Season 6 Episode 4: Framing the Vision - Finding the Best Shots on a Budget - Low-Budget Rebels: An Indie Filmmaking Conversation with Josh Stifter

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2 (00:14):
Low Budget Rebels god Cast.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Low
Budget Rebels podcast. I'm your host, Josh Stipter, and this
week I am talking about a subject that's very important
to me, filmmaking. As much as we talk about the
audio and the performances and everything else, filmmaking is very
much for a lot of us filmmakers about the visuals
and finding a way to create a shot that is

(00:47):
beautiful to us, something that the audience will look at
and say, oh, I like that visually, I'm interested in
what I'm seeing, or oh that visual scares me. Visuals
are a key component to making the movie that we
want to make and expressing ourselves properly. On Rebel Without
a Crew, the reality show I was on, I was

(01:07):
the only filmmaker who didn't bring along a cinematographer, and
that goes to show you how important the visuals are
and the technical element of getting those visuals. It's not
easy to get the perfect shot for your movie. It's
not easy to tell the story you want to tell

(01:28):
in a visual way that makes sense, and having someone
behind the camera can be a key component to making
the movie that you see in your head. Getting someone
else's vision in someone else's eyes as part of the process,
as the means of you discovering what you're trying to
say and having that collaboration with someone is incredibly important.

(01:51):
And while some of us love to run the camera
ourselves and see it through our own eyes, it's important
to all of us to find a way to expe
rests those visuals. On this week's episode, that's what we're
talking about, how to get that shot, how to block it,
how to set it up, how to prepare yourself to
get that shot. And my first guest Alex Kwan, the

(02:13):
director of Failure and Forgiveness, both films that have very
few takes. Failure is essentially a single take movie, and
in Failure, Alex has set up this world where visually
we're being taken from shot to shot and moment to
moment visually and we have to almost forget that we're

(02:36):
changing angles, that we're changing shots. This is like a
technique that Steven Spielberg used for the first time the
first time I saw this technique used. Obviously, it's been
used before Steven Spielberg. But there's the scene in Jaws
early on where they're walking around talking about what's happened,
the potential danger, and getting on a raft and floating around,

(02:57):
and it's all done in this single take that moves
from close up to close up to wide and bounces around.
And when I saw that as a kid, I realized
early on that you're shot. The audience is a voyeur
into the moment, seeing what the camera person wants us

(03:20):
to see and what the director wants us to see,
and being able to properly find where that camera should
be placed, how it should be set up, in a
way that properly utilizes the lighting around you and isn't distractive,
or maybe it is distractive. One of my biggest pet
peeves in filmmaking is when people believe that you should

(03:41):
get completely lost in the moment and lost in the movie,
and well, that's true. Sometimes the easiest way to get
lost in a movie is when the visual isn't flawless.
Sometimes the flaws are what pull us in, it's what
makes us enjoy the movie. The improper lighting or the
improper angle, or the crazy Angle, Sam Raimi, The King

(04:03):
of the Wild Dutch or the extreme zoom moments that
our eyes would visually never do, but our brain connects
with them in a way that it engages me. It
makes me want to continue watching. It reminds me that
I'm watching a movie, and that reminder keeps me interested.

(04:25):
So I think that and some of the filmmakers listening
to this, some of the people listen to this, You're like,
I hate those kind of movies. I want a movie
that's simple. I want a movie that is beautifully shot
and perfectly crafted so that I completely engage and forget
that I'm watching a movie. We all have different tastes
and we all try to find it. But I talked
to Alex in this episode kind of about that.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
How do you.

Speaker 3 (04:48):
Find a way to engage the audience and keep the
camera in motion and block it when you are doing
something so incredibly difficult as a single take movie. What
is the process for blocking a long take like this?
How do you go about doing it?

Speaker 4 (05:08):
So the way I've been, like, you know, working for
the last ten years with shorts and Forgiveness and now Failure,
which was an eighty seven minute long take, is that
I do floor plans myself. I like to go to location,
started location, shoot it with my iPhone, so I know
the whole thing entire That.

Speaker 3 (05:27):
Advice right there is the goal. That's every movie I've had.
But the key thing is shooting it with my iPhone,
going home and looking at it and being like, oh, yeah,
I see it now.

Speaker 4 (05:38):
Yeah absolutely, because you have to study your your space
right and where you're going to move your actors, your
camera and see how big is it? Like the challenge
is so you gotta I know it. You know that
might sound like, oh, that's not directing. Yes it is,
because you have to really make sure everybody will be
able to do what you want. So I do the

(05:59):
floor plans. Then I go to a location I don't know,
like thirty times, like I went to that house man
like so many times I shot.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
So did you find that house? I don't like not
find it? But what what made you choose that specific location?
Was there a reason that you were drawn to that
and were you you say you went to like thirty times,
what gave you the.

Speaker 4 (06:19):
Access to it that much? So basically like that house
one of the producers of the film has shot there before.
They did a commercial or a music video, I don't remember.
So he became friends with the owner and I was like, hey, like,
I mean I saw it. I love it. We were
planning at the time, like three years ago to do
one another project, so I've seen it previously so and

(06:41):
I love it. So I was like, hey, we don't
end up shooting this concept, I want to shoot here
one day. So that concept fell apart, but with failure
was perfect because I remember the location and I was like,
I want to shoot there, and I knew there were
friends because they've been like now shooting other projects and whatnot.
So then the guy was all some guy the owner.

(07:01):
Of course we rented out, we pay for it everything,
but since he was a friend and he's an old guy,
a very chill guy, he was like, Alex, come whenever
you want, like you know, just let me know. I'm fine.
So yeah, he was very chill. She was cool, and
I was like, hey, man, I only need like ten
minutes every time I go in there, or like, you know,
once I should the whole thing, then yes, I need

(07:22):
like an hour and a half, but I just need
like ten twenty minutes. So he was very chill. It
was more like more so to start the spaces and everything,
and it came out great. I mean, the guy was alsome.
He let me like do my prep. I love proproduction.
Production for me is my best friend. A lot of
directors like hate it, but I love it. I love it.

(07:42):
The best you're prepared the better. So yeah, that's how
I I. You know, I prepped for long takes, and
then when the actors arrived, then I like to do
a whole blocking entirely the whole thing to shoot it.
And it's fine if it's sloppy, it's fine, if it's
not per it doesn't matter. What it matters is like, Okay,

(08:02):
you're gonna be here, Okay, you're gonna move there. Okay, great,
So I can see it, I can review it. Then
I can tell a DP on the camera operator because
those two are very important for me all the time.
So then okay, this is the idea, Okay, the movement,
and then we're gonna change it because it's a dance, right,
We're gonna be constantly evolving and changing and doing also
with rehearsals, right because the actors they want to they

(08:24):
don't feel it right, they don't feel this certain. I
don't know. Hey, can I do this differently? Yes? You can, Yes,
you can. I mean, I'm very open mind. Especially in
a long take, you have.

Speaker 3 (08:33):
To you have to be yeah, there's no way because
you don't have that control. You don't have the control
to be like no, we got to do it again
from the top, and I need you to say it
like this. You got to be like, you gotta be comfortable.
You gott to be this person in this moment. And
I can't tell you what that person is as it's happening,
so you gotta go.

Speaker 4 (08:48):
Correct and you know. It's it's very interesting because it's
a mix of TV. It's like directing TV and a
theater and film because I have, you know, I'm wireless
right with the camera up, you know, with the DP,
so I'm telling the camera up like, hey, move to
the right, move to the left. So so I'm giving
him directions also my DP. But also I'm telling, you know,

(09:09):
to my AD who is following the camera behind the camera, guy,
Hey tell Ted please to move here, you know, So Hey, Ted,
move here. So I'm literally guiding and directing Ted live,
you know, while we're shooting. So it's kind of like, Okay,
like like TV or like like theater, but on film.
So it was fascinating the process because you're not only

(09:30):
like doing like like directing a film. It's like it's
live and there's no cads and the audience is you know,
we're watching it, so we're the audience. So it was
well for me.

Speaker 3 (09:41):
The one of the things, especially in the second viewing,
that I noticed was how cinematic it still felt. And
I think part of that is one that the set
design was done in a way that felt like a real,
lived in place. It didn't feel like a stage show
where you know, everything's got to be overly exaggerated or minimalist.
It felt very full. It felt like a real room,

(10:06):
but it didn't feel like TV in that way of
where it went for you know, like the Friends set
where you're just like, Okay, this is like a ton
of weird colors and iconic things that would never be
in this room, like this just doesn't make any sense
in reality. There was like a realness to it that
felt cinematic. How much of that was there, how much
it was set deck, and how did you like sort

(10:27):
of block your shot around what you had access to.

Speaker 4 (10:30):
So I would say there was a lot of stuff
in the house. We brought more stuff to the house
as well, so it was like a sixty forty or
fifty to fifty you want to call it. And yeah,
we have to take out stuff furniture because you know,
the owner has a lot of stuff, so we needed
to get you know, a lot of stuff out of
it so we could move properly and like, you know,

(10:51):
because you know, you're we're following ted throughout the whole house,
literally throughout the whole house, so they need to have space.
And the owner was really cool. There was no only mutations,
so we were able to get rid of furniture and
bring our own furniture or bring our own stuff. So yeah,
I mean the main thing was, like you were saying,
not to feel like friends, like it feels cinematic, it

(11:11):
films like a film. It doesn't feel like that. So
we were able to like work with the art department
in a great way where hey, guys, like the vision
is like we're gonna we're gonna see everything, and this
is the house of this guy for many, you know, years,
and this is like his dad's house as well, so
it has to feel all as well, which is you
know it's an all house, so no.

Speaker 3 (11:32):
It totally feels like that.

Speaker 2 (11:33):
That's what I love.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
As he starts to talk about his dad, you just
go like, oh, this is some inherited bullshit that this
guy's getting, Like he doesn't he hasn't really earned it necessarily.
There's this very strange and that adds to the drama
of like, well, what's he going to do? Because you
not to spoil things, but it definitely builds into this
like where is it gonna go?

Speaker 4 (11:52):
Yep, absolutely, And that's what I wanted, and that's why
it was very important. The house. It was very important
because also like you know, that owner and that house.
I like it. I think it has very good taste
in terms of like the way it's built and there's
a lot of wood, and I mean, I love it.
He has a great taste, and I wanted something like that, Like,

(12:12):
you know, you as an audience, also you're not thinking like,
oh my god, it's a one little house kind of thing,
like I wanted to have like a visual you know, okay,
you're in the one take aspect, but also like the
house is nice. You know, it's like you're not you
don't feel like, ah, what is this house like you
were saying, like not over the top, but not like
you know, like there were stuff missing, you know in it.

Speaker 3 (12:36):
What were the conversations you had to get this kind
of place into that, like what the house looked like
and what was happening. But with your DP, with your
camera operator, with the people who are actually physically getting
the shots, you know, like I storyboard everything, whether it's
a stick figure on set where I'm just like, okay,
I need this simple thing whatever. You're obviously not able

(12:57):
to know exactly where that camera is going to end
up at a point, So what what was your process
of making sure they were getting what you wanted?

Speaker 2 (13:05):
And then how in advance did you explain what.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
The tone of this movie was going to be visually
as far as like, you know, they could just have
randomly wound up in a Dutch where you're like, whoa,
that's way too fucking out there. I'm out of the
movie now, or they could have ended up in you know,
incredible wides where we're seeing what we should not be seeing.
What was the conversation.

Speaker 4 (13:27):
Yeah, man, that's a great question, because first of all,
like I always work with two vps, like that's you know,
they're like my two guys, and these guys were BC
like they couldn't do it. So that added to the
tension of like, oh my god, I need someone that
really knows me because it's a one take Like yeah,
so I have a new VP and a new camera creator.

(13:48):
It's the first time I work with them, so that
adds to the tension of also the one take aspect,
and I'm like, guys, look like it's very basic, Like
I show them like the shorts I done and the
Forgiven and the films I've done, and I'm like, the
really is simple, Like we gotta you know, fall the actors,
and it's fine, We're gonna have crazy moments with the camera.
I mean, it's the nature. It's you know, we can't

(14:10):
do anything about it. And steadicam doesn't fit in the house,
so we can't have steadicam And we're not going to
be switching with Dolly, and we're gonna do easy rig
because that's a great technique for this specific film. And
if you notice, there's a closet and it's very tight
that closet. Yeah, Like the camera creator his name is June.

(14:30):
It's an American Chinese guy, he's super small, and at
the beginning, I was like, how the hell he's gonna
do eighty seven minutes? Like how Like I didn't picture it?
But he proved me wrong. He was awesome. He was
like a ninja dude. Like I don't know how he
got in the closet, like I have to, Like, Yeah,
there's that.

Speaker 3 (14:48):
One specific shot with the where you're just.

Speaker 5 (14:51):
Like, wow, we're like literally in a corner of this
room right now, and it is incredibly dramatic shot that
is very powerful and where the camera had you, had
you been able to direct it in cuts, you would
have put the camera there anyway.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
Yeah, Like there are moments where I'm just like, this
is where he wanted the camera. This is exactly where
the camera should be right now.

Speaker 5 (15:10):
Yep.

Speaker 3 (15:10):
And this is the framing we would have been in
had even had we not been in a single tape yep.

Speaker 4 (15:15):
Correct, And everything that I asked for, man, and I'm
telling everything that I asked for, June did it. So
respect to him he also.

Speaker 3 (15:24):
So were you giving him these ideas in the moment.
I mean, obviously you talked about the blocking in advance
and you said I'd like you to get into this
corner when we get to this moment. You saw the
shot in advance, you kind of knew where you wanted
to be, but were you in the moment also going
like farther back, man, a little bit back, like a
little bit more up up up up? Okay down there perfect.

Speaker 6 (15:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (15:43):
I mean it was very like I said, you know,
it was like a thriller, you know experience because it's like,
hey man, move more to the left, go more to
the right, like stay there. Yeah, We're I'm constantly giving
him directions and also a DP because you know, we're
both it's a collaboration and it's like like you me,
I'm very technical, so I'm very like the camera preator

(16:03):
is like a buddy of mine. It has to be.
So I'm like, hey man, like just go there, stay there,
don't move like. So yeah, it was it was a constant,
like tense situation because like you know, you're telling your
camera life like move here more, you know, and and
the actor can move somewhere else, right. So it was
fascinating the process. I love it. I recommend it. I

(16:24):
mean as a one time experience, I recommended for any
filmmaker to do it. Just be aware of the distribution. Yeah,
but if there's not a lot on the state, yeah
do it, it's great.

Speaker 3 (16:37):
Well, so then there's also just one last element of
the camera and finding the shot. There's a story element
to the camera that I find kind of fascinating because
there's a character who were constantly sort of secondarily with,
and I often found myself feeling like I was perceiving
it through the camera of this character, like I was

(17:01):
the eyes of this character as we were moving around
the room. Was that an intentional choice or is that
just a happy accident of me watching it on the
second viewing and being like, that's why I was so
comfortable with this camera?

Speaker 4 (17:12):
No, no, no, that was that was basically the main
objective with that you're talking about like the glasses right, well,
the UK none manner.

Speaker 3 (17:20):
Yeah, I don't want to no no, no, yeah, but
you know who I'm talking.

Speaker 4 (17:25):
Yeah, yeah, I mean that was the main That was
the main objective, and it was very fascinating because like
the actor Noel has, he had to be hiding, you know,
behind the camera and then like in the closet or whatever,
like whatever, he had to be hiding. So it was
a whole dance that he coordinated really well. I mean
he because he had to learn those like Okay, this

(17:45):
is my cue, I have to go in. This is
my cue again, I have to go in. So yeah,
it was fascinating. I think it came out great, you know,
with him.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
I think that's a great I think there's a great
point in this where a lot of independent filmmakers and
low budget filmmakers forget that the camera is a character
and it is the audience's eyes into that moment.

Speaker 2 (18:07):
And it's really.

Speaker 3 (18:08):
Easy to go like, what's the best fucking shot I
can get right now? But the reality is, sometimes the
best shot isn't the shot that's going to make the
audience relate the most. How do you make them a
fly on the wall, or how do you put them
right in the emotion or how do you put them here?
And so I think figuring out that way of constantly
allowing or forcing the audience to be in the proper
perspective is a key.

Speaker 4 (18:29):
Absolutely, I agree, one hundred percent. And there's a lot
of moments like it's not a spoilerable when they go
downstairs to a pool table area, that's one moment where
you know, we also see him there and then he disappears,
and like, you know, it's cool. Like I've heard it
from a lot of audiences around the world while we

(18:51):
were doing at our festival run, and it's like, oh
my god, I love that dynamic of the character going
in and out, in and out, in and out. Yeah,
I wanted that on that some sort of psychological aspect
of like, Okay, who is this character? But like you
feel like, oh shit, you know that that's cool.

Speaker 3 (19:12):
And the reality of the camera is that we're trying
to express what the characters are feeling, We're trying to
express what the audience should be feeling. We're trying to
find a way to convey all of these emotional beats
and give the editor what they need in the in
the final in the edit of the film to be

(19:33):
able to create the movie. And so we're constantly in
this juggle between getting the perfect shot, finding the right coverage,
and telling the story with a movie like failure. Alex
had this incredible challenge of trying to do it in
the boundaries of that single take, but most of us

(19:54):
don't put ourselves in that in that box, we allow
ourselves the ability to be able to block in advance
more thoroughly for that specific scene or that specific beat,
and we also give ourselves this advantage which I talked
to Spooky Madison in this next interview about of coverage

(20:16):
and how to think it through in advance and think about, well,
what are the shots we're gonna want in the edit
and what's the coverage we're gonna need. There are so
many little things that go into every single scene. There's
so much to take into consideration, and taking that moment
to think about it and figure it out. That's the

(20:36):
key to knowing you have what you're going to need.
And someone like Spooky Madison, who has done she does
so much. She acts, she directs, she produces, she wears
so many hats in the process. Being able to take
a moment step back, like she talks about with What's

(20:56):
Wrong Wendy and the blocking and having a cup of
Joe and walking around with your weed pen and figuring
out what are we going to need in this scene
is pivotal. What's Wrong Wendy director Spooky Madison has some
amazing points here about the blocking and some advice for
any filmmaker who's trying to figure out, well, where do

(21:17):
I start when I'm beginning the process of trying to
figure out how to get.

Speaker 4 (21:21):
The shot that I want.

Speaker 3 (21:23):
What is your process for figuring out how to block
a shot, how to set it up, what the angle
should be, all of that fun stuff.

Speaker 6 (21:31):
I mean, I think very visually, so everything that I
am writing down and writing it down the way that
I hope my DP is going to shoot it, so
very specifically in the graveyard scenes for What's Wrong Wendy,
I have shots written in the script that even the actors.

Speaker 3 (21:48):
Have, So.

Speaker 6 (21:50):
I write very visually the way that I think. So
I actually have this, all these specialty shots planned for
Wendy that I would like to talk to the DP
about and then allowing him to kind of run with that.
But you know, you get the standard wide masters, you
get the close ups, you get the ots, but I

(22:13):
always have in mind specialty shots when I'm writing the script.

Speaker 3 (22:16):
One of the things I have learned in doing working
with people on independent films and doing a lot of
editing on the side is coverage is often overlooked in
low budget movies, and I find that fascinating because we
have almost unlimited capability as far as filming goes. At

(22:38):
this point, your memory card has so much memory, you're
not worried about that. It's not like the days of
running film. And yet people seem to like fear coverage
so often.

Speaker 6 (22:49):
Yeah, I have noticed that. It's that mentality that I
had mentioned, the get in and get done mentality. You
need all the coverage. You need to be able to
play with that in the edit so that you can choose.
I mean, because the edit's going to dictate the story
in the end of the day. So if you got
a shot of the actor saying it a completely different

(23:12):
way than they were saying it the other ways and
you like that one way better, that would change the scene.
So you need all this coverage now. I have, on
the contrary, though, seeing people get a lot of coverage
and then try to fit all of the coverage in
a scene and it's just all these different angles of
like nothingness. I think that any editor should have a

(23:34):
good friend who can come in and help trim fat.

Speaker 2 (23:37):
Yes, that person is so important.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
I've talked about this on the podcast many times that
one of the most important people is the honest person
who will tell you like this does nothing for it.

Speaker 2 (23:47):
I know you love it.

Speaker 3 (23:48):
I know it's important to you, it does nothing for
your audience. And that's why I'm you know, I try
to mentally put myself in this place where I'm like,
I'll exp my director's cut to the cut that you
know has all those things I love or the way
I thought it should be. But then I always put
out the other version to people as well, and see

(24:11):
and I come back to my version a few months
later or a few weeks later, and I'm always I
have not once gone back to my version been like, no,
that is the right way.

Speaker 2 (24:18):
I was right. It's always the other.

Speaker 3 (24:20):
One, absolutely.

Speaker 6 (24:21):
I think the trimming of the fat in the edit
is often overlooked in India because everyone is in love
with what they get and they want to fit everything in.

Speaker 2 (24:32):
It's also a fear of having wasted time.

Speaker 3 (24:34):
I think people fear that their time is wasted, and
at a certain point you just have to realize, like,
that's it's irrelevant. You lived in that moment and that's
fine that you got it, but you can let it go.
When you're writing and you're coming up with interesting shots,
are you thinking about how you're going to do them
in the moment or is it just I visually kind

(24:54):
of want to see this, I don't really know how
we're going to make it happen, or are you like,
here's where I would put the cam right, I know
what I'm gonna do here.

Speaker 6 (25:01):
I am not a DP and I'm not a camera op.
But I was recently given the opportunity to suit some
things with a very big camera rig on Fiberburn and
I got to experience like the weight of the camera
and like getting really cool shots. So while that is

(25:23):
something that I would love to explore in the future,
I am very ignorant to the terminology. Everything is like
a tilt or a pan to me. So I know
what I want and I'll probably be able to explain
it efficiently to my DP for Wendy, but I'll be
probably using the wrong terminology the whole time.

Speaker 3 (25:43):
Well, I like this because I'm curious about the conversations
you have with your DP. What are those like when
you're trying to explain a shot?

Speaker 2 (25:50):
How do you communicate?

Speaker 6 (25:52):
I trust my DP a lot, and I'm gonna have
in my mind. I'm gonna go what I do as
I go through the script myself, and I write down
the specialty shots that I like in those scenes, and
then I present those to my DP as you know, suggestion,
and then usually the DP like, oh, yeah, we could

(26:14):
definitely do that, or the dB has a better idea.
I trust the DP to get my wide coverage in
ots shots, but it's the specialty shots that I really
like to collaborate on because I think that's when a
true director of photography comes in, is when they take
charge and they say, I like that idea, but here's

(26:36):
how we can do it better and more efficiently.

Speaker 3 (26:38):
If it's something that's going to be, you know, incredibly difficult, fine,
I like when a DP can find a way to
make it work and explain it to me how it
works better.

Speaker 1 (26:50):
Now.

Speaker 3 (26:50):
I have shot a lot of my own stuff. I
run camera all the time. I know how it works.
But on a little Lucha and the Big Deal, I
worked with a DP for like want not the first time,
but the first time on something that big and that collaborative,
and there were moments where I expected him I had
an idea for a shot, and I expected him to
say like, no, we're not going to be able to
do that, like that's ridiculous, and it was completely the opposite.

(27:12):
It was like, no, that, let's do this let's give
it a shot. Let's try And that was such a
gratifying feeling.

Speaker 2 (27:19):
But there were.

Speaker 3 (27:19):
Moments as well where like, because I usually run my
camera and I understand the visual effects I'm going to do,
I understand how I'm going to put something together, where
it was really hard to explain what I was trying
to get. Do you do you ever have moments like
that where you're just like, this is frustrating. I don't
know how I'm going to get through that explaining this shot?

Speaker 6 (27:38):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Because I think visually I I communicate
in like sounds.

Speaker 3 (27:49):
I feel like sometimes where I'm like grunting, like.

Speaker 6 (27:53):
You know, like the and they're like, I don't I
don't know what you're saying.

Speaker 4 (27:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (27:59):
But thankfully I have found Dusty Austen, who's become a
really great friend and co producer on so many films,
and she kind of speaks the same language, and she
is so smart and is a great like teacher, So
like I feel like if I'm like trying to explain something,

(28:20):
she'll be like, Okay, She'll take those grunts and then
she'll be able to tell my DP this is what
we're going to do. Because Dusty is also a v
effects artist, so she's going to be able to work
with a DP and the special effects makeup artist to
really plan the shots. Like if she needs like a still,
like a you know what is it?

Speaker 3 (28:39):
A slate?

Speaker 6 (28:41):
A plate? Yeah, if she needs like a yeah, if
she needs a plate, like, she's going to be able
to tell them why and I don't. I can't do that.

Speaker 3 (28:48):
Yes, yeah, that is exactly what the issue was with
my DP was trying to explain visual effect stuff because
I need a plate, then I needed someone to do
someone something on one side of the screen, then something
on the other, and I was going to cut it together.
Trying to explain this was incredibly challenging, but we got
there with just some you.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
You explain in grunts.

Speaker 3 (29:08):
I explain in stick figure drawings, like I am the
director on set who's just like here, let me show you,
and I start doodling something where I'm like this, this
and this, because because I don't think visually, I have
to actually like make the thing in reality to explain.
So that's been and that's something I do for everything.

(29:28):
My blocking is really my storyboarding, Like that's where I
block is in storyboarding. I know a lot of you know,
people get on set, they sort of walk through the
scene with their DP or figure it out. I'm I
don't really do that. I'm like, the these are the
shots I need. These are like my stick figure. Guys
check them out, and then generally that's enough to be like, okay,

(29:48):
well then the blocking has to be here. We need
to be standing here. This is where everything needs to happen.
When you're when you're blocking a shot or setting up
a shot, what is your process like how do you
blo out with your crew and cast and figure it out?

Speaker 6 (30:04):
So we when we shot Fiberburn, we were on a
sound stage of an apart what we had built an
apartment building and the rooms were the same every single day,
and so we were very familiar with this set, and
we were on the fly creating new scenes because we
are we hate ourselves and yep, and so we were

(30:30):
we didn't have a shot list or like a storyboard
for these scenes that we were just freaking do and
all of a sudden, And so what we were the
benefit of knowing the set so well is that we
were able to kind of work with the set piece
as its own character. So, yeah, I like to on
any set, not just the fiberburn set is to create

(30:51):
is to think of the set as a character itself.
All the set pieces, all of these things are characters.
So it's finding those characters to interact with or to
move around that's going to bring I think that scene
to life. So that's the first thing I do is
I obviously envision the character the set as a character.

(31:16):
I really like to do it with a cup of
Joe in my hand and I usually have my weed
pen in the other and it's just doing it over
and over again with my crew, usually while my lighting
technician is doing the lights, is when we're doing blocking,
and I think that's a really great morning bonding exercise,
to be honest.

Speaker 2 (31:36):
No, it totally is.

Speaker 3 (31:37):
And in fact, I'll take out my phone, the camera
on my phone and just like take some shots with
my phone, Yeah, just to show my crew what they
look like. This is what you look like in this moment.
This is what you're going to look like on the camera.
And then I think it puts most people.

Speaker 2 (31:51):
It seems to.

Speaker 3 (31:52):
Give them an ease of the moment because they've seen
themselves then and it doesn't feel so weird, it doesn't
feel so like I don't know what I'm going to be.
Like here they can see the character of the room.
I love that, by the way, I absolutely love the
way you said that because that I've never described it
that way, and I'm stealing that for the future, because
every time I try to describe this to independent filmmakers,

(32:12):
it kind of like goes over their head, and like,
because they're not set deck set deck people think like that.
They think, like, this is my character that I'm putting together.
But if you're all doing it, you don't have a
set deck person and you're all trying to put that together,
it's really hard to explain, Like, no, it's important that
there's a lamp in the background because it's dull without
that thing.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Like, I need the character of this.

Speaker 3 (32:34):
Room, and so I'm totally stealing that and everyone else
out there, listener, they should the character of the set.
And it's one of the things when I moved to
Atlanta and I started writing scripts for Atlanta. In Minnesota,
it was easy. I'd lived there for thirty years before
I wrote my first feature, so I was like, I
know Minnesota inside and out, but trying to write for Atlanta,

(32:55):
I had to make Atlanta character. I had to get
to know it in a way that was it made
it much more personal and much more something I can experienced.
It sounds similar to like the set you're talking about.

Speaker 6 (33:08):
Yeah, absolutely, And it's funny like you having to get
to know Atlanta. And I just recently shot a short
film in uh it was like last June or April
or something, and it was called Grizzly Peak and we
were in the Redwood Forest and it was like its

(33:29):
own it was. That was a wild ass character that
set because we were in the forest filming it was
fucking wild. And then you know in Ohio everything kind
of has a feel of like hometown misery. So you
kind of like everything has a like every different place
has its own like character, set, character. It's it's rad.

Speaker 3 (33:52):
We all communicate in different ways when we're discussing how
we want our movie to be created, whether that's look,
the performance, the sound, the lighting, the edit, all of
these things are communicated in our personal own ways as filmmakers.
And that doesn't just go for the director or the
actual filmmaker behind it, even the deep he even the soundtech.

(34:15):
Everyone involved is going to have their own way of
communicating and we all have to find ways to allow
our personalities to show forth. And I think the biggest
mistake we make as filmmakers is thinking that there is
one single way of communicating, one form of terminology that

(34:36):
should be used. The whole concept of inappropriately using tilt
and pan that Spooky was talking about, or the communicating
through grunts as you're trying to figure out the shot.
This isn't a negative to me. This is the way
that certain filmmakers communicate, and you don't have to have

(34:58):
the proper terminology as long as the person that you're
communicating to understands what you're trying to say. I can't
tell you how many times I've tried to explain what
a shot is going to look like to an actor
so that they're informed as to where they should be positioned,
how they should be playing, where they should be looking.

Speaker 2 (35:17):
And it's difficult to communicate that.

Speaker 3 (35:21):
You have to teach yourself the proper way to communicate,
and the more you work with the same people, the
more you work with people who learn to understand your
form of commun communication, the better the smoother your set
is going to move. And I really love that Spooky
talked about the grunts and the way that she blocks

(35:42):
and the way that they communicate on that set in
order to properly make sure they're getting what they need,
because it's going to be different on every set. I
struggle to communicate this concept on the episode. Communication is difficult,

(36:06):
and it's one of the key things that we all
communicate in a different way. And talking to Dylan Brown,
the director of Tahoe Joe, which is a found footage
bigfoot movie. He also directed The Summer We Died. He
communicated with me in this episode through talking about other
movies and things that work, things that don't. The two

(36:27):
of us use references and sometimes that's the way it
works best. Sean Ashley and I who work on a
few projects together. Now we are doing Get That Dick,
a feature film, and we worked on a short film
called l Ron. The two of us often communicate through
movie language, saying a line, delivering it similar to another person,

(36:49):
or delivering a shot or getting a shot similar to
the way we saw something or the way we felt
something in another movie. That can help us find the
basis for where to begin the process of getting what
we need. And so Dylan Brown and I used references
to other movies as to things that we like, ways
that we think shots can be used in order to

(37:12):
hide from the audience what they should be seeing, to
make their their imagination flourish, or showing what needs to
be shown. There are so many ways to convey what
you want to convey with your movie. And Dylan and I,
Dylan Brown and I got into a few of these topics.

Speaker 4 (37:29):
In this conversation.

Speaker 3 (37:31):
I'm curious, with your background of films, what it's like
to set up and block a shot. How do you
go about figuring out what you're going to show the audience,
especially I mean in both found footage and something like
Summer We Died. You had talked about the layering, the
drawings and stuff, but like, how do you go about

(37:52):
going like, Okay, here's how I'm going to make this
look like the way I want it to look.

Speaker 7 (37:57):
So with found footage stuff, because I always have like
creatures and stuff, and all of mine, most of mine
is you know, I want to somewhat sell the whole
amateur filmmaking side, but it's also got to look visually
appealing enough to where somebody's gonna want to stick with it.
Because if you were to actually watch like an hour

(38:17):
and a half of somebody's footage that had no idea
what they're doing. You're gonna see too much of the ground,
and you're gonna see sky, and you're not gonna really
see what you need. So I am always trying to
make it look amateur, but also you know, showing the
audience what I need them to see, like holding on
shots just long enough to where I can see it.
And it's like if I need them to be able

(38:38):
to read like a sign or something on a door, Yes,
a normal person filming with their phone would probably glance
at it and move on. I will hold on it
a little longer than normal, you know, and kind of
make a slow pan over, but I'm still kind of
like purposely moving my body, so it has a little
bit of that that movement to it. With monster stuff,

(38:59):
it's always how can I show as much as possible,
but with like fast glimpses of it, so like the
audience doesn't get a chance to put all the pieces
together in their mind to pick it apart, because I'm
working on a couple thousand bucks or even sometimes a
couple hundred bucks to make these things, So like I
can't let them look at it too long, otherwise they're
going to see all the flaws. So it's always like like,

(39:21):
for me, my favorite shot in found footage monster stuff
that I like to do is when it's in dark
and somebody has a flashlight and like the only light
source is a flashlight and then that's what catches the
monsters like teeth or you know, like just glimpses of
it as it's coming. And I love those kind of shots. Now,
with the Summer we died, I had a lot of
practical effects for my kills, and like we had a

(39:44):
head smashing scene and then what I call the can opener,
which is like the skateboard into the guy's face at
the end. We had some really really cool practical effects
made and I overly shot those, like I shot a
ton of footage of it. But when it went into editing,
it was like, yeah, I can't linger too long because
it just doesn't I don't have the big budget to

(40:06):
pull off like a really really amazing effect, so I
have to give them just enough. And that's pretty much
what I what I do is I just like I think,
what can I give the audience enough of to where
they put the pieces together without giving them the whole puzzle.

Speaker 3 (40:22):
And I don't think that just goes for independent films.
Here's the thing I've realized is a lot of independent
filmmakers think that they're trying to keep up with the
big shots for movies. They want to make that moment
that makes people go like, what the fuck that's crazy.
But the reality is when I see those in movies,
they're often the ones that don't capture my imagination as
much as the ones where the filmmaker doesn't give you

(40:45):
a lot, or it just gives you a glimpse, or
I always go back to this. There's two shots that
I always go back to. One is the Django unchained
shot when he bursts.

Speaker 2 (40:55):
In on the.

Speaker 3 (40:57):
Guys in the cabin, and the one dude stands up
in the tub and gets his dick shot off.

Speaker 2 (41:02):
It's like fucking like, it's like twelve frames.

Speaker 3 (41:06):
It's so fast, and in the theater when it happened,
I like viscerally burst out laughing. Not because I thought
it was like funny that a guy got his dick
shot off. It's just like the fact that Tarantino had
this prosthetic made, did this shot showed it for like
twelve frames, and we do this close up to see it,
and the woman next to me was absolutely disgusted that

(41:26):
I thought it was so funny, but like, to me,
like my imagination pictures of that shot going on for
like four seconds, but it's like frames long.

Speaker 2 (41:37):
And then also.

Speaker 3 (41:37):
Tarantino does the the ear being cut off in Reservoir Dogs,
and you don't see anything really, you see the aftermath,
but the camera moves away when it happens. It's the
noise that we hear. It's the it's the imagination, your
imagination running with what is happening that is so much
more powerful than what you could actually see.

Speaker 7 (41:58):
Yeah. I actually just have had my mind blown because
I had in my head that you see way more
gore in the first Saw movie than you actually see.

Speaker 3 (42:09):
Oh there's very little. It's such a minor amount.

Speaker 2 (42:12):
Yeah, I know.

Speaker 7 (42:13):
And it's like it's always talked about, oh, this torture,
porn and this and that, and I'm like, wait a minute,
it's not though, like they make you feel like you
saw more than you did. It's it's so mind blowing
how little there actually is compared to what's out there.

Speaker 4 (42:27):
Now.

Speaker 7 (42:27):
I've seen comedy horror movies with way more gore than
what the original Saw movie.

Speaker 3 (42:31):
Has, yet it's still as disturbing as hell.

Speaker 4 (42:35):
See.

Speaker 3 (42:35):
That's the thing, Like, I think the first Saw movie
is more disturbing to me than any of the movies
that followed. And it's because of where my It's because
of where my imagination runs. It's also because of those performances. Like,
people can shit on those performances all they want, but
there is something completely raw about those two acting together

(42:56):
that really just like gets me. I think it is
the like rawness of the performance, the lack of like
it doesn't feel like I'm watching actors perform. It feels
like I'm watching dudes have to decide if they're gonna
cut their fucking limbs off.

Speaker 7 (43:10):
Yeah right, you know. And and so it helps me
like making really small indie films to say, yeah, we're
gonna we're gonna hear more than we see, or we're
gonna just imply you know a lot of what's going on.
And it really does help because it gets me out
of a jam of like I don't have the effects
to pull it off, but I can still trick people
into thinking they saw more than they did. And I

(43:32):
was one of the scenes that I was always harkening
back to in the summer we died for Some of
the stuff I wanted to show was in American History X.
The whole bite the curb scene. Yeah, you think you
see more of what actually happens there than you do.
It's just you know what's gonna happen, and the sound
of his teeth biting the concrete is actually enough to

(43:53):
make me close my eyes to where I didn't even
want to see it.

Speaker 2 (43:56):
I don't know if I've ever watched it.

Speaker 3 (43:58):
I feel like I've gone I've like done it after
watching the movie and been like, I'm gonna go online
and I'm just gonna watch just the clip, just the
thing that happens. So I know that I've seen it.
I don't actually know if I've ever made it through it.
I don't know if I've ever been able to watch it.
And to me, it's like the most graphic moment, one
of the most graphic moments in a movie ever, but ever, right,

(44:18):
you see very little yeah, and you really don't.

Speaker 7 (44:21):
Yeah, it's just really good editing, but there was nothing
There's nothing glory about it. It's just the idea of
what's happening, And that to me is like the true
testament of I think like a really masterful filmmaker is
I can affect you without having to even go there,
Like I can get you by just painting the picture enough.

(44:44):
I don't have to hold your hand through this and
show you everything I can. I can give you bits
and pieces, and your mind is now going to completely
ruin your day because you're gonna think about stuff way
worse than what I could ever show.

Speaker 2 (44:54):
You, right.

Speaker 3 (44:56):
I think part of that is also for me as
a filmmaker. The second that it gets who I see
too much, I instantly disconnect because I know how they
did it. I am like I I'm then I'm gonna
tear it apart. Like for me, one of the biggest
like missed opportunities was in Midsummer. There's the scene where
they smash the head with the hammer or whatever has

(45:19):
been since I've seen the movie, but you see it
like you see the whole thing happen. It's obviously a
dummy they use they shoot it at like and for me,
because I saw it, that scene almost became like comical,
not like not like laugh out loud for me, but
just like oh they went and they showed the whole thing.

Speaker 2 (45:36):
My imagination doesn't get to run with it at all.

Speaker 7 (45:39):
And yeah, yeah, I just I feel the same way
I love I love effect shots like that because I'm
always like, oh, I want to see the prosthetic they use.
But I do the same thing where I'm like, I
get taken out of the the moment in the movie
because my mind goes to the technical side. And I

(46:00):
will say, like when we did our head stomp in
the Summer we died. I was having so much fun
with the accidental grossness of it because it went way
nartlier than I thought, and we had like Hamburger in
a mannequin head that was like blowing through the eye
holes and I just was like, fuck it, I'm gonna
actually leave way too much in here, purely out of
I'm having fun making this and I think it looks cool.

(46:20):
And I know we went like overboard with that shot,
and I was like, whatever, I'm gonna do it. But
You're so right about Midsummer because I know there's like
a wide shot pulled way back when the hammer hits
a face and you know it hits the face, and
I'm like, oh God, and it's the second one, I
think when you actually see like the head explode when
and you're you're right, the first one is more effective

(46:41):
because it's like a it's like a dull thud, and
you hear it from far away and you're almost standing back,
like where the characters that are in the crowd are
seeing it take place. And then yeah, when he moves
to the like super inclose tight shot of it happening, Yeah,
my mind just went to like, ew, gross, Okay, how'd
he make it? And then I'm already wanting to figure
out that side and I was completely checked out of

(47:03):
the moment at that point.

Speaker 3 (47:05):
I think that there's a finding the balance based on
your actual tone you're trying to set. And so for
some movies, yeah, show a lot like yeah, I mean,
if it's the right kind of movie, go for it.
Midsummer I felt like it was trying to be very moody,
and I lost the moodiness of it when I saw
too much versus like, I'm trying to think of a

(47:28):
very specific example, but I can't come up with anything.
Oh okay, here's a perfect example, and there's something about Mary.
There's the hole zipping up is penis. Oh god, and
but they're like the build up, You're like, you're never
gonna see it. The joke becomes like I'm not gonna
see this thing, and that's funny. I'm laughing and it's very,
very funny, and then it cuts to the actual shot

(47:50):
and you instantly go like, oh no, the funniness is gone,
like I'm I'm now laughing out of awkwardness because this
is really bad.

Speaker 2 (47:58):
I don't like it.

Speaker 3 (47:59):
And I think that's a great that's a great move
for comedy to take at the opposite direction where you
showed me too much and I'm now I will never
forget that shot.

Speaker 7 (48:09):
Yeah, no, I totally agree. I think I think that's
where Hostel lost me in some parts. Was there were
certain things done that had me cringing in the theater,
like the Achilles tendon thing. I'm like, oh no, like
I'm I'm like recoiling and in imagined pain and it's
grossing me out. And then there was the blow towards

(48:31):
scene when he's like burning the girl's eye out, and
I was like, this is not anywhere as effective, Like
this is nothing about that is grossing me out. Now,
It's just like it lingers so long and then the
eyes hanging there and then he's cutting it and then
liquid shoots out of it, and I started laughing because
it was like the Julia Child's Dan Eckrote episode Bleeding

(48:52):
on Saturday Night Live, where like he's bleeding so excessively,
it's just funny to this point, and I was like,
I don't know if Eli Roth, because I do know
he kind of is like a sick humor guy. But
that sequence that I felt like was supposed to be
really powerful with this poor girl getting her face burned off,
I was like audibly laughing in the theater because it
goes on so long. I'm like, this isn't scary, this

(49:14):
is just gross and hilarious.

Speaker 4 (49:16):
You know.

Speaker 2 (49:18):
Yeah, I totally agree.

Speaker 3 (49:19):
I was in the same place with that one, where
I just I didn't know tonally where I was supposed
to be because I was all over the place going
from like this is disgusting, this is awful, to like
this is kind of funny, I think, yeah, and yeah
I don't. Yeah. I think that there, especially with independent filmmaking,
it's a tight rope that we have to walk to

(49:40):
find the right balance of what we show, what we
don't how far we take our shot to get, you know,
the classic like every frame is a painting mentality. You know,
we don't have the time or budget to get away
with that all the time. But then if you could
find moments. There are specific moments in Tahoe Joe that
I'm like, oh, they knew what they're This is framed
like perfectly for the moment where I'm just seeing enough,

(50:02):
I'm getting the mood. And if I took a screenshot
of this, I could put it up and be like,
this is a great screenshot. Trying to find those things,
And in the same goes for other found footage movies
where I watch I mean like I watch Creep, and uh,
I constantly pause it while I'm watching it. Now, I'm like,
I've seen it a hundred times, but every time I
watch I'll pause it. I'll be like, that's good framing,

(50:24):
Like how did they get me to this point where, yes,
I'm watching like this fake documentary being made about this
guy sort of I don't really know where I'm at,
like or I'm not supposed to know where I'm at
the first time I watch it, but like, this is
a good framing. He's on the third where we've set
it up in a way that like looks nice. I
like that and found footage, and I think it's something
that you know, if you're making it found footage independently,

(50:47):
it's something to think about, like how do I get
the frame to a spot where it looks like a
nice shot, even it just has to happen naturally.

Speaker 7 (50:54):
Yeah, I have been trying to be a little more
diligent with that, because you know, you're right, there are
certain moments in all those that we've done where I
had a specific shot in my mind. So I was
definitely figuring out, like I've got to force the camera
into this position because I have to get this shot
in this way that's how I want it to be seen.
But then I was at unnamed footage fest this a

(51:16):
couple weeks ago, and there's a found footage movie there
called dream Eater, and they did a genius plot point
by making the person who was filming most of it
a film like an aspiring documentary filmmaker who they call

(51:37):
attention to the fact that she has an expensive camera
set up, that she has a background in filmmaking, So
they were able to pull off some gorgeous shots, and
it felt natural to the story because they called the
tension of the fact that she had an eye for
shots anyway, And when I was watching it, I started thinking,
I want to do some of this in mind, where

(51:58):
when they are going to leave the camera static, even
if it's like a hidden camera or whatever, they were
still keeping something in the foreground a little bit out
of focus, and then the characters in focus, and then
everything behind them out of focus again, and they were
she was doing these great things with like stacks of
books or a teacup would be just in the frame
enough to give.

Speaker 2 (52:18):
You depth, adding some depth.

Speaker 7 (52:19):
Yeah, yeah, And it was like, damn, this is that's
such a good, easy trick and it doesn't cost any money,
and it doesn't take extensive amounts of you know, film
education to do that. I can set those up purely
by looking at this movie and then getting my camera
and just playing with it and going, oh, there you go.

(52:40):
And it's natural to set a camera down somewhere where
there would be stuff in the way. There might be
a picture frame, or there might be in the woods.
There's always branches, you know, and things that can get
in the way a little bit. And so now I'm
like really thinking for Tahoe Joe three, like what are
those cool things that I'm gonna be able to do
with the cameras. When it's supposed to be like a

(53:00):
game trail camera set up or a security camera that's
that's static, I can still set it up and frame
it in a way that's really visually interesting and not
just be a CCTV cam or whatever.

Speaker 3 (53:12):
I think this is something that even not found footage
people should think about in their blocking and while they're
setting up their camera, you know, whether you have a
DP or not, the discussion should revolve around like what
is the framing versus like let's get our coverage, let's
get you know, close up? Why, Like what could we
put in the background that's going to give us depth?

(53:34):
What can we like what angle can we put this
at that is going to utilize the set.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
As a character.

Speaker 3 (53:40):
I talked with another filmmaker about the set being a
character and like, when you're blocking it, think about that.
What do I need to know about this room? Is
like it's such an easy way to add value to
your movie.

Speaker 7 (53:53):
Oh yeah, absolutely, I we've I've I worked on a
set with a guy I was just kind of happened
to be in the area where they were filming, and
he said, Hey, I know you're in Reno and you're
only about thirty five minutes from ore we're shooting. You
should come up and you know, do a little pia
stuff for us and just hang out. And I'm like, yeah,
hell yeah, that'd be fun. And it was so cool

(54:14):
because they had this little tiny tint that he had
some characters in out in the middle of the wilderness,
and they were lighting everything in such a way that
I felt like their campsite was like much bigger than
what they actually had, and it was because he was
using shadows to be like really long and so like
the trees felt taller and the forest felt darker and denser,

(54:37):
and it was all because he just knew what he
was doing. And I was like watching and I'm like, damn,
I'm seeing the set transformed by how they're moving the
lights around and stuff. And yeah, they were. They were
like they were making the most of what they had
by literally transforming how it looked just by moodiness and
by lighting. And I think it's just stuff that until

(54:58):
you're there to see it, your brain doesn't naturally go there.
And shadows move all the time and affect your landscape
and normal in your normal life. I mean, I've had
times when I'm walking through a parking lot and I
always as a kid, I would love standing under a
street light or like a big parking lot light and
seeing my shadow would go in like four different directions
at once. Yeah, and now that's like a shot that

(55:20):
I would kill for to have in a horror movie,
you know, would be to have that foreshadows underneath the
street light shot. It's so cool and so it is.
It's like you can have the eye for it, but
you still have to know how to pull it off.
And I always feel like you're never gonna do that
until you watch somebody else do it and who did it?
And so I just love studying my friend's work. I

(55:42):
love studying professionals. Steven Spielberg is like my I mean,
I got all my Jurassic Park stuff back here. That
is my favorite movie of all time. And what Spielberg
does with light is just unreal to me. And you know, no,
I'm never going to be able to replicate it to
his level, but I I can sure be inspired by it.

Speaker 3 (56:02):
Yeah, I think that's a fantastic point. I on Greywood's plot.
We were filming in the woods as well, and I
my natural like, my mind kept going back to this
concept of like, well, what would the lighting that, what
would it actually be?

Speaker 2 (56:14):
What would it be in this moment?

Speaker 3 (56:15):
And I realized quickly, like, it doesn't need to be
completely flawless, like the moonshine isn't exactly like it would
be bouncing off of trees and stuff. So putting a
light behind a tree that then forces your focus towards
the center of the screen. Yeah, there's no reason why
there should be a light behind that tree. But no
one in the audience is thinking that there's a light
behind that tree.

Speaker 2 (56:35):
They're literally just.

Speaker 3 (56:36):
Thinking, like where am I supposed to be looking right now?
There's a happy medium in a balance there. You don't
want it to look completely unnatural, but there is a
way that you could kind of play with the audience's
perception of what the lighting is doing.

Speaker 7 (56:50):
Yeah. I love the Wolf Creek movies that came out
of Australia, and I remember there was like the sequence
when the killer Mick Taylor like shows up and he's
kind of skylined and there's this dust plume behind him,
silhouetting him, and you've got this light. And then I
remember thinking, wait a minute, I see his truck headlights

(57:12):
over here, but the light source is something completely different,
that is not that is not a natural thing to
the outback. But I feel like the director was probably
just like, yeah, but who cares? This looks fucking cool.

Speaker 2 (57:23):
It looks cool, this looks cool.

Speaker 7 (57:26):
It's cool, yeah, you know, and so and then who
am I to say that the moonlight didn't hit a
reservoir of water behind him and it's bouncing up like
I don't know, and who cares? Anyway? Like it's a movie,
it's supposed to have some artistic stuff behind it. And
quite honestly, if a movie is so hyper realistic, it's

(57:46):
gonna be boring. I wanted to have that visual stuff
where like that uncanny valley of like, yeah, it looks
like a familiar setting I may have been in, but
there's still something about it. It's artsy. That's not you
know what like a real diner would look like. You know,
it's like I feel like pulp fiction. The diner is
so it's there, and I've been in diners kind of

(58:07):
like that, but there's also something about it that doesn't
feel like a diner I've been in either. There's something
about it that just feels all.

Speaker 3 (58:15):
There is a certain rawness to the way that Dylan
talks about crafting a movie and finding the shot. He
goes for it and he wants it to be fun
and unique and raw. And I very much respect that,
and I love the concept. And some of us can

(58:35):
work like that, can work very raw and put it together,
while others need to be very technical, pragmatic and know
exactly what they're going to get.

Speaker 2 (58:44):
And Michael Peril for those of us who need to.

Speaker 3 (58:49):
Have everything laid out, there are ways to set yourself
up to know that you're getting specific shots. And Michael
Parrow is the director of a movie called Self Driver,
and Self Driver was all set in basically one set
in a car and in order to create a movie

(59:12):
that continuously was moving and god getting everything you need
and making sure that the shots are set up properly,
Michael talks about having a very specific shot list, how
he prepares himself for the day, how he knows what
he wants before he gets into the movie, to know
that he's getting all of the coverage. He needs a

(59:33):
very different take and we all work incredibly different, and
I think one of the most important things you can
do as a filmmaker is start to learn about yourself.
I am the kind of person who does also enjoy
having a shot list and knowing what I'm getting. In fact,
sometimes I'll even animate, do an animatic for, or storyboard
entire scenes from the movie. I tried to do as

(59:54):
much as I can in storyboards so I know what
I want when I get to set, and Michael something
very similar as you'll hear in this episode. So Michael,
he has a very specific vision for what he wants
and what he needs to get, and he talks about
that in this conversation how he gets that and what
his process is like. So if you're filming the majority

(01:00:18):
of this movie it takes place in a car, what
was it like to figure out how you were going
to film that in advance?

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
Did you do like a shot list.

Speaker 3 (01:00:27):
Storyboards, take some video in advance trying to figure it out?
Was there something like that that helped you get into production?

Speaker 8 (01:00:36):
I think my method is always to have a shot list.
I'm not a great drawer, and I don't like the
limitations of a storyboard, but knowing like angles and sort
of the way into the scene is I think really important.
Having just sort of a document that is a list
of the images that you want is super valuable. And

(01:01:01):
I think the main thing is just for this film,
I knew I wanted the like the claustrophobia of the
car to overwhelm us over the course of the film.
So the strategy was to start looser and like have
wider medium shots and even the close ups be wider
at the beginning of the film, and then slowly get
the camera closer and closer to our main character so

(01:01:24):
that by the end we're seeing, like the film is
told in like tight tight closeups of his face and
the passenger's face and really lean into the claustrophobia. So
that sort of strategy was like I'd map that out
over the course of the script and be like, Okay,
this scene, I know it's after this beat, so we

(01:01:44):
should be a little bit closer and a little bit tighter.
This stuff at the end's got to be like super extreme.
And then when we shot the earlier stuff, knowing that
would be looser and wider was sort of the general strategy.

Speaker 3 (01:01:56):
Yeah, So then I'm curious what was your film processed
in order to get these shots? Because one of the
things I have had not struggle with, but I find
that in low buddy filming can be kind of a
challenge because you don't have so many people on set
watching and making sure everything is okay. So like I
film very out of order. I'll film the last scene first,

(01:02:18):
a middle shot, then jump back to the end, then
the first scene, and I just like move around all
over the place and making sure I am continuing to
keep those sort of concepts of like right now, I
want us to be more comfortable, so we're not going
to be so tight keeping those elements can be kind
of challenging. Did you guys film pretty consistently in order?
Did you jump around?

Speaker 8 (01:02:39):
We definitely jumped around, just for like scheduling of aps.

Speaker 3 (01:02:42):
Scheduling of course that's the biggest thing.

Speaker 8 (01:02:45):
So yeah, I think it was just Again, my sort
of method is I will print out every scene as
a separate like document, yes, and then I've got like
a top sheet that is my shot list. So when
I'm working, I just pull out that with its top
sheet staple together, so I know immediately like I'll do
like a little blurb on what the scene's about, my

(01:03:07):
like five to whatever shots that I'm going to cover,
and I tuck that out of my back pocket for
the entire scene, and that sort of keeps me on
top of like I'm not referring back to this massive script.
I've got just the like say.

Speaker 3 (01:03:21):
Yes, treating every scene almost like its own little short
film where you're like, I just got to get through
this script.

Speaker 6 (01:03:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:03:26):
I can't tell you how many people don't do that,
and it drives me nuts. I'm like, this is the
easiest way to know you're getting what you need is
to just have your shot list and I'll put like
a page of maybe some like inspiration from other movies
for shots. I'll like have a page that's just like
a couple of shots that maybe I maybe if I
get stuck and I'm like not quite sure what the

(01:03:47):
mood is, I can go to that shot and it's like, Okay, yeah,
that's right. I was kind of going for like a
Fargo in the car moment, like.

Speaker 8 (01:03:54):
Yeah, exactly, well yeah, and then you have this like
this thing that you can like whip out and your
not fumbling through something else, and like I cross off
every shot as I get it and then like if
I get a new idea as we're shooting, I'll write
it there and then cross that out. So at the
end I've got a script with all the shots, and
if I'm missing one, then I know immediately like okay,

(01:04:15):
highlight that we got to come back for that, or
it might.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
Just not get But it's a great place to write
your director's notes too.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
Yeah, It's just a piece of paper.

Speaker 3 (01:04:23):
That's there available and you can sketch stuff out or
like I am, I'm a big fan of like stick
figure storyboards because I went to school for art.

Speaker 2 (01:04:32):
I do animation.

Speaker 3 (01:04:32):
But I'm also like I all I need to do
is have it visually portrayed in a way that I
can explain to my DP if I have a DP
on the movie, or to my cast, where I'm like,
this is what your shot is going to kind of
be like, or the blocking, so I'll just like cover
those in stories stick figure storyboards.

Speaker 8 (01:04:49):
Yea, yea yeah, yeah, I think that makes a lot
of sense.

Speaker 3 (01:04:55):
So when you're in the moment on this movie, did
you have a director of photography or were you you know,
low budget, sometimes you got to do it yourself.

Speaker 8 (01:05:03):
It was all me man, Yeah, all you.

Speaker 3 (01:05:05):
So, how do you troubleshoot when the shot you planned
isn't working out? When you're like, okay, we're not this
is we're getting a struggle. Like what is your method
of wrapping your head around it?

Speaker 8 (01:05:17):
That's a great question. I don't I don't know that
I have a method. I think you just have to
Maybe the most important thing is to step back and
like not panic. And it can be hard sometimes, especially
in our environment when we were just we were literally
on the road and so and they'd be like Nathaniel
right beside me and then an actor in the backseat

(01:05:37):
behind us, and I'm like tucked in to the side
of the window. And so there were times where I
was just like, Okay, we got to pull over so
that I can like actually troubleshoot and not try and
solve this thing on the fly.

Speaker 3 (01:05:50):
And I think that's a great So this is a
perfect method. And I think too many filmmakers I've worked
with on sets, this is where they fall apart. Is
the step back is king like that is like so important,
and so many people they try to just like muscle
through it.

Speaker 8 (01:06:07):
You can't muscle through it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:10):
You have to Yeah, take that moment and step back.

Speaker 3 (01:06:13):
Like the running joke was they can tell like when
I was stressed because I was I'm antsy, I'm always moving,
I'm always talking, and when the shot wasn't right for me.
And sometimes it was the simplest thing because I'm just
very picky about tiny details, and but they'd see me
like step back and I'd grab my hat and I
would just like hold my hat for a second and
then I'd tap it and I'd figure it out and go.

(01:06:34):
But like that little second would give me enough to
be like, why am I Why am I not accepting
this as the shot that I want? And a lot
of times I was literally like, there's nothing in the foreground.
There's no parallaxing motion with the moving camera. We're just
in a stagnant shot. And I'd run off set and
come back with like a traffic cone and set it
down in the front of the shot, and then I

(01:06:55):
had my parallaxing motion.

Speaker 8 (01:06:56):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I think that's it. Yeah, stepping
back and just not being afraid to, like you you're
the captain of the ship, but you have to be
okay with like stepping away from the ship for a minute.
To collect yourself, and if you're it's it's you know,
the fast that you can do that or the like,

(01:07:17):
if you can do that without actually removing yourself from set,
that's great, But you have to find a way to
collect yourself and you know, come up with a solution
without reacting. I guess before you've got the the idea.

Speaker 3 (01:07:32):
I think as a director sometimes it feels like you
you are being perceived as losing control in that moment too,
and I don't think that that's true. My experience has
been with every actor I've ever talked to and crew
after the fact, they were like, we're glad you took
a moment to think about it, Like that's fine, Like
they're still figuring out what they're gonna do, so it

(01:07:54):
gave them a beat.

Speaker 6 (01:07:56):
Well.

Speaker 8 (01:07:56):
I think that that's the difference between like being the
you want to be perceived as the leader, versus being
an actual leader. And I think it's so easy to
get wrapped up in wanting to be perceived a certain way,
and I think that comes with a lot of baggage
of the way you think an actor is supposed to
look on set or a director is supposed to look

(01:08:16):
on set. Rather, but it really like real leadership is
knowing when to take a break and knowing when you
need to like figure out something and knowing when there's
a problem that needs to be solved.

Speaker 3 (01:08:32):
So on self driver, when you were blocking a scene,
what was like the first what were the first things
you thought about? Like where did your mind go? Was
it like the camera, the shot? Was it the performance?
Like let's figure out this performance first? What was the
most or the lighting even like that's kind of where
my mind first goes, and like where are we going

(01:08:52):
to put lights so I can set up my shot afterwards?

Speaker 2 (01:08:55):
Where was your mind at well?

Speaker 8 (01:08:57):
I guess like because our set was so small, the
lighting was like once we figured out a lighting set
up for the The Blanket film, it was sort of set.
We had a few variations on it, and there were
some scenes where we used one like a flickering light,
and I knew that certain scenes I wanted that to
be the main light. And then other scenes when we're driving,

(01:09:18):
we just sort of like augmented and filled in the
natural light that was coming from the windows. But for me,
it definitely starts with performance. And again, because our set
was so limited, there wasn't a lot of like actual
blocking other than just like can you come in here
this like maybe lean in for these beats, but do
what feels natural. So like a lot of that work

(01:09:41):
was done for me because just because of the limitations
we'd set up from the very beginning.

Speaker 3 (01:09:47):
That's where I think a lot of people would they
fear doing a movie like that because because of the limitations,
they're afraid that it's going to feel boring or it's
not going to work or whatever. And I have found
in my experience like limiting to like for a low
budget film, especially like a first feature, limiting to a
single set or a room or a car or whatever,

(01:10:09):
actually like it adds value because of the fact that
you could figure out how to do it right and
then continuously do it right.

Speaker 8 (01:10:19):
And then you're sort of forced to come up with
new ideas in that space and you can get creative.
There's a lot of ways to get creative, but you
it forces you to think differently less like and then
if you don't, you still have the thing that works
that you can fall back on.

Speaker 2 (01:10:35):
But and you have, it gives you time.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):
It gives you time to focus on something that probably
would have got lost in the mix. You wouldn't have
had as much time to focus on performances if you
were spending your whole day figuring out a new lighting
setup every single day. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:10:50):
Now, then that for me was the biggest thing, is
just finding a way to work with these actors, and
you know, performance first was definitely my like, that's my
favorite part of the on set experience is working with actors.
So I wanted that to be the the meat of
the production.

Speaker 3 (01:11:08):
Was there anything after the fact that when you got
into the edit you were watching the movie playback, you're like, oh, man,
I should have done this.

Speaker 8 (01:11:17):
I mean all the time. Yeah, there's like every single
scene I was like, oh, fuck, we should have I
wish we'd gone here. I wish I'd done that. I
don't think that I can't think of anything specific, but
there's always you know, it's me leave on the table.

Speaker 2 (01:11:31):
Right For me?

Speaker 3 (01:11:31):
On The Good Exorcist, there was this moment where I
was just like, why didn't I get like all of
this coverage. There's there's a moment because I was filmed
for a reality show while I was doing it right,
and there was a shot of there's a dude watering
a tree for like an incredibly long time. Like the
joke is just like you're awkwardly watching this guy water
a tree that's dead and he uh. And in the

(01:11:54):
reality show, I can see them filming that my camera
crew filming the puddle of water, and I never filmed it,
and I was just like, oh my god, if I
could have the footage from that camera. And it just
taught me like a thing or two about yes, I
need the coverage for performance and getting the actors and
close up, wide, medium, all the different shots, but also

(01:12:16):
remembering to focus on all of the little things that
are surrounding because that can save your edit.

Speaker 8 (01:12:21):
One hundred percent. Well, and that's like for me. Texture,
like I was sort of saying before, texture is the
thing that goes in, goes first in these indie films
when you're shooting a movie in two weeks or whatever,
like you don't have the time for that or it's
very hard to get that. So with my next one
coming up, I'm trying to find ways to make sure

(01:12:42):
we have the time for that, the time to get
those things and ways to cover a scene, strategies to
cover a scene so that I know so that I
can go in and get those details and find different
angles on a scene in different just getting the things
that a your budget movie has the time to get.

Speaker 3 (01:13:03):
We are attempting to create art that is incredibly challenging.
We have to work inside of tight boxes, low budget
and set parameters that sometimes we set for ourselves, and
sometimes we're forced into simply because we don't have the budget,
we don't have the time, we don't have the resources.
Every filmmaker has restrictions. I have been on multi million

(01:13:28):
dollars sets, huge movie sets that still we're talking about
the constraints and the budgetary confinements that they were put into,
or the effects confinements they were put into, or the
strategic confinements, or the confinements.

Speaker 2 (01:13:45):
By the studio.

Speaker 3 (01:13:45):
All of these sort of things can get in the
way and we have to work inside of them. So
finding your shot sometimes means figuring out what your parameters
are and then working inside of that to get exactly
what you feel will express what you're trying to say.
Thank you so much to these four filmmakers for coming

(01:14:06):
on this episode and the past three episodes before this.
Go check out their movies from Failure, What's Wrong Wendy
to Tahoe Joe and Michael's film Self Driver. All of
these movies are incredible examples of low budget films, and
all of these filmmakers have made other films as well,

(01:14:27):
So go check out everything, or go check out the
movies that they've done, Go follow them on social media.
Make sure that you are supporting the independent filmmakers, and
on top of that, help support Flush Studios by telling
me what filmmakers you would like to hear on this podcast.
If you've heard these episodes or you've heard this episode

(01:14:47):
and you know a filmmaker who would be great for
talking about low budget filmmaking, send them to me. Head
over to you could go to speakpipe dot com slash
low bud Rebels and leave me a message a voicemail
about who you think should be on the show. Or
if you have something that this episode inspired you to

(01:15:11):
want to talk about, or any of the episodes have
inspired you to want to talk about, head over there
speakpipe dot com slash low Budget Rebels. You can leave
me an audio message that I can play on the show. Also,
head over to Flush Studios dot com, head Patreon dot
com slash flush Studios. That's where you can help support
what I do here at Flush Studios, making the movies

(01:15:34):
I make and creating these podcasts, doing the behind the
scenes all of the stuff that we do. That Patreon
helps me keep the lights on. So head over there
Patreon dot com slash Flush Studios. You can give one
dollar a month. I think you can subscribe for the
year for like eleven dollars for the year, or you
can give more. Whatever you can give to help support

(01:15:55):
Flush to do is plus you get a ton of content.
There are like almost a thousand or maybe over a
thousand hosts available right now on the Flush Studios Patreon
behind the scenes short films, all of the podcasts, ad
free comics, like, there's tons of stuff, and there's new
stuff coming out almost every week, if not every week.

(01:16:16):
I'm attempting to do more, but I'm in the process
of making my new film Get That Dick. Watch out
Forget That Dick coming soon. And if you want to
check out what I've done, you can go watch Greywood's Plot,
The Good Exorcist, or any of the short films on
the Flush Studios YouTube page. All of that to say,
there is a ton of awesome, low budget content out there,

(01:16:37):
and if you're looking for films behind the scenes inspiration
to help you make your movie.

Speaker 2 (01:16:44):
It's out there.

Speaker 3 (01:16:45):
You just gotta go hunt for it, and I think
you'll find a ton of stuff. There are some great
new episodes of low budget Rebels coming out. I have
four brand new guests for the next four episodes that
I am incredibly excited for you guys to hear the
conversations that we've had. I'm editing those episodes right now
and I can't wait to get them out there. Thank
you so much to everyone who's tuned in so far.

(01:17:07):
I hope you've learned something about getting the shot sound
design if you haven't listened to those past episodes. The
past three go back. Season six has been fantastic. I've
had such a wonderful time talking with the filmmakers about
creating these independent films that are absolute passion projects. The

(01:17:30):
stuff we don't make because we're just trying to make
a dime and we're looking at the box office. These
are projects we make because we love filmmaking, and I
hope you guys all love the process of hearing about
the process that goes into it, and I hope you
all enjoy the final films that these filmmakers have made.

(01:17:50):
All right, until next time, keep kicking ass, keep making
the projects you want to make, keep being independent, and
as always, stay rebellious.

Speaker 2 (01:18:04):
Low Budget Rebels is brought to you by the indie
film Hustle Network, Recorded at Flush Studios headquarters in tropical Atlanta,
Produced by the film daddy Josh Stifter, balla Baboo

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Season 6 Episode 4: Framing the Vision - Finding the Best Shots on a Budget

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Season 6 Episode 4: Framing the Vision - Finding the Best Shots on a Budget