ProVideo Coalition.com: Stunning Good Looks by Art Adams

If you are trying to become a videographer, your path is slightly more difficult. You’ll need to compile a reel of your best work. It should be no more than three minutes in length. Put only your best work on it: like your morning espresso, YOU ARE ONLY AS GOOD AS YOUR WEAKEST SHOT, because THAT’S the shot they’ll remember. Don’t make it longer than three minutes . There are a lot of tapes out there and only so much time to watch them. Make yours short and very, very sweet. A hyper-caffeinated producer is only going to watch it for so long before moving on to the next one.

If you have short one or two minute projects that you can use in their entirety, put them on as long as they are really, really good. Don’t use them if the photography is stunning but the acting is horrible, or if the sound is muffled, or if the music was played by a child of ten on a xylophone. Producers and directors often can’t focus solely on the photography and can be influenced by the piece as a whole. All they may remember is how bad the acting was. Your photography will be lost. Your reel won’t mean a hill of beans.

If you can’t use whole sequences then take your best shots from a number of projects and cut a montage to music. Pick music that has energy but isn’t going to alienate a lot of people: stay away from rap or heavy metal or experimental music. Try to keep similar types of shots together: people in one spot, cars in another, steamed milk somewhere else, etc.

Put your name and title in big letters at the head and tail of the reel. Don’t include a phone number because that might change. Put that information on the tape label. (Labels are easier to change.)

Remember that your opinion of a shot or sequence will be prejudiced. Get second opinions. A specific shot may make you proud because you know that the odds were stacked against you and you know how much work went into it… but unless all that effort shows very clearly on the screen and is totally obvious to the uninformed viewer, DON’T USE IT. It won’t do you any good. There’s a reason coffee beans are roasted only so much and no more. Don’t overdo it.

But… in the end, what you use is up to you. Opinions are good, but it’s your reel: go with your gut.

I would suggest getting copies of your work in the best digital format possible, after footage has been digitized for editing but before it has been compressed for the web or DVD. (Try to get raw footage whenever possible, in case the footage shines but the finished piece itself didn’t turn out terribly well. You can always recut it and color correct it to make it look better.) I typically ask for DVCPro copies of my footage because that format stores twice as much color information as DVCAM. (Apple’s ProRes may also be a good option.) Mail the editor a portable Firewire hard drive with a SASE and a Starbucks gift car. Buy a DVD authoring program, build your reel, burn dozens of copies and give them out like candy to anyone who might hire you. Don’t expect to get them back. You want them to sit on shelves and catch someone’s eye at just the right time.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

How to Break Into the Entertainment Biz

If you’ve got talent, a good attitude and basic barista skills, you’ll do okay