Quintessential Studios' Weblog

At the end of 2009, I felt kind of alone, in regards to filmmaking.  The people involved in the projects I’d been a part of, kind of went off to do their own things and I was left in a creative void.  In fact, it was quite a deep, empty void, for me personally.

I felt deep inside that it was my own fault that people were disbanding and I’d even had some harsh words to some.  I felt regret and remorse in my heart and, honestly, felt very near to ending it all.

That probably isn’t a very positive PR thing to admit, but I feel that maybe I should talk about it because there may be other people out there, who might be experiencing similar thoughts.

One particular day, as I was leaving school, almost with the intent to end it all, I decided to visit a friend. I figured I’d kind of get some things off of my chest and start to make my rounds, to tie off the loose ends, so to speak.  I also knew in the back of my mind that communication was always the key to solving problems, so it might help me out of my doldrums too.

I guess, luckily, he was home.  We talked about random things and eventually got around to how I wished I had had more filmmakers or people interested in filmmaking around, people who want to learn the things I wanted to learn and shared the same passion for it as I did.

We talked about successful groups that we had each been involved in, groups of all types, beer making groups, tropical fishkeeping groups, etc.  There were some things that each had in common.  Just having someone to listen to me, helped.  Talking about those groups, sparked something in me.  I decided to create a filmmaking enthusiasts group (and subsequently, to put my death plans on hold.)

Honestly, I didn’t care if it was just a bunch of people who wanted to get together once in a while and drink coffee and talk filmmaking.  The point was to have a group, some like-minded folks to be around, to build comradery.

I started to promote locally to see if I could garner any interest.

Jan 5th, I got six people to join me for coffee.  Everyone there was very interested in starting a group and felt that it was definitely a needed and worthwhile venture.

I decided to front up the money to put the group on Meetup.com and went to work promoting the hell out of the group.

Over the last eleven months, we’ve grown to over 300 registered members and a good average of 50 people in attendance to our monthly meetings.  We have over 30 sponsors and lots of support from various other groups and organizations.  I truly do plan to take this to an even higher level next year.

Our end of the year/one year anniversary meetup/”mini-expo”, while not as big as I’d planned, was quite a success overall.  It was held at the UC Riverside’s Barbara and Art Culver Center of the Arts.

We had presentations from Douglas E. Welch, Maxon Computer and Avid.  We gave away nearly $6,000 in prizes. Everyone seemed pleased.

If you are interested in joining IFIE, please sign up here: http://IFotIE.com

Quintessential Studios Action

Production wise, I’ve been still shooting B camera at LAFCPUG meetings, completed some marketing videos for a chiropractic marketing firm and some of their related services, covered a couple events, shooting stills and video and even did some shooting at a cousin’s wedding. (“I don’t do weddings”, BTW.)

I’ve helped produce/fund a couple of independent crowd-funded films: ‘Invasion of the Not Quite Dead’ and ‘Solomon Grundy’.

I’ve attended MANY industry expos and conferences and even was a technical adviser and cameraman for one (paid).

In October, I produced a live shoot for the band Pandemic Unleashed.  One of the videos can be seen here: http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=180094208668072&oid=197727010181

Educationally, I’ve completed three more college classes this year: Sound Recording in Media, Advanced Editing (FCP) and TV Studio Equipment.

In Summation

People can become depressed for many reasons.  That’s part of life.  It’s not a chemical deficiency.  It’s a lot of things.  The main thing that IS going to help them, though, is communication and understanding.  Be there for people and listen.  My friend saved my life and he doesn’t even know it.  I’ve decided to take the time to be interested in others and to help see them through to reaching their goals in life.  Actually, I’ve kind of always been that way.  I just wanted to point out that you do matter and we can help each other out, every day.  And, a little goes a long way.  So, thanks for being interested in what I do and say and I hope I am able to return the favor!

A premier expo for filmmaking is heading to the Southland this September, the Digital Video Expo.

The DV Expo (www.dvexpo.com) comes to the Pasadena Convention Center Sept. 28 – 30.

The expo is comprised of a conference and exhibits. The conference includes education, some free and some that costs extra. The exhibit hall is open to all and a free exhibit hall pass is currently available.

Free exhibit hall passes and early bird pricing is available now and up until Sept. 11th. There is a discount code for add-on conference events as well. Discount code to use for that is “IFIE”. That saves you $50 in addition to any other discounts.

Expos are a great way to learn about the current equipment that’s out there and what’s coming and a great way to try things out, hands on. Many times you are face to face with the heads of the companies, themselves. Suffice it to say, the people representing the products at the exhibit hall booths are highly knowledgeable and can answer any questions you may have.

Some free education and presentations that can be found there are lighting master classes, “The New Now — Surviving the Changing Business of Production” along with first Looks at Panasonic AG-3DA1 3D camcorder and Canon XF305 and XF300 camcorders.

There are also meetings of industry groups such as the Los Angeles Final Cut Pro Users Group, International Digital Media Alliance, Digital Cinema Society and the Los Angeles Post Production Group. These are great opportunities to meet and network with working professionals in the film and TV industries.

The Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire will be there checking out all the great exhibits and taking in many classes. So, it would be a great opportunity to network with some local filmmakers as well.

In addition to having many sponsors and a rapidly growing membership base, Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire (http://IFotIE.com) is now an official Adobe User Group, given the moniker Inland Empire Media Users Group on their groups site (http://inlandindiefilm.groups.adobe.com/).

Please join us there and our meetup group and help build a stronger support base.

We are also a Peachpit Publishing Partner and that means a great discount on Peachpit Press books!

As a part of NAB Show’s Broader-casting sessions was the panel “Big Idea, Small Budget: ‘Zombieland’s’ Production Innovations”, produced in association with Film Independent.

Digital technologies are providing filmmakers many more opportunities to create larger scale blockbusters on a much lower budget. Since we discuss digital filmmaking here on this blog, this panel was right up my alley!

Moderated by Josh Dickey, Deputy Editor of The Wrap, this panel was composed of Panelists:
Maher Ahmad, Production Designer, Zombieland
Michael Bonvillain, Cinematographer, Zombieland (not present)
Paul Linden, FX Supervisor, Zombieland
Ruben Fleischer, Director, Zombieland

To start off, the budget of this film was $21 million dollars. This is actually small for “Hollywood” films so consider that these cost-saving ideas are scalable and can apply equally to micro-budget, no-budget or mega-budget films.

There were basically four points that were covered with regard to “How exactly did you save money in production?”

Ruben Fleischer explained that he came from a low budget background (the first point) and from music video production and that producing Zombieland was a make-break moment for his career. The low budget background enabled him to approach the process with that type of mentality. Being given a hard cost budget to make his film, he had to juggle every cost involved along the way.

To Fleischer’s credit, he assembled a first-rate crew, industry veterans who not only had the experience to get the best quality but who also were smart enough to be able to work within a variety of budgets. This was an area in which he didn’t skimp on the budget. As Maher Ahmad added, “It can cost you a lot more in the end if you ‘try to save a few dollars’ on your management’s salaries”. He mentioned that some advice from his dad that helped him and that was to not be the “smartest” guy on the production and so he hired people “smarter” than him. He also said, “You have one job and that is to choose”. There are many choices brought to you by members of your team and you choose. You are the filter.

During the Q & A portion of the panel, he was asked how did you balance “letting the creative people alone to do their jobs, while still maintaining your own creative vision for the movie?” He said that part of the professionalism of the heads of his crew was the fact that they all worked within his creative vision for the film. Working with good people will help any production save money.

Tax incentives were another point where they saved money. It is not only important to find a suitable location but it could also be to your advantage to research what tax incentives are available in that certain state. This shouldn’t be the only deciding factor but it can be considered. Zombieland was shot in Atlanta, GA. Another sub-point here, a “smaller” community can really be excited for you to film in their area. Fleischer said that they were able to film in the mansion in the movie at a very low price for that very reason.

The two other points were kind of combined together in the presentation and those were “knowing the movie” and “preparation”. Preparation included, storyboards, previz, production design, VFX (which included 747-matte enhancements and digital squibs), greenscreen driving, shooting smart and quick and digital filmmaking.

Michael Bonvillain shot the movie in HD on the Genesis camera. The Genesis camera was good w/low light and there was a huge savings in having footage immediately vs. film development costs. Short comings were that the DIT tech does takes time and pulls away from the focus of the shot, discussing options but overall the shooting is faster. Also, blowups are great vs. film, not as grainy when blowing up a portion of the frame for a shot.

Paul Linden described the various VFX processes and the use of digital squibs vs. practical squibs. The decision was made pretty early on to go with digital blood spatter, not only because of the sometime misfiring of real squibs (blood packs that explode out), causing wasted time in retakes, but also that they could create any effect they wanted. They showed some examples of how they were put in and also how they could shoot, say some zombie getting their head smashed with a shovel or some other large object and that they could just shoot it with a shortened handle and VFX in the end of the implement and the resultant harm.

While some things seem extraordinarily expensive, like the giant indian statue in one scene cost $10,000 to make, they explained that that was cheaper than some other alternatives. (I don’t know about that but okay!)

Also, 150 smashed cars were used in the film. It’s cheaper to buy already smashed and crashed cars and move them around as you want them then it is to smash up good cars!

All in all, Ruben Fleischer was proud to announce that they came in $2,300 under budget!

A mention was made that with the newer, lower cost acquisition tools that are available to anyone these days, that there is no reason that these points can be applied to filmmaking at any budget.

This was the focus of another panel, I also attended, The Twenty-First Century Camera Crew and How it Works. I will discuss that session in my next post.

Good morning all. Today, will be my first day on the convention floor at NAB, starting with the keynote address which will feature a NAB Distinguished Service Award presentation to Michael J. Fox. (Pretty excited to see that!)

Already, I’ve been (last night) to the Adobe hotel suite where Adobe met with their re-sellers and showed them some of the new features in CS5 (VERY cool stuff to be announced publicly today, that’s all I say for now). I’ve also meet with about 30 people who will be at the MotionMedia Ball later tonight at an impromptu gathering at the Yard House. At that event, I had an interesting talk with both an attendee of the REDucation and a beta tester for the upcoming Media Composer 5 by Avid. (All I can say about that is that I want to get the new Avid now.)

So, with Avid and Adobe going full guns into making editing better and better, I’ve just got to say that at this point, Apple’s Final Cut Pro is looking like it’s just going to be a prosumer app in no time. We’ll see how the shootout goes at FCPUG Network’s Supermeet Tuesday night!

BTW, they still need a camera and shooter for the live stream of the SuperMeet. Hit me up on Twitter if you have a tripod and camera that can stream SD via firewire and want free admission and raffle tickets for Supermeet!

Antony “AD” Lane has employed a truly 21st century method in fuding his latest project, Invasion of the Not Quite Dead.  He is using Twitter and Paypal.

Since May 2009, Lane has been on Twitter everyday promoting and pleading for people to help produce his film.

So far, he has raised over £19,005 (approx $29,000) from 550 “pre-order producers” from 19 countries.  His goal is to raise £100,000

Lane has employed a levels approach, where different levels of donations will get you a higher level of producer package.

There are packages as small as £10, a “Download Producer” and up to a £1000.00 “Profit Share Producer”.

According to his website, http://www.theindywoodproject.com, “The project has received an incredible amount of press which has included a BBC FOUR documentary, the front cover of REVENANT MAGAZINE, horror sites FANGORIA & DREAD CENTRAL & in May 2010 the teaser promo will be opening a star studded HIGH PROFILE event at hte LONDON IMAX.”

Top names have signed on to the project including, actors FRANK JAKEMAN (Breathe), LESLIE SIMPSON (Dog Soldiers, The Descent, Doomsday), TERRY STONE (Doghouse, Rise Of The Footsoldier), VICTORIA BROOM (Umbrage, Dead Cert), AJAY NAYYAR (24, NCIS), JAMES FISHER (Umbrage, Zombie Diaries) and the OFFICIAL LARA CROFT model Alison Carrol.

Perks of the different producer levels include signed BLU Rays, posters, t-shirts, spots in the film, producer credit on the film and digital photo zombie makeovers.

Lane can be found on http://Twitter.com/indywoodFILMS.

Currently Lane is running a 25% off producers packages promotion (offer ends April 12) to get the number of producers up.  Also by mentioning “Eric Harnden” in the notes of one’s paypal payment, it’s possible can help yours truly rise in producer status through the refer a friend special!

See http://www.theindywoodproject.com/promotion2/ for more details and to see the pre-trailer for the movie.

I’m blogging for http://www.inlandsocal.com/iguide/movies/ now, under their sub-heading “Inland SoCal Filmmakers”.

Here is the blog that was published Feb 22, 2010 from http://www.inlandsocal.com/iguide/movies/content/your_films/stories/movies0222dslr.1428f70a0.html

DSLR Videography Is Taking the Main Stage

by Eric Harnden

In April, I was on the Digital Production Buzz talking about finding deals when building your studio. I wrote up more about that here:http://wordpress.quintessentialstudios.net/?p=86

From that post I said, “A little more on knowledge: Overall knowledge of your subject can always be improved, and for me, I spend a lot of time going to expos (like Createasphere, DV Expo and NAB*); Seminars, Meetups and User group meetings (like LAFCPUG**) and I most always learn something new. In fact, I was surprised that I knew more about the Silicon Images’s SI-2K camera*** than a Moviola camera rental rep…. All because I had just seen it demoed and talked about at another event…. Of course he knew a LOT more about EVERY other camera out there and a TON about compression and data rates of the different cameras and, so, I did learn things from him.”

Last week, I went to an Orange County Meetup given by the MCAI-OC (Media Communications Association International Orange County). It was called “ALL About DSLR (Digital Single-Lens Reflex) Videography” and I learned all about the hot new Canon cameras that are now being used to shoot video, not just for home fun but for commercial video and movies. It was a very comprehensive event covering pre-production, production and post. Canon reps were there and Rob Terry showed how he used them to shoot 40 commercial spots in two days for the Kellogg garden company! While I have read and watched a lot of videos on the web of what’s being done with these cameras, I didn’t know the actual workflows of them. This is mainly because I am not shooting with them yet and so haven’t delved into them that much.

The tide is rising, though, on their impact upon the indie film world and I figured it was about time to dive a little deeper into this wave!

The very next day, I attended the Createasphere Entertainment Technology Expo in Universal City and one of the main events was the Canon Intensive Workshop, where, you guessed it, they covered the exploding market and uses of these new cameras. These cameras are being used to shoot movies now. George Lucas is using them right now at Skywalker Ranch for some shots in his upcoming feature, Red Tails.

If that wasn’t enough, I decided to take part in “From the Camera to the Web – Your Files and What to Do With Them” and “Sound – An Audio Primer for DSLR and Small Crew Productions” not really realizing they were both part of the “DSLR Video Track”. And so, I ended up learning more than I ever wanted to know about DSLRs and working with them.

During these two days of intensive DSLR videography training, I meet some great people who said they would be willing to trek on down to the IE and give the Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire presentations. So, stay tuned for an announcement about that.

Meanwhile, I picked up a bunch of free magazines to give out at our next meetup. Another benefit from expos, lots of free swag!

Speaking of which, I am in talks with DV Expo who are going to offer the IFIE’s free and discounted passes to their September 2010 show in Pasadena, CA.

____

*NAB, National Association of Broadcasters. They put on an annual week-long expo  in Las Vegas every April.

**LAFCPUG, Los Angeles Final Cut Users Group. Meets every 4th Wednesday of the month in Hollywood.

***The camera used to film Slumdog Millionaire.

The Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire meets every 3rd Wednesday of the month. Click here for more information.

Jag35.com makes 35mm adapters for digital cameras.

With the advent of digital cameras, one issue has been, “they’re too good!”  In other words, everything in the viewfinder or frame is in focus.

Depth of Field Example - Logan Parks

There is a quality to film and film cameras where things at a certain distance are in focus and other things at other distances are out of focus.  That band of in-focus area is called the “depth of field”.  It can be narrow or wide.

Most digital video cameras have a very wide depth of field. This means that most everything you are seeing in the shot is in focus.

With a narrow depth of field, you can concentrate the viewers attention on what you want in the frame.  Some independent filmmakers cheat by zooming all the way in, which narrows the depth of field, and actually moving the camera back and forth to pull off a movie-like effect.

Other digital filmmakers go a step further and use a DOF adapter or 35mm adapter.  This is a device that allows you to mount lenses from still cameras to your video camera.  This allows you to adjust the focal plane to whatever subject you like within the video picture.  These adapters can be very costly, some cost more than the cameras themselves.  Jag35.com a local manufacturer in Rancho Cucamonga, has created a line of inexpensive 35mm adapters to help the budget-minded filmmaker.

Jag35 will be demonstrating the use of 35mm adapters and other helpful products at the March 17th meeting of the Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire.

Details of the meeting can be found here: http://www.meetup.com/Independent-Filmmakers-of-the-Inland-Empire-Meetup-Group/

Wednesday’s meeting of the Independent Filmmakers of the Inland Empire was a real treat and the response was an exciting surprise. There were approximately forty people in attendance, a huge jump from the eight that came to the first meeting.

Since the group is new, the reasons for these first meetings were to 1) establish the group, 2) introduce filmmaking enthusiasts to one another and 3) start to organize the group and structure of the meetings. I’ve found with related past activities, like when I ran a 48 hour film project team, that it takes a number of meetings before things find their groove.

Because one of the main purposes of the group is to help filmmakers, we surveyed the group to see what they expected from coming to these meetings, how they would like the meetings to run and what they wanted to see at future meetings.

Having gone to numerous successful film related and other types of enthusiast group meetings, I am patterning the basic structure of the “IFIE” meetings after those. Taking from the desires of the group, we will be holding a structured format agenda with announcements, education, presentations, show and tells, networking time and raffles.

Filmmaking is a dynamic process and I fully expect these meetings to have a dynamic life to them but one thing’s for certain, there are a lot of independent filmmakers and related crew, talent and artists here in the Inland Empire and we are here to help them do what they what to do, create films.

Because of the overwhelming response and anticipated growth of the group, we are looking for a bigger venue in which to hold our monthly meetings.

To find out about more about the group or when and where the next meetings will take place, please visit: http://www.meetup.com/Independent-Filmmakers-of-the-Inland-Empire-Meetup-Group/

Next meeting is scheduled for March 17th.

The Assassination at India Palace

OR

Well, The Food Was Pretty Good!

You think you're funny, Funny Man!

Pulling from my “education” of the Metro shoot, the plan was to have the writers all work together on a story for this next 2 Hour Film Project.

I even preselected a genre and sort-of story line for the writers to bring to this meeting. (Since they didn’t really get a chance to write the last time, I figured that I’d have them at least show me what they could come up with, given some time on their own.

Our production manager secured an Indian restaurant for this location and, since he’s connected, got the dinner thrown in. (Amazing how many more people showed up for this rehearsal!)

Everyone, and some new people I never met before and who didn’t even end up being on our 48 Hour Film Project, gathered around and I gave these specific instructions: “Okay, so I want everyone that is going to write to sit down together over dinner and come up with a story.”

Everyone got up to get their plates and proceeded to have dinner and to not work on a story at all!

Time was ticking away, as we didn’t have the place for that long and after dinner and after realizing that no one had done any writing at all, I put the writers together to come up with something.

At this point, it was becoming clear that everyone had had their own idea of what we were going to do and that chaos was going to reign supreme again.

The director went off to shoot some establishing shots he said he had in his head and most of us just milled around.

After some time, that same fussy actor from the last shot came to me to declare that the actor and partner “couldn’t stay long”. I said it was alright if they left. The trouble, it seems, stemmed from the fact that the idea they were working on, that actor was helping with the writing tonight as we were short one writer, who happened to take a wrong turn and got frustrated and decided to just go home!

Again, the director had his own idea for the story. And what we ended up shooting was a mix of the two ideas, I think….

Again, the 1st AD had his setup messed with by the production manager. (He didn’t like the lighting set up but didn’t realize that the 1st AD and the director and grip had already figured out that because of the glass entrance, the lights couldn’t be set up that way. Those guys being more passive-types, just opted to let the PM do his thing, as it wasn’t worth the fight.) It was just a practice run after all.

One of the ideas for the story was created by our PM. Everyone kind of went with that idea with a few twists. Our director is very good at taking some idea and putting a funny twist on it that appeals to more people. Our PM told us he used to be a stand-up comedian and so his character would be sort of funny. Uh, well, yeah, right…. Nevertheless, our director made a funny short out of it called Assassins Anonymous.

Laugh Clown Laugh!

We didn’t get close to the amount of footage and there were a lot of mad people at the end of the night!

After we wrapped, the first AD, the director and I met at my house. We talked long into the night about what worked, what didn’t, what we could do to improve things, etc, etc.

We seemed to iron things out fairly well. I had the feeling, that we’d be better off, if I got rid of some people, three in particular, but as fate would have it, I wouldn’t even have to raise a concern.

To be continued…

See the video: