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New Short Film, "Distance" Ready to be Viewed!

Artofilm

Artofilm

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 12, 2005
579
41
Hey everyone.

I would just like to let everyone know that I just finished a shortfilm.

It was made more as a "warm up" film for a longer short film to be in production this coming spring season.

Either way, I think it turned out great. Take a look!

http://www.inblacklight.com/indiefilmdistance.html

The equipment used was a Canon GL2, manfrotto fig rig, homemade dolly, homemade crane, R0DE microphone, and some good old fashioned bounce boards.
 
Proof that if you don't use an iPod, it'll kill you!

Seriously, nice first effort. Some of the scenes are a tad long, having already established that portion of the story (Riding, riding, riding... riding some more. Running, running, running... running some more.). The end was majorly telegraphed; but I don't know how much that could've been avoided, as every shot post encounter went to that end.

I thought the transitions between handheld & mounted were a little disconcerting. Either the crane/dolly shots were too smooth, or the handhelds were too jittery, but in combination it was a bit much. There's some homebuilt steadicam rigs out there that would have helped a lot to keep the transition less jarring.

Overall, about a third of it could be edited out without losing any of its impact, and actually make it more effective, not giving the audience the extra time to ponder the upcoming "gotcha."

All in all, I liked it. I'm interested to see where it fits in a longer script. (Beginning? End?)
 
Thanks for the advice, BTW what did you mean by "telegraphed"?

Sorry if you misunderstood.

The script has not intent of fitting into a longer script or the like. What I meant was that this script was written so I could use it as a warm up so we didnt go shooting a 15min. short film and run into some problems that could be avoided.

Truth to be told, this is my first short film in about 3 years. So I wanted to give myself a starting point. I have another script written as well, but I really want it to shine in production, so I didnt want to mess it up being the first film shot in the last 3 years.

I was contemplating re-editing Distance.

Everyone, give me some ideas where to do some cuts, lets see what we can subtract.
 
Very nice! camera work etc in some areas isn't great but i love the idea and was pulled off in the end! :D
 
Thank you very much,

I know exactly what you mean about some areas arent that great. Some parts, for some some reason are, "rougher", than others.

I personally think the ending (about the last minute and a half) is the best part out of all of it.

Well, I am doing a re-edit of the film either way, so far I've knocked off about 1 minute of footage out of a 5 minute movie:eek:
Ive really gotta touch up on my editing!

Thanks for the reply!
 
i really liked it.

i'm addicted to those kinds of endings! great job, i really didn't see it coming.

either way... i think the camera angles were excellent. kept the chase really intriguing.
 
Hey all, thanks for all the replies.

So I've re-edited Distance mostly, I've managed to remove approx 1:30 out of about 5:00. The film without credits is now 3:44, it used to be almost 5:00.

I think it shows off the story more, and makes it quicker and more "intense", it's still not perfect, but I like it more.

Take a look!

http://inblacklight.com/indiefilmdistance.html
 
Just watched it (didn't see the first edit) but that is really good. I'm glad I took the time to watch it and thanks for posting.

Obviously some areas didn't come out too well but you didn't want to actually kill someone in the making.

Edit: 3 out of 5 is pretty powerful. Really struck the message home in a way that the similar ads on the TV don't.
 
Just watched it (didn't see the first edit) but that is really good. I'm glad I took the time to watch it and thanks for posting.

Obviously some areas didn't come out too well but you didn't want to actually kill someone in the making.

Edit: 3 out of 5 is pretty powerful. Really struck the message home in a way that the similar ads on the TV don't.
Click to expand...

Thanks for posting,

Funny that you mentioned 3 out of 5, it was made for a MADD film competition. I just got a call the other day telling me that 3 out of 5 won 1st place. Its pretty cool!
 
Thanks for the replies everyone,
Remeber, don't be afraid to give out any pointers or anything like that!

Thanks again:D
 
Nice work. I watched both the first cut and then the paired down one. The second edit moved the story along much smoother. Can't even recall which shots were cut, so nice work there. Also looked and sounded great. Beautiful colors, simple but effective special effect look (red flashes), and good use of static to take us into the music player's earpiece (as if we were listening with the rider).

Some constructive criticism... As the rider crosses the yellow line, he holds his hands up to his face, then a quick cut shows his hands back on the handle bars as he turns the bike away. It's a jump cut. As this is your most critical plot point, I think it needed to flow better. Either he puts his hands back on the bars, you introduce us to the red flash special effect, or some other visual cue that foreshadows the ending without giving it away. That jump cut just bothered me. Also, the lady in white led him into the forest. Why the forest and not back to the road? If she's leading him somewhere, it should be relevant to the rest of the story. The middle of the woods didn't seem to have much of a signifigance other than it was the middle of the woods. And lastly, when the lady at the very end is over the downed biker, she doesn't have the blood on her hands like the lady in white did. It could have been very effective to make the lady over the rider match exactlly to the lady in white (smudged eyeshadow from crying and the bloody hand). We never see the end lady's eyes or bloody hands to really bring home that this is the lady in white.

These are just MHO's so please only take them at that. I really enjoyed the movie as a whole, just wanted to give you some notes to think about. Good luck with your next project.:)
 
Nice work. I watched both the first cut and then the paired down one. The second edit moved the story along much smoother. Can't even recall which shots were cut, so nice work there. Also looked and sounded great. Beautiful colors, simple but effective special effect look (red flashes), and good use of static to take us into the music player's earpiece (as if we were listening with the rider).

Some constructive criticism... As the rider crosses the yellow line, he holds his hands up to his face, then a quick cut shows his hands back on the handle bars as he turns the bike away. It's a jump cut. As this is your most critical plot point, I think it needed to flow better. Either he puts his hands back on the bars, you introduce us to the red flash special effect, or some other visual cue that foreshadows the ending without giving it away. That jump cut just bothered me. Also, the lady in white led him into the forest. Why the forest and not back to the road? If she's leading him somewhere, it should be relevant to the rest of the story. The middle of the woods didn't seem to have much of a signifigance other than it was the middle of the woods. And lastly, when the lady at the very end is over the downed biker, she doesn't have the blood on her hands like the lady in white did. It could have been very effective to make the lady over the rider match exactlly to the lady in white (smudged eyeshadow from crying and the bloody hand). We never see the end lady's eyes or bloody hands to really bring home that this is the lady in white.

These are just MHO's so please only take them at that. I really enjoyed the movie as a whole, just wanted to give you some notes to think about. Good luck with your next project.
Click to expand...

I like your ideas.

Especially the one about the jump cut from the biking scene. I never really thought about that.

About the scene with the woman, I rally do know what you mean. Once we were done schooting that scene, I went home to upload it and then I put it in sequence and thought, I really need a closeup of the womans face looking at the blood or something.

Its something I missed that I really shouldn't have and it definately would have added to the film. Maybe one of the other takes will have her looking at her hands. I did direct her to look at her hands, but she told me that she got carried away in the story, which is fine, but maybe it did matter more than I thought it did.

thanks alot!:D
 
So I did some touch ups following some of the latest ideas on this site.
Once I did those changes I also noticed that one of the sequences the were fine in the old edit, was now too long.

I shortened it up and I think everything flows more evenly now.
Take a look, let me know what you think!

http://www.inblacklight.com/indiefilmdistance.html
 
Nice work! Throwing the effects in at the "wreck" and at the end to see the bloody hands hands really helped keep me, as a viewer, stay in the story. Well done!
 
Nice work! Throwing the effects in at the "wreck" and at the end to see the bloody hands hands really helped keep me, as a viewer, stay in the story. Well done!
Click to expand...

Once you had told me before about the fact that you had trouble with not seeing her hands/face, I knew I had to do something about it. I had other people wonder the same things you did.

I went through my raw tape footage and I found a take that I didnt use that had the part where she looked at her hands. Some luck getting that.

I think it's looking very good now, amazing at how much footage I can edit out and get a far better experience in the end!
 
Artofilm said:
Once you had told me before about the fact that you had trouble with not seeing her hands/face, I knew I had to do something about it. I had other people wonder the same things you did.

I went through my raw tape footage and I found a take that I didnt use that had the part where she looked at her hands. Some luck getting that.

I think it's looking very good now, amazing at how much footage I can edit out and get a far better experience in the end!
Click to expand...

yeah it's definitely looking even better now.. nice job.
 
Fantastic!

this story reminds me of one of the short films in "Tube Tales", Charles McDougall's "Steal Away"


Anyway, good piece of work!
 
Thank you very much everyone!

I have also added a new review box on my website where you can write your own reviews/comments/questions. Give it a try, write up your reviews on the films now!

I also will be working on a music video in the next month or so, so stay tuned for notice of that.
 
Not bad. The whole he was really dead the whole time, though, is becoming tired. :) Just saw a student film by a guy who's going to be directing a future soon and he used the same device. You can always see it coming from a mile away, and once you sense it, you're not really interested any more.
 
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