All the animals were gathered around the barn, and one of the pigs got up to make his speech. Comrades, I have something to say, but before I get to that I must tell you that I had a strange dream last night. In my dream, I went down B&H and bought a Sony mirrorless camera and the very next morning, I woke up and had an offer from 20th Century Fox on my doorstep.
Yes Comrades, in my dream there I was – suddenly, a world renowned film director, and it was all because of my Sony FX3 I bought the previous day. Now Comrades however, I have a confession – I’m not getting any younger, and my dreams have remained just that… Dreams. Have you noticed that too, my dear Comrades? We have worked on our trade almost to our deaths, given measly rations by catering, and are expected to make ingenious short films every week with only Canon FD lenses. I once envisioned a time, when we animals overcame our human masters, and every beast in England would be part of this incredible new revolution called DSLR filmmaking. We tried with Magic Lantern, we tried with the GH2, but still the humans went back to their expensive Cinema EOS cameras, how could we possibly compete? Our crew of 3 pigs, twelve ducks and one horse, is no match for the 300 strong crew on the low budget $80 million dollar feature film, THE CREATOR. So what do we do, do we suffer in the shadows, never to make a name for ourselves, or do we have a REVOLUTION comrades?
One of the horses in the barn raised his hoof, and the raven looked on silently with interest. Boxer, the hardest working horse on the filmmaking farm exclaimed with excitement: “I will work harder! (And buy more Sony mirrorless cameras)”!
A great chorus of bleating from the sheep rang out across the barn. “FOUR SONYS GOOD! TWO SONYS BAD!”
Soon the farm was flooded. Delivery after delivery from WEX in Norwich had garnished the land with 68 Sony FX3 body onlys, in black, and yet still none of the animals had made a name for themselves in filmmaking, nor had they even shot a fancy sci-fi film about Ai powered humanoids with holes in their heads.
One day, one of the pigs stumbled into the barn and saw an incredible number of diagrams and letters drawn out on the tiles. Snowflake, a plump be-speckled pig who looked a bit like Stanley Kubrick had written down the entire script of THE SHINING in white chalk on the floor. He had also found time to write 5 filmmaking commandments on a nearby wall. These read:
- All cameras are equal, but some cameras are more equal than others
- Thou shall not were human clothes or use human phones whilst on set
- Always use a shutter speed of 180 degrees
- Always use an Atomos Ninja, even when your camera does internal ProRes
- Never mention Lance Armstrong in the company of a RED employee
The next day, one by one the other animals entered the barn to gaze in wonder at the script for THE SHINING and the 5 commandments. If only they could learn how to build a computer, to do matte paintings on top of real life locations like Gareth Edwards. Then they could be liberated, finally work for themselves, and never have to buy another green screen again.
Then it was decided that they’d build a sound stage. Everything would be shot on the sound stage with 68 Sony FX3 bodies. The lenses would be provided by their comrades in China, and a virtual production studio would be born!
The uprising against the entirety of the human filmmaking industry had begun. The next day however, a terrible tragedy unfolded. The film’s great visionary, Snowflake, had squealed off in a rage, after one of the other pigs Fincher, accused him of betraying their Sony FX3 by going off with a fancy Canon C500 Mark II.
“How dare you choose the Canon instead? Do you not realise Snowflake, that in order to make a blockbuster sci-fi for $80m instead of $300m you absolutely need to save money in the camera department!! The Sony FX3 retails for only $3989, thus making everything in our film possible even for ordinary animals with their Atomos Ninjas”, he shouted.
So it was decided from now on to let Fincher run the show. He ordered some B-cameras, a Sony EX3 with Letus DOF adapter and a GoPro.
Now it was truly possible to match other $300 million sci-fi movies down to every last cast member, all thanks to their belief in the mighty Sony.
“But why…” enquired Fincher “do we need so many people to film two pigs taking at each other about robots for two hours”?
“We have a room with just two actors, but the crew consists of 800 sheep and 345 ducks! This will NOT do!”
“My goal is to get this down to just 4 sheep – one to hold the boom mic, one to point the camera, one to direct the pigs and one last person to be on hand in case anyone needs a cup of tea!”
The other animals agreed and the sheep bleated, but one voice remarked timidly in the background “What about the wireless follow focus”?
Immediately Fincher shot back – “We do not need to focus, the camera will do it all for us! ALL we have to do is sit back and become famous!”
And so the animals immediately got to work after a chorus of BEASTS OF ENGLAND and the scenes came and went. The donkeys grew old, the pigs grew fatter and the ducks more square, but what they produced had still not matched that great classic of modern times THE CREATOR. Fincher just couldn’t understand it. They had all the Sony FX3, all 68 of them and yet still the amazing sci-fi masterpiece alluded them. So far, they had only managed to shoot one scene of THE SHINING, with some pigs in it.
Eventually it was decided that a new revolution was needed. There would be a cull of sheep and the 5 commandments would be replaced and simplified with just one, which read:
ALL FILMMAKERS ARE EQUAL, BUT SOME FILMMAKERS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.
