Great images and nice editing do not make for a good story. I have been noticing on this board an air of condascending attitude. It has to do with the fact that something is made with Super8 and it has nice images and good editing. It has time lapse! So what! I am talking about the story itself and the trailer. The trailer fails at pulling elements together beyond nice images and time lapses. There is a big difference between the aesthetic structure based on imagery and editing and the aesthetic structure based on the the dramatic lines. The trailer succeeds in the first aspect. It fails in the second one. It fails in giving me the PUNCH LINE that gathers the story together into one unified aspect.
You may want to go and see it. I did NOT say that the story is bad. I did not talk about this. I was talking strictly about the trailer. Only if everyone here gets off their "woooooooooow, it is made in Super8" and "nice time lapses" then we can judge the other important elements
paul wrote:
It looks beautiful. But the trailer does not answer the question: Why should I see it? It does not encapsulate the dramatic plot.
When I saw the trailer i thought, wow, great images, nice editing, what has happened to this man, who's that pretty woman, where does it go to. I want to see more..
With all respect, this criticism doesn't make sense to me.
I see your point. But the story as glimpsed in the trailer could have offered more possibilities as to the making of the trailer itself. I can not be certain because I have not seen the short. But I feel there is something missing. It maybe a matter of style.
Maybe after I see it, I'll be able to be more certain
Evan Kubota wrote:As the director of a dozen shorts, I can tell you that cutting a trailer for a short is totally different from cutting a trailer for a feature. Even many feature trailers are less plot-based and more centered on the image (Star Wars Episode III, most horror films, etc.).
It's not a reasonable expectation for a short film trailer to set up the plot - firstly, because short films have very simple and abbreviated plots compared to features, and secondly, because there simply isn't time. For a 10 minute film the trailer shouldn't exceed 45 seconds to a minute. The most effective trailers I've seen for shorts have little or no dialogue - simply a series of images with evocative music. That's the best you can do in the format, IMO.
i agree with both viewpoints. i think the images are cool enough to make a lot of people interested in the film, including me, but the problem is that there's some kind of storytelling going on too and that doesn't quite work. why is it interesting that the guy hasn't slept for so long? i don't think we don't need an explicit answer but a way of connecting this piece of information with the rest of the trailer.
Which Eumig and Nizo models did you use by the way?
The Light of Eons wrote:
paulcotto wrote:What flavor of HD24P did you use 720 or 1080? Did you have the film transferred professionally or did you use a home built scanner of your own design? I have 2 home built film scanners that I made 2 years ago. One can do 1280 X 1024 and the other does 800 X 600. I often wonder why no one had done Hidef super-8 before, now you have proven it is viable. Your footage looks great!!! I see you will be showing in Houston May, 22 which is my birthday I sure hope I get a chance to go.
Congratulations,
Paul Cotto
Hey -- just a reminder: "The Light of Eons" screens in Houston on April 30th!! (NOT in May at all).
I had my super-8 selects telecined professionally, and went to 24p, 2k HD (I think!). I'm impressed that you made your own scanners!
