Ever since I bought my first camcorder, I haven’t been suitable to repel the temptation to produce my own video products. Sometimes I indeed star in them. I admit I’m quite a ham and since the apple noway falls far from the tree, my two children are as well.
And so began what has come a collection of home produced Wild ‘N Out vids and DVD’s. Whether they were predicated on my youths ideas or my own, I can tell you with all honesty we had a blast making them and laugh our behinds off watching andre- watching them. Now that they are grown, it’s come a tradition of feathers tore- watch our faves. It my expedient that this composition will help you to avoid the misapprehensions we’ve made and learn what works so that you too can immortalize your families creativity and joy and have a palpable lasting memory for generations to come.
Lights!
Before you start, you must decide what your video will be about. This is sometimes best done by one person as too multitudinous hands at this stage may spoil your product. I’ve factory that youthful children ( ages 7 and below) do betterre- making well given children’s stories or elf tale. Some ideas that we’ve used in our products are
The Three Bears
Little Red Riding Hood
The Boy Who Cried Wolf
Jack and Jill
The Three Little Gormandizers
I’ve factory stories that have farther corridor to play can be farther fun as it allows everyone to get in ontheaction.However, also it allows them to show case their bents by playing further than one part, ala Mike Myers style as in the Austin Powers series, If you have only a numerous players.
I have noway factory it necessary to buy any props or costumes for our video’s as our maxim is” Make do with what you have”. Necessity is the ma of invention and we’ve come up with some ridiculous costumes from using particulars around the house.
Outline your story. I’ve always started my product with a shell script as we have farther fun when we advertisement-lib. It’s much farther robotic and generally important funnier than anything you can script. But in order for you the director to be suitable to make sense of your story you must have a clear morning, middle and end. A sample story might look like this
Costumes and makeup are enough easy. I’ve noway felt the need to dress in bear costumes when we’ve done the three bears. We just dressed the way we allowed a mama pop and and baby bear might dress. Easily an apron and cap for ma would work, but if you don’t have them, she can dress like a modern day ma too. It’s always great to have rugs and analogous available, but in the absence of them, scarves and hats do the trick just as well. You can pick up just about anything you’d need at a providence store if you wanted, but again, I’m not a believer that having the right outfit is all that important.
When you’re turning a boy into a girl or vice versa make up is important. For the guys, a hefty cure of color on and camo do the trick while a girl will need a painted on mustache. You can do this with eye brow pencil or makeup. Anything dark that will show up for the camera. You’ll want to apply it a little heavier for the camera than you would for real life. I’ve also used eyebrow pencil to blacken some teeth to look like a toothless person on camera. You have to dry the tooth well and also color it in with black eyebrow pencil. I’ve used burned corks to draw on beards and that works well too.
We used a womanish lubricant called”Astro-Glide”as artificial rips when we mugged the mock on the Blair witch design. The actress said it tasted gross but it looked so realistic on film!
ACTION!
Ultimately, you’re ready to shoot. As director, it’s your job to make certain everyone knows what they are supposed to do and say. I always like to make sure little bones know and I’ll ask just before we start shooting. It gives them a chance to ask questions and if you ask them to repeat back to you what they are supposed to say and do, you’ll see what might need correction. You also need to review with the actors hand signals for ending the scene. I always like the rent to the neck signal but you can use whatever you want, as long as all or your actors know what that is. It’s also important for all the players to know what signals the end of a scene. It could be a word or a expression or an action. (ie an actor gets up an leaves)
I find it easier to regain my stories in sequence, but if that is not possible you can always edit it subsequently. You also want to be sure whoever is shooting knows what they are doing. I formerly let my son be the camera man when he was about ten times old and we got great footage of the ceiling and everyone’s bases. We kept it because we laugh really hard when we watch it, but for a good quality video you want either a teenager or an grown-up doing the filming. I always plant it good to regain and direct. Ultimately, you have the most control because if you don’t like what is going on, you can stop the film and rewind andre- film the entire scene.
There is no reason why you can’t follow the action from room to room indoors, or through the timberland and meadows outdoors. We’ve done both. In the Three bears we followed Goldilocks from kitchen to den to bedrooms. In the Blair Witch we followed our actors through the timberland and actually used only a small section of timberland by walking in a circle, but the cult doesn’t know this.
Your crew muscle bug you to see the video after each member, but I would make them stay. Make a big bowl of popcorn and have a formal’premier’of your video, including buddies and family who haven’t been a part of it. Also sit back and watch the look of pride come over your children s face when they see themselves on film. It’s truly priceless!
EDITING
After you view it once you’ll see what needs to be taken out or bettered on. As I said, I’m no perfectionist, but I have on occasion seen the need to go back and do another take on a scene or two.
I’ve also taken to making a title runner which is generally hand drawn on a piece of paper along with the credits and film that.
We’ve also been having a” cast call”at the end of the video so everyone who had a part in it can take a bow and ham it up.
Good luck with your first product and may the Schwartz be with you!