Now.

Direct Actors for Improv

Home Film School Student has a conversation with an actress about being directed in a scene where she ab-libbed quite a bit (and they wanted her too). The content of this video is valuable if you encourage actors to improv during a scene (this may be more helpful for them, actually), but my favorite parts of this video are meta. Such as the dude asking “are we ready to go” at the beginning, and this “bored camera guy” shot.

I’m trippin! Check out the videos here.

The Beeping! The Beeping!

For the first little while I worked with Final Cut Pro I had no clue why some audio would beep on the timeline and need to be rendered while others did not. Turns out it could be a few reasons, and Genius DV has laid them out in a handy little post.

For your health.

IndyMogul Really Wants You To Make a Slider

Zach from Backyard Effects and IndyMogul will stop at nothing to get you to make his $20 slider. Nothing.

Nothing.

Partner with YouTube Instructions from a YouTube Video

Did I just blow your mind? Maybe this video will. From FilmmakerIQ.

DiY is basically going to apply. Basically.

Young Man Reading a Newspaper While Yawning Tracking Shots with Smooth Jazz

To make things easier, we’ve gone ahead and scoured the net for the best Sony HVR-A1U reviews and tutorials. Check ‘em out!

Warning: We could not find any decent tutorials on the Sony HVR-A1U online, only test shoots and hilariously bad related videos. We’ve embedded them for your enjoyment. We’re going to make an HVR-A1U tutorial video soon. You can see my descent into madness as the post continues.

Resources, Tutorials, and Reviews

HVR-A1U Manual (pdf) – Full owner’s manual

HVR-A1U Brochure (pdf) – Summary of some of the key features

HVR-A1U Error Codes – For diagnosing problems

Sony’s HVR-A1U Page – Specs and pictures

Sundance Media Group – Great review and tutorial, talking about specific features with examples and menu images

Videomaker – Quick review from Videomaker Magazine

Studio Daily – Review of a pre-release version of the A1U from Studio Daily

DV Format – Another great/review tutorial of features with images

CNET User Reviews – Some reviews by users of the HVR-A1U on CNet

Digital Content Producer – Review with some great technical info

TV Technology – Another Review

Kino-Eye – Great review with a link to a Z1U/A1U image quality comparison gallery

HVR-A1U Footage Tests

This test footage of an English Bulldog is the clear winner

Low Light Test:

Depth of Field Test:

Test Footage:

Misc Tests

KIA Test Shoot

More Test Footage

Even More Test Footage. This time, a cat.

The test footage to end all test footage

Test Footage of a Pigeon

Someone burning nachos (still test footage of the A1U for some reason)

Film Look Test

Tutorials and Misc

This man is unwrapping the HVR-A1U that he bought used. I REPEAT. HE IS MAKING AN UNBOXING VIDEO, FOR A USED PRODUCT. EVERYTHING IS WRAPPED IN BUBBLE WRAP AND PACKING TAPE. MY HEAD IS GOING TO EXPLODE.

This is the Z1U, but I had to include this. It’s too stupid.

This man is doing his best to make it hard for you to hear/understand him

A Completely Useless Tutorial by a Moron

Mom Describes Shorts (or what not to shoot as test footage with your Merlin steadicam)

The Winner of The Stupidest HVR-A1U Video Goes To

Before you watch this, I will warn you that this defies all of humanity’s combined gathered intelligence over all time. It is so stupid, so useless, and has absolutely no reason to exist. It is 1:16 seconds of manic, shaky footage of the Sony HVR-A1U, with some abrasive rap in the background. Now that I think about it though, the rap goes with it perfectly. The creator of this video probably put a lot of thought into the song choice for this masterpiece. He ultimately chose this diddy, in which the vocalist tells us he “hate[s] bitches, but [he] loves pussy”. Behold.

To help you get to that happy weekend place again, we’re bringing you some of the coolest stuff that we found on the interwebs.

Video/Audio/Image Converter (for Free)

FCP Daily has this scoop. It’s a really amazing converter of formats called adapter. It’s free, AND you can get it for PC and MAC. It’s still technically in Beta, so you might wanna keep it in conjunction with your favorite video converter right now (like MPEG Streamclip), but it looks very promising. You can get all the deets at FCP Daily.

“Babies” – the Documentary your Girlfriend Wants To See

(If you are a dude, of course.)

I don’t hang around many females who are into documentaries, and all the sudden every girl I know wants to see this. It’s amazing. Kudos to the fimmakers for coming up with this, because none of them are exactly flocking to my DVD shelf to borrow “The Bridge”.

The documentary I’m talking about is called “Babies”. It came out this weekend, and you can find all sorts of clips and trailers and featurettes and stuff here. It stands as proof that with a documentary – what you need is a good, marketable idea. And some babies.

Good Storytelling Advice

Speaking of making something people like, has everyone checked out Filmmaker IQ? Yes, there are plenty of things like the “$50 DIY Ran Machine” and all that, but there are some great articles on storytelling as well, like “Exploring the Dark Side: The Anti-Hero’s Journey“. Put that into your Google Reader and smoke it.

—-

And finally, here is an educational video about abusing perscription drugs.

In the mean time, here are some cool things around the web that caught our eye that may be useful or just fun:

DSLR Film Blog

I came across this blog in my research on DSLR filmmaking for this week’s podcast. (I had hoped that there was a blog dedicated to this, and I found one! I love it when the internet works like that.)

Anyways, the DSLR filmmaker blog is really great – its in-depth, technical, and gets you excited about DSLR filmmaking while at the same time bringing you the latest news on the technological advances in the DSLR world. They also highlight some DSLR short films and other DSLR-created media.

You can find this blog at www.dslrfilm.com. We highly recommend you check it out and add it to your favorite feed reader.

Make Sure You Don’t Have to Cope with the Loss of Loved Data

The good people at fcpdaily.com posted some great tips on autosaving in Final Cut Pro that I think need to be sung from the mountaintops. Check it out here.

Pay special attention to the message on sequences at the bottom of the post. I think it’s a great thing to go nuts with sequences – they are small in terms of data size, and they allow you to create really easy snapshots of your progress whether you have a client who will want to revert, or you are your own client. I like to create a daily sequence and name them with marks so they sounds cool. IE: Rough Cut Mark III – 021510

This Tutorial Guy Likes to Party

Am I right?

1. Canon 5D Mark II Audio Exposed – Boom Mic (juicedLink, Zoom H4n, Microtrack II, BeachTek) from P3Pictures on Vimeo.

That’s all we got going for now! Stay tuned to the site for some cool stuff coming up – our DSLR podcast + some great tech tutorials.

Yes, we put our own blog into Google Reader, okay?

Anyways, the good folks at DiY Filmmaking sucks posted something that caught my eye: YouTube rentals. You can read all about it there and get a link to the application page (as well as a link to the private Beta Dynamo, which is doing something similar but more customizable), but the gist is you can offer rentals of your film on YouTube.

First reaction: this…is…awesome.

The thing is, of course, you need to have something an audience is willing to pony up a few bucks to rent. But you already knew that, that’s why you’re making films!

Anyways, it is in beta right now, so check it out. If you have any success stories with this, we’d love to hear them. We’ll be keeping an eye on this.

The War of the Typefaces

Not long ago I posted about typefaces and how they can enhance the look of your film with very little effort.

If any of you are typeface fans, I highly recommend the addicting and awesome TypeWar. Just check it out, you won’t regret it. Plus you can sign in using your Twitter account, which is handy.

Warning: This is for type nerds only. I am in 98th place if you wanna come after me.

Mr Caleb Pike

I ran across this dude’s Vimeo account the other day. He knows his stuff and is not afraid to bust out awesome tips. Give him a visit!

Search for the Worst Tutorial Video Ever

I recently began my search for the worst DiY Filmmaking Tutorial ever. I don’t know why. Here’s are some candidates.

I don’t know, the above are pretty hard to beat. I’ll keep looking, though…

It’s going to be cool. You gotta believe me.

But first, let’s take a look at some cool things from the DiY (and beyond) world happening around the web.

That Dude Who Swears From the RV Video Had a Documentary Made About Him

Remember this guy?

Someone made a documentary about him, for real. And it got picked up by a distributor. The good folks at the Documentary Blog have got the scoop.

If that doesn’t prove you can find documentary subjects in the strangest of places, then I don’t know what does.

Tim & Eric Are All About DiY Filmmaking

Doug got me into Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job, and I can’t get enough of it. I was watching some clips the other day, and I realized how much of the show’s humor centers around really crappy DiY Productions. Having a good sense of humor about things can be really advantageous to DiY productions. All of these are great. Especially Grub.

Drop vs Non-Drop Frame : It’s a Thing

Here’s something fun: take a few minutes to check out B&H Photo Video’s great write up on drop frame vs non drop frame. Then bookmark it, because you’ll probably forget it all, but just remember that it’s a thing, and you should know that:

a.) It exists

b.) It may come up in one way or another sometime.

Hmm.

That’s it! Look out for part 2 of our web series tomorrow.

We’re going to start doing some Monday roundups of our favorite cool stuff from around the web having to do with DiY filmmaking, and DiY inspiration. Let’s do it!

LEGO Film is a Thing

Make’s post about this reminded me that LEGO movies – excuse me, LEGO Brick Movies – are a thing. Check out Make’s recap for some cool ones (or below). There is even an online community dedicated to this –  Brickfilm.

I used to love making LEGO movies as a kid, and now thinking about it, I realize that there are a few benefits.

• Sets are cheap
• Actors don’t complain
• Actors heads are removable

You can’t go wrong!

There are actually HUNDREDS of these online and they can get pretty sophisticated. Check out some stuff by Squashed Cat Productions for some nice use of focus panes and smooth animation:

If you are looking for a decent tutorial on how to make these, you are kind of out of luck. Most of them are like this:

When do I take the picture?

Free Preference Manager for Final Cut Pro

The good people at FCP Daily came up with a sweet freebie last week – a preference manager for Final Cut Pro. The lack of this being native on the system drives me nuts, having worked in places where many editors use the same bay. Avid handles it fine, but its a pain in FCP. Good get!

James Cameron on TED Talks

This is hardly DiY but worth the look for inspiration. For what it’s worth, this video by JJ Abrams is one of the best TED Talks, and best filmmaking and storytelling pep talk I’ve ever seen:

That’s it! Happy monday.

Let’s just get right into it, shall we?

This man has taken some time out from his busy day to get exasperated by us and show us in painful detail “a different way” to wrap up cords improperly. He’s really got ruining his cords down to a science here.

You can tell this man (apparently Bill Elzey, with showplace lawns) has carried the weight of cord wrapping on his shoulders for years. Sit down and let Bill tell you about his world-weary extension cord wrapping technique thoughts that can only come from a lifetime of pain and heartache.

Chris from Hackcollege shows us how to properly wrap your iPod earbuds. What makes this tutorial special is it is the ULTIMATE. I mean, who wouldn’t want listen to advice on how to laboriously wrap up your headphones from this man?

Chris don't hurt 'em!

This man combines being barely intelligible with demonstrating cable wrapping in almost complete darkness. Take notes, Filmmaker IQ!

If you have an abnormally large amount of time on your hands, you might want to check out this, which is part one of a TWO PART SERIES ON CABLE WRAPPING. This is for the serious cable wrapper only. This is the Lord of the Rings Extended Director’s Cut of cable wrapping videos. YOU’VE BEEN WARNED.

Oh and did I mention that part one is ten minutes long?

This man has a future in professional education (FYI I’m totally with “SuperBeefsandwich” in the comments there).

And of course, there always that nagging feeling in your head that while there are plenty of westerners on YouTube obsessing about cable wrapping, the Japanese have probably made a sport out of it.

Cable wrapping techniques are another one of types of things that you automatically do one way and you eventually learn how to do the right way. I remember when I was early into my high school career I was out helping on a local shoot and started wrapping cables around my arm. An old roadie quickly noticed and verbally accosted me, kindly showing me the right way.

So here for your reading and viewing pleasure is a short guide and some great videos on how to wrap cable.

First of all, can I wrap this cable properly?

Not all cables are created equal. The $4 video cable for connecting your DVD player isn’t going to be the same as a $40 6 foot Mogami XLR cable, obviously, but the quality of the cable has a lot of bearing on whether or not you can wrap it correctly in the first place.

Quality cable has a natural bias, meaning that it really wants to be a certain shape. This comes from the manufacturing of the shielding, which means that when you obey the natural bias, you keep the shielding in tip top shape as well.

Bottom line: if you are having a hard time finding the cable’s natural shape bias, you might consider that the cable just sucks.

Author’s tip – Christmas light have no natural bias.

Why? Oh, so so many reasons.

You might ask – why? Why should I do this? So what if it’s wrong, I like my way. Well one reason is the just described above possible damage to the shielding that might result. Cables are not invincible. They need to be handled with some care, and when they are, you are much less likely to plug in something and have it not work when it’s mission critical.

Also, wrapping cable with the proper technique means virtually eliminating the twists and knots that arise from general cable usage. This cuts down of frustration and you looking like an idiot. Seriously, you can throw the cable and it just unfurls perfectly. It’s a beauty to behold.

Did I mention that girls love proper cable wrapping technique?

Make sure you do the over/under technique

Once you find the cable bias, it is really easy to wrap cables just like that and call it a day. Unfortunately, it’s more complicated than that. See the video tutorials below for some guidance on these techniques. You pretty much just fold over the cable every second wrap though.

Don’t tie it in a knot

Wrapping a cable up properly then tying the ends in a knot is like carefully parking a car and then scraping a wrench across the front hood.

For the love of God use these. They’re cheap.

Don’t over think it..too much…

People can really get weird about how they wrap their cable and will have debates over such things as what size the wrap should be, whether to connect XLR heads, and other various minutiae. These people typically use cable all day every day for their job, and have dreams about wrapping cable and having conversations with individual cables they admire. As a DiY filmmaker, you just need to know how to do it to get the most out of your cables and be efficient when shooting. Don’t get too caught up in the craze that is sweeping America (the proper cable wrapping craze).

Check these guys out

Here are some of our favorite cable wrapping tutorials online that’ll steer you in the right direction.

Gospel John of Filmmaker IQ is very excited about cable wrapping, and has a great POV shot of how to do the over/under.

Ric Wallace, appearing in what appears to be a cable dungeon, takes his cables very seriously. All 7 1/2 minutes are worth it, but don’t miss his passionate plea to “do right thing by ‘em (cables)” at the beginning. I like Ric a lot.

If you don’t trust any of the above tutorials, let this wizard show you how to do it.

Perhaps you’d prefer to get your cable advice from a dispassionate headless man?

That’s it! There are many more of these on YouTube so if you find one that is good please post it in the comments so everyone can get their learn on.

Author’s note: check out the comments by our boy Yootoobsuchs who appears to be the self-appointed policeman of proper cable wrapping techniques in YouTube-ville. He’ll set you straight!