The best film-making advice I ever got

[mkabi]

Biggest lessons I learned…

Figure out the story you are trying to tell before shooting. How is the image helping you tell that story?

Massage/manipulate the image before shooting… wear complimentary clothes, move things around… turn an image that would’ve been great with normal clothes and current setup to something more epic.

Last one is controlling light. Yes. We all know to adjust shutter angle and iso in camera, we also know to bring a couple ND filters, pro mist filters… and even lights for late night shooting… but there is a thing and its really magical if you know (again about controlling light)… for example - the golden hour (specific hours in the day where the sun works with you instead of against you). Filming on rainy days….Throwing water on concrete (day or night) helps a lot, something to do with how much light is absorbed vs reflected. Adding smoke (smoke machine) or filming on foggy days (fog machine), it adds layers to the image but it also limits the light entering the camera.

[fuzzynormal]

On 4/14/2025 at 1:03 PM, mkabi said:

Figure out the story you are trying to tell before shooting.

I just worked with a "director" on a mil+ budget doc that completely failed at this fundamental.

God, what a waste of time.

Got paid, but it was soul crushing trying to make an edit out of a pile of crap. Bleh. 

[mkabi]

On 4/24/2025 at 10:49 AM, fuzzynormal said:

I just worked with a "director" on a mil+ budget doc that completely failed at this fundamental.

God, what a waste of time.

Got paid, but it was soul crushing trying to make an edit out of a pile of crap. Bleh. 

Well… take it as a learning experience…

What was your job on that project?

In the future, if you have some input on it… state the gaps in pre-production.

And, also… just to elaborate on “Figure out the story you are trying to tell before shooting.” A lot of people have an “idea” or an epiphany of what they want to shoot… that’s not the same thing as a story. Usually a story has a beginning, middle and end; a good story has a climax and resolution with characters and character building (so the audience has some connection with the characters they are watching)… now having a climax… characters… may be too much… but at the very least have a beginning - middle and end (thats the bare minimum requirement). The idea or epiphany is stuck in the beginning… there is no middle and there is no end.

You don’t need to have a full on script… especially if it’s a one man band. But, write it down (may its a 1 page - point form thing) because it will help organize your thoughts.