Turds to Birds - Ben Ratner

Throughout my film career (which has already lasted longer than Conan at 11:35), I have learned an abundance about the creation of films and movies, from conceiving a story to sending out DVDs. After every production, I make sure to take time and reflect on how the shoot went – what went well and what didn’t. The production of my group’s final project, “Turds to Birds” was an invaluable educational experience for me and the rest of the team.
I held a few roles on this production, namely, assistant director, cinematographer, director of photography, and post production. For the most part, I was pleased with the group’s dynamics. Some of us had other events that were prioritized higher than this project which definitely cut into the quality of the film. We had a short production meeting a few days before the taping; although, as the group decided to change the plot of the film on the day of filming, there was little time to script out a well-thought out story with rich character development. For example, Lauren’s character suddenly gets angry at the end of the film and starts talking differently, unlike the first few minutes of the film. This could have likely been avoided by having a set script in advance with a full shot list and storyboards. That would have also helped us film in a shorter period of time. We exceeded planned taping time by over an hour. I was otherwise happy working with the cast. They were good at coming up with literary and cinematic elements of the script over the course of the production day. I chose to take on the task of recording the video and post-production because I have a lot of experience editing, and I wanted to edit what is my third short film. I uploaded each draft to YouTube, requesting through a Facebook thread that the group look at the video and give me any feedback – positive or negative.
Our original idea for the film was to create an instructional video showing the steps to do the “Jerk,” a dance move from a popular music video on YouTube (hence the name of our “production company” – Jerk Productions). We ran into trouble on production day because we could not figure out how to cut it down into small steps while being clear to the audience. Because the group wanted to still include dancing and music in the video, we decided on changing the story to a weight-loss-infomercial-gone-wrong story for the final draft. Our final story shows how Lauren’s character is frustrated with not being able to lose weight, so she tries out an infomercial claiming that it will help her lose all the weight that she wants to lose. She ends up being better than the trainers themselves, and she never loses any weight.
Compared to my past videos and short films, I would consider “Turds to Burds” to be on the less successful end. I was unhappy with the story; if we spent more time planning it out then not only would it have made more sense, I would also have had the time and opportunity to plan my shots by making a shot list and a storyboard. That would also have helped to cut down on production time. Another weakness of this project was the quality of the audio recording. As we shot in a very echoic room, voices were not always clear. Also, because we played music a bit too loud during the recording, it made it harder to add better quality sound in post production while also keeping the voices crisp and clear. Other then choosing a different room and projecting more, we could have used lavaliere microphones or a boom microphone in order to capture higher quality direct sound. One of the biggest problems in the editing room was that the talents started their lines just frames after I said “rolling.” They also often laughed at the end of a scene. The combination of the two caused troubles because I often had no way to cut the beginning or end of a shot without including me saying “rolling” or them laughing.
One major thing that we should have avoided was using a location without permission. In the real world, if you do not have written permission to tape and you get caught, you can not only get fined and sent to jail, but your footage can also be confiscated on the spot.
My favorite cinematic shot from the film is the low angle shot of Gavin when he says, “Hey turd, get up! I don’t care about your nails!” The shot was beautifully composed, and the light clips behind Gavin’s head, making it look like what Lauren’s character saw when she fell. The original purpose of the shot was simply a low angle shot of Gavin, but I the realized that it was an excellent point-of-view shot from Lauren’s perspective.
Other than the audio problems, the biggest thing I will change for my next short film would be to enforce the group to be present at a production meeting where we would plan the story, script, and shots. Organization and order are key if you want to have a successful shoot and a professional looking final production. I learned this the hard way at Northwestern this summer at a film program, where I did not plan a detailed shot list with storyboards. I had to stop production and create them before I went on with the taping for the day. If I did not do that, I would certainly have not shot everything that I needed to get. My second film shoot, a short film written by Rachel Dicker that was filmed at my house, was much more successful because I knew that it was absolutely necessary to have a shot list, storyboards, and a schedule to the minute for the entire day. Because we had none of these elements ready in time for our final project production, it is clear that there are elements that could have been improved and problems that could have been eliminated. Also, I should have tried to make sure that we had a script beforehand and enforce sticking with it and changing it as little as possible.
I think that the most important thing that this project emphasized to me was that one must spend a lot of time planning a film in order to have a good looking film. While it may look fine to the untrained eye, as a result of my past experiences, I think it is clear through the rest of this paper that there were many problems that could have been avoided if we spent a little more time working out all aspects of the production.
During the production of this film, we did not have go out of our way to reach the minimum required five cinematic techniques. The most-used element would be the wide shot. It was used to show large groups of people in one shot, while also giving a sense of where they are. The modified angle shots (low angle and high angle) were used to show lack of power (high angle… used when Lauren falls with the weights and when she first asks the trainers to join the program) and total control (low angle… when Gavin tells Lauren to stop complaining about her nails and to get up). I used desaturated color in the opening shot in order to help convey a sense of frustration and sadness, in addition to what she was saying on camera. Also, during the phone call title sequence, I chose a very stressful sounding sound bite to help show Lauren’s lack of comfort. We utilized the jump cut and title cards in order to convey a sense of time change without actually showing an event for its full duration. For example, during each vignette, the viewer only sees about ten seconds of footage, while in reality it could have been happening for hours. The title cards made an even bigger jump in time because they blatantly say “two weeks later.” Another type of shot we used was the close-up. When Jessica was yelling at Lauren for the first time, I decided to go to a close-up of Jessica because it showed the anger on her face more clearly than a simple wide-shot. For the opening shot of Gavin’s Weight Class, I decided to use split-screen so the user could compare who was picking up the weights.
In conclusion, this production was a valuable learning experience for me and my group. While I might be more critical of my own work because of my experiences and prior knowledge, as a whole I am happy with how it came out. I have been getting mostly good feedback regarding the film. My only suggestion for the class as a whole would be to spend a little more time teaching the basics of creating a short film and the basics of editing and editing theory. Quite a few groups have asked me how to do something or what the best way would be to edit, while they have never even used iMovie before. As a whole, I really enjoyed this semester of “The Rhetoric of the Moving Image.” It was a good refresher course after my experiences at Northwestern film camp this summer, while giving me a new perspective on the various parts of film. Cut… this paper is a wrap!