What’s your Title in Filmmaking? – Visual Designer

by davidhjlindberg | Apr 4, 2014 | Career

I got a pretty good question yesterday I wanted to share with you, it was about what title I refer myself as in filmmaking.

This was the question:
“Hey David, just wanted your opinion on how you title yourself as a filmmaker. I see that you go as colorist, but when you were doing stuff on your own where you directed, edited, color corrected, vfx… etc did you refer to yourself as just a filmmaker?”

A few months ago I would have called myself a filmmaker since that’s the general term, but nowadays I don’t think that’s as accurate anymore. I think filmmaker is a correct title if you’re the director of the film OR shot the film, maybe directed it as well, and finally edit and graded the whole film, but when you’ve just been touching the visuals like if you’ve been the colorist/visual effects artist/online artist/editor/ I don’t think it’s that correct to call you the filmmaker.  On the other side you’ve had much control over the design of the visuals the film in some way and that’s why I’ve now decided to call myself a Visual Designer.

This is a typical message I get when signing up for a new job:
“We want you to make this film look better, just do whatever you think would benefit the look, it can be changing the colors, adding particles, changing the sky etc. Well do your magic.”

This means I will jump around in a number of titles like colorist, visual effects artist (vfx), online artist and sometimes even screenwriter (!). I mention the title screenwriter because sometimes I will change the look of the film/scene so dramatically after doing some grading + visual effects & online stuff (sky replacements, retouching, particles) that it now looks completely different.

That’s why I think Visual Designer is really an accurate description of what I do and I both think and hope that title will become more common from now, ’cause it’s very common nowadays that you’ll get the task “make the scene/visuals look better” and then filmmaker is not the correct title and it’s not effective to mention all the different roles you have like:
“Well I was the colorist, added some particles to increase the cinematic feeling, added some clouds to make it less happy as well as some mist, added some grain as well to make it look better on the cinema screens etc.”
Not an effective way of expressing your profession/title…

If you say you was the Visual Designer I think you cover the fact that you’ve had control over the visuals of the film and that you’ve designed both the colors as well as some other vfx things to make it look good. The truth is that today it’s not common to just do the colors and stop there, it’s more about adding whatever optimizes the look of the visuals whether it’s about adding color, grain, removing grain, adding particles, adding objects, removing objects, yeah you get it. It’s more like being the colorist + visual effects artist + online artist + screenwriter, which I think we should from now on call = Visual Designer.

You don’t have to agree with me but I think this is a title that will ease things up and only benefit the industry.

Cheers!
/ Lindberg

Editing dialogue

by jonathanduek | Mar 19, 2014 | Career

Hi there!

I’m very excited to start writing on this site with someone as talented as David, and I hope great things will come from it. As David mentioned I mainly focus on editing and grading, and I thought some basic tips for dialogue editing would be appropriate for my first post.

This is not as much a technical guide as it is a way of thinking when you’re editing dialogue. I will not cover the technical details like syncing your material, match clips and that sort of things.

Know your material

Before you start editing, it’s important that you know your material very well. Sometimes you work with a director who wants a lot of takes, and sometimes someone who may even just have one or two for each angle. No matter the amount of takes, it’s your job to know what you have and what you’re working with. You can always ask a director to filter out takes that were interrupted, or those he knows he’ll never want to use. It could also be beneficial to sit down and talk about the material with the director and/or producer. You may have noticed something in a take that they didn’t see, and a good director should appreciate your input, so don’t be afraid to point out things you’ve seen while watching your material. Don’t be afraid to tell them what you think. Great things can come from disagreements, but  be humble. You don’t want to be hard to work with. And remember that you’re the editor, and not very often does the editor have the final say in a movie.

When you know what you’re going to work with, you can take another look at it. Each clip take by take, and try to memorize small things from every scene. Write a short note for each clip with things you found appealing, and sometimes even things you didn’t like. I’m not saying you should memorize every blink an actor makes in a scene, but just a short sentence like “Good smile at 00:00:31:76″ or “I like the glance George gives her at 00:00:17:34″. As I said, try to write something down for each scene. If you didn’t find anything interesting in a scene, try looking at it again. Pay attention to the actor’s face and look for expressions or even sounds he makes that you think is good, like a quiet scoff or a deep breath. If you still can’t find anything you like, then most likely the audience won’t either and you shouldn’t include that take in your final scene.

Start off by making it bad

Anyone who has ever edited anything knows the first draft is never good. You don’t have to intentionally make it bad, but rather try not to think so much about your first few cuts. This applies to any type of editing really, but I’ve found it extra helpful when editing dialogue. At this point you should know your material well, and already have some favorite takes you want to use. Try to get them down on your timeline and just chop them up. Follow the script and edit the dialogue in a way that you can listen to it and find ways to improve it, and start working from there. I find it easier to improve something bad rather than creating something amazing from nothing.

Make it sound authentic

One of the most important aspects in a dialogue scene is how authentic it sounds. It doesn’t necessarily have to sound like a normal everyday conversation, but it has to fit universe you’ve created for your movie. So when you’re editing, try to put yourself in a viewer’s perspective. You’re not part of the converstion, you’re the listener.

Something that helps you make it sound more authentic is to know your characters well. The character is something the director, writer and actor have created together, and the truth is that you don’t have as much say in the matter as they do. It’s important that you talk to the them and find out what the characters are like. Try to edit each character with a separate mindset for each one, based on their character, the situation they are in and their mood. You may think “How do I edit in a way that makes my character seem angry?” and usually you don’t have to. The greater part of that job has already been done by the director, actor and even the technical roles like lightning and cinematography, but it can be benefical to not have a calm and smooth type of editing when someone is exploding with anger.

When I watch dialogue scenes that are bad, they often have one thing in common (among others). They often tend to cut to a character who is speaking. Every time.  In the instane someone opens his mouth, the camera is already there to show every motion his lips make. In reality, when we’re sitting around a table and talk to people, we don’t know who the next speaker is going to be, not even in a two man conversation. So when someone starts speaking we’re not already focused on his face, and we don’t turn our heads the second he starts speaking. Therefore, when it’s suitable (which it is more often than not) try to hang on to a frame showing the previous speaker (or even someone who hasn’t said anything) a second or so when another character is starting to talk. It also helps to make your cut smoother.

Also don’t forget to let your characters breath. It’s in your power to decide the tempo of the conversation, and instead of just slamming sentences on top of each other, try to give your characters time to think or perform an action. Even in the most intense dialogue scenes.

When you start closing in on your final draft of a scene, close your eyes (or shut down your monitor) and just listen to the dialogue. Think of it as overhearing a conversation on the subway. This will help you hear if it sounds like a real conversation. If you feel the dialogue isn’t quite right, but you can’t really find any errors, then try re-editing it a little bit and listen to it again. If it doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t.

It’s not always the words

A dialogue scene is not just what the characters are saying to each other. Just like in a real conversation, we can tell a lot about what someone is feeling by looking at things like body language, sounds he/she makes and even distance to a person they are talking to. I will give you an example of a scene that mixes all the elements of a conversation really well, to tell us as much as possible about the goals and personalities of the two characters in it.

The “Wolf of Wall Street Hum”

(It’s okay to watch even if you haven’t seen the movie, it doesn’t contain any spoilers)

Leonardo DiCaprio is not actually saying very much in this scene, but you can still tell that he’s uncomfortable in the situation. If the editor wouldn’t have included shots of Leo looking over his shoulders, and kind of shrinking a bit in his chair, we wouldn’t have known that he was uncomfortable, even if most people would be while drumming on their chest and humming in a public space. You can never assume that the audience knows your characters like you do, because they haven’t looked at all the material, talked to people working on the film and read the script. They see what you allow them to see, and it’s your job that they see what the director and writer intended them to see. In this scene, we now know that Leo is not comfortable in the situation, and that told us something about his character.

So try to include glances, sounds, eye rolls, the way they are standing/sitting, what they are doing with their hands and anything that tells us something about the character in that particular scene.

Choose your style and stick to it

Any good movie has its style and tone and so should your editing. Different scenes require different styles of editing, but when the ending credits roll, the people watching have to feel they have been watching the same movie throughout the entire time they’ve been looking at it. Most departments working on a movie have their style set out for them when they are starting to work on a movie. Make sure you do as well.

Set out a way you edit your dialogue scene. Determine tempo, what type of framing you include, if you use face shots more than you use shots that cover a bigger area. That sort of things.

Kill your darlings.

This is a very used expression, but it can never be stressed enough. A lot of bad short films I’ve seen are often longer than they need to be. Just because you like something in a take or scene, it doesn’t necessarily have to mean that it’s important. Be sure to re-edit and delete  a lot through the process, sometimes even just to see if something would work.

If you get stuck with a scene you know you need but you feel is not working, try looking at it again but closer. Be honest to yourself and throw away things that don’t help you tell the story. You may have a beautiful shot of one character playing with his spoon while having coffee and talking to a friend, but unless that spoonplaying is necessary, then throw it away. Most likely, you’ll have enough beautiful shots in your movie as it is, and if you don’t, then one shot won’t carry the movie anyway.

When you’re editing dialogue it’s essential not to trick the audience as well. They may think that spoon will play a role later in the movie, or later in the scene, and you don’t want that unless it actually is important for the movie. That’s the type of things that will leave your crowd feeling your movie is unfinished. Now, the spoon may not have been the best example but this applies to any type of action or hint in a scene. Both big and small.

Another tip for unsticking yourself in a scene that you feel is not working, is taking something you really like about it and take it away. Try to make the scene work without that specific clip, facial expression or sentence that you like so much. Sometimes it will work and sometimes it won’t. Maybe in the end you won’t even end up putting the thing you liked about the scene back, and sometimes you’ll realise that you actually did like the scene like it was before.

I hope you will take your time to read this and find something that helps you make your dialogue editing better.

Best,

Jonathan