What's on your bookshelf?

Has anybody read Filming the Fantastic? Is it worth looking at?

Yes, I have it. It's about visual effects cinematography, so I think it's a good reference for anyone planning an effects shoot. There's a lot about things like film and video and color and so on that is interesting from a technical point of view but may or may not be useful to you. On the other hand, there's a lot about combining live action and models, green screens, doing crowd shots, shooting explosions (though not how to explode things) Very Happy

"Dynamation" and so on. The thrust is to try and do as much with the camera as possible to avoid having to solve difficult problems in post due to poor planning.

It's not the first book I'd run out and get, but I think it's useful, if a bit pricey.

Arthur

I am addictive bibliophile. I have a personal library of many thousands of volumes, and my filmmaking library includes over 100 screenwriting books, and most of the valuable works on other topics.

Here is my suggested home-schooling book list.

OVERVIEW

FROM REEL TO DEAL. The basics.
REBEL WITHOUT A CREW. The Gospel According to Robert.

WRITING

ALTERNATIVE SCREENWRITING. A concise summary of the 3 act structure and a number of variants.
500 WAYS TO BEAT THE HOLLYWOOD READER. Pithy pearls of wisdom.
STORY. You might not agree with all of it, but it will certainly make you think.
THE HERO OF A THOUSAND FACES. Campbell is better and deeper than Vogler.
EBERT'S BIGGER LITTLE MOVIE BOOK. A dictionary of cliches you don't want in your movie.

PSYCHOLOGY FOR WRITERS

POKER PSYCHOLOGY. Poker is about reading other people, making calculated risks, making decisions every moment. In other words, it's about what your characters are doing.
GAMES PEOPLE PLAY. If you absolutely have to learn about psychodynamics, this is the best beginning short of becoming a psychoanalyst.

DIRECTING

ACTORS TURNED DIRECTOR. The book on getting great performances.
FIRST TIME DIRECTOR. Move the camera, but never randomly. By a protege of Zemekis.
SETTING UP YOUR SHOTS. Sometimes simplistic, sometimes thought-provoking.
DIRECTING THE FILM. AFM interviews with the gods of film. Guess what? You will have the same problems they do, only their problems have a lot more zeros on the them than yours.

ACTING

SECRETS OF SCREEN ACTING. Terrible title, but will clue you greatly.

SPECIAL EFFECTS

Everything by Bernard Wilkie. Endless ideas for on-stage on-camera effects.

VISUAL EFFECTS

THE DV REBEL'S GUIDE. The Gospel According to Stu. There is nothing else like it.

SOFTWARE GUIDES

This is such a changeable subject, it's really impossible to make recommendations. To learn AFTER EFFECTS, I found the books by Chris and Trish Meyer to be absolutely indespensible.

COSTUME

Depends on period. Mostly you'll be using contemporary clothes, but just remember that pro costumers "build costumes" -- i.e. special techniques not used in crafting everyday or fashion clothing.

PROPS

Everything by Thurston James.

GUNS

Google "Airsoft." If you live in a state like Arizona, you'll be able to line up lots of real firearms.
If you want top quality ray guns, look for "The Weaponshop of Isher."

PRODUCTION DESIGN

This is a less-than-relevant topic for no-money indies, since finding the right location *is* the production design. Let's face it, we're not painting the brown door red because we think red would be a better color. It's a great door, it happens to be brown, so deal with it.

PRODUCTION EQUIPMENT

NUTS AND BOLTS FILMMAKING. There is nothing like it. Plans for building grip gear and a zillion other things. It leans a little too heavily on PVC plastic, but other than that, good ideas and thought-provoking ideas.

Stu mentions www.dvcamerasupport.com in The Book. I spent the money for this download, and have built the stabilizer rig. Yes! I'll be building at least two other projects from this compendium. My first two jibs sucked, and now I understand why.

<< By the way, Krylon offers a "dripless" spray paint in Ultra Flat Black, among other colors. It isn't hype. A smooth, dripless painted finish from a spray can. Now *this* is technological advance.>>

*****

There are other books, but I don't have them handy at the moment ...

-- Paul

	Clinco wrote:
	Stu mentions www.dvcamerasupport.com in The Book. I spent the money for this download, and have built the stabilizer rig. Yes! I'll be building at least two other projects from this compendium. My first two jibs sucked, and now I understand why.

Paul,
I'm interested in that book but the link you posted doesn't work...
do you remember what page in Stu's book where it was mentioned?
I've looked but I must keep flipping right by it. Confused

Any help would be greatly appreciated since I'm possibly building some equipment from the "killer camera rigs that you can build" book.
I would just like to compare and see what other DIY'ers have done.

Thanks!

I must have been having a serious junior moment.

The site is www.dvcamerarigs.com

Well worth checking it out.

-- Paul

That's funny,

That is the book I was refering to...it's good stuff!
I built "the shock corridor stabilizer" from that book for a friend and he loves it.
I'm finally getting to the point where I need one of my own to rely on so I'll be building it in the next few weeks.

Thanks for the help!

I think I might have mentioned this elsewhere, but what the hell...

I have ABS plastic tube for track, but running a dolly over it creates a loud noise emanating from the tubes. Very distracting. I made the dvcamerarigs slider, but decided to increase its mass for smoothness by building it from angle iron, with a fixed 10" track gauge. Then I built a 3' sample of track from a scrap of 1-1/2" angle iron, with the corner facing up, and some 1x2 steel channel stock for the "railroad ties."

The damned thing is heavy, all right, but it moves smoothly and silently.

In-line skate wheels are a great material for making movie goodies.

If anyone out there in Rebel land knows a URL or has figured out for themselves how to make CURVED TRACK, *please* shout it from the rooftops --

-- Paul

In order of purchase - bottom to top.

	ChristianLett wrote:
	So, what you got on your bookshelf? Christian.

Christian:

I just happened upon this thread the other day when I was searching for new books to add to my collection. Thanks for your efforts (and I assume Stu's)!! I just bought one off your list yesterday. I'll post my list when I get a moment, but wonder what you now have in your library since your first posted your bookshelf.

Regards,

Bill Strehl
billstrehl@comcast.net

_________________
Bill Strehl
billstrehl@comcast.net