Category: Projects

Alex

Max

Casey

Justin

Brian

Dante

Finishing Touches

We now have all the footage for the collaborative project.  I’ve completed a draft of it – you can check it out below.

I’m really pleased with how this project turned out.  Even without any color grading or correction done, the footage looks really good.  We can make it look even better, though.

Your final project is to color grade this piece.  You’ll find two versions of it in this Google Drive folder.

Shooting Schedule

Here’s the revised script for the collaborative project, with additional info about location, shoot date, actors, and the person in charge of each sequence.

Scene 1: Parking Lot
DP: Max
Location: TBD
Shoot Date: TBD
Actors: Casey, driver

Exterior, night – a foggy parking lot.  Cool light glints faintly off the hood of a car.  A shadowy figure – the courier – moves into frame and the headlights come on, throwing them into sharp silhouette.  The car’s window begins to roll down and the courier walks over to it.  A small object is passed out of the window.  The courier takes it and exits.

Same location – we see the handle of a door.  The courier pulls it open and enters a building.

Scene 2: Hallway
DP: Casey
Location: TBD
Shoot Date: March 30
Actors: Casey

The courier is now moving through a long, strange hallway.  As they near its end, the sound of music increases.

Scene 3: Club
DP: Alex and Casey
Location: Studio
Shoot Date: March 23
Actors: Casey, dancers

Interior, a club environment with brightly colored, flashing lights.  The courier enters the room and is surrounded by a small knot of people dancing.  The courier removes the an old bellows-style camera from their coat and fires off a shot.  The flashing lights – and people – disappear.  On the ground in front of the courier is a small orb of glowing purple light.  She picks it up and the world around her disappears.

Scene 4: Jungle
DP: Alex
Location: Greenhouse
Shoot Date: March 30
Actors: Casey

The courier is in a completely different environment, surrounded by lush greenery and enveloped in warm light.  She surveys the environment and take another shot.  The color around her drains away and another orb – now green – appears.  She takes it.

Scene 5: Virtual Environment
DP: Dante
Location: Studio
Shoot Date: March 23
Actors: Casey

The environment changes again.  The courier is now in a misty graveyard.  Once more, the courier surveys the environment, take a snapshot, and collects an orb, now cool blue.

Scene 6: Lair
DP: Brian
Location: Studio
Shoot Date: March 23 or April 6
Actors: Casey and Brian

Again, the environment changes.  The courier is in a dark room with long slashes of light falling across the wall.  They advance slowly.

Same location.  There is a figure seated at a desk, rimmed in light – the boss.  The courier advances towards the boss with the camera.  On cue, lights from the left and then the right appear, illuminating the boss.  They look up at the courier.

The boss: “Do you have it?”

The courier nods, sets the camera on the desk before the boss, and backs away.

Scene 7: Finale
DP: Justin
Location: Studio
Shoot Date: March 23 or April 6
Actors: Casey and Brian

The boss opens the back of the camera.  Light spills out from it.

Colored lights flash across the faces of the boss and courier.  The courier looks on nervously.  The boss smiles.  After a few moments of this, the boss lowers the lid again.

The room falls back into near darkness.  The boss looks up to the courier.

The boss: “Nice work.”

The courier nods, then turns and walks away.

THE DROP

Exterior, night – a foggy parking lot.  Cool light glints faintly off the hood of a car.  A shadowy figure – the courier – moves into frame and the headlights come on, throwing them into sharp silhouette.  The car’s window begins to roll down and the courier walks over to it.  A small object is passed out of the window.  The courier takes it and exits.

Same location – we see the handle of a door.  The courier pulls it open and enters a building.

The courier is now moving through a long, strange hallway.  As they near its end, the sound of music increases.

Interior, a club environment with brightly colored, flashing lights.  The courier enters the room and is surrounded by a small knot of people dancing.  The courier removes the an old bellows-style camera from their coat and fires off a shot.

The flashing lights – and people – disappear.  The courier is in a completely different environment, surrounded by lush greenery and enveloped in warm light.  They survey the environment and take another shot.

The environment changes again.  The courier is now in a misty graveyard.  They survey the environment again, and take another shot.

Again, the environment changes.  The courier is in a dark room with long slashes of light falling across the wall.  They advance slowly.

Same location.  There is a figure seated at a desk, rimmed in light – the boss.  The courier advances towards the boss with the camera.  On cue, lights from the left and then the right appear, illuminating the boss.  They look up at the courier.

The boss: “Do you have it?”

The courier nods, sets the camera on the desk before the boss, and backs away.

The boss opens the back of the camera.  Light spills out from it.

Colored lights flash across the faces of the boss and courier.  The courier looks on nervously.  The boss smiles.  After a few moments of this, the boss lowers the lid again.

The room falls back into near darkness.  The boss looks up to the courier.

The boss: “Nice work.”

The courier nods, then turns and walks away.

END

Group 1 – Max, Brian, Alex

Group 2 – Justin, Casey, Dante

Collaborative Lighting

Over the next two weeks, we’re going to be working on our mid-semester project.  Filmmaking is a collaborative process, so rather than assigning everyone an individual project, we’re going to work on this project as a group.  You will each be graded based on your creative input, your on-set skills and knowledge, and your ability to work as part of a team.

For this project, we’ll be filming a series of shots, each with a different lighting concept.  There should be continuity between the shots – such as a character exiting one side of the frame and entering the next shot from the opposite side – but they should have totally different lighting.  Our goal here is to showcase different lighting techniques and ultimately create a unified piece – a sort of showreel for the class.

Again, I want this to be collaborative, so we can work on the specifics of each shot and the overall narrative together.  There should be at least six setups; here are some things I would like to include:

• One green screen setup
• One setup using a complementary color scheme
• One setup with an analogous or monochromatic color scheme
• One setup using the fog machine
• One setup using cookies to cast deliberate shadows
• One setup with predominant back/edge lighting

Each of you will take the lead as cinematographer on one of the setups.  Once we decide together exactly what we’ll be filming, we can assign the different scenes.  On your setup, you are welcome to ask questions and get input from the rest of the group, but you’ll be making the final lighting decisions.

The goal is to finish this project during the class periods on March 2 and March 9 – if we absolutely need to, we can wrap things up after the break, though.

Here’s how you’ll be graded on this project:

25 points – overall look and effectiveness of the finished shot
25 points – knowledge and technique during your assigned setup
25 points – input and help on other setups
25 points – safety and correct equipment use
100 points total

Let’s work together, have fun, and make something cool!

Max

Casey

Dante

Justin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE1tqMUd4R8

Alex