We Shot Our Film with a $600 Camera, 3 Lights, and No Budget | Hacker News Reader

We Shot Our Film with a $600 Camera, 3 Lights, and No Budget

nofilmschool.com

41 pointsMR4D6 comments

I used to belong to a filmmakers' group, so I read the article. Some good suggestions about gear, not so much about filmmaking or editing.

Ironically, they overexerted themselves:

- the "theater experience" is not about the camera or image quality, it's about the sound quality/sound track. You can show grainy film with stereo CD-quality sound, and nobody will complain. Try the reverse and see what happens.

- looked like years of editing - for VOD. Why? They could have done two more films in that time window.

- sounds like a lot of SFX - why? A lot of movies have only a handful.

- as far as "oldversion" software - well, when do you think the engines for that softwarwe were written? Probably the 80s or 90s.

If you look at any music studio, they're using like 2010 Macbook Pros (you can replace the battery and they have Firewire), along with DAWs from ... the oughts.

"The original Blair Witch Project was not shot with a DSLR, it was shot with a Digital 8 camcorder and 16mm film."

A data point from another low-budget film, but that one made it to theaters even.

BWP was intended to look crappy, homemade. To a trained eye it doesn't because shots were definitely produced by a skilled camera man and director, not an untrained amateur.

It is not about the gear but about your skill and creativity. If you have experience you can take scrappy tools and figure out their strengths and weaknesses to produce interesting results.

In all comparisons I ever saw of amateur with expensive gear vs pro with cheap gear the pro always wins.

To watch the movie: https://www.cosmosmovieofficial.com/watch-cosmos?fbclid=IwAR...

(took a while to find)

Their $600 camera links to a search which produces 4K body at $1200 as the cheapest camera option... Maybe it once included an 1080p one, but it does not at this point.

Relevant:

"Primer" won many rewards on a similar budget ($7K)

"House" had an episode shot entirely on a Canon 5D (A $2000 camera at the time, IIRC; however, the production likely cost >$1M per episode at the time)

The original Blackmagic Design Pocket Cinema Camera would go for around $500 these days. It is a 1080p camera.

There might have been used suggestions or new stock in that link when the article was published, as there typically is.

As a Steadicam operator, I like this one:

>> 4. Wheelchair Dolly

For those not in the know, lots of shots in The Shining were shot by Garret Brown (Steadicam inventor) sitting in a wheelchair being wheeled around with the Steadicam rig.

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