The Importance of Trusting Your Own Opinion

[Ed_David]

I’ll admit it, I use camera forums a lot.  Too much, probably. I use them to check out the latest cameras and lenses and lights and accessories. I waste about two hours a day on them.  Time I could spend watching “the View.”

When I started out shooting part-time in 2005, I got a DVX100 because a juggler who was a featured extra on a tv show called “Sons of Saddam” told me to.  “Cause it does 24p.”  I didn’t know what that meant, but I plunked down $3,000 - all the money I had in savings on this camera.  

The camera could have been a bust.  But I did it because a juggler who played one of Saddam’s sons goons said so.  That’s how easily influenced I am.

Then I bought a HVX200, not even testing it first.  “Cause it can do HD.”   I bought the Redrock micro adapter because I watched the work of MacGreggor and some other DPs back then do stuff on a Gorilla 35 lens adapter that hadn’t even come out.  I hadn’t even tried it first.  Just sent in my credit card info.  

Rinse and repeat.

All these periods of time I bought things just based on videos I saw shot on them. No tests - I didn’t understand tests.  Just videos shot with them and the opinions of people I respected.  I could look at screen grabs but just scroll down to their opinions.

Well finally 11 years later, I am seeing what I was doing - buying based on people’s emotions.  Based on the emotions of people whose work I liked.

This is fine to do, but it’s not always the smartest thing to do.  

There are several, maybe twenty influential figures online in the cinematography world.  David Mullen, Shane Hurlbut, John Brawley, Art Adams, Geoff Boyle, and of course Andrew Reid, come to mind as leaders who people follow and listen to.

Even the opinions of the above people and the other influencers are, in the end, just their opinions.

When someone says, “this to me screams filmic” or “this looks digital” - again, that’s all an opinion.  If they say, “that grade is terrible” or “man you nailed the skin tones” - again, that’s all opinion.  Even looking at test charts and camera tests, the results are subjective.  Aesthetic is subjective.  There are scientific tests, but they lead to opinions.  This isn’t pure math - this is an art form.

There is no such thing as filmic.

Everything is digital.  Film emulsions see the world differently, but they go through a digital intermediate.  They become digital .  And I think that’s probably about 99.9% of all films shot on celluloid.  Maybe a few hipsters shoot film and use a steinbeck, but they still upload their results to vimeo, which converts this to a h.264 file.

I have very strong opinions, and a lot of people have very strong opinions.  That’s why we work in film.  It’s an art form that is full of passionate people.  But I also have low self-esteem.  My whole nature of existence is based on others approval.  I’m getting better at trusting my own self, but this is my basis.  

I think maybe most artists have low self-esteem or why would they want to share their art?  Is it ego?  Or the attempt for others to connect?  Yes that’s part of it.  But whether you want to admit it or not, we love when people love our work.  We live off the feedback, or why would we check vimeo 5 times a day to see if someone commented?  Why else would we have awards?  Especially in an art field where awards are just based on opinions of a community who may or may not get your work?

Something is beautiful if you think it is.  You don’t need an oscar in cinematography to be happy with your lighting or camera movement or angle, or have your opinion mean anything less if you aren’t in the ASC.  Everyone brings something unique to the art form.  Everyone brings a new perspective that is needed, especially now, when everything feels pretty much the same.  

[Nikkor]

Whenever I start to design a building, at first I get very excited, my mind gets into a fugue, my "intuition" spits out fast results. Then usually I go into the library and look at similar proyects, I start to rationalize, I begin to get influenced, conservative, confused and loose motivation. This process can last forever until the thing needs to get done, in the end I always end up doing something similar to what I had thought in the first moment. I wish I could stop doing the inbetween because it sucks out your life.

In college, when the whole class had to do the same project, it often occurred that we ended up doing almost the same thing, a boring standarised answer, a conservative and consensuated solution.

I read a study where they would make people take decisions. At first they would ask people individually to give a fast answer, afterwards they would give them time to think and have access to other peoples responses. The fast individual (the gut) answers turned out to be correct more times than the others.

It's judgement that defeats us

 

(I was reading about "Cognitive bias" just before reading your posts, that timing )

[Axel]

1 hour ago, araucaria said:

It's judgement that defeats us

We need the reassurance of others to keep our persona alive. We are social beings. Therefore, we act, we pretend and rarely see our real needs. Of course, we have some ideas how we should be (not that we should be), and those rule our thoughts, literally. We believe that we think about something, while in reality we listen to a debate of inner voices. Many with personality disorders call them what they are: alien. Thoughts are deceiving. Emotions are much more reliable. We can learn to trust our feelings (more), to allow them to guide our actions, we can then better sense the real motivations of others and make better decisions.

Which camera to buy? How does this esoteric stuff apply there? I need to ask myself (who asks whom?), if I suffer from NCO ...

>Trusting Your Own Opinion<

Plato said opinion was a poor substitute for knowledge. Know why I need a tool and what I want to achieve with it.

[Ed_David]

all great points.

But opinions are based on knowledge in art.  There is no right or wrong.  It's emotional.

The dialogue is indeed in our heads, between doubt and belief in ourselves.

I still think the concept of competitive awards giving out for art is bizarre.  I can understand an award for a scientific project - but to say "Crash" was a better film than Lost in Translation, both competing for best picture - and being such different films is a bizarre fact of our modern "filmmaker" community.  Apples and oranges.

What people value at the time vs what people later value.

For instance, Schenededty, NY, by Charlie Kaufman I think is a masterpiece.  And look at the reviews of it at the time.  They made it seem as if the film was total trash.

 

[Nikkor]

11 minutes ago, Ed David said:

For instance, Schenededty, NY, by Charlie Kaufman I think is a masterpiece.  And look at the reviews of it at the time.  They made it seem as if the film was total trash.

That film made me depressive for 2 days

[DPStewart]

Brilliant post Ed.
....as usual!

[majoraxis]

For me it's about confidence. How do I gain the confidence in my ability to communicate the story I want to tell with my target audience.  Do I spend $5k (again and again) on a camera and lenses and learn how to use them?  Do I take classes at the locate community college and learn how to tell a story despite the limits of available equipment. Do I pay some to shoot my story for me and learn by watching what they do and asking questions. Do I write a script, rent a complete system, lights, camera and lenses,  and only shot when I have something worthy of investing in?

So I went the "spend the money on the camera" route and tried to learn how to use it and it did not work out how I hoped it would.   First I purchased an GH1 and hacked it, and purchased c-mount lens, thought I could do better so I purchased I BMPCC to used the same lenses, and used home depot lights with mixed results - I really needed to purchase an external monitor.  Then I purchased an NX1 and small led light panel and external monitor, and it looked better, but still was not exactly what I was hoping for.  Now I'm on a BMCC and I have even more lights and it looks good (enough) when RS is not messing with panning, bottom line is it still has limitations the I would like to move beyond.

Even though I can see the gaps in my current setup ( I realize I could use a better tripod and larger High CRI LED light panels). What I really want is to be able to do is use minimal lights (have low noise, high ISO capability), have low or no rolling shutter, the ability to shoot handheld so stabilized lenses and/orI IBS sensor with great autofocus, oh and don't forget the high dynamic range.

So I keep hoping there will be a "messiah" camera that will allow me  to do all of the above - it will probably be the A7RIII with 4D auto focus and minimal rolling shutter with full screen read out in 4K. Who knows. it will probably have other issuess I would like to avoid like 8 bti space making me want to wait for the next next generation.

Anyways, I would rather buy a new camera body than more lights - go figure - I guess, currently you can't have it all (for my budget) so I will confidently make do with what I have - after I add some more light and a tripod.

[squig]

Unfortunately our art has been corporatised and industrialised. I don't need awards to feed my ego, I need them to put food on the table. I make films because I have something I need to say about this insane world, and there's no better way to say it.

The most talented artists always question themselves, most of them think their work is shit. Just watch Coppola melt down in 'Hearts of Darkness' (one of my favourite films).

I've been in the entertainment business since I started DJing at house parties when I was 16. I put on my first rave at 20, and put out an ARIA award winning album on a major label at 29. I've seen other talented people make it while others crashed and burned. Fear is the number one enemy, procrastination is another. I think fear is what causes the procrastination. Self doubt can be a real killer. I know a guy who trashed the files every time he made a track because he thought his tracks were shit. He's a far more talented composer/producer than me.

Because I worked in a record shop and DJ'd for 15 years I developed a sense of what makes a track interesting to people. Like Ed said aesthetic is subjective, but there's certain key elements in music and in film that can make or break either. Tarantino's success comes from many years learning the language of film, same goes for Scorsese. Both of them are masters of nailing a score too.

My formula for figuring out if my music/screenplay/film is up to scratch is to compare it to other work in the same genre and determine whether my work hits the same marks. To do that I have to put myself in the shoes of my audience. It's like an out of body experience where you have to try to leave your ego behind and just see whether your work entertains you as an audience (you're gonna have to figure out for yourselves how to chill the fuck out). I'm sure everyone here has some experience entertaining themselves. One thing that really helps is to walk away from your work for a while. If you're working on something all the time you're gonna be too precious and either think it's amazing or a piece of shit. I put my screenplays down for months and then I do a reading purely to entertain myself. It's then a lot easier to make the changes I need to make it interesting enough to play to an audience.

The album I produced was 4 years, over 30 tracks, and a mountain of pizza boxes and zip tie bags in the making, and it wasn't until the night we recorded 'The Last Track' that I knew it was good to go. How did I know? When you get that feeling I got that night you'll know. This film I'm planning to shoot this year's been a full-time job for the past 7 years. Persistence and madness are every bit as important as talent.

End rant. Now back to the joy of my film site design clusterfuck.

 

[Xavier Plagaro Mussard]

6 hours ago, squig said:

To do that I have to put myself in the shoes of my audience. It's like an out of body experience where you have to try to leave your ego behind and just see whether your work entertains you as an audience

 

That's very nice! To have confidence in yourself, you must be confident that you can "judge" your work as someone else. Maybe that's why we are never 100% sure, because we can never be 100% someone else!!!

[Axel]

A propos procrastination. I read a german book on that topic called HOW TO GET THINGS DONE WITHOUT A HINT OF SELF-DISCIPILINE, written by a very successful motivation coach. In the ad campaign for the book, the true Genesis was told. God felt obliged to create the world in seven days, but he couldn't built up momentum. No one there to delegate tasks and the clock ticking. On the last day, five minutes to twelve, he hastily lumped everything together. He saw that it was nothing to write home about, but he said to himself, hey, for five minutes work!

The author defines procrastination as the result of feeling obliged to do something one is not convinced of. Seemingly lazy people can set free a lot of energy once they manage to distinguish between what they are supposed to do and what  they want to do. Always try to invest as little effort to meet the expectations of others as possible, more important, don't waste a thought to second-guessing if they might approve. We are living in a less than perfect world (see above), and you don't owe anything to anyone. It's not just about business schedules or other mind-consuming, pointless duties. Creativity is blocked by self-discipline, by to-do-lists, these things are self-contradictory. Will what I plan to do please others? Why should I care?

[agolex]

3 minutes ago, Axel said:

and you don't owe anything to anyone.

Maximizing creativity is one thing, a world with egomaniacal exploiters on sprees of self-fulfillment is another. But we're on that route alright and there's no going back, so might as well lead the pack. ; )

[Axel]

22 minutes ago, agolex said:

Maximizing creativity is one thing, a world with egomaniacal exploiters on sprees of self-fulfillment is another. But we're on that route alright and there's no going back, so might as well lead the pack. ; )

More evil comes from obeying than from doing ones own thing (as our countries' history illustrates). Emotions or thoughts expressed with genuine passion will also be appreciated by others. Doing what you think might be after everybody's fancy results in mediocrity. At best.

And: I don't see we are on 'that route'. The current crises on so many levels can't be solved by accepting practical constraints. We need more people who trust their own judgment (made with minds, hearts and souls) and who contradict the so-called common sense of their society. Again, our country provides the challenge right now. How can we sleep while our beds are burning?

[agolex]

1 hour ago, Axel said:

More evil comes from obeying than from doing ones own thing (as our countries' history illustrates).

Oh, I don't think that obedience helps, at least not in my case, of course everyone has to find something that works for him personally. And my comment was more tailored to all the stuff around 'creativity', everyday life and relationships, not creativity itself. That is, being a super creative or successful person and therefore deciding that one can be a total douche otherwise wouldn't work for me.

1 hour ago, Axel said:

Emotions or thoughts expressed with genuine passion will also be appreciated by others.

Probably one of the the reasons the aforealluded guy was successful in our country. Being genuine by itself sure feels good but doesn't necessarily help society, it always depends on your values. And if your maxim is being creative/successful/powerful at all costs, you might put others at a serious disadvantage.

1 hour ago, Axel said:

The current crises on so many levels can't be solved by accepting practical constraints. We need more people who trust their own judgment (made with minds, hearts and souls) and who contradict the so-called common sense of their society.

I don't think we need more people who think they can save the world and try to enforce their solution by all means, because naturally they know what's best for John Doe, Adam Arendt and Li Juan, too. First, especially the benefactors are super enthusiastic about their new rules and tools and later they wonder how it could have gotten that far. Personally, I don't think the kind of global 'crises' we got ourselves into can be solved at all.

1 hour ago, Axel said:

How can we sleep while our beds are burning?

Guilt helps and hurts equally, obsession with it is pretty shitty, agreed.

[hmcindie]

 As 'creators' you need to able to trust your own opinions. But you can't be completely blind to others either, especially the opinions of your target audience. Learning to filter the good opinions from the bad and taking the correct lessons instead of the wrong ones is a lifelong journey.

I don't know if this is useful but I wrote my first blog ever a couple of weeks ago. It tells about some issues of creativity during a short film shoot so it might fit this topic

http://filmmakersprocess.com/blog/filmmaker-story-mikko-lopponen-short-film

[Axel]

1 hour ago, agolex said:

Being genuine by itself sure feels good but doesn't necessarily help society, it always depends on your values. And if your maxim is being creative/successful/powerful at all costs, you might put others at a serious disadvantage.

Officially, the values of our nation are freedom and the dignity of man. The unofficial value, deducable by the norm, is being successful in the rat race. That's a serious disadvantage for everybody, even for the winners. It's unlikely that the disrespect of creatives for the other-directed *opinion* of racing rats can cause any serious harm.

1 hour ago, agolex said:

I don't think we need more people who think they can save the world and try to enforce their solution by all means, because naturally they know what's best for John Doe, Adam Arendt and Li Juan, too.

Whoever saves one life saves the world entire, why not start with myself? Why should I try to convince others? 

1 hour ago, agolex said:

Personally, I don't think the kind of global 'crises' we got ourselves into can be solved at all.

They will be solved eventually. After the current migration period will be over, little will be left of our accustomed way of life we are not ashamed to call our culture. Not meant as a verdict by me, just comparing what has happened before in history.

1 hour ago, agolex said:

Guilt helps and hurts equally, obsession with it is pretty shitty, agreed.

A bad conscience is always bad. Nobody gets a loaf of bread because I do without a new fancy camera. We say I'm sorry too often. 

[Axel]

1 hour ago, hmcindie said:

 As 'creators' you need to able to trust your own opinions. But you can't be completely blind to others either, especially the opinions of your target audience. Learning to filter the good opinions from the bad and taking the correct lessons instead of the wrong ones is a lifelong journey.

I don't know if this is useful but I wrote my first blog ever a couple of weeks ago. It tells about some issues of creativity during a short film shoot so it might fit this topic

http://filmmakersprocess.com/blog/filmmaker-story-mikko-lopponen-short-film

Wow, big fun! Be proud of that. I enjoyed it a lot.

When I was working as a projectionist, I used to join the audience for scenes that were special to me. I raised the volume, I witnessed their emotional reactions, and I wished I had made that film.

I know this seems to contradict everything I wrote before. But it doesn't. The worst films try to satisfy the audience, showing them exactly what they expect. Famous quote: 

Quote

Never ingratiate yourself with the audience!

 

[Nikkor]

35 minutes ago, Axel said:

When I was working as a projectionist, I used to join the audience for scenes that were special to me. I raised the volume, I witnessed their emotional reactions, and I wished I had made that film.

Oh this could be a movie, but adding a creepy note (no offence ;)). The script would be by Paul Schrader. It's this alienated projectionists that was living through the emotions in movies, but he starts to notice the emotion in his audience and gets kicks through it (emotional porn), after a while he needs bigger kicks and starts to follow people (for instance, someone he notices in the theater, who comes with his boyfriend, but then starts to come alone and cry,bla bla) on the streets and interfere with their lifes -directing/creating his own real life movies- ,etc...

Sort of a taxi driver, nightcrawler, the following movie

[squig]

If you try to satisfy an audience you're bound to fail. Engage your audience, and lead them on the journey you want to take them on. And blow their minds while you're at it.

[Axel]

10 minutes ago, araucaria said:

Oh this could be a movie, but adding a creepy note (no offence ;)). The script would be by Paul Schrader.

Yeah, indeed. Though I am not exactly a psychopath, that's my lifelong addiction to cinema, not too far from reality. Must seriously consider this. Now I'm curious: what's your motivation to make films?

 

 

[Nikkor]

15 minutes ago, Axel said:

Yeah, indeed. Though I am not exactly a psychopath, that's my lifelong addiction to cinema, not too far from reality. Must seriously consider this. Now I'm curious: what's your motivation to make films?

I don't think there is much to consider, I saw your post like the person who invites people into his homes to let them have a good time (or a dj and his audience,etc...) but there is potential for a 70s B movie about movies

My own motivation to do a movie? Since adolescent the years my buddies and I have know so many characters that get lost in my hometowns nightlife, there are so many funny stories, I've always wanted to make a movie about it. Thousand of small stories that add up to one big long joke you can tell over and over again, and although it might only be fun to us, I think it has a lot of universal potential. I think I gotta get organizized