hmmm I guess you could call this my cry for help.

[kampergodzilla]

This is a movie I did with my friends and well let's be honest right off the bat it's terrible. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF8pNYqYjAM However we still want to try and keep going with what we have and I've been given the task of having to write the next epidode that will hopefully take away from the awfulness of this one. Now you'l notice that the movie was well very poorly edited which I blame myself for that although I wasn't the editor I wasn't there to oversee the process and make sure it went smoothly and thus we had breaks in the audio and just bad editing alltogether. So if anyone has anyway of making this better please let me know. In my opinion our blooper reel was better than the actual film. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AefKxFbhdlM&feature=related
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Godzillas like a hurricane or tidal wave we must approach him as we would a force of nature we must understand him deal with him perhaps even try to communicate with him

[DanteCWB]

Okay, I think we talked about this before and I told you not to do it.

But you didn't listen. (shakes fist)

Like I said earlier, when making a Star Wars Fanfilm, you have to pretty much be awesome at this because the competition in the SW Fan Film department is very stiff, and you're not ready to compete.

Firstly, what program are you edting on?

Digital zooms in post are generally a no-no. Just let the camera zoom. If you're not satisfied with the shot first time around, do it over. On shoots, I've seen takes go into the twenties.

Try taking more than one shot of each line. In editing, it gives you more room to edit when you have mutilple shots of the same thing going on. For practice, try shooting a conversation at a table and get a shot of the whole table with everyone in it, and then get a medium shot and a close up of each person. Then edit it together.

Your sound problem is an issue. And without proper programs, microphones, and other equipment, it's very difficult to get good sound. Sound is the bane of handicam filmmaking, hence why Sorta was as silent as possible.

As far as your story is concerned, you should probably abandon the whole Star Wars idea. Modify the story so that it doesn't involve Jedi, and just have it be a reference to Jedi. Call them something else since no one's in a robe, no one has lightsabers, and no one's really using the force. And if you plan to use these things in the future, then find a way to work these kind of things into the new storyline without ripping off the Jedi. What you have is fairly independant of the Jedi, I wouldn't have guessed they were Jedi if you hadn't mentioned they were Jedi.

Scripting needs some work. Try and convey the story in a way that's a little more solid. Show, don't tell. Since your sound is crappy due to things outside of your control, trying making something that's mostly silent. If you need some dialogue, then go for it. But do some test shots with the sound to familiarize yourself with the mic that you have.

If you roll with this, you should be able to produce a pretty good film, and you'll have something cool to show off.
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Clayton Bennett - Project Sorta

[kampergodzilla]

I agreed with pretty much everything you said there thanks we were planing on useing lightsabers but we may call them something diffrent and possibly shape the actual blade diffrently and almost turn them into schimmys (if thats even a correct term idk). As far as the editing goes I have to ask my friend about the editing program and the zoom shots. Most likely we're going to put all our major speaking scenes inside or in a small space where we could attempt to muffle the sounds of wind and things. Luckily last time I looked on youtube the first video had very few views so I actualy am going to push to delete that video completly and start off new
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Godzillas like a hurricane or tidal wave we must approach him as we would a force of nature we must understand him deal with him perhaps even try to communicate with him

[DanteCWB]

Wind is the bane of filmmaking. I can't even use my $300 mic outside until I spend more money on a windshield for the mic (which costs even more than the mic).

Shooting indoors would be better. Try making some more laid back films before you shoot into the effects world. My first major effect film in post involved a girl that teleported across the room sometimes. Basically I just shot indoors and had some fancy tricks in editing that made it look like there was a teleport. No effects other than a woosh sound effect, other than that, it was just how I arranged the shots.

Starting off new would be a good way to go about. I still say you should do some editing practice first before you try to tackle an actual story. I've been doing some editing stuff for practice instead of making narritive based films right now. Treat the table idea that I mentioned as an assignment and see what you get out of it. 90% of editing is just screwing around and acting on instinct. The more footage you have to screw around with, the more instincts you have to act on. Go for it and see what happens.
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Clayton Bennett - Project Sorta

[kampergodzilla]

Yeah I'm ging to contact the person who does my editing so we can do that. The fact that the camera that we are using looks and performs like it was built by a 12 year old is deffinatly a problem but it's all we can afford we've actualy talked about just doing a short chase film on the streets of Chicago (and hope not to get arrested or worse) just to hone our camera skills. We may just film some random fight scenes as well and probably figure out on just one camera person or at least a main one.
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Godzillas like a hurricane or tidal wave we must approach him as we would a force of nature we must understand him deal with him perhaps even try to communicate with him

[DanteCWB]

Before you go streaking down the streets of Chicago in a high speed chase scene, get to know editing of simple scenes first. Do the table thing I talked about and then graduate to fight scenes. If you don't know what you're doing while filming a combat scene, you can get seriously hurt.

Also, risking arrest isn't that awesome of a thing to do either. I'm bending some laws while filming a documentary right now. True Guerrilla Filmmaking while running around in stores and stuff. I wouldn't advise it. I almost got kicked out of Publix, got bitched at by an assistant principal at a school, and got some shady looks on a playground.

(The documentary is about a 7 yr old with mental and physical disabilities)

So, getting in trouble can be really nasty when a camera is involved. Beware. Start with some smaller projects before you go nuts with the fancy camerawork. Get down the simple stuff, experiment with it, get some ideas, then work on the tough stuff.
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Clayton Bennett - Project Sorta