cinematography That good ol' cloning effect, but with camera movement?

S

sblair

I'm working on a short film at the moment in which an office worker travels back in time, earlier in the day to have a conversation with himself.

I have all the other shots sorted nicely, containing lots of camera movement so would really like to keep this going through the shots where the actor is talking to himself. However, it is for a school project and one of the requirements is that no greenscreen/compositing software is used, I did manage talk my tutor into letting us use garbage mattes. I also won't be able to shoot at a higher resolution and then scale and fake the movement in post (i.3 shoot at 1080, and drop it into a 720 comp then keyframe position/wiggle etc.) as the final product has to be in 1080p.

Anyone got any ideas on how I could clone my actor while still keeping the same style as the previous shots?
 
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The easiest solution would be having a look-alike stand-in. Obviously this method has its drawbacks, but it would allow you to give the illusion of the actor talking to himself. You'd just be limited in how you shoot, only showing one face at a time.
 
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Thanks for the speedy response, the stand-in is my fall back option, but I was really hoping that there would be a way to have both faces in shot and be able to move freely around the scene. I was wondering perhaps about locking a tripod off on a dolly, tracking in filming one half of the scene, and then keeping tripod locked off, repeat the same track for the other half of the conversation...?
 
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No compositing needed..

Use Look alike and only shoot Over The Shoulder Shots to have a conversation between the two... the look alike only needs to "look alike" from behind, much easier. This way move the cam all you want..
 
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Theoretically, and bear with me for a moment, what about filming the first half of the conversation with the track in, then leaving the camera exactly where it is, have the actor perform the other half of the conversation. Then all that would be required would be to scale the second shot at the same speed as the original track, but I was wondering if the fake track would fit with the real track, or would it not line up because one is being scaled and one is being tracked?
 
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If I were working under these rules, I think I would start the sequence with a static split-screen, so that the audience could see that these are clearly the same person, no look-alikes.

THEN, I would cut to an over-the-shoulder dolly-shot, to get that camera-movement that you're looking for, while obscuring the identity of our look-alike double.

By the way, you don't want every single shot to have motion, do you? Mix it up. Static shots are good, too.
 
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I have no experience doing this whatsoever so take my advice for what its worth. I'd practice blocking till the actors/camera operators want to kill you. After you crush their mutiny I'd film your scene with a stand in I'd then film the same scene again with greenscreen and switch spots of the cloned actor/stand in. IN post I would then key out the green screen and crop out the stand-ins. Thats only for shots with movement though. I'm lazy so I'd just use stationary shots for everything and lock the camera down.
 
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