[MaddaCheeb]

As it is, I've done a ton of research as to what people liked and didn't like about the first movie. A main focal point is character development, and another is the too-basic plot. I'm striving to fix those issues with my new script.

Yes, I have a camera and equipment. Yes, I completed the script. I have plenty of time to revise it so...

Constructive criticism of the first movie would be largely appreciated here. Help me make a better movie!

Tell me what you liked and didn't like about the movie; Please be specific!

And yes, it 's an indie film.

[Zethiwag]

Good luck!! What's the budget?

[MaddaCheeb]

Zethiwag posted:

Good luck!! What's the budget?

There is no actual set budget, it's all coming out of my pocket. So far it's cost about 700$ for equipment, editing programs and travel expenses. I am hoping to spend under 1500$ though.

[KlaseR]

First of all Skyline is like one of the worst movies in history. It would be easy to make something better than that. The only good thing was some of the CGI.
The bad is basically all these:

- terrible character development
- terrible dialogues
- stupid characters
- terrible screenplay
- terrible plot
- terrible camera work
- entirely shot in a dull hotel
- hardly anything happens
- no real backstory to alien invasion
- most of the CGI was awful
- the ending could have been interesting but was shat upon
- terrible movie all together

I advise you to make your own alien invasion movie without taking Skyline into consideration, it would just put people off watching it and give your work a bad name before it gets released.

[Jasun]

Why on earth did you choose Skyline, out of all the films in existence?

[MaddaCheeb]

Jasun posted:

Why on earth did you choose Skyline, out of all the films in existence?

Because I, out of many, many, loved it. Besides, if I'm going to film, write and act in my first movie it better not be some goddamn love drama shit.

Edited:

KlaseR posted:

First of all Skyline is like one of the worst movies in history. It would be easy to make something better than that. The only good thing was some of the CGI.
The bad is basically all these:

- terrible character development
- terrible dialogues
- stupid characters
- terrible screenplay
- terrible plot
- terrible camera work
- entirely shot in a dull hotel
- hardly anything happens
- no real backstory to alien invasion
- most of the CGI was awful
- the ending could have been interesting but was shat upon
- terrible movie all together

I advise you to make your own alien invasion movie without taking Skyline into consideration, it would just put people off watching it and give your work a bad name before it gets released.

Elaborate on any of those points. Camera work especially.

[KlaseR]

MaddaCheeb posted:

Elaborate on any of those points. Camera work especially.

- terrible character development random people seem placed there just to allow more deaths later on in the movie. You never care about them and you have little or no backstory or anything that would make you be interested in them as people.
- terrible dialogues No intelligent or interesting dialogues between the characters. Dull conversations.
- stupid characters Stereotyped characters that make completely predictable choices. Stupid dialogues and no interesting conflicts between people.
- terrible screenplay The screenplay is basically everything exept the visuals and the characters (exept dialogues). It's just not interesting or original in any way.
- terrible plot Alien Invasion, duh. Been done thousands of times. The plot isn't original or exiting in any way imaginable.
- terrible camera work No interesting scenarios or shots. Everything is dull and standard.
- entirely shot in a dull hotel no reason to elaborate this.
- hardly anything happens "Alien invasion starts" "let's run away" "No, let's wait for help" "let's run away" "No, let's wait for help""let's run away" "No, let's wait for help" Bam. movie ends.
- no real backstory to alien invasion It just happens.
- most of the CGI was awful A few exeptions. Most of it was shite.
- the ending could have been interesting but was shat upon The fact that the protagonist gains control of an alien body. Pity it lasts 10 seconds.
- terrible movie all together

[Jo The Shmo]

have you filmed any movies before? do you know anything about filming a movie?
do you have an upper limit for your budget? do you have access to resources like sets, actors, editing equipment, etc?

Edited:

also if you post your completed script here we could give you constructive feedback, otherwise there's not much we can say

[booster]

You're gonna need a lot of luck on this one buddy, seeing how bad reviews the first one got. It is most definitely going to affect on how people view this sequel you're making.

But I admire your optimism, and who knows, it might become a really good movie.

Just keep it original, and don't copy too much from the first (actually don't copy anything from the first).

Edited:

Also, what kind of filming equipment do you have?

[MaddaCheeb]

booster posted:

You're gonna need a lot of luck on this one buddy, seeing how bad reviews the first one got. It is most definitely going to affect on how people view this sequel you're making.

But I admire your optimism, and who knows, it might become a really good movie.

Just keep it original, and don't copy too much from the first (actually don't copy anything from the first).

Edited:

Also, what kind of filming equipment do you have?

Nikon S93000, records with a full 1920x1200 resolution and 60 Frames-per-second.

Standard Vista Explorer Tripod

Again, indie movie.

Edited:

Jo The Shmo posted:

have you filmed any movies before? do you know anything about filming a movie?
do you have an upper limit for your budget? do you have access to resources like sets, actors, editing equipment, etc?

Edited:

also if you post your completed script here we could give you constructive feedback, otherwise there's not much we can say

I'm not sure If I want to post the script. It's still in the revision process, but it is completed.

I have a basic audio editor that filters out background noise while leaving the original audio file in sync,

and I'm currently doing my homework on camera angles.

Never filmed anything before.

[Jo The Shmo]

this is a really ambitious project to take on with zero experience, a low-end camera, a small budget, and a mediocre script to base it off of.
good luck

[KlaseR]

MaddaCheeb posted:

Nikon S93000, records with a full 1920x1200 resolution and 60 Frames-per-second.

I think you mean Nikon S9300? the video quality should be okay but it has no external mic input.

Good luck anyhow. I started with a box of shit much much worse than that.

[booster]

If this is the camera you're using.

Then this project just turned from an Indie movie, to a high school movie project.

But hey, good luck anyway. And most importantly, have fun.

[MaddaCheeb]

KlaseR posted:

I think you mean Nikon S9300? If so it has no external mic input.

It's why I have to use an audio editor to filter out the noise.

Edited:

booster posted:

If this is the camera you're using.

Then this project just turned from an Indie movie, to a high school movie project.

But hey, good luck anyway. And most importantly, have fun.

I don't need an expensive camera to film a good movie. I don't have the money anyways.

[mark6789]

I think its great your making your own movie and all and i hope you do good but skyline isnt the best choice of movies for revising. Have you thought other alien movies to do?

[MaddaCheeb]

Jo The Shmo posted:

this is a really ambitious project to take on with zero experience, a low-end camera, a small budget, and a mediocre script to base it off of.
good luck

Thanks bro

Edited:

mark6789 posted:

I think its great your making your own movie and all and i hope you do good but skyline isnt the best choice of movies for revising. Have you thought other alien movies to do?

Yes but none seem as easy to...ahem...base off of.

[Fr3ddi3]

Skyline really is a terrible movie and i'd strongly advise picking another film to base yours upon.

What is a basic outline of your story?

[MaddaCheeb]

Fr3ddi3 posted:

Skyline really is a terrible movie and i'd strongly advise picking another film to base yours upon.

What is a basic outline of your story?

Pro Gaming Team comes to Las Vegas for Major League Gaming 2012 competition. They party at the pool and everything, go to bed, and then aliens attack. All but one of the team members is taken, and he must try and escape the city. He meets up with another survivor at one point and they try and decide what to do while waiting for the inevitable.

Eventually they steal a car from an underground parking garage and escape. Due to CGI constraints a chase scene of sorts will not be filmed on the strip, or anywhere near Vegas.

Crappy outline but the story is much better in person.

[Cheesemonkey]

MaddaCheeb posted:

I don't need an expensive camera to film a good movie

then you really don't understand enough about cameras and filming to shoot a movie

[Kopimi]

MaddaCheeb posted:

It's why I have to use an audio editor to filter out the noise.

you're going to use your nikon coolpix camera's built in microphone as the primary audio source for your film?

[MaddaCheeb]

Kopimi posted:

you're going to use your nikon coolpix camera's built in microphone as the primary audio source for your film?

And then edit the audio in Audacity. It works, I've done test shoots.

Edited:

Cheesemonkey posted:

then you really don't understand enough about cameras and filming to shoot a movie

Think about it: I'm not gonna spend 1000$ on a camera that will never get used past this movie. Even then, with a youtube-based release, i won't be getting any of that money back. It puts out a decent picture, I don't see the problem here.

But do YOU understand enough?

[Kopimi]

so is this a cloverfield style movie where the camera and audio is purposefully bad or what

[MaddaCheeb]

Kopimi posted:

so is this a cloverfield style movie where the camera and audio is purposefully bad or what

I could shoot it like that, but seeing as I hate the "found footage" type I likely won't. I could play off the main character finding a video camera and using it for a few small scenes.

[Jo The Shmo]

how about you shoot a trailer or a scene for the movie and show us that you can actually make a decent film before we trust that you can take on a feature-length project

ive been making videos for literally 10 years and I still wouldn't dream of taking on something this big

[MaddaCheeb]

Jo The Shmo posted:

how about you shoot a trailer or a scene for the movie and show us that you can actually make a decent film before we trust that you can take on a feature-length project

ive been making videos for literally 10 years and I still wouldn't dream of taking on something this big

Again, filming begins in June. Will push out a trailer sometime in July.

I'm ambitious to be honest.

Actually it isn't feature length. I'm aiming for a 40 minute run time.

[Cheesemonkey]

ive only been making videos and stuff for like a year and a half and only for school but let me put this into perspective

this took us like five days (so what like 5 hours of actual work) in media and we still fucked up on so many levels. of course it was one of the first things we ever did and i could do much better in far less time now, but can you?

you are not prepared to make a feature length movie, especially one of that magnitude

[MaddaCheeb]

Cheesemonkey posted:

ive only been making videos and stuff for like a year and a half and only for school but let me put this into perspective

this took us like five days (so what like 5 hours of actual work) in media and we still fucked up on so many levels. of course it was one of the first things we ever did and i could do much better in far less time now, but can you?

you are not prepared to make a feature length movie, especially one of that magnitude

maybe not but I'm going to anyways.

Oh and don't insult me behind my back, please. You just end up looking like a giant moron, which I can already see you are.

[Cheesemonkey]

you're right there is a giant conspiracy against you and your movie

[Jo The Shmo]

this is like my proud work of art and its still a piece of shit

Edited:

here is one of my earliest ones (a masterpiece i might add)

as you can see the first movies you make are generally shit, and it takes a MUCH larger budget than yours to make something actually decent


like that movie BDA worked on, I'm pretty sure they had a really big budget or a least a lot of people working on it
and they were all students and learning about filmmaking, not just people who picked it up as a hobby

[AutomataReturns]

Not in any major way trying to be cynical, but making a movie is fucking hard. As much as you think you can do it yourself, you are going to have to rely on others. Those are others are generally not as excited about the project unless you are paying them enough to be. The reality of the industry is that many people want to make their own film. How many turn out even slightly good? How many even get completed?

Good luck, god speed and what have you, but personally, I do not think this will go through.

[Jo The Shmo]

this is the thing bda worked on

take a look at those opening credits, and how many people were involved. That's a lot of people.
I'm also taking a guess and saying that their budget was huge, because that's why film festivals are around, to help independent filmmakers who invested tons of money in their films find distributors and make back their money. That's how the independent film industry works, not through youtube.
and this was a relatively simple film, it was only 6 minutes long and it was about a staring contest. yours is about some huge thing in LA with car chases and aliens and tons of people....
and theirs was clearly based on the good, the bad, and the ugly, which is a classic film. yours is based on a real shitty sci-fi film.
I'm sorry, but it just doesn't seem like an idea that's even close to possible

[ventilated]

a "low budget" movie usually drops about $25K for audio post. That's the REALLY low budget movies, with "no budget".

What are you going to do for color correct.

Are you editing it yourself?

Since it's going to be an alien flick are you doing CGI yourself?

I'm not trying to burst your bubble, but you don't have the money available. You would be better set to write a killer script and sell it. In the selling contract you can demand involvement to a certain extent. That would be your best bet actually, and hope that it gets picked up somewhere.

[cricket50]

I didn't think anyone actually enjoyed Skyline.

[Sir Whoopsalot]

This can't turn out to be anything other than hilarious.

[Cheesemonkey]

MaddaCheeb posted:

And then edit the audio in Audacity. It works, I've done test shoots.

wait wait why did anyone miss this

i have done hundreds of hours of interviews and you simply need an external microphone, using the built in one isn't an option and it absolutely is not an option if you are trying to film something dramatic, especially because the built in microphones don't even have dynamic volume, have no wind reduction, and have a lot of white noise compared to even the simplest of plug-in microphones

Edited:

and i work with prosumer canon cameras and not a budget point and shoot