really lame, but story wasn't as critical as getting the class to understand what was happening visually.

We also had to have at least one creative shot. It could be anything. For example, when the girl hits the ball, I cut to a shot from within the hole, seeing the ball fall into the lens. Did this by painting a light, hollow plastic golf ball the same color as the real ball. I then used a Pringles can with cardboard taped around the opening. Stuck the can over the CP-16's lens (old-school 16mm film camera) and turned it so it was facing up. Rolled the ball into the can and into the lens as I shot at a high frame rate. Looked very convincing. My teacher made me explain the shot in detail because everyone, including the teacher, thought I had actually dropped a real golf ball onto the lens.

So, think of simple problem-solving sequences and film them. Don't worry about it being some masterpiece. You first need to learn to think visually. Then, learn composition, lighting, and motion.

And if you really want to test your visual storytelling, try shooting the same sequence, but only use a still camera and limit yourself to maybe 9 frames.

Hope this helps.
Click to expand...




This sounds good...I will remember this. One question, did you ask the girl and the golf clerk to do these things, or is this something you actually witnessed and just happened to be at the right place with your camera?



thanks for everyone's reply so far!
 
Failure is the best teacher.

With failure comes necessity, with necessity comes ingenuity, with ingenuity comes brilliance.

Literally just made that up, sounds inspiring though, right?
 
SojiRo said:
This sounds good...I will remember this. One question, did you ask the girl and the golf clerk to do these things, or is this something you actually witnessed and just happened to be at the right place with your camera?
Click to expand...
This was a scripted shoot, so I had arranged the actors (actually my older sister and her husband) to play these roles. He was the manager of the golf course, so I was able to arrange to shoot this early one morning before they opened.

Even with simple shoots like this, you learn valuable lessons about everything from scheduling actors, location scouting, staging and blocking, and how to use equipment like the camera, a light meter, and reflectors. Set out to learn to just thing with each shoot and you'll be amazed at how much you'll learn.
 
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?t=34182

Every script that's in the thread above is open to anyone to shoot. Plus, this might be a cool way for you to get settled into our online community.

Each one of these shorts would be one very long day of shooting, perhaps two days.

In the meanwhile, you could do something really quick, this weekend. I come from the school of thought that your first short should be no more than one minute long. You're not so much focused on telling the best story ever told, with this first short, but just on learning the basics of filmmaking (rule of thirds, 30-degree rule, 180-degree rule, basic lighting, etc). My very first short film was about a couple dudes playing a game of rock-paper-scissors, over the last piece of pizza. It probably won't end up in the National Film Registry, but I learned a lot, making it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top