Student Filmmakers - June 2008 - (Page 17) instead of the director who was responsible. In such cases, having the recorded shot choices available for review can settle the matter. For this reason, producers love camcorder evidence and my even contract for it in writing. Other disagreements are easier to manage with a camcorder. An actor, unsure of how she will appear in a shot can inexpensively see for herself and assist the director in arriving at a solution that gives the actor confidence and yields a better performance. A DP may also be convinced that a tricking lighting while the problem director can be expeditiously corrected by trying various solutions verbally responds. Then the two can look at the results on the playback and make a quicker decision than by any other means. Today’s relatively inexpensive, consumer HD camcorders have an output that is not that far from the quality of some cinema bound, video-based features. It is not inconceivable that an aggressive editor will not value some of the camcorder clips as B-roll. True, this may be stretching a point, but entire films have been entirely shot with handheld camcorders (e.g., The Blair Witch Project, 1999) and many others have included scenes, which employ camcorderacquired or camcorder effect shots. Having one on the set, for the small expense (and whose to say the camera doesn’t become a gift to someone after the shoot?) may be well worth the editorial flexibility. Gathering Footage for “The Making of” Video Another great reason to employ a camcorder on the feature set is to gather footage for “the making of” video. Most indie budgets cannot afford to produce a making-of production. However, once the film has found distribution, one of the things often requested by the distributor is a making-of doc. How nice would it be to offer the director’s angle selection videos and whatever odd rehearsal bits, off-camera dialogue and “set fun” were captured thereon? June 2008 studentfilmmakers 1 http://www.cdiabu.com
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