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Amateur film?
kathos
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I want to get into some indie film making... but I don't really know how to get started. I have some crappy cameras and stuff, but I want to get that professional movie feel (image).
Also some movie editing software (to add in stuff like half assed explosions and HUDs).
Also some movie editing software (to add in stuff like half assed explosions and HUDs).
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It can be half achieved using expensive software or alternatively, heavy color correcting on a software that can handle that (I'm thinking adobe premiere pro, Final Cut Pro. There may be more but those are the ones I am experienced with.) Ultimately, you won't get it to look like film, because you're not shooting film. You're shooting mini-DV. And mini-DV will never look as good as film ever.
HD can come close, but not quite yet. Give HD a couple more years, when the file sizes get smaller and the compression a little less, and who knows.
But HD is still very expensive.
Since I'm assuming you are working with mini-dv, then as I said the answer is no. However, you can make your DV a lot better by using the principles of good ligthing. A photographer or a cinematographer can help you more with that, but google some 3-point ligthing to start with. Buy yourself a couple of cheap car reflectors (those things that you put on your windshield to reflect the light away from the car) and practice, practice, practice until you graps the fundamentals of lighting.
Learning how to light properly will probably make your movie 90% better looking than anything else.
I'd still reccomend mini-DV just on its ease of use. Editing and shooting video is complicated enough as it is without adding any more variables.
I'll try to find it and get back to you
If it's cheap, then you should use what you have, you'll need to digitize your film for editing, and your best bet is to use Final Cut and a pretty powerful Mac when it comes to editing.
If you want to make a job out of it, then unless you have enough money to throw down on your own panavision camera, your best bet is to find someone who has one and learn to use it and then find jobs and get in a union.
But for just having fun and making a good looking project: lighting. Natural lighting looks like shit on film, and especially digital. So if you want to really make a good looking product you'll need to first buy some lighting kits, there are some florescent kits that are somewhat cheap and really good for general purpose, and if you want to do out door lighting you'll need things like flags, silks and reflectors.
To learn all of this stuff you really need to do it. Watch a lot of movies, pick out what you like and try to duplicate it. This is for editing and lighting, and watch what you make, and just keep doing this until you get something you're happy with and keep building up your skill sets.
this will help cut down on initial costs tremendously.
so do you recommend Final Cut Pro over anything else?
i've been thinking about checking out Premiere, after learning my laptop was incapable (shoulda bought a macbook pro!) of running Final Cut Pro. i'm mostly in this for learning how to edit.
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MiniDV can look as good as film, it depends on the camera being used. There is a difference between a Canon XL1 and a Canon ZR500, despite both of them being on MiniDV. Don't be fooled by the format itself, MiniDV has the capacity to look as good as film.
That being said, HD is not that expensive, relatively.
Despite what Munacra says, HD is and does look as good as film. Plain and simple. There's actually a number of studio films out on the market now that were filmed entirely on digital, and there's no difference between them and a conventional film camera. As far as presentation is concerned, there is no difference.
Vote for my film! (watching it is also an option)
wii friend code: 7623 9955 2119 1775
Vote for my film! (watching it is also an option)
wii friend code: 7623 9955 2119 1775
I've only worked with a beta of Premiere, but we all of us who used it pretty much agreed it was like someone wrapped all the good features of Final Cut Pro in barbed wire.
Final Cut Pro is really scalable to the level of skill you have so it's good for all levels of editors you can also use it a slower machine(how slow i'm not sure) and all you'll have problems with is render times.
On the HD vs film, as wombat says HD can look just as good as film but it can be more demanding when it comes to lighting. And the industry is still setup to use film and will be for quite a while so if you do want a job you certainly aren't shooting yourself in the foot learning how to use film at this stage but for just making your own projects digital, either Mini-DV or some form of HD, is the best value.
Most people who shoot things just for fun just get friends to be in it, and the friends overact and generally just look like "a guy who happened to be in the film." You can spend thousands of dollars on cameras, developing sets, costumes, etc., but if your cast is shit, your film will be shit.
As far as lighting for Mini-Dv goes it's biggest Achilles heel is a lack of range. White's blow out really easily and black can get alot of digital noise. It can look great if lit carefully. Reflectors work nicely to even out light. Buy a piece of white foam core from an art supply store and put tin foil on one side. You can use the tin foil side for harsh reflections and the white side for even ones. For basic lighting those clamp on bulb ones are really cheap and easy to use.
Also if you don't want it to sound like ass you're going to have to invest in a decent external mic.
as far as computer based editing goes, you have many many choices, from open source stuff
http://www.jahshaka.org/
to high end avid systems.
the best bang for buck, turn key system for pro-ish stuff is probably going to be the adobe motion graphics collection. premeire, after effects, photoshop, audition. works on any platform (so you aren;t stuck with a mac). older editions of premiere were pretty flaky. the new version is supposed to be very good. after effects, you'd need no matter what (or combustion, or shake on a mac). same with photoshop. so if you get the bundle, you have everything right there. that will run around $1500-2000. final cut is around 1k, but you still need to buy photoshop and a compositor/effects suite. oh, and a mac.
you might be able to get by with one of the smaller avid systems. avid xpress pro is $300 for the student edition.
i just really didn;t like final cut when i used it. and anyone who says you can only edit on a mac is lying or trying to sell you a mac.
as for cameras, keep an eye out for a 3ccd digital. people are starting to upgrade to hd and dumping their sd stuff. canon xl-1s are going sub 1k in the used market. you can maybe find a beta cam. (i still have not seen a prosumer digital cam that does higher quality than those old things). beta is a whole mess of other stuff tho, and is still, 10+ years later, waaaaaay expensive.
but either way, motion graphics and video are not cheap. while you save money on film, you make up for it in hardware. better computers, better/bigger storage, ram, video cards (fireGL or quadros), software, mics, etc.
and if you want to emulate film, double all those costs. and be prepared to dump alot of cash into an hd cam. you can sorta do it by dropping your frame rates to 24fps, and some good color grading/filters.
if any of the above confuses you, you have alot of research to do. start reading cgtalk.
my opinion, your milage may vary, etc etc.
When you see a store selling an "HD Camera" chances are about 100% it's HDV. Honestly HDV isn't all that great and the issues can be a real headache. You're probably better off getting a good DV camera and investing the cash you save on a good tripod, lights and a good mic.
Other HD formats are more professional and MUCH more expensive. An HDCAM camera can easily run 150 thousand dollars. There's others but don't even worry about them they're well beyond even most pro's hands.
Man, mini-dv can not look as good as film. Does mini-dv look as good as HD? Because there is practically no difference visually between HD and film. So what you're saying is that mini-dv looks the same as HD, and that is totally wrong.
First: latitude. I mean that's one of the key reasons why DP's don't like to shoot with DV. In video if you expose for the highlights I bet you anything you won't get good information on the dark areas, and viceversa. Go ahead and test it out if you want to.
I think HD can come close to looking to film, but the file sizes, the expense and the hassle is not worth it.
As nexuscrawler said, the prosumer version of HD is HDV. And that is not cinema quality HD. Cinema quality HD cameras can go to the 100k+ mark. Add that to the cost of storing the files and the computer that you will need to put the footage together, and so I don't know what not expensive relative to what means.
a prosumer HDV camera, yeah that you can work with. But have you ever tried loading that crap in Final Cut or Premiere? Issues up the ass.
Learning how to light a scene is still the best thing you can do to make it look good. Even mini-DV. A nice chinese lantern from Ikea, and some reflectors are the cheapest and best way to go around making a movie look better.
Vote for my film! (watching it is also an option)
wii friend code: 7623 9955 2119 1775
8mm is basically a dead format so it's not even worth discussing.
And good sound.
If you don't have this, it ain't gonna matter if you have a 40000 dollar camera, it will still be shit
Film usually follows the opposite approach where maintaining shadow detail is your bigger challenge.