The Fortune - Short Film

This was my first short to ever have this many people involved. It was a really good experience working on this project, planning, shooting, and editing. I got to know some of my friends better and build better relationships. It took a couple of months to plan and prepare for the shoot. I discuss the ideas with the writer solely online and through calls, as she has graduated and was not really available. I later sought assistance from my friends and others who were interested by emailing everyone in the school. I was so fortunate to have a very actress in the film who was the best actor I had ever worked with to that point. The actor was pretty good as well as he had appeared in some TV commercials. We ran a few rehearsals and blocking for a few days before we did the real shoot.

However, I learned one of my best lessons on the day of shooting which was to not have too many crews running around and out of control. There were too many people which made it slower to change from one scene to another as they were having fun talking with each other and there were not that committed to the project. Nonetheless, we manage to keep things on track and finish the second day of shooting. Unfortunately, Covid-19 struck harder and made it even more difficult to work on because parents were worried about their kids coming out exposed to high risks. We were unable to find the same days that we were available and some of the crews could not make it to the set anymore. The main actress then later travelled abroad for a year. Eventually, the whole project was cancelled mid-production unfortunately.

In terms of post-production, it was my first time to really try color grading using Davinci Resolve as I was taking it up at the moment. The main challenge was that the footage was shot in rec.709 and I had to grade from there which was really difficult but was a good lesson as well. It made me shoot in s-log2 most of the time after that. Moreover, though this is not about post-production, I'll say it here, it was my first time really trying out one of the most useful software for video production, Cine Tracer.

Shot Format: 4K, 25fps, rec.709, h.264

Gears I used: Sony a6300, Sigma 30mm f1.4, Sony a6600, Sony 18-105mm f4, Sony 85mm f1.8, YN 600 LED Lights, Zoom H4n, AKG EB 264, Ronin SC Pro Combo, Yunteng VCT-880, Benro A38TD, Andoer Boom Pole