Blogs » the Renaissance Man knows very little about everything
the Renaissance Man knows very little about everything
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The title says it all so if decipher it than I guess you don't need to read this blog. But if you want to get more details I'm happy to oblige; all of you practicing film out there, you're probably working on a variety of things and styles and I'm here to tell you that that is a mistake. While it may be unavoidable to make wedding videos or short promotionals for non-profits as you struggle to make money off of your talent, when you're working on your own time you need to adopt one style, one genre and get gooood at it. Now that doesn't mean you can't try new things and improve, that's fine, that's encouraged but it has got to be directed. When I say genre I mean experimental sci fi vs love story vs sci fi thriller vs action movie vs documentary vs musical vs etc... Most of these genre's are so different in their standard portrayal that, how you do the shots, the story and the visual effects will greatly effect how good it is within it's genre, how well it fits into it's style. This isn't a question of mainstream vs cutting edge originality, A romance can simply not be a series of quick blurred shots spaced out between epic monologues that take 2 or 3 shots in total, I know it's an extreme but a war scene is something that takes a long time to get good at and if you then you decide to do short romance movie you will (likely) FAIL. One of the writers of the hangover talked to me and my buddies about the importance of being pigeon holed: when someone wants to make a sci fi thriller, they'll come to the guy who has lots of experience with it and is skilled at it. Same thing goes for getting your foot in the door, you've gotta show you know something and not a whole lotta nothing. If you have a good variety and bulk within the genre of war films you can GET KNOWN for having really good war films and that can get your name out there. Eventually you'll have someone important run across them and see one really good one that gets you in. Style is a not so obvious a thing that must be pigeonholed, that's because it also must be developed. Very few people got anywhere being known as the guy who does terrible editing or unnecessarily shaky camera work. The balance between honing and keeping your style lies in understanding what YOUR style is: your favorite epic angle(s) that you put in every film, your montage style story-telling (or your non montage style), your stylized rack blur laden short film design, your hectic back and forth shots for dialogue, your music overlay choices. These are your landmarks, the points that make your style you and that pull it just enough from mainstream to be original but not undefinable. The things that are not your style are your endlessly long shots (unless they fit well for building suspense), your inability to get smooth story flow out of an action scene, your grainy or shaky look to all your shots; in short your ability to confuse your viewers and embarrass yourself with correctible (but unforseeable at the time) lack of professionalisms. Now I'm trying for sci fi thriller though due to the length of my films they are more sci fi experimental or just experimental. Early on there were things I liked to do that I thought would be really cool and original, like strange camera angles that are removed entirely from the shot, foot level shots to convey emotion etc... and they all looked terrible. But they were the 'keepers' of my style, once I learned from them and improved my skills overall they started to fit better and I knew better how to wield them. Don't mix up your style and your inability to produce viable film. If you think you're a more skilled filmmaker now then you were 6 months ago then try that cool effect that ruined your previous movie and do it a little differently. I myself am guilty of jumping around between genre, but I urge you (and myself) pigeon hole pigeon hole PIGEON HOLE, it'll pay off in the long run.