Go Naked pt. 2
Wednesday, July 16, 2008 at 4:31PM A month ago I called your attention to a teaser for a short film called White Red Panic by Ayz Waraich. The film is now complete, and viewable on Vimeo as well as on his site, dimeworth.com.
Don't you dare watch the video in this little window though. Go to the Vimeo page, download the full-res movie (requires logging in) and watch it full screen. I watched it projected at 1080p 90" wide played off a PS3.
And it looked damn good.
Ayz is my new "shut up and make movies" poster boy. He didn't fuss with 35mm adapters and carbon fiber matte boxes. Instead he tamed the toy (the in-spite-of-itself Canon HV20) and put some fine actors with a good, simple story into shots he knew he could make look great using a combination of well-considered camera settings and ample color correction.
Thankfully for all of us, Ayz has started to share some of his production methods on the Rebel Café, including these color correction before/afters.
Read the thread on the Rebel Café and get inspired—but don't make the mistake of thinking that you need to do exactly what Ayz did. The point is that he got off his ass and made a film at a scale he knew he could slam dunk, with the gear he had available.
See, I love Redrock adapters and follow focuses and jibs and backrubs from supermodels. But I worry when I see young filmmakers thinking that they should not embark on a project without having all that stuff. Ayz estimates his budget at somehwere south of $1,000. Add the cost of a brand new HV30 to that and you still haven't come close to the cost of most fancy DV matte boxes. Think real hard about that the next time your gear lust overtakes you. I know I will.
Rock on Ayz. You deserve all the attention you're getting for this flick.
Reader Comments (12)
The acting was really good, that made all the difference. The look and shooting was the icing on the cake.
Yay :) I'm glad to Ayz getting some link-love on ProLost, I was so impressed when I finally got to watch his short after waiting for weeks. It looks great on Vimeo too.
I love too that he didn't feel the need to shoot this on 35, I see so many people (especially here in LA) who write something and try, and try, and try for months to get it shot because they won't film it on anything but 35. And for what?
'Red | White | Panic' looks great and is a very enjoyable short to watch... which is all that matters, really.
Rock on, Ayz :)
This was a great short. Great acting and great dialogue. The teaser inspired me to go out and get an HV20 myself, proving Stu's opinion that having a camera of your own makes all the difference. I have shot more in 2 weeks than i have in the past year. Ayz's short also proves that theory.
It also prove that working with what you have is far more productive than worrying about what you don't.
On another note: Stu, how did you burn this so that you could watch it on PS3?
ttown71, I downloaded the .mp4 file from the Vimeo page and copied it to a USB drive. The PS3 can play that format right off the drive.
Re: Shooting on 35mm....I think that's related to the amount of film school grads/industry pros that are presumably running around. We get the same thing in Vancouver; I've often wondered why in a town with so many Vancouver Film School grads and otherwise creative people there isn't more going on not only in the way of shorts but video podcasts, but a lot of it can be explained by people having a certain elitist mindset that keeps them from actually *doing* anything.
Also, great short. Makes me want to get my ass in gear and make some HV20 goodness, pronto.
I guess RED is the new 35mm then.
A lot of people I meet that are trying to get a short together are set on trying to get a RED to shoot it with.
Anything else won't do.
Great film, I'm super impressed, but I had one question for Stu. Yes, the film is great and looks great, but I noticed a lot of "dancing pixels" in the midtones and shadows. Is that unavoidable with the HV20/30, or with HDV format, or with one-chip cameras, or with any level of compression? Is this something that the De:Noise plugin would eliminate? Maybe Ayz should try that. What do you think?
Great film, I'm super impressed, but I had one question for Stu. Yes, the film is great and looks great, but I noticed a lot of "dancing pixels" in the midtones and shadows. Is that unavoidable with the HV20/30, or with HDV format, or with one-chip cameras, or with any level of compression? Is this something that the De:Noise plugin would eliminate? Maybe Ayz should try that. What do you think?
I haven't watched the film yet, but I am looking forward to it. You actually inspired me to do exactly what Ayz did, before I heard of him. I finished my first full length in January of this year (production started about two months after I purchased a copy of your book...that's no coincidence!!!!)
I'm color blind, so I couldn't color correct. Rather than use that as an excuse, we made it black & white with splashes of color.
So, thank you, Stu.
The trailer can be found on YouTube...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOdGO2Iokqw
Clint Gaige, Two Bits Productions
I just re-read my last comment...sorry, that sounded like a sales pitch...it was merely meant to say thank you for your inspiration.
I have gotten to sit and enjoy Ayz's film today and have to say, he has really raised the bar for rebel filmmaking. What a movie. What a movie!
I have a question:
What is the 1000 dollar spent on? Even that amount seems too much for a short like this.
BTW loved the film : ) Keep up the good work.