Holiday Season – Post production at a crawl

As we enter the holiday season, my editing time will and has been limited on Petite Chardonnay.

Family is a key component to our life, and I will not miss any moment to spend time with mine. Hope you spend time with yours.

The intense and uninterrupted post production as come to a crawl until after the new year when it will be 18 hour days and nights for at least 3 months without any distractions.

There will be some assembly, but only basic preparation per scene, takes, and organization during this time, as well as, creating more marketing material such as updated posters, calendars, teasers, shirts, winter apparel, and more plus an exciting development I have decided to create a PHOTOGRAPH BOOK.  A 100 plus page book of selected photos from the 1600 photos that Patricia Collins, Mark Hoffman, George Ann Heck, Lisa West, and others have taken during the production.  The book may cost over $50, but it will be a hard cover, full color, landscape view — a must have coffee table book; and proceeds will be split amongst the photographers.

LOOK FOR THESE for your holiday shopping needs and grab a few items not just unique to collect, but they are useful.

http://www.cafepress.com/ariapicturesshop

I have the interviews and BTS video that Steve Dakota and Mark Hoffman took and will be assembling those together which does not take much concentration as the story itself; I am not worried about how fancy the bts sequence is as I am NOT selling that as the main story, not that it is going to be done with haste and no care, just saying I want my full attention on editing the movie, so I can keep working while family is home for the holidays.

 

Jim Heck is creating a photographic slide show for many uses, one is for the wrap party that is still in my mind, which I should get more votes from instead of a select few: do you want and think a sit down, semi formal $20 for adults and $10 for kids under 12 at Lucchesi or Double Oak in May would interest anyone?

I wish everyone a wonderful holiday season, the end of the year, and a very, very prosperous and safe 2012 for all my family and friends. MAKE A NOTE: 2012 will bring new things for everyone, both financially and personally.

God Bless, peace, be safe.

- ger

A Film Maker’s Guide to Completion

this is a continuing and on going Guide and is subject to additions as I think of them.

This is a guide to help up and coming filmmakers who need a little information about the ins and outs of making a movie on a small, low, or no budget.

PART ONE

Start at the end to know where to start

Most people think the important thing when making a movie is having a Camera — and that may have some validity;  Some think you have to have a good story before you start — and yes a good story is a key element; There are those that feel the acting is most important when making a movie — and again acting is also a relevant part in making a movie — good or bad — but none of those compare in importance to knowing how you are going to finish the movie, such as, the media format, the editing system, music, audio and video effects, the output format, and most of all THE EDITOR.

You can have the best camera, box office smash script, and professional actors but without knowing how you are going to finish it and without an editor, a competent editor, you might as well stop before you get started.

An editor — a good one not to mention a great one — is the most important element in the film making process — yes this is coming from an editor and although it may sound biased it is a fact.  And after working on many, many projects and seeing other projects that don’t have a experienced editor on them, the projects that have longevity, look good, or even have a chance at getting finished have an editor that knows what they are doing.

WHAT AN EDITOR DOES FOR YOU

A skilled and experienced editor is the last person that tells the story, the person that puts all the pieces together in a cohesive manner — some may think the Director dictates the story, the edits, and the cuts which may be true, but the editor actually makes them happen — and the editor is the one that has the knowledge of how to export it in the format that was decided upon in the beginning which dictated how the movie was to be recorded in the first place — THE EDITOR IS KEY!

The editor is the one that spends hours, and I don’t mean 2 or 6 I mean 10 – 18 plus in a day, going back and forth on one edit to decide if it is one frame to the left or one frame to the right that will make the difference in the scene — these are the small things that no one will notice or see unless is was done incorrectly — and we as editors know this, but it is our job, our love of story telling, and our need to do things right that sets us above everyone else in the film making world — we have the time to fine tune and try variations.

The editor sets the pacing of the movie and a scene and can do so no matter what the pacing was on set.  The editor can also make an actor look good or bad depending on the takes used — and it is not always about taking the best performance on each camera set up on each actor in each scene it’s about what take works well with the preceding clip and the previous and the two before and after — these are the duties, the responsibilities, and the reverence that us editors revel in.

There are so many things that an editor does to make a movie even get finished let alone be something people want to watch over and over again, it is truly a joke when someone who just bought or has played with a movie editing program for a short time sits in front of it to cut a movie, not a home movie, not some slide show, and not some youtube video of his friend crashing on his bike, but a real movie they want to project onto the big screen.  A real editor edits something everyday, learns something, challenges them self to get better, to be more creative, and to become more useful to a film project than one else or any other equipment.

Without a real editor skilled and experienced editor you’re just pretending your making a movie.

Petite Chardonnay Day 6 : “IT’S A WRAP!”

Day 6, Sunday, November 13, 2011, brought us a cool day — not as cold as expected — and as the day went on it also brought us closer to the end of our last day of principal photography — which was both exciting and heartbreaking.

With the five leads and a very small crew we kept to the same quality and discipline that we held throughout the production.  I could tell that everyone felt the end was in the air and we would not see each other in this capacity on this film again, but that did not bring their spirits down; everyone pushed forward and completed their tasks.

And when Frank Cosgriff — our first Assistant Director — yelled “That’s a wrap!”  Many emotions and cheers filled the room.

Most may feel their part in this film is over, and that may be true for some, but the journey is not — I think about everyone and carry them with me as I work the magical part of the process of filmmaking — at least the magic that I can add to it — everyone has done their job, now it is my turn.

As the days, weeks, and months go by many of you will find other projects to do, grow up, and have their braces removed; meenwhile I will be focused and working hard on one project; this film called Petite Chardonnay.  I will — at certain times — keep you up to date on the progress of the film in post production — I have already purchased several boxes of tissue for the occasion.

So with your patients, understanding, and I know you have the passion, dedication, and devotion for this film, we will continue to walk beside each other — in spirit of course — but to me the JOURNEY is NOT over — we have created memories and relationships that will live forever.

Be safe, God Bless, and I thank you so much for being a part of the first phase of this epic story.

- gerald