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watch The Survivor's Guide to Roman Fires

I ended up splitting it in halves and posting it on YouTube, so you can now see it there (just in case an 89mb download didn't entice you). Tough choice to make, but worth it.

UPDATE: So... YouTube messed up the audio sync on both parts. You'd think with free content hosting... oh yeah. Well if Revver decides to take the bait, then I'll post that. Till then, I'm investigating a codec that my webserver can stream.

UPDATEx2: Got it down to 39.5 megs, streaming from my http server. I don't imagine you guys can knock out my 250gigs of bandwidth, can ya? ;)

(PS - it won't hurt my feelings if you do)
 
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I pulled down the 89MB file. Who doesn't have broadband these days? I'll watch it after my wife gets done with Big Brother.
 
If anybody has given it a look, even just a "yay" or "nay" would be greatly appreciated. This is my first scripted narrative, so I'd really love some thoughts.
~ Paul
 
liked it, thought it could use some color correction, looked washed out on my screen...blacks weren't all the way to black. I enjoyed the concept and thought the flow worked pretty well. Editing was good, acting was a bit flat, but not so much as I'd expect first time out. I'd liked to have seen more grit in the hiding and militia escape toward the end...maybe a less clean trench coat on the fanatic gun toting madman would have been enough.

I never quite felt the peril of the border threat...perhaps because I live in MN and the southern connected border is a continent away from me...they were travelling to canada which would be about a 5 hour drive from here. I didn't seem to have a sense of place for the whole thing country wise.
 
I like post apocolyptic stories (one of my favorites is still Kevin Costner's The Postman even though it didn't get very good reviews). Some are just too far fetched (e.g. Day After Tomorrow) or too stupid like Escape from L.A.. Your story was plausible and it moved, so it held my interest. I've seen several shorts that didn't hold my interest enough to make it through five minutes, so at nearly twenty minutes you did well. Some of the scenes looked a bit overexposed and didn't mesh well with others (see knightly's color correction comment), and I would've liked to see more 'sexy' in the bedroom. And you succeeded in illiciting emotions because about the third time psycho dude said STFU I would have tackled his ass and beat the crap out of him. :lol: All of the technical details can get corrected in post or in future projects, but good story sense is hard to fix if you don't have it. You have it. This is why I asked about the script(s) in the other thread.
 
Awesome, thanks for the comments.
The color quality was tricky, and here was my reasoning: LCDs wash out the color, and the fat old-school monitors (CRT? can't remember now) do not. So at one point I made the decision to err on the side of bright for the cathode-ray guys, not the LCDs. Now, I think I regret that. Also, on the last scene, I overexposed and washed it out on purpose. It was supposed to be shot in winter, to be very dark and ugly, and shooting got delayed till beautiful happy springtime (hear those chirping birds? d'oh!). I decided to use the bright light to the point of agitation. Make it feel hot. Did it work?
Acting: yeah, that will improve. We needed more rehearsal, I needed to take a larger hand with my actors, and I definitely shouldn't have been in it. There were many times I was setting up the frame, and then walking into it and pressing record on the remote. Seriously. The only times I wasn't working the camera was when I was in frame, and it moved. Acting, directing, shooting, it was too much for me so performances suffered. Lesson learned.
That's an excellent point on the trench-coat being clean, something that I didn't consider much. A lot could have been added to his character if he looked like he just belly-crawled out of a dog-house. Good thought.
No sense of location -- that was on purpose, to make it a kind of "anywhere and everywhere." Maybe I should have made specifics to make the threat more real.
Vince -- I really appreciate those comments about story sense. My history has been in acting on the stage, so telling a good story was always my top priority. Coming out of this, I realize how much the technical and the storytelling are one and the same. I look forward to my next project to explore the technical more.
Which drafts of the script do you want to see? I'm happy to show them.
~ Paul
 
I think the technical and the artistic are completely separate, but related...and if one fails, the other will too.
 
Mm, perhaps our definitions are different, or maybe not. This is what I meant:
The dramatic - acting, script, costume, location, etc - is entirely dependent on how it is presented - shots, edits, lighting, etc. It's just like a novel. The camera is the voiceless narrator. What point of view is presented? What information is revealed, and when? Is this a bright, open character, or a dark, concealed and shadowed character?
We're in this business to tell stories. That is foremost in my mind when I approach a project now. (I'm speaking also largely of stage.) Certain aspects can be more compelling than others, but the whole is the story, and every little piece should add to that whole. Likewise, the story feeds those choices. If you keep that in mind, you have a wealth of artistic input feeding itself, each aspect feeding another.
At least, that's my mind now. I'll see how the philosophy feeds me on my current project ;)
~ Paul
 
nope, we see it exactly the same way...both halves of the craft combine to make magic, either of them not in synch with the story breaks the magic bubble and disconnects the suspenders of disbelief.
 
knightly said:
nope, we see it exactly the same way...both halves of the craft combine to make magic, either of them not in synch with the story breaks the magic bubble and disconnects the suspenders of disbelief.
Click to expand...

Yes, the technical execution did hurt my suspension of disbelief because everything was still clean, the grass was mowed - life looked normal. You had to really listen to understand the magnitude of the peril. I'm very much a "show me, don't tell me" person. But, with someone starting out, I can forgive technical flaws on an interesting story, but I absolutely hate bad story masked by good technical execution and eye candy (e.g. Starship Troopers). I've watched short films that were essentially child-like chalk drawings that held my interest because they had a good story behind them. This is why I am focusing so much on telling a story first and foremost before shooting a single foot of video. Yes, I am studying the technical side in parallel, but I wrote the script first and continue to revise it throughout the process.

Paul, I'd be interested in seeing the first script and the last draft. vturner@houston.rr.com. Thanks!

Incidentally, I disgree that the camera is "voiceless". How you shoot something is just as important as what you shoot, IMO. Cinema is vastly different from stage for this reason - you can focus the audience much more accurately and effectively. On stage, you have to talk a lot becuse you can't show as much. With film, you can show so much you don't have to talk a lot.
 
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Nice!

I thought the story was interesting, I thought that you took a chance in shooting it in broad daylight. An interesting decision.

--spinner :cool:
 
Ah yes, I agree that the camera has a powerful will. I meant literally voiceless, but the figurative voice is as loud as, if not louder than, the characters.

I agree technically; it's a medium of show before tell. Man if I had a crew and the money, I would have done it too. My ambitions outrun my means ;). I was actually the only dedicated crew on the technical side - my cameraman was only present about a fifth of the time (if even!). So, next time, gadget. Next time.

I'll send those scripts over tomorrow. I really appreciate the interest!
~ Paul
 
CrazyFrazee said:
I was actually the only dedicated crew on the technical side - my cameraman was only present about a fifth of the time (if even!)
Click to expand...

I sympathize so heavily, it's frustrating to be the most dedicated guy on set...I am happy now I've found a couple of folks who are as into this as me finally...I actually have people calling me telling me about projects now rather than having to pull everything together myself!
 
I've never had any aspirations to send this to festivals, but seeing the slamdance apps... do you think there'd be a point? I kind of think I should just wait for my next, more honed product, but it couldn't hurt, right?
~ Paul
 
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