WEDNESDAY CLASS
DISCUSSION: Friday’s individual shot-directing task.
Robin remarked that he was surprised at the way everyone approached the task – people were efficient and quiet, speaking in lower volumes, focused on the work (all talk was about the work), and highly generous towards one another.
Someone said that they found it difficult to communicate their vision without taking over the role of the person to whom they were trying to describe what they wanted.
Then came the question – “Where/when do we compromise the director’s vision for respect?” I don’t think this is the right question. I don’t think much should compromise the director’s vision. Time is one element that may require changes to be made. But, really, things should be prepared enough so that the director can best achieve their vision. All key crew should be on the same page as the director before the shoot. There should be minimal explanations and descriptions required of shots during the shoot. Suggestions for shot alterations should occur in pre-production and certainly not on the shoot day (unless prompted by time constraints).
However, our class exercises can’t really give us this kind of preparation time, so I suppose that compromising the director’s vision is a valid potentiality – especially since there’s a lot more group contribution than on a professional production. It’s a still difficult question to answer though.
Robin then went on to clarify the director’s role – being decisive, being articulate and communicating efficiently, being a good person to work with, getting people to give the desired level/type of input (which could range from a high level of input to no input at all) and having a good way of managing that kind of creative collaboration.
WATCHING THE SHOTS:
We went through the shots that each person directed. I loved the ground-level tracking shot that would track and then pause on each character’s feet as they delivered their dialogue. The feet blocking performances were really inventive. I thought it was a very clever shot. I also liked the framing idea behind Kai’s shot – the guy’s lower-/half-face in the foreground, and the girl in the background. I didn’t shoot it very well for Kai, but I really liked his vision. Also kudos to Karl again for his hilarious and brilliant acting in the panning shot.
I hadn’t actually watched my shot until this little screening. And I found that I didn’t really like it. It looked better in my head. It also didn’t seem to work for the script – it changed the scene’s tone. Of course, that tone change is the result of a combination of extraneous variables as well as my intended changes.
ORGANISING THE DOUBLE-SHOOT TASK:
When we allotted positions, I again found myself avoiding the director and DP roles – roles that I’m actually interested in. But the reasons behind this recurring avoidance aren’t just about fear of screwing up. I’m disinclined to accept the director role because I feel like the director must know their vision inside and out to have the conviction required to deal with on-set demands. For me, this requires deep, detailed preparation. Even more so if the concept doesn’t originate from my own mind. The director also has to believe wholeheartedly in their vision – a confidence which comes from the stewing of an idea and its meticulous preparation. I’m happy to direct things later on for my studio project, because I’ll be able to better devote myself to creating a more detailed vision that I’ll believe in. But, for now, I’d rather use these in-class shooting tasks as opportunities to practice and better understand roles under the director.
The reasons for avoiding DPing are similar. The DP must create shots that they believe in and know inside out before shooting. They need similar conviction to the director in order to deal with on-set demands. Again, for me, this requires meticulous preparation.
Of course, there is always the fear of screwing up, but that is more related to my own expectations: wanting to avoid the demoralising feeling of personally unsatisfying work. There’s nothing more frustrating to me than doing substandard or standard work. I will feel like I’ve wasted my time. To me, it’s the most devitalising thing in the world. It’s painful to do work that I’m not satisfied with. It doesn’t matter too much about other people’s expectations, but if I don’t fulfil my own goals with my work, I’m left with unshakable frustration and devitalisation. So, that’s another reason for my avoidance of the director and DP roles.
We spent most of the class time preparing for task 1. Karl and Gina mapped out shots, and I attempted to document the shots so that I could later make them into a shooting schedule. We then did a recce of the location, during which Karl took photos to build a rough ‘storyboard’. I don’t think we prepared anything for task 2, except for roles. This was probably not the wisest decision, since task 2 was quite a complicated request.
For task 1, I chose the role of first assistant director. I did this because I thought I was well-equipped to first – I knew what was required on a detailed level and I believed that I’d be able to help bring the scene to fruition. I also didn’t want to sit through another shoot where the shots weren’t called and time-keeping was neglected and the task was a messy ordeal. I trusted myself to first for the group.
I chose to act for the second task. I don’t know why I did this, because I don’t really like acting. It’s uncomfortable. But I felt that it’d be a mental relief to change roles from an order-giving, logistics/time/safety-concerned, behind-the-camera person into an order-taking, performance-concerned, before-the-camera person.