58 réponses à ce sujet

[John Epler]

Right on both counts, Dahlia.

Though when I use the word 'motivated', what I generally mean is - there's a reason for it. This applies to camera moves, camera cuts, animations; if you can't justify why you're doing something in a scene, it probably doesn't need to be there.

One of the most common problems with everyone's early content (including my own) is that they do a lot of stuff for no other reason than - well, then they can. They don't have a reason why the camera is moving the way it is, or why someone's gesturing the way they are. That's the difference between motivated and unmotivated.

[DahliaLynn]

Sometimes I can't really explain *why* I make a shot choice, other than because it "feels" right.

When I see feel, with the need to find an explanation for it, I start thinking could it be because I am used to techniques filmmakers use that become common practice? Something I've seen before and retained subconsciously? or something that simply causes that brief moment of butterflies in my stomach (which has occurred numerous times) telling me "That's the shot"

I'm not sure why, but certain things just work. Other times I find that known techniques are an excellent basis to start with, and then tweak to make them feel right.

Nevertheless, asking myself "why" did I make a certain choice (like low/high angles for example) is an excellent standard (of many) to go by. Not all have defined answers, but as long as I can justify what I'm doing in some way, I'm happy. Thank you again for clarifying.

Any techniques you've found useful and can share here will be most appreciated.

Modifié par DahliaLynn, 01 juin 2011 - 06:27 .

[Lord Methrid]

I find that sometimes just sometimes unmotivated shots work beautifully.

Unmotivated shots help set particular moods albeit ambigous. As you said Dahlia, if it feels right then do it There are numerous films that mange to do this technique quite well.

Here's a good example from Scorsese's "Taxi Driver", unmotivated, we see camera pans all over the place. It's the director's unique vision that tells us what the mood of these scenes are all about as well as a glimpse into the character's world.

Watch at 5:08 - 6:03
Umotivated Camera Pans in Taxi Driver

I hope that helps

[DahliaLynn]

Oh beautiful catch. Thank's so much for that link quite inspiring!

I would say that what he did with that camera pan in fact was indeed motivated in the sense that he had intended / had a reason for the camera to pan in that direction, in one continuous shot of showing what De Niro was walking towards and looking at, then coming back to him in one circular sweep, emulating the Point of View of the the actor.
Sort of like two shot effects in one move:D

He does that in a similar fashion with the telephone shot where the camera moves away from the actor to the empty hallway and statically sits there, helping us feel that loneliness the character is feeling at that moment.

I say "motivated" keeping John's explanation in mind, unless  "unmotivated" is some sort of cinematic terminology I'm not aware of?

Modifié par DahliaLynn, 03 juin 2011 - 12:31 .

[Beerfish]

Bah!  What does Scorcese know!     (Thanks for the link LM, I watched from beginning to end.)

[BloodsongVengeance]

i noticed in the dragon age machinima (by machinima.com, i think? the one they never finished! ), they used a shaky camera a lot. the problem was... i *noticed* they used a shaky camera a lot. if you notice it, it's probably bad. if you don't notice it, it's probably good.

i just figured they used a lot of fast cuts, shakes, and close-ups to hide flaws in the animations :X


i used a camera shake effect in my 'zevran & rinna vignette.' the main reason i used it was to hide the fact that their feet landed terribly awkwardly on the roof. however, the shake went with the impact of the action, and it actually looks good. well... in my opinion.

i don't have any formal film training, either (although i have art training in general), so i don't know what i'm doing. most of the time i 'see' a composition or motion of a shot in my head, and i try to imitate that. um... actually, that's how/why i do almost all of my art. from seeing it in my head.

well, to sum up, i'll quote my first art teacher... 'if it looks wrong, it is wrong.' conversely, if it looks right, it IS right.

[John Epler]

Beerfish wrote...

Bah!  What does Scorcese know!     (Thanks for the link LM, I watched from beginning to end.)

Scorcese's a hack, is what! Does he know who I am? I'm a pretty big deal on the internet!

More seriously - Dahlia is right, and I think I explained that poorly. If there's a reason behind a movement, even if it's just to achieve a particular visual effect - it's a motivated movement. What I'm cautioning against is more the urge to just move a camera because you can. And the very first cinematic design work I did (well, after the ME2 Joker conversations) ended up with a -lot- of the 'oh nothing's happening, TIME TO MOVE A CAMERA' problem. Same thing with gestures.

And BloodsongVengeance is also right in that, if it looks wrong, there's probably a reason. Now, sometimes, you -want- to create a jarring dissonance. This is particularly effective if you're trying to convey a particular emotional state on the part of a character, although this being a game, you want to avoid ascribing emotions to the PC wherever you can. That's the choice of the player, after all..

But if you wanted to set something up as though the PC was being controlled or influenced by an outside force, you could use things like jump cuts, weird movements and the like to give the player the idea that -something- is wrong - without having to be too blatant about it.

[Lord Methrid]

DahliaLynn wrote...

I say "motivated" keeping John's explanation in mind, unless  "unmotivated" is some sort of cinematic terminology I'm not aware of?

Ah my mistake, in film school we used the term "unmotivated" sometimes to distinguish between the usual motivated camera pans of the norm with those of the unusual or "unmotivated". In context of films some people generalize ambiguous camera pans as unmotivated dispite any artistic expression or director specific reasoning. I say "unmotivated" here just to help distinguish between something that clearly shows the viewer something of interest rather throwing the viewer off.

Machinema is slowly getting closer to film excellency as more people of professional film making experience make their way into this medium Sometimes one must experiment with all kinds of camera angles regardless of concluded failures. One must learn from their mistakes after all.

But I will say, I would love to see some more of these ambiguous Scorsese shots in machinema

BTW John, did you perform all of Dragon Age's in game cinematics? Excuse me for not being caught up on your work for that game

[DahliaLynn]

Allow me to expand upon this a bit LM. It is my firm opinion that machinima *is* film in every way. It goes for both simple animation as well as realistic depictions of characters and settings. The advantage to digital creations is that if you indeed do make a "mistake", you don't have to go for a reshoot! *hugs her CS editor tightly*. You can also make the actors move as you wish

The main dissonance between Machinima and in-game Cutscenes is that Machinima has one defined story from start to finish, where  Cutscenes are created to tell short and (sometimes very short) mini stories within the realm of a dynamic evolving plot, which is mostly dependent on a player in the case of DA. You need to create the same scene several times for situation A B C D etc. But cinematic and artistic aspects apply as in any audio/visual story telling medium.

You also have limitations on how PC would react as roleplaying has a high factor you would want to be sensitive to as John mentioned above. Exhibit A : Subtle reactions at her own wedding! (but hopefully just enough to allow for any player to feel comfortable and realistic)
This wouldn't work well in Machinima, as when I showed the scene to my mother for example she told me "the bride isn't reacting very much"!!

I do hope that the Cutscene forums evolve to more cinematic threads as I feel that sort of info is truly what is needed when speaking of CS design.

Modifié par DahliaLynn, 04 juin 2011 - 10:52 .