Now that the 2020 Oscar Nominations have been released, it got us thinking a little bit. How much weight should we give to these awards? Just ask any filmmaker, and they’ll be able to give you a list of 10+ movies they believe should’ve been nominated. You could argue that it’s the academy’s short-sightedness, but 2019 was also one hell of a year for movies and you could argue it was hard to choose.
It’s the end of 2019, so it must be listicle time. There are a lot of them out there (trust us, we’ve looked) but, we think our take on the “best of” article is a little different. In our second of three, we’re tackling the best YouTube advice we received in 2019.
The art of being an efficient YouTuber is oftentimes about planning for the unexpected more than anything else. That’s the beauty of the platform, right? You’re capturing once-in-a-lifetime, impromptu moments and shaping them into a narrative. The inherent charm is the fact that it’s not a canned moment. It’s genuine.
Sure, it’s fun editing a wedding film from time to time. But, it’s a whole different beast when edit season rolls around. All of a sudden you have dozens of expectant clients, hundreds of hours of footage, and one blank timeline staring you in the face. It can be a beast, especially if you’re new to the game.
Producing a non-profit film can be difficult because the work is so important. There’s a looming social/humanitarian/environmental problem and taking a chance on a film production isn’t always in the cards. Also, words like “capital” and “budget” tend to complicate the matter, too.
Generally, the words “what did you shoot this on” are frowned upon around Musicbed. We’re generally a bit more interested in the ‘why’ rather than the ‘how’. But, when you get a film like The Lighthouse, it’s nearly impossible to separate the two. Its visuals are haunting, mystifying, and incredibly intentional according to cinematographer Jarin Blaschke.
As filmmakers, particularly documentary filmmakers, it’s our job to do the digging. It can be uncomfortable and it’s never clean, because the truth is never simple. This is why documentaries are so important—they offer the time and context needed for the truth, as long as we can extract it.
Welcome back to our second article in a series exploring The Commercial Directors Diversity Program, or CDDP. In this installation, we had the opportunity to speak with Vanessa Black and Jane Qian about the specifics of their productions and how they overcame challenges to make them a reality.
Take Stink Studio’s Executive Producer Omid Fatemi, for example. He’s behind the TUMI x Chris Pratt spot, which is simple on the surface, yet infinitely effective—a funny film about a man packing for his first trip to Hong Kong. Of course, it helps to have Chris Pratt as your talent—but, there’s so much more to this project than that. And that’s where Omid’s magic tricks come in.
