Cinematography - Week 8

04/04/2019

Ash talked to me about the content of last week's blog: He told me that I am not required to film the showreel over the term break and that he found my location scouting progress promising and said to consult with SIT Facilities concerning filming at G Block on Tay Street, use a location release form template that is in the Y drive (for them to sign off), and to mention his name to vouch for me. 
Ash also told me that I don't have to do colour correction or grading on Resolve, which I don't mind using, I like using Resolve, and having been learning from using it.

Instead of this week's class being a drop in for us, it was decided that we will learn cinematography from Patrick this morning and start to plan and organise production for a short film written by James (he's someone from SIT Productions downstairs).
Patrick walked us through some very technical ground concerning cameras and lenses.
Ash came back for the afternoon of this class after the lunch break.

Class notes

Psychology of camera is the aim of today's class

What is cinematic
Something that looks amazing, you can film, express with a camera, doesn't look out of place, and is good looking or visually striking.

• 24fps 
• Anarmorphic 
• 2:35:1 (Letterbox) 
• D.O.F. (Depth Of Field) 
• Lighting
• performance.

During Patrick's time at the New Zealand Broadcasting School in Christchurch during the 1990's. the standard format was SVHS (analogue video)

Cinematography is about adding layers of meaning

The specifications for television broadcast during the 1990's at the NZBS was 576i50 4:3. At that time, Patrick experimented using Letterbox with those specifications, but you get a narrow and hard to see compressed image

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaHIFAZ8fz8

In the 2000's, television started a new aesthetic, potentially influenced by Michael Bay films.

Patrick's perception on what is cinematic during his time at the NZBS was long lenses, crane shots, and shallow depth of field

Shooting for coverage - Shoot as many basic (if not all) camera shots as possible and decide later in post-production on what is best. Peter Jackson uses this method, but we don't seem to have the time to do this. It's a good template if you forget what to shoot and is also referred to as the 'Sausage Factory Template'.

Patrick applied the 'Sausage Factory Template' for when filming 'Huhu Attack'. I also applied this method during my time doing videography in Timaru and Christchurch.

Shooting for coverage

MCU (dirty or clean)

WS (Master)

CUs of objects of significance

What is cinematic is not only what we do see, but what we don't see in frame.

Low angles empowers the subject and dominance, whereas high angles diminishes the subject and produces less dominance

MCU with 28 mm lenses will bring out more facial features and the background more.

The focus is not completely on the subject and it makes the frame personal.

I think Taika Waititi uses this to make it personal in his film, but who know if he uses only 28 mm to achieve this.

Filming a MCU with 85 mm - 120 mm lenses makes you more observant

27 mm - 32 mm are lenses that the Cohen Brothers tend to use in their films. They use wide lenses to exaggerate the face and combine long shots and close ups, both are which in terms of cinematography are genre trademarks in comedy and drama, particularly when depicting tragedy in drama.

David Fincher is a tripod filmmaker. He hates using handheld camera shots, so limits handheld in his films and primarily applies camera shots and angles on a tripod. He keeps his shots stationary, but is getting more subtle as he gets older and more wiser.
He only has one very brief use of handheld in The Social Network.

Conversations aren't cinematic, but drama is. 

It's made me wonder - What is the difference between drama and conversations in film? How to make conversations engaging and cinematic?

50 mm lenses are the closest equivalent to the human eye.

A mistake that filmmakers in the past 15 years have made is that they move the camera for no reason

Camera movement

Handheld - tension, unpredictable, unsettling, dynamic

Static / locked off - calm, stable, broading, unsettling, monotonous (boring)

Dolly / Push in - reaction, heighten action, moments of importance, realization / revelations, something is dawning on the character

Dolly / Pull out - failure / despair, isolation, hopelessness, location reveal, closure / resolution, deflating tension

Crane up - big obstacle for the character

Crane down - Audience dropped down to a new world

Zolly combines zoom and dolly. I believe I have seen it in Jaws.

Perspective in narrative terms is how the character is processing the events that they witnessed.

Subjective POV - you are following a person's journey through the film. It needs to be visually reinforced when used and requires you to make a decision as to whose story this is.

Objective POV - omniscient / God's eye. You are looking at the action as an outsider. A term related to this type of point of view that adapted to film from theater is 'proscenium'.

Similarities between Malick films - Handheld, intimacy, wide lenses, orchestra-based music

Proximity to the protagonist is important and reinforces a subjective POV. You can reinforce this by placing the camera closer to the protagonist than others.

90 degree shutter angle - you see more detail and looks choppy. It's interesting how having less exposure than the conventional 180 degree shutter angle can show more visual detail.

It's good to look at genre conventions as a foundation. 

I believe what we are doing for the next couple of classes and the filming during the holiday break will be beneficial towards sorting out our showreel assessment

Identify the genre - period drama

Muted colours, warm lighting, bloom in flashback, 180 degree shutter speed, tripod, lenses generally longer than 50 mm, controlled camera movement, sparing use of camera movement, objective POV

The overall lesson this morning in Cinematography has been finding purpose in the framing we use.

Some films combines these archetypes together into one character

Protagonist - experiences the most profound change

Main character - person we follow (the most)

Hero - person we want to win.

We have to be assertive and decisive about the story before filming commences because we have limited time to spare

Subjective eyelines is a good thing to consider, in order to be engaging.

It's difficult to figure out camera techniques that will achieve what you want the audience to feel, but breaks genre conventions.

We were given a form to fill out to help us carefully consider stuff about the visual and artistic aspects of what we are going to film. I was pretty much stumped on filling out the form until he discussed about it as a class.

The significance of this scene (compared to others) is it being the Set Up

Costume places

• Musical Theater Invercargill
• Repertory Society
• Op shops (for contemporary civilian clothes)

James came into our class to see if we had any questions concerning the script he had written for us.

Hierarchy of knowledge is important in filmmaking and screenwriting. It tells us what each character knows and doesn't know.

I had an idea of having the flashback stylistically as choppy silent film (low frame rate). 
The point was valid, but could interfere with the overall style and can be something achieved in post-production instead.

You can be creative and gives illusions on kissing scenes to keep your actors happy and/or comfortable.

Don't ask an actor to do something you wouldn't do. Don't obligate them into doing stuff outside their comfort zone because it can halt the entire film production.

James informed us something about the story; the wife is actually a sex addict. Jack lies.

When a child actor is cast, you must follow labour laws and hire someone to chaperone and keep an eye on them.

Artistic planning (list of characters, props)
We as a class discussed and outlined the costumes, props, locations and shot list for filming this Victorian short film. There was a lot of debate with each shot for each scene in the shot list on how it should visually look.
I later recorded all the information we were planning and organising for the filming during the term break and I collated them together into a spreadsheet on Google Sheets.

I went briefly went back into colour correction / grading on Resolve. I applied the Eyedropper tool that samples the skin tone for colour balance / temperature and the result you get is seen in the images above. I further developed the colour correction and grading by playing around with the colour wheels and curves like I usually do. 
I then grabbed a still of the colour correction / grade and applied it to the next shot.

In a different shot, I applied the auto balance to see what difference it would make compared to using the Eyedropper Tool, and it was a very undesirable outcome - it was very overexposed as you can see in the image above.

05/04/2019

I continued on with finishing the colour correction of the footage taken the other weekend in the TV studio downstairs. I continued on with the very same process as I have done previously, which is to sample the skin tone for colour balance / temperature and ply around with the colour around until I'm satisfied with the image.

In the images above, you can see how this particular image has change before and after the colour correction with the same process as described before.

I was looking through the clip and saw in one instance where with the lighting and colour correction, the image looks really great! 
I had to use the Snipping Tool on the computer to get this snapshot because it wouldn't let me export a still on Resolve.

In the images above, you see more before and after colour corrections with the process I used on Resolve. Looking back on these colour corrections, the colouring reminds me of The Matrix.

That door on the right would be a good obstacle for the chase sequence. The obstacle trying to get in, but cannot because it's locked.

If I am able to film at this location, I would like the sequence to end at the other end as seen here

A good hiding spot for a character in my chase sequence

I would say that the Esk Street would ideally be the start of the chase sequence if filmed here.

I came across just by chance, another potential filming location for a chase sequence for my showreel. It's an alleyway and car park just off Esk Street. 
I took quite a few photos of the place and it will help me storyboard the sequence if it was to be filmed at this location. I wouldn't be surprised if there were ethical concerns to do with the public if filming in the car park.

Who knows, I could use all locations in mind for the chase sequence. I could storyboard the sequence if filming was limited to only one of the locations or storyboard the sequence with all potential filming locations combined.

I have been meaning to mention to Ash about my interest in filming those events he was talking about being at the local stadium, but I have been forgetting to bring it up and I forgot to go to the information meeting during the lunch break on Monday. However, I'm not sure I have the time to be be involved, but I have been interested.

 
Brainstorming biopics
The Walk (2015)

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013)

Trumbo (2015)

Bohemian Rhapsody (2018)

The Founder (2016)

Breathe (2017)

Soul Surfer (2011)

Brain on Fire (2016)

LBJ (2016)

An Angel at My Table (1990)

Rudy (1993)

Hoffa (1992)

Shadowlands (1993)

Ed Wood (1994)

Malcolm X (1992)

Shine (1996)

Catch Me If You Can (2002)

Ned Kelly (2003)

The World's Fastest Indian (2005)

The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)

Grace of Monaco

Big Eyes

The Imitation Game

Straight Outta Compton

10/04/2019

Been a tough day trying to get myself to make progress today for this paper. It's been absolutely pouring down and my socks and shoes got soaked from the rain, meaning I had to stay inside the flat for the day and it's not the best place for me to study. I'm prone to get more mental blocks here than on campus.

Over the past week, I had a video of my cinematography practice posted on Vimeo and shared on Facebook to see how other people think of it and because there are people that I know that are interested to see how I am progressing down here. I recieved 30+ views on Vimeo and numerous positive comments and reactions on Facebook, including my family in Timaru, Alexander Jones (the guy who runs the 48HOURS in Christchurch now), and Deborah Marshall (my photography tutor at Ara).


Interview idea for Showreel
I had been thinking about the interview I have to do for my showreel. I was thinking that perhaps I could get the local Labour List MP, Liz Craig as the interviewee. I know the MP quite well since I have been down here. It would be kind of convenient to film since her office is only around the corner from the Downtown campus. Although, the subject of interviewing is up for debate because the course outline has called it a 'personal' interview.

It may not work, but it's just a thought worth putting down


Observing biographical drama as a genre
As far as I'm concerned, the biographical drama genre is about an outsider or social outcast who wants to change the world or how we see the world because he or she has an innovative idea and overcome many obstacles to achieve it. Not all films in this subgenre is about that, it can also be an average person who stumbles onto something big or life-changing, or can be about an historical figure. To an extent, it can get quite heavy on the second act or 'The Complications'. 

Looking at the movie posters from the brainstorming session of examples of movies in this subgenre helped come up this view.


Not all films in this subgenre are also not limited to an American protagonist (although most in the brainstorming session are American), but there also those who are British (Freddie Mercury, Alan Turing, C.S. Lewis), Australian (Ned Kelly, David Helfgott), French (Philippe Petit), South African (Nelson Mandela), and New Zealander (Burt Munro, Janet Frame). The field where the protagonist thrives (or at least for a limited time) are not only confined to a single subject. It can be literature, music, politics, technology, sports, art, business, film, crime, health etc.


In addition, not all biographical drama are completely true or accurate whether it is because of artistic license or it's a fictional story that was inspired by the actions of a real person ('inspired by a true story').


I think Ash mentioned that no longer than 1 minute of a single clip from a movie is to be used in our video essay? I could be wrong.

All the following videos referenced were uploaded on YouTube in same month (February), but at different years. I reckon they were uploaded in that month leading up to the Oscars because biographical drama tend to have a high level of success with being nominated or winning Oscars.
 


The Audiopedia. (2018, February 15). What is biographical film? What does biographical film mean? biographical film meaning & explanation [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARQpee-QKWI

Biographical drama is a genre that dramatise the life or series of events based from an historical figure. 
The historical character is the protagonist and his real name is used. 
Films in this genre try to tell the real-life character's life story, if not depicting the most significant years of their life. 

This is true with Bohemian Rhaposdy going from the formation of Queen in 1970 to the Live Aid concert in 1985, instead of ending to Freddie Mercury's death in 1991 or starting the film off with his childhood in a linear style. 
Actions and characteristics by the protagonist tend to be publicly known or historically documented, but it can the most demanding roles for actors and actresses. 
Actors like Ben Kingsley, Jamie Foxx, and Rami Malek became more respected as actors from portraying real-life people in this film genre.

Biopics featuring a male or female protagonist are different to each other, especially female biopics where they have to overcome female victimisation. 
Some biopics stretch the truth and fictionise certain scenes, and casting biopics can be controversial since it's about comparing the actor's similarity, skill, and ability with the real-life character they would be portraying. 
Anthony Hopkins didn't have much faith in portraying Richard Nixon in Oliver Stone's Nixon (1995) because he felt there was very little resemblance between himself and the real Nixon.



Zoom. (2008, August 12). Genre of biopic films [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvsC7J2Y5dM

Biopics tend to be Oscars favourites



Raindance. (2017, February 3). Raindance Genre Class: Historical, Biopic and True Story [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFPHjLwUxvM

Biopics can attractive to audiences if they are done right because you already have a built-in audience who would you to go and see a biopic or are fans of the real-life character. The traps you fall into when applying this genre is that you can slip into other genres like crime (e.g. Goodfellas). It can be a misleading genre because of artistic license, but can also be a powerful genre



Patrick (H) Willems. (2019, February 16). Raindance Genre Class: Historical, Biopic and True Story [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3q3LEaK7_U

A video essay that has been made on biopics and makes it unique compared to other video essays is that it starts with a dramatic sequence related to the subject. However, this video essay focuses itself on biopics about real-life musicians. They do make points that are relevant to the biographical drama genre in general, not just music-related biopics. it' also implements an equal mixture of fact, analysis, and opinion.


Biographical drama is a genre that has been around since early cinema.


'...biography first became a 'prestige' item when Adolph Zukor presented Sarah Bernhardt as movie bait for middle-class audiences in 1912...'
- Dennis Bingham

There are biopics that are serious dramas where we see a famous actor go through a transformation into the real-life character like a chameleon, then there are also biopics that are about subjects already famous or known to general audiences and are told in a straightforward narrative style. 

There were multiple music biopics made in the 1940's and 1950's. However, the biographical drama genre as we know it today didn't come into existence until the 1970's. It eventually built up to a boom in this subgenre in the early 2000's.

A genre trend in biographical drama about musicians is that it's about a musician's journey from obscurity to fame.

The biographical drama genre is in its current state is stronger than ever and show no signs of slowing down.

How you approach making a film in this subgenre is critical and one thing to consider when creating a biographical drama is the question; What is the best way to tell the story of an amazing life?

It tells of the Hollywood formula used for music-related biopics

• It begins well into the protagonist's career, particularly moments before they perform at an iconic or significant concert of their career
• It jumps back to a traumatic, sad, or life-changing moment (e.g. tragedy, abandonment) in their childhood or early life.
• The moment of discovery - where we see the protagonist perform in public for the first time and surprises people hearing him or her talent for the first time and cynicism an skepticism is defeated
• From the moment of discovery, it jumps forwards to the protagonist performing in front of an adoring crowd of fans and get their first slice of fame, whether it is womanising, going on tour, or becoming a hit on the radio and can be complied into a montage scene.
• I would say there is also someone close to the musicians that try to produce tension between each other like Paul Prenter in Bohemian Rhapsody and Jerry in Straight Outta Compton
• The protagonist starts to take drugs or create friction with other characters close to them in order to innovate and develop their craft further.
• Montage of the repercussions of drug use or the collapse of relationships
• The Dark Period - They isolate themselves from others and are barely sober, and sometimes lead them to going to rehab
• After The Dark Period, they clean themselves up, reconcile with others, and make an impact on their career, and sometimes ends on a freeze frame
• Ends with text containing information about what happened in the rest of the protagonist's life.

I was hoping the video essay would reference that formula part in Bohemian Rhapsody because that's what it made me think when they were starting to lay out the Hollywood formula for music-related biopics.


A biopic has to end with some sort of victory.


The more significant events you fit into a biopic, the less time and attention each event receives


Drug addiction and family violence are common tropes in the biographic drama genre

A scene related to a song by the protagonist is fitted into the film just before the protagonist sings that song. 

The Hollywood formula for biopics have made people's complicated lives into cliches

It described biopics as 'cinematic Wikipedia articles'

Biopics are usually made with the approval or assistance of the subjects themselves or their estate, in doing so the film is fact-checked by people who knew the protagonist of the biopic and make sure it portrays a flattering image and legacy of the real-life character.

Walk Hard is a film that satirises and parodies the entire biographical drama genre

'The appeal of a biopic lies in seeing an actual person who did something interesting in life, known mostly in public, transformed into a character'.
- Dennis Bingham

This genre is successful because audiences want to see these particular real-life figures be brought to life on screen, despite the genre's predictability.