Last short film for Uni

[GingeUK]

I feel kinda worried about posting this on here as there is so much quality work floating about that I feel this is somehow inferior. The links below are to both halves of my last student film for Uni, Once a Thief.

The film follows Tom Manning, a thief by profession who chooses to go straight, but realises that its not all black and white on the other side. Sorry for the quality, but it is YouTube and had to compress it a lot to make it fit to the sites limits. I shot on the Sony Z1 which was a great camera, but awful in low light conditions as you will see in two particular scenes which we could not reshoot sadly. Anyway, I hope you enjoy. Although I did not direct, everyone had some hand in how the films narrative eventually went about.

Part 1
YouTube - Once a Thief Part 1

Part 2
YouTube - Once a Thief Part 2

[miker]

I quite like the premise, but to me the pacing of the editing is a bit flat, and the actors don't come across as very dynamic (so flat, again, IMO)

The talking to camera narrative concept worked pretty well I thought, and I liked the cut to stills.

I think sound let you down a bit, there was a couple of times I noticed a clash of noise over dialogue (eg chair scrape).

Seeing the Zurich building there, I assume most or all locations were Portsmouth/Southsea. Were your actors also local?

[GingeUK]

There were only two local actors, that was the boss and his secretary. The others came from around the country such as Manchester and Coventry.

I know what you mean about sound. There was a momnet where the girlfriend slies a mug over her dialogue and it wasn't till post than we realised.

EDIT: One thing I have learnt from this film though was the importance of set dressing. Although you get the point as to what the scenes do, most of them are far too bare for my liking.

<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ July 08, 2006 09:22 AM: Message edited by: GingeUK ]</font>

[somedeadguy]

I enjoyed it. The sound was a bit staggering, and I know what you mean about dressing sets. Other than that I tought it was good, I actually watched the whole thing.