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watch Would you please critique my trailer...

G

gorillaonabike

https://vimeo.com/53637905 - password cb1300

If you have a minute, would you please all critique this trailer for a short I wrote (I'm also the editor). This is just a first little cut and I'd appreciate all your thoughts, please. We might want to shoot the short at some point - these are just a few little bits and pieces for a trailer and there is very little other footage.

It's been compressed in 720 for Vimeo.

I'd be very interested to know your thoughts and would appreciate knowing what you think / feel when you see this.
 
from what i saw,
your audio was all over the place. you should mix tracks within clips so that you can't hear the obvious cut.
your resolution is good quality, but the audio kills it, giving it an amateur feel.

oh and use more stabilization.
 
gorillaonabike said:
I'd be very interested to know your thoughts and would appreciate knowing what you think / feel when you see this.
Click to expand...
Ready for an honest opinion?

This is an excellent example showing that a great camera means
very little in the long run. It looks beautiful. Audio is terrible. It’s
exposed but not well lit. Such high definition shows why make up
is so important - it’s almost painful in the close ups.

As a trailer (technical aside) it needs to be tighter and faster. The
end credits don't look professional - I'm not sure they are needed.
 
directorik said:
Ready for an honest opinion?

This is an excellent example showing that a great camera means
very little in the long run. It looks beautiful. Audio is terrible. It’s
exposed but not well lit. Such high definition shows why make up
is so important - it’s almost painful in the close ups.

As a trailer (technical aside) it needs to be tighter and faster. The
end credits don't look professional - I'm not sure they are needed.
Click to expand...

Thanks, please keep it coming...

The story behind this 'short' is I wrote it but thought I'd bring in an outside, experienced director (he was doing it for free) to get it shot. Well, we sat down, agreed everything, wrote down what was agreed and then he didn't put in the preparation and wasn't interested in sound.

The result was a mess which is why I'm now stuck with trying to edit something together... i.e. a trailer so the talent can get a little something out of it for their showreel and so I can get something out of it to put it onto my website (going up in August 2014).

Don't get me wrong, I don't blame the director... he's a young guy who's talented and will be great in the future. Some young guys take a few years to figure out which way is up - I was one of them and I came good in the end. My fault for depending on the wrong person - I should've taken it off him and done it all myself.

So, for example, the reason for the long credits at the end is to cover footage which is less than good.

That's why I'm asking for a real critique so I can put something together which will be usable. And that's why I appreciate the brutality - to make it work, I need critiques which come from the heart so I appreciate all your comments and really appreciate everything everyone has written so far.
 
Last edited:
First of all never ever ever put something out unless you are happy with it, if you do not believe in it then how do you expect an audience to?. You mentioned the Director wasn't bothered about sound. As soon as you realised that they were not taking it seriously, you could of made sure they did or you should of made it your job to find someone or research what to do to get the best sound. There is no place in film making for blame shifting, ive seen it before with other film makers and it just comes across as lazy and amateurish. If you wanted to see this project through, you could organise a ADR session, and do a tighter cut.
good luck

Also, If you want to cut trailers, go and watch and study how they are cut together. I hope you don't think I am being unfair, you have a good idea.
 
gorillaonabike said:
I wrote it but thought I'd bring in an outside, experienced director (he was doing it for free) to get it shot. Well, we sat down, agreed everything, wrote down what was agreed and then he didn't put in the preparation and wasn't interested in sound.
Click to expand...

Then he's not a director or at least not a film director. Sound is an integral part of film, if he's not interested in sound, he can't be interested in directing films. It's like saying I want to be a pilot but I only want to fly a plane, I'm not going to pay any attention to navigation, radio telephony or aviation law. Not someone I'd ever want flying me around, even if they were doing it for free!

You asked me to be brutal. OK, the sound is a disaster! Almost everything which could be wrong, is wrong. I suppose I can't really say that the sound design itself is wrong, because there is no sound design! Having said all this, I have heard worse but not often and not by much. I won't go into the specifics of what's wrong because it would take hours and fill many pages and besides, I think you already have a pretty good idea of at least the basic fixes required. If it were me, I would dump whatever audio post has been done (if there has been any, it's hard to tell) and start again from scratch.

Sorry, you said be brutal, I could have put it more diplomatically but I would still have needed to say the same basic facts.

G
 
AudioPostExpert said:
Then he's not a director or at least not a film director. Sound is an integral part of film, if he's not interested in sound, he can't be interested in directing films. It's like saying I want to be a pilot but I only want to fly a plane, I'm not going to pay any attention to navigation, radio telephony or aviation law. Not someone I'd ever want flying me around, even if they were doing it for free!

You asked me to be brutal. OK, the sound is a disaster! Almost everything which could be wrong, is wrong. I suppose I can't really say that the sound design itself is wrong, because there is no sound design! Having said all this, I have heard worse but not often and not by much. I won't go into the specifics of what's wrong because it would take hours and fill many pages and besides, I think you already have a pretty good idea of at least the basic fixes required. If it were me, I would dump whatever audio post has been done (if there has been any, it's hard to tell) and start again from scratch.

Sorry, you said be brutal, I could have put it more diplomatically but I would still have needed to say the same basic facts.

G
Click to expand...

He is a film director. He has shot fully-funded films in a number of different countries. These have been state funded as he has applied for grant-driven products.

In terms of the sound, I will therefore need to go back to my friendly sound engineer. I don't think the sound's a disaster - not on the version I have. I think Vimeo has changed the design and there are plenty of artefacts in Vimeo which aren't in the version I have on my laptop.

However, I will go back to him to talk about it.
 
gorillaonabike said:
He is a film director. He has shot fully-funded films in a number of different countries. These have been state funded as he has applied for grant-driven products.
Click to expand...

We'll agree to disagree on this one. Film is the combination of visuals and sound, if he's only doing half the job then he's a visuals director, not a film director.

gorillaonabike said:
I don't think the sound's a disaster - not on the version I have. I think Vimeo has changed the design and there are plenty of artefacts in Vimeo which aren't in the version I have on my laptop.
Click to expand...

I think it's well worth you going back to the other thread and reading again what Alcove wrote, they were wise words. Before you can start thinking about sound design you need to be able to really hear, which is more difficult and time consuming than you would imagine. The other problem is that a laptop cannot reproduce the frequency range, dynamic range or resolution to which the ear is accustomed in real life. So a laptop is not a good place from which to judge the quality of your sound. Yes, youtube and vimeo can change the quality of the audio, especially if you don't know what your doing but the miriad of problems I heard were not caused by vimeo. You may not think the audio sounds a disaster but to me it sounds like the audio post hasn't even been started yet. I'm not sure how more disastrous it could be!

Sorry, I'm being harsh again, maybe you shouldn't have said I could be brutal! :)

G
 
Thank you to everyone who gave constructive criticism. In terms of sound, it is what it is and I am working around it. It wasn't captured properly but I am adding a few bits and pieces in post and simplifying.

I am also changing the nature of this.

And I can't wait until I shoot my next short in Feb / March and start to get it all onto my website.
 
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