Clocks - The Plans

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Clocks, a short film entirely made of still photography.

Around the world the use of photography in film making is something that has been done extensively and very artistically. The inspiration or idea of making this little experimental film came into my mind when I heard a song, by Coldplay. But I also had this in my mind, that this time I have to do something totally different from that of conventional film making. It has to be unique, artistic & abstract. The song by Coldplay, played its part right at this moment. It gave me the idea of an abstract story. The idea of time that flows forward but it isn't what we do, our flow of life is not directional, its a movement like two and fro (though the song by Coldplay doesn't say anything like that). In other words we live a life which is repetitive by nature. The film will show exactly that, by slowing down the time, making it faster again and then again slowing down. It will show the state of mind, how we react in different situations. What we see, how we see. The repetitive mass movement of people across their life, and many more things.

Most interesting part, is that the entire film will be made only through still photography. Probably this film is going to be the most powerful representation of still photography; what it can do and how beautifully it can do. Right at this moment you may fell, that why still photography, the same can be done through a video camera also?
The reasons are many, as people like us & production like ours is very weak and limited. I always think on, how can I produce a good quality film with all these limited resources. In this case particularly, we had to shoot many things in many ways, under different conditions. Secondly, the style of screen that this film is going to have is very different. Right now I can't really explain in words what exactly is going to be shown, as because the film is under pre production right now. But just take it in this way that, this is just an experiment. If it works well then it will be really good, but if it doesn't then I will be sure that this way of film making is not going to work. Which means I have to look for something else, may be another experiment or so.

Techniques that has been planned to be used in this film production are the basics and some very creative, artistic & abstract way of still photography. Such as...
1. Stop Motion Photography
2. Time Lapse Photography
3. Slow shutter/long exposure (idle/panning/motion,etc) Photography
4. Series Photography
5. Night Photography
6. Off focus photography

All the above types are as pre planned, more types may include.



More details coming soon...

Morichika - the mirage (undone)

Current Status of the film : Under Pre Production

Intro:
Inspired from the novel, 'The Binding Vine' by Shashi Deshpande, I wrote a very small script, taking some parts directly from the novel and mixing it with my own imagination, I came up with a story, named as 'Morichika', meaning 'the mirage'. The story depicts the life of women. With several themes like human relationships, women's bonding, death, fear and agony, Morichika is a story of many but mainly women related human feelings. Morichika, reveals the life of women, their hardship, it speaks about their fundamental rights. In one word it is a feminist story.

Mira's poem:
Desire, says the Buddha, is the cause of grief
but how escape this cord
this binding vine of love ? (p. 137, The Binding Vine)

The central theme of the story is human bonding. Human relationships are explored with all possible pros and cons, husband-wife, mother-daughter, male-female, mother-child, woman-woman, etc.

Relationships according to Shashi Deshpande should not be a trap. They must give sufficient freedom to the other to grow as an individual.

The story also raises some important issues concerning women, their suffering, their subordinate status and their inability to speak out. The story never claims that the men are to be blamed for this, nor does it claim that women are good and men are bad. It just shows the reality of women's life.

Male characters are almost absent in the story, as it is in the novel. where ever they are present they have a negligible role to play. But the men are not ineffective. They influence the thematic structure through the patriarchal system.

The main interest or focus, whatever it is, has been put into the story and script. Then it is the characters that comes under great concern, as because they will be the ones who will carry the effective flow and the theme of the story. The acting is the priority, that comes in the third position. There will be lots of emotions and also hard hitting dialogues. Hence the acting should be perfect and fluent.

Lots of people will join the journey this time, as in making the film, till it is competed. So the credit list may last a little longer as compared to last few.

The making of a documentary

Intro:

‘The making of a documentary – an unfinished documentary film’ is just a work of fiction. It has no connection with reality; rather it is loosely based on some cleaver story making and using realistic camera actions. Although the dialogues used in the film are real in the sense that there was no such scripts used in this film. On the basis of the situation a general outline of the plot is given based on which the actors improvised on their dialogues. The inspiration of such method of direction came from the directors like Spike Lee, Jim Wong, Jean- Luc Godard, Gus Van Sant, Judd Apatow and many more. Another method of scripting was also used in this film, where the actors were allowed to write their own part of script. Directors like Woody Allen, Ingmar Bergman, Stanley Kubrick, James Cameron, Orson Welles, Akira Kurosawa and many other used this type of scripting in their film making. So adapting such a style is purely because of inspiration and for learning purposes.

“I believe that every film in itself is like a chapter of a learning process that shall never end, and must not end”

Chapter 1: The Eye

The cinematography or the camera work in every film is like an eye of that film. Through it the world will see, observe and criticize. It provides a vision that helps the audience to understand that what the director or the story wants to convey. Hence it is the most important part of any film making. In this case the camera acts as a person or as a follower, who follows every incident that takes place in the film. The audience must take it slowly as a part of the film or story telling. As decided, most of the shots were hand held, so as to provide a feel of realism. There were night shots without light as to utilize the ‘night vision’ option which in recent time has brought a new wave in digital film making. Film making has always been under different experimentations. In case of my work, it’s the same. The making of a documentary (TMD, in short) purely exists because of the idea of experimentation. The entire film in itself is an experiment. Secondly the process of filming it which includes both pre & post production involve many experimentations. For example, as told earlier, the scripting styles, the cinematography, the lighting and even the over all feel and look of the entire film. One of the main targets of the film will be to fool the viewers & make them believe that the videos they are watching, is in its truest form and they are real video footages. Until the film ends with the note of ‘fiction’. Hence the camera work must be in such way, that it fames the scenes in more realistic manner. Scenes of interviews close up discussions and some real type graphic scenes will make it look more realistic. Lesser use of decorated sets, costumes, makeup, foregrounds & backgrounds.

Most important, the view through the ‘eye’ must look like as if it’s showing a daily part of life instead of a fabricated one.

Chapter 2: The Concept & The Story

2.1 The Concept

The film shows the making of a documentary film, headed by four young lads. Among them one is the director with an assistant, and the other two are the camera persons. Staring their first journey as documentary film makers, they follow a very strange newspaper article regarding two boys, who went missing for many days without any trace. Later, while into the making of the documentary they come across some dramatic evidences which leads them to some dangerous circumstances under which the director and a camera person loses their life, and the other two commits suicide. The documentary remains unfinished.

To be continued....

KAVI - a short film

KAVI

Youtube link of the short film...

Kavi Part 1 of 2
Kavi Part 2 of 2

~ Overview ~

Director: Sourav Dutta

Story & Idea: Vivek Anand Kapoor & Sourav Dutta

Produced by: - Sourav Dutta, Souvik Ghosal & Anupam Sen

Editing: - Sourav Dutta

Still Photography & Art Direction: -Anupam Sen & Souvik Ghosal

Genre: Fiction

Film Type: Short Film

Run Time: - 00:10:45

Country: India/Kolkata

Language:Bengali (ES)

Colour: Colour

~ Cast ~

(In order of appearance)

Souvik Ghosal

Master Akash

Avisek Raha

Vivek Kapoor

Gaurav Upadhyay

~ Special Thanks ~

Gaurav Dey

&

Principal, Teachers & Students of 'Little Angle School', Barasat. Kolkata.

--------------------------------------------------------------

"God said let there be light, and there was light..."

The idea of this story is somewhat like that. One of my friend, whose work is to deal with shares suddenly on his way back to home hits with an idea of a story. He must have seen something on his way back. But that is not the point, the point is what was that idea. Well, feeling free and thinking me as the only friend to share, my friend shared his idea with me, I mean the theme of the story.

At first I felt like its okay, but tough to recreate the frames he referred. But on thinking I found it to be quite interesting and different specially from the perspective of a short film. On the other hand there were some problems in concern with the budget (which is as usual) and also the story. My friend provided me with just an out line of his idea. Rest we need to work it out. The subject of the story is really sensitive but attractive (specially for me).

The Idea

The idea that I was provided with is very simple but strong. It goes like this...

"A guy walks into a bus, he carries a briefcase. It seems like he is not a regular guy. Then something happens due to which there occur a self realization...and then the climax (to be revealed in the film only)..."

This is exactly the way my friend told me the idea that he had or may have experienced.

What I think...

I think this is simply dealing with someones mind and psychology. So I am thinking of doing some experiments with camera, editing and most important the picturization. Then the question rises that what exactly we are going to portrait, in this case its going to be 'his thinking' & 'his point of realization'.

Secondly, the execution of shooting out door is going to be another challenge. As far as our plan is concern, the entire shooting will be done more than 8 different outdoor locations. Although close by but in a film like this one, its very difficult.

Then comes the work of one of the toughest technical terms in film making - 'cinematography'. But I love this part of work, its exciting, challenging and adventurous. And this time its going to be something very extra ordinary. I have planned to carry out loads of experiments with the camera and it movements. Lets see how much of my plan is executable in real time.

Day 1

"Nothing comes easily and secondly if you put in your best you will always receive the best", that is what I learnt during the shooting of this film.

To be very frank, this time it was a 3 man army that I was working with. And that include my actor too. How funny, isn't it? But this is what I like the most. I believe every person is

equally important. The more they understand the director's mind the more better it is. And specially in a film like this if help comes from any direction then we must not let it go by.

The first day of shooting was scheduled to start very early.

Few of the shoots were planned to be taken in the bus during our journey to Kolkata. Then some random shots of people, traffic movement and so on...

Everything went on according to the plan, except few delays & running here and there for the right camera angle. The most noticeable thing that I remember is the heat of the sun, it was extremely hot that day.

The maximum delay took place at Maidan, when we decided to take the shoot of the tram, coming in and Kavi watching it passes by. It was just a half minute shot but it took almost 2 hours for the tram to come. But at last it came and we took our shoot & we celebrated. The reason 'at last the tram came in.'

The first day of shot was really hard but we learn a lot about outdoor shooting, lighting and so on. We went to many places like from Dharmatala to Maidan, back to Dharmatala, then to Rabindra Sadan area, near Park Street and so on. The most important thing that I noticed for the first time is the beauty of Kolkata. I went many times through these same places but I never saw it in that way. But while shooting as my eyes were looking all around for good spots, backgrounds, and I found it all over. There were so many good spots. I have to admit that our Kolkata still holds its beauty.

Pre & Post Production

Till now 'Kavi' is my fastest film making experience. As far as I remember, the shooting for this short film began on 27th February 2010 and the final editing ended on 7th April 2010. Within this period we had 3 to 4 days of shooting & then few days rest, then again 4 to 5 days of editing, on an average of 2 to 4 hours every day. Then due to some urgent works we had to stop the editing for few weeks. And then in the month of early April the editing started & was successfully completed.

The post production went quite smoothly in compare to my previous short films. but I feel the most amazing thing in this project was the number of people I was working with. In total we wee 3 that includes me too. Anupam & Souvik were the others, where Souvik was also my actor & the only character of my short film.

Not only this, infact this small group was a new group, totally amateur in film making experience. But they both are good photographers, & they were really very energetic in this project. It was their photographic vision that helped us a lot in the production part of the film. Both Anupam & Souvik has good 'pre-vision' powers, specially Souvik as because Souvik helped me develop a entirely new portion of the film. Although some of the portions were excluded during the editing due to very bad video quality, but the school scene and the scene where we see Kavi repenting in the bathroom is entirely the idea of Souvik and the credit for this must go to him. Not only this during the editing as well, Souvik's presence of mind & screenplay sense also helped me further in synchronizing the overall screenplay of the film. Even the arrangement of the shooting in the school was also done by Souvik, aka, Souvik Ghosal.

I call him 'Ghosal babu' sometimes though...

More day to day work experience coming up soon...