Best Books

[ickle_jim]

What with it coming up to Xmas ill soon be having lots of money and book tokens from family and friends so im wondering what are the best books for a newbie to film making.

[Yammeryammeryammer]

"Rebel Without a Crew: Or How a 22 Year-Old Filmmaker Became a Hollywood Player" by Robert Rodriguez is debatably the best source for new low budget filmmakers. I also liked Bruce Campbell's "If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B-Movie Actor", which has a lot about the making of some Super-8 films and the Evil Dead movies, and provides some bit of inspiring ingenuity. If you are into special effects I would take a look at Tom Savini's Grand Illusions I and II. Lots of make-up type of things. And apparently, although I haven't found the book myself, there is a good book by Bernie Wilkie called "Special Effects in Film and Television" or something to that effect, and it is supposed to be the ultimate. But all three of those are fairly hard to find, but very worth having. I have also read "Stanley Kubrick, Director" by Alexander Walker, Sybil Taylor and Ulrich Ruchti, if you are into Kubrick. Which I am not really, and in retrospect I wonder how I made it through it... Anyway, most other major film-makers have some type of biographical book floating around. Just check out your bookstore.

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ December 15, 2002 02:38 PM: Message edited by: Yammeryammeryammer ]</font>

[ickle_jim]

im not looking so much for insperation from film makers, i had more a text book sorta thing in mind. Well not a text book but ya know... something long those lines. I was looking at Film Directing: Shot-by-shot by Steve Katz which got really good reviews on amazon.

[Yammeryammeryammer]

Ok. Well, I would still recommend Rebel Without a Crew, which is a journal. The thing it does is shows you the start to finish, conception to distribution of one low budget film. It is not the normal route by any stretch, but it does explain a lot of the terms and gets you familiar with the lingo. It is easy to read, and cheap. If you want a text book, I would still get Bernie Wilkie's book "Special Effects in Film and Television", because it is a more of a 'how to' type of book than Grand Illusions. It concentrates on simple effects, which includes a lot of hokey camera tricks. All of these things are for interest, and if you plan to make films, it provides you with some awareness of the tools at your disposal in an easy to understand fashion. If you piece it together, it is sorta like a text book, that doesn't kill your soul if you read it cover to cover.

[deanl]

Hey there.

You would be better off not bothering with a bunch of books. Just pick up your camera and start making your movies. You will learn a LOT more (like if you are any good at it)a lot faster.

Saying that, I own every book mentioned in this thread so far.

But thats from a general intrest in filmmaking as apose to looking for a book to teach me HOW to tell a story.

Despin out.

[ickle_jim]

well i agree with you in that theres no substitute to actually getting out there and doing stuff, but id like something to read with my hot chocolate in bed [img]wink.gif[/img]

[steven_craig]

Digital Cinematography
Paul Wheeler
ISBN - 024051614
Focal Press

my personal fav

Film Directing Fundamentals
Nicholas T. Proferes
ISBN - 0240804228

[Chance1234]

rebel without a crew is ****

heres my recomendations on this link here

http://5ylac.s5.com/FilmMakingBook.html


Chance

[GREATwarEAGLE]

Just going out blind and shooting, without doing any homework first is brave. We all try it. And, if your LUCKY enough to come back with satisfying, "editable" footage, will give you a sense of pride. It did for me. But eventually, I chose not to neglect the homework.

Some of the best books I've read are:

THE FILM SENSE
by Sergei Eisenstein

THE RHETORIC OF FILM
by John Harrington

FILM ART an introduction
by David Bordwell & Kristin Thompson

and probably the one I learned from most
ON DIRECTING FILM
by David Mamet

ON DIRECTING FILM is just condensing Eisienstein's simple theory of montage. Tell the story in the cut. Shot A has nothing to do with shot B, but edited together and they tell a story in the audiences mind.

We see this all the time in movies, but not nearly used to it's potential. One recent example that does a good job is a sequence from MONSTER'S BALL.

Peter Boyle is looked after by his son, Billy Bob Thornton, who is fed up with his old man. Thus far in the film, we know their relationship isn't worthy of Hallmark.

There is a simple scene in their home, where Boyle is interfering with his son's social life.
Cut to Billy Bob sitting in an office, speaking to someone, as a Senior Citizen is wheeled down the hall in a wheelchair, in the foreground of the office.

I saw this film in the theater and as a result of this sequence, the entire theater burst out laughing. In a film of such grim material, laughs were rare. But we all knew what was happening. And not only was it humorous, but it was a compliment to our intellect. We didn't need them to spell it out for us. We spelt it out for ourselves.

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ November 06, 2003 05:04 PM: Message edited by: GREATwarEAGLE ]</font>

[Actor]

Feature Filmmaking at Used Car Prices by Rick Schmidt. http://www.lightvideo.com/books.asp

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ December 15, 2002 11:04 PM: Message edited by: Actor ]</font>