Old and New

[fuzzynormal]

tl/dr:  Made a small and simple doc film years and years ago with my first 'hybrid' camera. The process was inspiring and changed my outlook about working with motion pictures:

A bit of online chatter here about cameras that are older and it got me thinking because I recently posted a doc my wife and I are currently working on.  It was made with recent camera gear and fancy new computers and software. 

Something old.  Something new.

Well, as a retrospect, here's a look at the very first film we attempted.  This was in 2011.  My entire career at that time had been broadcasting and corporate.  Didactic stuff.  That was my reality and vocational training.  

If making a film was compared being an architect designing a building, my education was basically akin to being an electrician.  Installing wires and cables I could do -- and that was kind of it, y'know? 

So when we set out to shoot this 'Camino' flick, our assumption was that we were going to do what was typical for us:  Subject-matter-experts-interviews, b-roll, maybe even having a presenter doing stand ups and narration.  That type of thing.

Interestingly, this upcoming shoot was immediately preceded by a corporate assignment in southern Spain.  The experience of filming some pretty incredible scenery footage only to know that it was going to be handed off to my client who would hammer it into a dry travelogue video was disheartening.  Also, a year before we had also made a standard travelogue video ourselves in Japan.  We were underwhelmed by the results we created there too.

My wife saw my frustration with all this and started asking "why".  Why were we doing things a certain way.  What exactly would we be offering the world with another video that was a parade of talking heads telling the viewer what to think/feel?  No acceptable answers were readily available. 

So, the day before this journey we decided to ditch all the audio gear, the Sachtler tripod, and the HD video camera with multiple lenses.  Into the backback went a used 5DII and a nikkor 50mm prime.  That was it.  Felt a bit naked, tbh.  But that was the first day we set off into the world as filmmakers rather than as a cameraman or a broadcast ENG person.

We wanted to make something completely impressionistic and opposite of what was typical for us.  We'd only use 1 small cam, 1 small lens, a walking staff as a makeshift monopod.

This epiphany came about not only from the conversation with my wife, but also the realization that a really simple camera rig was not only going to give me an opportunity to run and gun cinematically; but to do it better than with the extensive gak I normally carried around.  Cinematic shooting was something that I never really felt the freedom to explore --until that moment.  And so we went to make a humble unassuming little film.  

The simplicity became it's value.  Less was more we reasoned.  Create a vibe rather than an info dump.

Our modest film might not seem like much, and there's so many mistakes I made first time out of the gate I still cringe at, but it changed our view about our careers.  From there we started to be interested in what it took to be better storytellers. Could we actually do that?  Really?

All of this to say that perspective really matters.  And that the gear we talk about here can actually offer new perspectives.  But it was the attitude first and foremost that needed a shift.  Cheers.

[kye]

Absolutely wonderful!

Without dialogue this is pure visual storytelling, not an easy challenge at the best of times, and your edit held my attention the whole time, which is something that very few non-professional productions do these days.

Various technical aspects did pull me out of the experience from time to time, but as an early effort and with minimal equipment this has got to be top 1% of what people were doing in 2011 for sure.  Wasn't it 2014 or so that the "my camera fell into a washing machine" style travel edits got popular?  Yet, yours from years before is infinitely more restrained, mature, and layered.

I'm always trying to tell little stories with my edits.  Even simple sequences where I join two or three shots together to tell a little story or to make a comment or raise a question, and this edit was brimming with silent commentary amongst the ebbs and flows you created.