Whether hand-held, shoulder-held, head-mounted, dollied, boomed or on a Steadicam, Camera Operating is like acting - that is, it is about reacting. For the audience, the operating can put them where they want to be in the moment they want to be there, because of where they were the moment before. This handbook helps directors and cinematographers create powerful shots with a strong motivation behind each move. You will gain a strong understanding of the fundamentals of camera operation, namely:...
The Blu-Book Film, TV & Commercial Production Directory (Hollywood Reporter Blu-Book Production Directory)
Pre-Production Planning for Video, Film, and Multimedia
by Steve R Cartwright
America's luckiest guy? The real story behind the most important man in the lives of Michelle Pfeiffer and Ally McBeal. I love Ally McBeal, says one female fan. "She's gorgeous, she has a great job, men are crazy about her, and she's still unhappy! Well, if Ally can be unhappy then I can be unhappy too." Is that what the popularity of Ally McBeal is about? Misery loves company? Only partly. The dialogue is scintillating, the characters peculiar, the stories - and not just those fantasy moments -...
No Other Way to Tell it
Drama documentary is a programme category unique to television. Combining the factual approach of documentary with the entertainment values of drama, dramadoc/docudrama has featured in television schedules for over 40 years, and has often been the focus of controversy. Questions are frequently asked about how the viewer is to judge between fact and fiction, and whether such programmes invade individuals' privacy. This is an introductory book which defines the form, and reviews its history and de...
According to Joss Whedon, the creator of the short-lived series Firefly (2002), the cult show is about "nine people looking into the blackness of space and seeing nine different things." The chronicles of crewmembers on a scruffy space freighter, Firefly ran for only four months before its abrupt cancellation. In that brief time, however, it established a reputation as one of the best science-fiction programs of the new millennium: sharply written, superbly cast, and set on an exotic multicultur...
Understanding how commercials are made is the key to doing it right. This descriptive book is a step-by-step guide on the mechanics of creating a commercial from a production perspective. Making commercials on all types of budgets is addressed. There is material describing the roles and dynamics of the key players: the producer/director, agency, and client. This book outlines the requirements of each group so that everyone can understand and appreciate each other's needs.
Fourth in the popular Screencraft series, Editing & Post-Production examines, through example, the craft of cutting and how films are created in the cutting room. Fifteen internationally-acclaimed editors discuss their work in film, revealing fascinating anecdotes and tricks of the trade, as well as the impact recent video technology has had on their profession. From the technical aspects of selecting takes, viewing the rushes, setting up the cutting room and creating efficient systems to the re...
Emotional engagement with visual stories through performance and camera placement is one of the most significant factors in how the audience appreciates a film or a television program. By selecting and combining fragments of moving image and sound the editor influences how the audience receives information. Combining history, theory and practice, this book explains why certain editorial decisions impact on the emotional and narrative engagement of the audience. With full-color examples taken f...
The must-have guide to traditional, emerging and creative TV funding models that are being developed and exploited by social media-savvy documentary filmmakers. Each chapter covers a different form of funding and combines advice from industry insiders - producers, buyers, specialist media agencies and corporate funding bodies - and entertaining case studies that illustrate the benefits and pitfalls of each method. With practical tips, case studies and advice it reveals what grantors, brands an...
NY 411 (NY 411: New York's Professional Reference Guide for Film & Television Production)
An exciting new strand in The Television Series, the ‘Moments in Television’ collections celebrate the power and artistry of television, whilst interrogating key critical concepts in television scholarship.Each ‘Moments’ book is organised around a provocative binary theme. Substance / styleoffers fresh perspectives on television’s essential qualities and aesthetic significance. It reassesses the synergy between substance and style, highlighting the potential for meaning to arise through their in...
Filmed In Supermarionation: A History Of The Future
by Stephen La Riviere
For the first time, a complete history of the Gerry and Sylvia Andersontelevision productions which pioneered science-fiction special effects. Filmhistorian Steven La Riviere, whose documentary about Supercar was thefinal word on the series, takes you behind-the-scenes and covers every aspect ofthe creation and production of such television shows as Supercar,Fireball XL5, Stingray, Thunderbirds, CaptainScarlet, Secret Service, and Joe 90. The book also covers theAnderson's efforts from the begi...
A look at world-changing events, through the lens of television cameraman George Jesse Turner.
Costumes, Accessories, Props, and Stage Illusions Made Easy
by Barb Rogers
The Art of Knife Fighting for Stage and Screen: An Actor’s and Director’s Guide to Staged Violence provides detailed information for the safe use of knives and daggers in a theatrical setting and an in-depth understanding of safe theatrical weapons. The book starts with an extensive safety review, then moves on to the basic techniques of dagger fighting, starting with grip and body postures. Readers will then learn about the basic actions of cuts, parries, blocks, and disarms. During this proc...
This work includes discussions of the history of sound effects, the different types of sound effects, creating sound effects from scratch, recording sounds in the studio and field, the advantages of live sounds over tape, knowing why and when to use sound effects, the difference between radio, TV and film sounds, Foleying and the Foley stage, and recording and editing equipment
You’ve almost certainly laughed at Scovell’s jokes—you just didn’t know it until now. Just the Funny Parts is a juicy and scathingly funny insider look at how pop culture gets made. For more than thirty years, writer, producer and director Nell Scovell worked behind the scenes of iconic TV shows, including The Simpsons, Late Night with David Letterman, Murphy Brown, NCIS, The Muppets, and Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, which she created and executive produced. In 2009, Scovell gave up her behin...
Televisuality: Style, Crisis, and Authority in American Television
by John Thornton Caldwell
The collision of auteurism and rap––couched by primetime producers in the Northern Exposure script––was actually rather commonplace by the early 1990s. Series, and even news broadcasts, regularly engineered their narratives around highly coded aesthetic and cultural fragments, with a kind of ensemble iconography. Televisuality interrogates the nature of such performances as an historical phenomenon, an aesthetic and industrial practice, and as a socially symbolic act. This book suggests that pos...
Besides the Screen
New media technologies impact cinema well beyond the screen. This volume speculates about the changes in modes of accessing, distributing, storing and promoting moving images and how they might affect cinematographic experience, economy and historiography.
Since 2010 “curation” has become a marketing buzzword. Wrenched from its traditional home in the world of high art, everything from food to bed linens to dog toys now finds itself subject to this formerly rarified activity. Most of the time the term curation is being inaccurately used to refer to the democratization of choice – an inevitable development and side effect of the economics of long tail distribution. However, as any true curator will tell you – curation is so much more than choosi...