RogerDeakins.com

Roger Deakins... You only think you don't know who he is, but I'm sure you've seen his work. Roger Deakins, BSC, ASC, is a multi-award winning, 8 time Oscar Nominated Cinematographer, who has shot almost every film by the Coen Brothers, Shawshank Redemption, Revolutionary Road, Doubt, The Assassination of Jesse James... the list goes on.

Needless to say, he knows his stuff. And the best thing about him is that he's not a secret keeper. He shares his knowledge with anyone who asks.

RogerDeakins.com is a great resource for anyone interested in cinematography, I spent nearly a whole day roaming around the forums reading through his responses. So, check it out. He gives out way more information than any other pro that I know of.

So the next time, you watch a The Big Lebowski, you'll know who sat behind the camera, shooting "The Dude."

Raindance Resources

There's some good articles on the Raindance website. Check it out. Learn something. It'd be good for you.

http://www.raindance.co.uk/site/index.php?id=37,138,0,0,1,0

Dale and The Laughing Turtle

Here are a couple of stills from the current project that I'm shooting for a friend. It's called Dale and the Laughing Turtle. It's turning out fantastic. It's keeping us busy, but we're about 2/3 of the way through shooting with one more big weekend ahead of us.

The film stars Lucas Ross and Ra'chel Lowery.

Enjoy...

Life After Film School

i saw this on a blog the other day, can't remember whose it was, sorry.

but i thought it was pretty cool. the ones i've watched are doug liman, seth macfarlane, and jason reitman. they were pretty good and had some interesting things to say.

worth checking out.

http://www.hulu.com/life-after-film-school

Musical Locations

A couple of days ago, Ryan and I had the honor of shooting a short piece for Crystal Woodman Miller, a Columbine survivor, who has turned the tragedy she went through into a message of hope.  

Since Columbine, Crystal has traveled around the world to share her experience with people who have encountered similar acts of violence.  We had a great time with Crystal although the shoot almost didn't happen at all.

Two locations cancelled on us at the last minute, a couple crew didn't show, and one extra didn't show as well, that's why you'll see me walking in the background.

However, the guys at "The Old School Bagel Cafe" were fantastic, we called them at 1:30 and showed up to shoot at 3:00.  We shot after they closed and squeezed everything in by sundown. It was a miracle.

We shot on a Canon XH-A1 using a Redrock Micro w/ Zeiss lenses 35mm, 50mm, & 85mm.  For lighting, we had 2-1K's, 1-500w, and 2-250w's, and a massive set of windows on the west side to let the sun set in on our scene. 

Here's a couple of stills pulled from the footage.  Thanks again to "The Old School Bagel Cafe"!

A steaming cup of hot... water... they had already cleaned out the coffee.
This is Petra, the "extra" (more like a friend) that showed... she was brilliant, professional & patient, with us while we were shorthanded.
Here's Crystal, mid-sentence, it's hard pulling a still of somebody talking.
The flower in the ashtray is part of the story that Staples (Ryan) came up with... get it beauty from the ashes... huh... nice.
What did we learn from this... Always secure a controlled location.  When one owner says that they never have customers after 2pm, they're lying.  And when another owner says they think that you can shoot there, plan on them saying "no!"  

Over all, I think it turned out real nice, it was chaotic, but it all worked out in the end.

Box 7235

Two weeks ago, a couple of us headed up to The Salt Flats, in Nowhere, Oklahoma (actually it's near Cherokee.) It also just happened to be the coldest day all winter with 35 mph winds, making the windchill 11 degrees F.

But thanks to the Staples' stubbornness, and the 2 1/2 hour drive to get out there, we proceeded with the shoot.

Miserable, doesn't even begin to describe it. Ben, our one and only actor, was an amazing sport about the whole thing. All of the crew was bundled up, but Ben was out there with nothing on his ears or his hands, and I didn't even hear him complain. In the end, the short turned out great!

Staples has already finished the edit and we're preparing for the web. It'll be on our websites March 20th.

So, make sure you catch it, joshmckamie.com & staplesx2.com. It is my favorite of the last three that we've done.

Here's a couple of stills. It was a lot colder than it looks.
Staples and Ben talking in the coldDustin Faust and I, freezing.

OTS (Over the Shoulder)

Lighting The Burrow Log

Lighting outdoors can be easy, cheap and still look good. Here's a couple of things that we did on our recent outdoor shoot, The Burrow Log.

The first thing to do, is pick the time of day. Unless the story, calls for "the mid-day sun" to be" beating down, relentlessly" on the characters, I would recommend shooting either in the morning to early afternoon, or late afternoon to sundown. This is what we did for The Burrow Log.

We shot late afternoon to sundown. The sun is lower in the sky, and therefore, not as bright as the midday sun. Does that mean that your story has to take place during that time frame, not necessarily, most people won't realize that it is late in the afternoon, they'll just know that it is light outside, and therefore, daytime.


Another thing to remember is to always try and position the sun as a backlight on your talent. This is sometimes a hard habit to get into since the natural thing to do is position the light on the actors face. But if you put it behind the talent, the Sun will give a nice rim or "halo" effect on their hair.


The only two pieces of lighting equipment that we had, was a 3x3 ft. piece of foam core, and a black bedsheet. The foam core, or Bounce board, was used for just that, to bounce the light from the sun back onto the actors face. To give your image depth or shape, position the light source, in this case the bounce board, off to one side. We had it above our actor pointing down to give it a natural look. If the bounce is too low, it gives the spooky, campfire story feel.


So what was the black sheet for? Negative fill. I wanted more shape to the face so by using the black sheet, we cancelled out ambient light that was hitting the actors faces.

And that's pretty much it. I guess the only thing to add is what kind of camera rig we were shooting on so here you go. We used a Canon XHA1 with a Redrock Micro lens attachment, that's what gives the image so much depth of field. Those lens attachments aren't cheap, but it sure "ups" the production value.

All in all I think the shoot turned out great!

Check it out here, if you haven't already.

Burrow Log Up Now!!

Check it out HERE!

Written and Directed by Ryan Scott (staplesx2.com), and shot by myself.

Burrow Log This Saturday

Sorry for the lack of love this week. It's been crazy busy, and I just haven't had time lately.

I will have "The Burrow Log" up this weekend on my website, so check that out.

Here's a couple of stills from the shoot.

Burrow Log Set Stills

I got a chance to take a look at a rough cut of the short film "The Burrow Log" that we shot this weekend. And I have to say it looks fantastic. Ryan Scott, the filmmaker behind "Burrow Log" has done a great job. I can't wait to share that with you.

In the meantime, you'll have to settle with a couple of stills from the shoot this weekend.

Here's the cast and crew. Ryan Scott's hand is on the left. I'm hiding behind the tree. Scott Green with his hand on the grip stand. Tyler Roberd's (Ethan) and James Austin Kerr (James) chillin' on the tree. Ty McCarthy with his hands in his pockets, and Dustin Faust taking the photo.

We used a Canon XH-A1 with a Redrock Micro Lens Adapter and a 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm Zeiss SLR lenses.
The director (Ryan) and the DP (me). I had to throw this in here because Staples (Ryan) hated so much.

Here's Tyler and James rehearsing the scene.

Next time, I'll talk a little about what our lighting technique was and working with the Redrock Micro.

Free Sundance Shorts

Hey, just wanted you guys to know this if you haven't seen it yet.

itunes (http://itunes.com/sundance) has 10 short films from Sundance for free, but only until Jan. 25.

I know some are labeled "EXPLICIT" so if that is something that may offend you then just beware. I haven't gotten through them all so I can't vouch for the "EXPLICIT" rating.

I think it's always a good to take a look at other filmmakers work, especielly those that are getting excepted to festivals.

Weekend, Out

Alright... It was a long day on Saturday but we got it done, and from what I've seen, I think that the footage looks pretty good.

Ryan Scott, the writer/director/producer of the short, is already smashing away on the keyboard trying to get this thing edited. And I'll keep you updated on that.

I added a work page to my website, so you can also check there for the video, and others. I'm going to be loading old work up there as often as I can. I already have "Aspen Roots" up, featuring Ryan Scott and Brittany Joyner.

We shot "Aspen Roots" in one evening, with us and a couple of crew guys to hold the boom mic and a bounce card, which was a similar set up to the "Burrow Log." "Aspen Roots" was really just a test, so that Ryan and I could play with some new equipment, and we ended up sending it to a couple of short film festivals. And it actually got into a Denver Festival.

Ryan was able to go up there and "claims" to have had a good time, even though we walked away with nothing but a notch in our belt. Not bad though, for a something we shot in one afternoon and spent about $50 on.

Anyway, as soon as I have more on the "Burrow Log," I'll let you know.

Excuses, excuses...

Here they come...

So, I apologize for the lack of posting this week, it's been a busy week. We have had a lot of pre-production for a couple of projects at work, and we have been getting ready for a shoot this weekend, and I have been working on updating my website work page.

So... all that to say, I'm sorry. After today, I'll have more time to post some more stuff, and I'll get you guys some stills from the shoot today.

In the meantime, you can head over to IndieWire (<- that is a link) and check out the speech Ted Hope gave at the Art House Convergence. He has some really great points for all areas of the filmmaking process. Also, if you haven't yet, check out his blog Truly Free Film.(<- also a link)

Have a good weekend!

No Money... No Problem

Okay... An excuse I used to use was, "if I only had that expensive writing software, that helps me format a script correctly, than I would write more." Well... that's not a valid excuse anymore. A friend of mine recommended this software to me, a while back, and... what can I say? It's fantastic. And the best part is that it is totally free!

I know this sounds like a cheesy infomercial you might see during the day, but I don't know how else to put it. The software is called Celtx, apparently prounounced, (Kel-Tex.) You can find it here.

So what's the big deal? It's a screenwriting software, for free! "So I can do that in Word," you say. Well does word allow you to tag characters, props and locations, and then automatically load them into a production reports for you, huh? Can you automatically print call sheets from Word, huh? Huh? Well, can you? I didn't think so.

Here's a screenshot of the main window.I know that's kind of small but you really ought to head to celtx.com, and check it out. They've got several tutorial/videos so that you can see how helpful this can be. It's available to download for Mac, PC and Linux, so again, no excuses!

Being organized is an important aspect of production. By being organized, it allows you to be more creative and not have to worry about things, like missing shots, missing actors, missing props, missing coffee... what!? Where's my coffee?!

What I Want This to Be... or Why Should You Care

I think my overall goal for this is sharing. I'm not a guru, nor do I claim to be. I'm just wanting to create a place to share information that, I think, would have been helpful if someone had told me when I was starting out.

Don't count on getting useful tidbits every day, because, on occasion, I like to rant. (I also like commas, if that's grammatically incorrect, I'm sorry,,, I didn't study English.) But as this thing grows, I would like to share my knowledge in all areas of production with an emphasis on "No-Budget" because that's what I know.

For example, we just shot a short film, that premiered at a the Denver Festivus Festival, for less than $100. Of course we didn't have to buy equipment, mics and computers, because we already own them.

Speaking of projects, that's another area that I would like to share. I learn best from doing. It seems that I learn something new on every project. Not to mention, a little shameless promotion never hurt anybody.

Well, I've wasted enough of your time.

Blog...What Blog?

So, you expected to pop over here and find a blog in full bloom, with cool pictures, awesome videos and words of advice... but got this instead, right?

My bad... I just got this thing put together and am still in the process of getting it to look right. So, if you'll bare with me, I'll get it finished soon, and hopefully begin posting before the weekend is up.

Anyway, Thanks for stopping by and take it easy.