In lieu of a ‘Best of Photography’ post for the month of October, I decided to unveil an important project that my wife and I have been working on for the…uh… past few years. (As it turns out, I didn’t take a single photo in the month of October.) Anyways, without further ado, here is the trailer for my our latest project…
When my wife first came to me and asked how we would like to tell everybody the news, it was like I knew all along how I wanted to do it. I answered her almost immediately, “We should make a movie trailer – a coming attraction, if you will.” She agreed and the gears in my head started turning. My first thought was to take a feel good/comedy approach. The tagline was going to be something like ‘It started with a dance…and ended with a cigarette.’ I brought this idea to my wife and she was generally unimpressed. When I asked her for criticism, she suggested that I turn it into a horror trailer. So I did.
One of the difficult things about filming/planning for this is that my wife hates to be photographed, and despises being filmed. Luckily, she was a good sport this time around and I got a few shots of her…mostly on one take. The whole idea for the ‘Bun in the Oven’ concept came about because that is how we ended up telling Charlotte’s parents when we found out the good news. The hardest part was trying to keep it a secret for so long since we wanted to wait until the three month mark to tell everyone. We think the trailer turned out pretty well and we were really excited about sharing the news this way. It was also way more fun than a phone call!
Project Details: Filmed on one day in October using a Canon VIXIA HF20 camcorder. I also used a Canon 500D as a second camera, since the lens has a built in image stabilizer. Unfortunately, the 500D is limited in what it can do video-wise, so I didn’t end up using any of the footage. A lot of the shots were handheld. The ones that weren’t were; the Liberty Ridge shot (monopod), both Test Results shots (tripod – framed and shot by me), Oven Zoom (tripod “dolly”) and Oven Reveal (tripod). I was glad to have my sister in law here to help me out as well. She was camera operator for the scene with my wife and I in the mirror, and was also on leaf-blower duty for one of the opening scenes. (Thanks Larke!) My wife also filmed the scene of me walking through the house and taking the phone call. I couldn’t have asked for a better crew.
The footage was edited in Final Cut Pro 7 and took way longer than expected, as I tried my hand at the 3-way color correction. (I definitely could use a lot of practice with this.) The day-to-night scene could have been a lot better, but I’m not going to fret about it. We also decided last minute, not to have voice narration since everything was DIY and none of us have movie voices like the late, great Don LaFontaine. As I said, I am happy with the finished product and we’ve received a lot of compliments from friends and family after posting it on Youtube/Facebook yesterday.
leoarsenault 