Ralph Bakshi on KickStarter

Last Days of Coney Island

I'm backing Ralph Bakshi and his new animated movie.

It's an animated cop, mafia, horror movie set in the 1960s in Coney Island, with political overtones both realistic and outrageous. Those are the description taken directly off of his KickStarter page.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ralphbakshi/last-days-of-coney-island-0

I grew up watching Bakshi's animated features "Wizards", Fire and Ice" and "Lord of the Rings.

I would love to see anything new that he is creating and here is a chance to do just that.

For some of you just reading this, this KickStarter campaign most likely will be over, but if you are getting this in time, PLEASE back his project. It will be over March 3rd. Give what little or great you can...it will be worth it.

EPISODE 7. NEW ANIMATION PROJECT

I'm back from a long hiatus. It's been a while since I've written in this blog, but I have some thoughts to put down after taking the long break.
I started this blog to write down what's on my mind concerning film making and anything related to film making. I have years of experience and just want to put down stuff that I know. I've tried my hands at almost everything with good to bad results and don't want to ever stop doing what my passion is. I'm a creative and being creative I find myself exploring all aspects of movie making from live action to cell animation. These are things that I can't keep out of my thoughts and thus I must play upon them and explore them. So...I'm about to move forward on another project with one of my oldest friends and that project is going to be a short animated series. We are going to do everything ourselves including self publish and promoting. The promotion being the hardest of it all being that you need to have connections and know how to get the word out there that you have something interesting to watch.

We are creating a scifi comedy cel animated webisode that we began writing this January 2013.  Not going into details just yet because we want to keep it on the lowdown until we are ready to reveal it, which of course is when we publish it. It will be tough since I am learning the software from scratch, but most of the pre-production work will be done in Photoshop and on paper. This is going to be fun! I will keep this blog updated and plug things in as we go along.

Here is a link to a cool independent project that was crowd sourced funded on KickStarter....
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/01/kickstarted-scifi-movie/?pid=2005&viewall=true
The actual movie will be at the bottom of the page. Be sure to watch it.

This one was done entirely by one person.
http://singularityhub.com/2013/01/17/the-democratization-of-filmmaking-riveting-sci-fi-short-film-rha-created-by-a-single-person/

Enjoy!

EPISODE 6: Visual effects on the cheap

My very first quasi professional job was working for Brick Price Movie Miniatures during my summer break visiting my dad who lived in LA when I was just 15 years old. I started out sweeping floors of the model shop and when I was done I was taught how to sculpt and make molds some of the projects going on in the shop. This was during the late 1970s and mind you everything was done practical. There was no CG and no digital post compositing. Everything was created to shoot in front of a film camera and then re-composited with on camera techniques. I was able to learn a lot of the tricks of the trade for that time period. Believe it or not some of those tricks still are effective today working with our nice HD video cameras and they are not that difficult to do. No digital compositing with After effects needed.
Miniature models and locked down cameras with matte paintings. Forced perspective shots and rubber latex prosthetic makeup. Puppets and black powder squibs. Lets not forget stop motion animation and Ray Harryhausen the king of visual effects. All of this was what I was raised in as a young artist in the film industry.
I just want to touch on the point,s but I will go into detail about these methods of film making later on in the blog.

EPISODE 5: The Rolling Shutter

The rolling shutter is an artifact you get from lower end throw away cameras that do not have a large CMOS chip.
This is due to the chip not scanning the image fast enough and part of the scan lag is carried over to the next frame. The effect It is very noticeable in fast action camera movement and tends to look like a jello effect on the image as it wobbles on the screen.
The only way to compensate for this is to limit fast action shots.
Better quality chips are starting to show up in cameras just under a $1000.00.
Most of these cameras are just shy of a thousand dollars. $700.00 on to around $2000.00. The equivalent of this ten years ago would cost you 30 grand.
These newer and better chips capture images clean and fast and tend to minimize rolling shutter problems, plus they have better light sensitivity and color depth. I'll place a link to my favorite low end camera, the
Canon EOS Rebel T3i which cost around $700.00 plus. The link below is very thorough showing comparisons and video samples.

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/T3I/T3IA.HTM

This camera will get you stunning HD video at 1080p with superb night time shooting with very little noise. There is a bit of manual handling to do such as using manual focus while filming since the auto focus tends to be a little slow to catch up and will be annoying.

This or any of the Canons EOS Rebel T3i's bigger bros are worth investing in.

There are other competitive cameras in the same price range and they all do a great job, but they all have features that you may or may not need for your type of production work. So you will need to research the features to find what works for you.

EPISODE 4: Disposable Cameras

I talked earlier about using HD 720p and 1080p cameras that cost just around $100.00 to $200.00 you can use to shoot a low budget production. This episode is dedicated to that subject.
I call them disposable because you will not be afraid to put them in extreme situations with the fear of destroying them. This means you can abuse them to your liking to get the job done.
The interesting thing about this subject is that you will spend more on accessories for mounting and recording than you will on a pair of cameras to shoot your production.
You can purchase two or three cameras for less than $400.00 and own them. Shooting a low budget film with two cameras is a lot easier and faster for scene setup and saves time capturing dialogue between two actors. The time saved in editing is valuable and the the use of one continuous soundtrack for both actors is nice too.

Below is a list of cameras that work well if used properly with some good forethought to how you are approaching your shooting. With good shot setup and post processing you can create a look that will be hard to discern from a pro camera.
Kodak playspot, Kodak Z18, JVC Picsio, Sony Bloggie, Panasonic HMTA1H and most aiptek digital camcorders.
Prices range from $70.00 to $195.00. Do a Google search on these to see video samples and reviews if you are interested to know more.

NOTE:
None of these cameras allow for additional lenses and may use different formats for video compression.

I embedded a youtube video from Youtuber Hairybearz who takes these fantastic environment shots with this $150.00 aiptek camera. It just shows you the possibility with this low coast technology.

And here is another for WarmWeatherGuy talking about $100.00 HDcamcorders.

Here is a link to a short film made with the iPhone4...
Apple of My Eye

Enjoy!

EPISODE 3: The new iPad

I have been a proud user of an Apple iPad since the iPad 2 came out. I now own the third generation iPad with the retna screen and 1080p video recording capability.
For the cost of just over $600.00 dollars you have a decent quality camera with built in editing software and Internet cloud connection and storage. With a little extra cost you can get accessories that allow you to mount the iPad on a tripod and add wide angle and telephoto lenses to the device. I'll link a YouTube video below.

In my opinion if you look at the iPad as a content creation device as well as a multi media machine the $600.00 plus dollars is worth the investment.

EPISODE 2: Cameras Cameras Everywhere

A question that is asked of me a lot these days is "what kind of camera do I need if I want to make a production?"
10 years ago I would have been very specific with this question and blurted out a few brands because there were not a lot of cameras to choose from and the digital technology that exist today wasn't around in its low cost user friendly guise.

Today with the on-vent of the internet and self publishing and free websites like YouTube and Vimeo and new ground breaking cheap $100.00 editing software, I had to change my evaluation on what can be used to make a production. There are so many choices of tech out there that it is a smorgasbord of devices to pick from and what works for your production depends on what you are doing. Low end Webisodes verses High end full HD productions. Etc.

Save money!
At the risk at getting the evil eye from my brethren the "pros" the amateur film maker does not need to spend $5000.00 dollar or more on a camera. If you have the right software tools for processing you can do a decent job on a $150.00 HD 720p or 1080p camera. The newer cameras in the blister packages on the shelf today have built in stabilizers and are easy to import into editing packages. iPad 3 with its good quality 1080p camera and editing software, you have a studio in one device. For the non stabilizing cameras, today's editing programs will stabilize, remove or add noise and grain to the image. Add special effects and transitions and you can begin to create.
The professionals will always complain about resolution, color depth or light sensitivity among many other elite settings you wont get with with cheap cameras. But today with the way content is being quantized (compressed) and viewed on multiple platforms, Image quality can be dealt with and accepted to a certain degree. With the use of proper lighting, editing applications and software filters, these visual artifacts and anomalies can be cleverly hidden and or resolved. Shooting your scenes in proper light will decrease noise and if you have to shoot at night, cover your scene with lights. It takes a bit more set up time, but with the cost difference, it will be worth it.
You can buy two or three of these low cost cameras and have a multi-camera shoot and then cut all your scenes the way you want and save time and money. Plus if you damage or drop a camera, you have a spare and you wont run around pulling your hair out screaming about the multi-thousand dollar piece of equipment you just dropped.

Yes, go out and buy that Canon EOS 5D Mark III. It's a technology marvel. If you have the money to spend... do it.  But don't let money be the issue here. Use what you can get your hands on and get good at it.

You may have to make a few bad movies before you learn how to make a good one, so don't let this stop you from trying. You can't learn unless you make a mistake and you can't make a mistake unless you try.

When all is said and done the real measure of it all comes down to story telling. If you have a good story and a good script and good actors to play out your script, the media you shoot on becomes secondary to what  it is delivered on. I find people are afraid to go and make a movie or a short film based solely on the fact that they think because there are so many people with cameras, everyone will want to make a movie and that the market will be saturated. The fact is, it doesn't matter how many people have cameras, not every one of them is going to be able to pull it off. Just because everyone has access to pencils and paintbrushes doesn't mean they can draw or paint. Believe me, people try. Sure, there is going to be a lot of crap that will be produced and we all know that it is out there, but with all the crap that is made, there are a few diamonds that shine and make the whole movie watching experience worth it.

Just remember, tell a good story and you will captivate your audience.