PRACTICAL DV FILMMAKING

Practical DV FilmMaking

• Overview
• Inside video
• Films and how they work
• Pre-production
• Production tools
• Production aesthetics
• Post-production tools
• Post-production aesthetics
• Careers and distribution
• Mapping the industry
• Glossary of film and video terms

The filmmaking process

To begin with, it would be useful to get to grips with the process of making a film as a whole. What do these people actually do? Why does it take so long between thinking of the film and getting down to shooting it?

The whole project starts life as an idea, in your imagination or as a response. You may have a story you wish to tell or a theme you want to work with. Whatever it is, it starts in darkness, probably a collec­tion of images you see appearing in the film, played out in no real order in your mind's eye. Most direct­ors favour getting as much material on paper as you can at this stage to establish the detail of an idea. Others suggest more idiosyncratic approaches. Robert Rodriguez recommends you 'stare at a blank projection screen. See your film, watch it from start to finish.' Whatever your initial idea, it is crucial to get to know it at this early stage as clearly as possible. Even though you have only a broad outline of the project you do have the initial spark: the images, atmosphere or look of the film. It is this that you should try to pin down and keep, as it will become the main creative thrust of the project, seeing you through the obstacles and possible wrong turns to come.

Stage 1: Planning

The first stage of making a movie is centred on getting the film developed as much as possible before you start shooting. Substantial changes during shooting are expensive and disrupt continuity, or worse can result in a discordant and messy film. Good planning means that when you start shooting you go through a smoother process. You will encounter surprises and have to make changes here and there, but planning means you encounter more of the right sort of surprises and know how to solve the less wel­come ones. The aim is to let your ideas grow and develop to a point at which you know every aspect of the project better than anyone else. You know the relative significance of each part of the story, the kinds of motifs and ideas that are running through it, and the kind of atmosphere that is to dominate. In a sense, when you commit your ideas to paper you are taking them out of the comforting darkness of the imagination, where you don't notice the loose ends and rough structure of a film, and exposing them to light. Some aspects of your ideas survive, some don't, but it is better that the project changes now than later. Work on paper is cheap but work on film is expensive. An hour of scriptwriting can save you a day of shooting and a week of editing later in the process.