Shotlisting

[lotrf3]

I was shotlisting for my first short film the other day, when I ran into a question. There's one scene where my character walks up and down the stairs, and then up and down again. I have this all covered in the same setup. But, since it's different actions at different times, I listed them as four different shots on my shotlist; 6D, 6F, 6V, 6Z. Since it's only one setup, should I list it only as 6D? Or is it just a matter of personal preference? Will my DP want each shot to be a different setup? I have a few other scenes with the same issue.

Also, Scene 6 has more than 26 shots, so I've had to number things 6AA, etc. Is this an insane number of shots for a scene, or fairly common?

 

[PaulGriffith]

Personal preference really. I'd probably do them different shots but next to each other because it's different action. 6D is where he stumbles, 6E is where he jumps two steps or whatever.

And yeah, 26 shots might be a lot. How long is the scene? I usually break a scene into two scenes even when in the same location back-to-bac if it's requiring that many setups.

 

[Gonzo_Entertainment]

Personal preference, but I'd list them as different shots, but of course shoot them back to back.

To get to AA it would have to be a hella long scene or have a crazy amount of coverage.

 

[knightly]

The question is... are the shots you're separating the same angle, framing and a continued action? If so, they're the same shot.

 

[2001 Productions]

To get to AA it would have to be a hella long scene or have a crazy amount of coverage.

It happens, though, especially with action sequences. The climactic scene in CRIMPS had more than thirty setups, all for one continuous sequence. Many of those lasted only about 2 seconds onscreen.

 

[lotrf3]

knightly - same angle and framing, exact same setup, but different action (the first time up and down the stairs is separated by about 2 minutes of screentime from the second time up and down the stairs; not exactly continuous)

Currently my shotlisting is fairly chronological. If I keep them separate shots, should I reorder it to be 6D, 6E, 6F, and 6G? Should my shotlist reflect the shooting order?

PaulGriffith - There is really no clear breaking point to separate it into two scenes.

It's not an extremely long scene, there's just a lot of movement and a lot of inserts to the several props in the scene. I could do more one-shots to cover the movement, but I want to stay away from handheld for stylistic reasons.

 

[Cracker Funk]

Doesn't matter, dude. Call it whatever the hell you wanna call it.

I would give each different shot a new shot #, but whatever...

Just stay organized, that's really all that matters here.

 

[LasVegasIRA]

I want to expand on this question.

When I made the shot lists for my last two films, I made up a 3 column spread sheet listing the shot number in column 1, an action description of the shot in column 2, and the actual shot description (close up, medium shot, etc..) in column 3.

I then color coded each shot to show which actor(s) (and in one case, if a car) would be in the shot.

So even though the shots were listed chronologically, I was able to use this system to keep things organized while I shot my footage out of order, knowing that I was going to have limited time with some actors and the car.

I did it this way because I had no frame of reference. I had never even seen a shot list before.

So my question is, does anyone have advice on the proper way to format a shot list? Or does this system seem like it would work for a larger scaled production?

 

[knightly]

I just finished an assembly edit of our latest 30 minute short... the scenes that were meticulously shotlisted and recorded took minutes to assemble... the ones that ended up not following the shot list are taking weeks to craft. It's more work now, but later it'll save you time to just be able to drop shots 1,2,3,4,5,6 in order on the timeline, checkboard some dialog and move to the next scene.

 

[PaulGriffith]

@LasVegasIRA - a shot list is different from a shooting schedule. Sometimes they're the same, but most of the time take the shots from your shot list and rearrange them for your shooting schedule so you go from top to bottom.

On bigger shoots, we always use an AD to keep us moving along. He has the schedule, and while the director is focusing on the shot right now, the AD is working with available cast and crew prepping the next shot so it all goes a lot faster. Anyone can look at the schedule and know what the next setup is and think about what their department needs to do for it.

 

[knightly]

We use an AD on smaller shoots too... have to keep moving forward and that requires someone with an eye on the clock and a schedule no matter how rough to keep us from spinning our wheels. Whip cracker extrordinaire, none of my past shoots would have been as successful without our ADs (Andrew Rose, Manna Simula, Erin Vork).