Owen vs Ikea

Hi,
I heard about you from a friend. I am looking for some of your feedback on a short comedy I made for the 2008 Philly Fringe Festival. It's called 'Owen vs Ikea' and I posted it on youtube.





Like my friend, I'm looking to get better and don't have any formal training. Also, I am aware of the copyrighted music I used would have to go.

Thanks!

Nice idea, and the performances are fine. Just gotta brush up on the editing. Most of it is too jittery, like you wanted to use every single take you got, and there's a lack of flow -- the pacing lacks confidence; the cutting seems to have little awareness of the viewer's internal rhythms and just does its own thing. Every edit is on the nose and makes itself highly conspicuous, so we're watching cuts rather than shots. Most of the jump cuts look poorly motivated.

Oh yeah, and I say this to almost every indie filmmaker: Stay away from those fades to black. They're grotesquely overused.


www.derekmok.com

Good stuff - Thanks for the feedback!

Some nice ideas, good ending point. I'm on the same page with Derek on the edit. The style of the edit looks fairly superficial, as you have yet to lock into the flow of the story.

Here are some specific points in the video i noticed while waiting for soundtrack pro to export last night.

0:51- CU of DVD Is this necessary? It's a little short, too blatant, and out of place..

1:02- Jump cut on action.... More than that, actually, the editing in sc 1 is a little choppy. Some shots aren't necessary, and you need to pay a bit more attention to the continuity in the overall edit.

Also, back a few seconds, to Kathy's entrance, that looks like a break in screen direction- she's looking screen left when she talks to Owen upon opening the door, pretty much an eyeline match, THEN she enters the room from screen left..

1:43- Cut to table. A little jarring. A wideshot of Owen against the backdrop of the mess of the table could be better.

The exterior scene where Owen drives off to the store. Do you have a MS of Owen you could cut to?

5:58 - Crossed line of action when cutting to the table.

Also, the intertitles used to indicate a break in time passage makes it look amateurish.

Hope that helps.



www.strypesinpost.com

Quote
strypes
1:43- Cut to table. A little jarring. A wideshot of Owen against the backdrop of the mess of the table could be better.

agreed I thought that owens feet should have been in the frame also.

i thought that the performances were a 6 (scale or 1-!0)

the parking lot scene looked very unnatural. should have been more cars around.

i see the actors actively trying to think of what to say.

A LOT of unnecessary cuts and bad angle choices.

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

fun! but owen is trying WAY to hard to be randal from clerks