i’m one of the newest members of the stillmotion fam, clocking in at just over 6 months and counting. i came in from the cold to the warm embrace of stillmotion not because i was sent from my dying planet in a rocket hurtling towards earth but because i wanted to be part of a team that would push me to up my craft as a filmmaker in every way, and push they have! i joined on paper as a “cinema assistant” but i’ve come to realize that no one at stillmotion does exactly what their job title states, everyone will…

do everything and anything if it helps out the team. so far I’ve been to 6 cities, edited, camera assisted, managed gear, been the in-house tech researcher for SMAPP, and i’m sure as time goes on the list will go on too.

as far as inspiration goes i like to think of what inspires me as the 3 points on king neptune’s trident. the first point is tech, whether it’s drooling over the latest iDevice, or drooling over the newest piece of camera tech, i’m a huge tech nerd who apparently, also has some kind of drooling problem. the second is entertainment, i love entertaining people and being entertained. i grew up entertaining on stage and in front of the camera and now i love engaging and entertaining people behind the camera through writing, shooting and editing. as far as being entertained goes, movies, music, books and comics are a huge inspiration to me and i love watching a great film, listening to a piece of music that really resonates with me, or reading something that makes me think or imagine, for all of them genre doesn’t matter, it just has to be engaging. and the third and final point to the trident is storytelling. through film, word of mouth, miming, it doesn’t matter i love telling stories to anyone who will listen. since i was a little kid nothing has been more fun than making and telling stories to my family and friends and now through stillmotion and things like this blog hopefully i’ll be able to share some pretty cool stories with you.

Evan

two from Canada, two from US?
or is it four from US now that P. and Amina are based out of California too?

in any case, it doesn’t really change just how many countries are represented in Sophie + Jason’s wedding. how many you might ask? well, twenty-four to be exact. yep, not only do they live in London and are traveling back to Hungary, Sophie’s homeland, to have their wedding – they’ve also invited friends from around the globe to join in the celebration!

here are the countries that are being represented at this single wedding…

Argentina
Austrailia
Brazil
Canada
Chile
China
Croatia
Czech Republic
France
Germany
Hungary
India

Iran
Italy
Japan
Macau
Mexico
Netherlands
Newfoundland
Norway
Portugal
Sweden
UK
US

how exciting is it to be able to have so many cultures and languages at a single event! given that many of the guests are traveling halfway around the world to attend this wedding and the fact that the bride and groom share a love for worldwide excursions, traveling will most certainly be a theme in their imagery. however, with the breath and depth of the guests list we are now also very excited to see how the melding of cultures and traditions will play a part in their story.

this will be stillmotion’s first time in Hungary and we. are. oh. so. stoked!

lil’j

one of the major components of SMAPP is the tutorial section and the entire stillmotion team has been burning the midnight oil for the past few months putting in a ton of effort in producing a healthy bank of tutorials to share at launch. how many tutorials are we talking about exactly?

thirty. yep, three-zero. 30 brand new tutorials available to you very soon.

when we first started we looked at the spectrum of what a filmmaker would need, from getting started to advanced tools and storytelling, and came up with a list of topics to cover. we looked across…

the major categories in an effort to offer a fairly comprehensive set of tutorials and from there produced a good mix of beginner to advance tutorials so that there is something for everybody. while that was a great start we quickly found ourselves buried deep in tutorial world as we have so many ideas on what we could share about. the solution was to start with a base and build from there so we have this set for now, with more to follow. if you haven’t seen them already, check out a few of the other SMAPP tutorials – basic interview lighting, 10 things that will save your life and deconstructing lighting a scene – we shared in the past few weeks.

without further adieu here are the thirty we are making available to you at launch.

Shooting with Primes vs. Zooms
Understanding Aperture, Shutter Speed & ISO
Compression & Expansion
Exploring Tilt-Shift Lenses
5 Killer Canon Lenses
Exploring Teleconverters
Techniques for Effective Composition
The Power of Being Present on A Shoot
Exploring White Balance Shift
A Starter Cinema Lens Kit
How to Clean A Sensor
Exploring Kelvin White Balance
Factors Related to Depth of Field
How to Set Exposure
Getting Started with the Canon C300

Getting Started with Wireless Audio
Exploring Working with a Boom
One Shooter Audio Setup
Advanced Lav Mic Techniques
Bag Solutions For Event Cinema
Exploring Lighting Modifiers
Deconstructing Properties of Light
Advanced Interview Lighting
Storytelling Through Depth of Field
Storytelling Through Camera Placement
How to Shoot Handheld
Bag Solutions for Event Cinema
Making the Most out of Your Monopod
Deconstructing A Highlights
Deconstructing A Main Feature

exciting isn’t it? we will be producing new tutorials on a regular basis after SMAPP launches too so we’d love to hear from you if you have something in particular you’d like us to share about in an upcoming tutorial. to get in touch simply submit a question on the blog or email SMAPP@stillmotion.ca and we’ll evaluate the idea of incorporating that into an upcoming tutorial.

lil’j

getting to know so many of the people that make up Old Skool showed us a world that few of us had ever experienced first hand. it was certainly my first time visiting the projects and you can immediately feel the environment as you enter.

as you’ll see in the film, what we were left with was such a warm portrait of these youth who put so much of who they are, and so much heart into making Old Skool a success. i can remember being in that age range, not quite 20 yet, and…

i don’t think i could point to one thing that i care about half as much as these youth care about Old Skool. their perspective and determination at such a young age is absolutely awe-inspiring.

last Friday we brought a projector down to Old Skool to premier this piece. among a packed restaurant, Teresa stopped the kitchen and had everybody come out and take a moment to share in the experience. Tammy’s first reaction to the film, through tears, was especially touching. she said that the Old Skool family means so much to her and the film showed the world how she knows each of them to be in her heart.

Music licensed at WithEtiquette.com
Drew Barefoot – Enjoy the Calm
Kelli Schaefer – Song For A Friend

Share started because we wanted to give back. after our first film, we feel like we have taken much more than we gave, and for that we have to thank everybody at Old Skool. if you enjoy the film and want to support Old Skool, please share their film and come visit their restaurant. if you have ideas or want to help out with our next Share film, please email us at share@stillmotion.ca

P.

we love telling other people’s stories. but what about our own?

one of the best things for me, personally, about our stillmotion retreat in Las Vegas this year, was having the whole entire gang together in one place at the same time so we could explore and share. having started here last year, it was the first time I got to meet some of the team face-to-face. ray may tell you differently, but I swear this was the first time I met him in person! it was fun just hanging out and getting to know each other on a different level, whether it was over a spontaneous game of basketball, or sharing recipes in the kitchen, and I think it brought us all closer together and…

set us off on a new journey of knowing. as a side note, it’s a great way to make your team stronger and that strength ultimately makes a team more effective.

RT and Justin take on PWL and P in a pickup game of basketball

one of our most silly times, and one that really got us laughing, was our team photo shoot in the desert. we even played broken telephone at one point! there was definitely no posing that day and I think you really get a great snapshot of our personalities from this shoot. towards the end of our trip, we all went out to dinner together and hit the Comedy Club for a show, which definitely kept us laughing.

lil’j, PWL and P heading up the mountain to do a little scouting

RT working hard in the hot desert sun

so what in the world happened out there? that’s between us and PWL :)

all in all, aside from all the amazing workshops, brainstorming sessions and other activities we got up to, it was nice to just hang out a bit, connect and get to know each other’s stories a bit better.

Alicja

we love telling other people’s stories. but what about our own?

one of the best things for me, personally, about our stillmotion retreat in Las Vegas this year, was having the whole entire gang together in one place at the same time so we could explore and share. having started here last year, it was the first time I got to meet some of the team face-to-face. ray may tell you differently, but I swear this was the first time I met him in person! it was fun just hanging out and getting to know each other on a different level, whether it was over a spontaneous game of basketball, or sharing recipes in the kitchen, and I think it brought us all closer together and…

set us off on a new journey of knowing. as a side note, it’s a great way to make your team stronger and that strength ultimately makes a team more effective.

RT and Justin take on PWL and P in a pickup game of basketball

one of our most silly times, and one that really got us laughing, was our team photo shoot in the desert. we even played broken telephone at one point! there was definitely no posing that day and I think you really get a great snapshot of our personalities from this shoot. towards the end of our trip, we all went out to dinner together and hit the Comedy Club for a show, which definitely kept us laughing.

lil’j, PWL and P heading up the mountain to do a little scouting

RT working hard in the hot desert sun

so what in the world happened out there? that’s between us and PWL :)

all in all, aside from all the amazing workshops, brainstorming sessions and other activities we got up to, it was nice to just hang out a bit, connect and get to know each other’s stories a bit better.

Alicja

for weddings, it’s all too easy to go to the top 40 or to pick a song your couple has decided on, but is that really fitting to the story or will it have the same impact in 1 year, 2 years, 10 years, etc? while we most certainly like our couples to share their music tastes with us, it’s less about guiding our soundtrack selection and more about really telling us about who they are, both as individuals and as a couple (do they like the same music? why, or why not? etc). what our couple listen to can be a huge tell tale of who they are.

back to song selection – for us, it usually starts with lesser known artists. the reason is quite simple – we want the songs selected to be our couples – we want the first time they see their film to be 100% about their story and nothing more. selecting song they haven’t heard guarantees there are no preconceived notions or memories associated or attached to the soundtrack. as a side note, it also helps…

an indie artist immensely and it feels great knowing we’re supporting musicians who will benefit immediately from licensing their music.

actually narrowing down to the specific tracks isn’t an easy task and does take some time. it almost always starts with finding the right feeling – do the songs feel right for the couple. for Ariel and Ricky, Sunbeam felt right from the start. knowing Sunbeam personally definitely helped, but how i feel when i listen to Sunbeam is exactly how i felt filming Ariel and Ricky and how i felt after putting together their film.

after finding the right musician, it’s about narrowing down even further to finding the perfect songs, and in this step we’re looking for tempo, where the crescendo’s hit, lyrics (if applicable) and the overall length. The Garden was a perfect introduction for Ariel and Ricky – it’s upbeat, fun and most of all, carefree – like them. at the same time, it has a great energetic opening which paired perfectly with the opening scene of Ariel and Ricky shipping rocks. for the end of the piece we cut to Let It go, again by Sunbeam, as it’s a much slower paced song to match the more emotional vows. it’s still a Sunbeam track, meaning it’s still fun, but it’s also much quieter and more subdued.

from there, it’s just a matter of laying them in the editing suite and finessing them so the levels of the song match the VO and nat sounds and the overall emotional spikes in the film.

now, soundtrack selection for our commercial pieces is a whole other story. one that we’ll tackle in another upcoming q of the week.

Justin

i recently read in an article that 48% of college graduates end up in a career that has nothing to do with their studies in university and i am one of them. my mechanical engineering diploma is buried under a box of old dv tapes that i will eventually unpack at our home in san fran. these days you’ll likely find me on a commercial set, filming a documentary or sharing our ideas at an education event but nothing excites me more than having a camera in my hand. the idea of taking light, movement, colors and turning all of that into a story is both incredibly fun and challenging, and i love that.

for me traveling is a huge source of inspiration, not only from the stories we hear through those we meet but also because of all the experiences that…

go along with it. last year i spent a day trying to hop on a train with a homeless girl in small town Louisiana, trekked through a forrest with an entire platoon of the US Army during tactical ops training and looked up at a million flashing lights from the sidelines of the Superbowl; each and every one of those trips showed me a completely different walk of life that feeds my imagination and inspiration like none other. i try to step back and get a sense of the environment – take note of the smell, feel the textures, listen to the sounds – and find a way to bring all of that to the audience through my imagery.

i’m told that i am quiet but that’s not because i’m not engaged, quite the contrary, i’m just taking it all in. people have extraordinary stories and extraordinary stories make for great experiences and great experiences is what we as storytellers need to take in to make movie magic. it’s not always easy, but it is incredibly rewarding when you realize the power you have as a filmmaker and be able to use that to share those experiences with others.

lil’j

Being that we had more room to breath and think about our shots we decided to light everything we could in a way that complimented what they were doing but didn’t give the film too much of a produced feeling. Having a couple of lite panels and a few small lights kept things much more low key, but gave us the flexibility to make our shots look a little more crisp and give the whole piece a more elegant feeling which really reflects the kind of couple Ariel and Ricky are.

Meet Ariel and Ricky. We sure loved getting to know them.

- Justin & PWL

featuring music by Sunbean – The Garden and Let It Go
licensed through WithEtiquette.com

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a few weeks ago we released a tutorial on basic interview lighting and how you can quickly achieve the look you want with just a few lights and modifiers. once you’re comfortable with the basics we invite you to continue to push your story through light. you can say so much through your lighting so this week’s tutorial will take it up a notch…

as we deconstruct how we lit multiple scenes differently based on story, all of which was shot in the exact same location. we’ll take a look at how each scene was lit and why it was lit a certain way. armed with 5 lights and the same set of modifiers, you will see how and why using different modifiers and techniques can say change the way the viewer experiences the scene.

so the next time you walk into a room or staged set, start thinking about what you want your scene to say, how that ties into the story you’re trying to tell and how you plan on achieving that through lighting.

Ray