this episode of film riot is brought to
you by Nord VPN go to Nord VPN comport
slash film riot to get 70% off a three
year plan and an extra month free when
you use the coupon code film riot so my
friend Joe Simon who you all know from
the DP at home episode that we did has
recently released a badass sci-fi drama
short film called the volunteer and the
reason I asked Joe to talk about it
today is because Joe decided to make the
entire thing
during quarantine which means he did it
alone at times he had his wife Katie
there to hit record for him but he was
the DP the actor and the director and
that is crazy inspiring to me because
this short looks like money now if you
haven't seen his short film definitely
check it out in the links below before
watching this episode it really is great
and almost like a visual poem with
gorgeous imagery and amazing VFX so
definitely check that out but now I'm
gonna let Joe take it from here
the short film the volunteer was born
from this pandemic the idea came from
having empty streets and empty spaces to
film it you know I really love 70s 80s
sci-fi movies and to me I'm always
thinking - the spacesuits and hazmat
suits and you know those really cool
outfits that they wear in those movies
and I thought you know why not I'm gonna
find in hazmat suit I started searching
the internet found that I can get a fake
hazmat suit for four hundred dollars and
said screw it and bought it it started
as a you know a smaller tone piece it
was just gonna basically be cool shots
of me a hazmat suit walking around
Austin put to music maybe 60 seconds
long but as this whole situation rest
just seems too much of a downer and
depressing and I wanted to make
something that would be a little more
hopeful and also a little bit more of a
story that you could follow along to the
original idea I had for this project was
to do a lot of very slow zoom shots as a
one-man band operation I was really
limited to just using a tripod so for me
I had to rethink those shots and so I
really set up each composition in a very
interesting way bringing leading lines
together you know directing the viewers
attention to where I want it to go as
well as doing zooms and posts so when
doing a small production like this
there's three things that really stand
out to me to make a small production
look big finding locations that have a
WOW factor to them that look impressive
this seemed like how could they have
this location for me finding these empty
places you wouldn't be able to make
those look empty like that without
spending a lot of time in VFX removing
everybody or you know having the money
to close down those locations I think
something that's really huge about
passion projects and whenever you're
doing something you know smaller is that
you need to build your story around the
locations you have available to you if
you write this big grandiose story about
whatever it is you know and then you're
like trying to find a location it
becomes extremely difficult to find
exactly what you want for free or for
cheap most productions when you have a
day to shoot you have that 10 12 hours
whatever it is and you have to shoot all
day long and make your story fit within
that time personal products like this I
will shoot just at blue hour or Golden
Hour you know spend that two hours three
hours at the front end and back into the
day and
break join the mid part of the day that
way I'm able to utilize the best light
possible to make sure that my shots all
look amazing unfortunately given that
all the stores are closed I couldn't go
out and find props so I was able to
order the hazmat suit online but that
was really the only thing I could have
so for me it was how do I make this
hazmat suit the focal point of the story
and obviously being the color was you
know yellow and green it's gonna pop in
and pretty much any kind of situation
you put it in so between the locations
time of day of shooting and the hazmat
suit I really had three things that
would make this seem a lot bigger than
what the production actually was for the
downtown shoot day we shot the print
shot we also shot under the scene down
on Congress bridge that we never did end
up using in the in the short then we
also shot downtown Congress Avenue right
in front of the Capitol which is not a
really cool shot well we positioned the
camera right in the center of the road
looking down you know you have a great
view all the way down towards the
Capitol the shot is quick I mean it's
only four seconds five seconds in the
short but it took quite a bit of time to
achieve it because even though it's
empty we know we've got an empty shot
see there was still people walking by
cars crossing in the background so
there's a lot of takes that we would do
that would get ruined it's crazy you
know how much time it actually takes to
do something when you're by yourself and
you're trying to grab these shots I'm
gonna pause Joe for a second so we can
thank our sponsor Nord VPN and of course
I've talked about Nord VPN several times
on the show but I think it's more
important now than ever where literally
everything we currently do is online and
it is the VPN that I personally have
used for years because it's incredibly
affordable and it could be even more so
by going to Nord VPN comm for its last
film riot to get 70% off now normally
the number one reason that I think Nord
is amazing is the security but right now
being stuck at home like we all are the
thing that I've been loving the most is
that once you turn it on you can select
over thousands of servers in over 60
countries which means it'll seem like
you're actually in those countries and
why is that awesome well let's look on
Netflix shall we I dig the show Always
Sunny in Philadelphia but it is not
available in the US for me to watch but
if I jump over to Nord VPN and switch my
server to UK search again
and there it is on top of that just
switching your country gives you a
totally different experience different
films different recommendations and that
goes for places like Disney Plus - so if
you're getting bored with what you have
available you flip that switch and you
have a whole new experience but again of
course it is that security to your ISP
isn't able to peek into your underwear
drawer so to speak and honestly I just
have it on all the time because of that
end since it's so fast I really can't
tell the difference with it on or off so
protect yourself and get a whole new
streaming experience by going to Nord
VPN com4 - film riot to get 70% off of a
three-year plan plus you used a coupon
code film riot to get an extra month for
free I'm a big fan of lighting with the
single source and for this specific room
you know this is my house and I see the
light - every day in the late afternoon
the light really pushes through that
window and it looks beautiful so we are
able to use the natural light that was
already gonna be there we helped augment
it with a 650 watt Airy Fornell light I
used that to push a little more texture
onto the background of the wall and the
tub in the floor the light was mostly
flat coming from the Sun and I wanted
this to feel a little bit more
directional and to gives texture I'm a
big fan of atmospheric lighting and this
is part of that is being able to create
these beams of light that give us
separation so in the shot you can see
you know it's hitting a little bit of my
shoulder it's hitting the back wall it's
hitting the floor it looks really cool
the production design of the bathroom
was very important you know I wanted it
to feel like it was his place but also I
wanted to create a framing and a look
that made him feel trapped
so filming a frame within the frame
creates this space of trapped you know
he's trapped inside of his house he's
not able to to roam the world as he
wants could each item in the room you
know it's very specifically placed there
you know there's a towel hanging over
the shower you know we place it there to
break up the wall and give us a little
or texture the door is open to a
specific angle so that we're getting a
reflection on the door from the window
but we also put a piece of clothing
hanging over the door to break up that
reflection so wasn't so uniform same
with the plant on the right hand side of
frame that plant came from another room
we brought it in we set it there to give
us some foreground then also
break up that flat wall that was behind
it when I'm shooting the room it's
really important just not shooting
what's there you're always bringing
elements from other places and really
looking at the entire frame one
balancing it out and bringing in
foreground elements background elements
and pieces that make it feel more
natural and real I would also add that
we use atmosphere aerosol in this scene
it's a canned based haze that helps
create a little bit more depth in your
scene it's something I use in
productions all the time the easiest way
to explain it is it lets you see the air
it creates layers in the air so instead
of the room feeling so flat it makes it
feel deeper and it also gives it texture
we had the shower on as hot as we can
get it so we're getting steamed in the
shower so between the shower steam and
the aerosol spray it just gives a really
great feeling in that room so there's
three reasons why I chose this angle of
the dining room first and foremost the
light is coming into that window it's
giving a nice edge kind of like
backlight it's not totally behind it's
coming across the face a little bit it
makes it feel a little more dramatic you
know the warmth light against that
darkness
it really helps push the story line -
we're looking into a corner so the
fall-off is really great you know we had
the sunlight that's hitting the table
and Hank talent but then in the
background
it's just darkness and the third thing
is the leading line so two corners
leading into our talent so the walls
draw your eye to the talent the light
draws your eye to the talent and so it's
a really great location shoot now to
help give us a little bit more light I
had to put in a Westcott cine RGB two by
one light now that light is off to the
right hand side of frame there's an egg
crate on it
and then we had four by four of half
grid so just creating some really soft
light you really can't even tell us
there because the scene is so dark but
it's bringing up our ambient level
enough so that we're not getting a lot
of noise on the shadow side of my face
which is really important if we just had
that side backlight coming in it would
be so silhouette II on that side that we
would lose a lot of the expression and
it's important to see the expression on
the face because that helps sell the
scene for this short I decided to do the
whole project in DaVinci Resolve I often
do my color inside resolve and of course
until now I've only recently started
editing and doing sound as well I've
been using premiere for the past few
years but after a few small edits in
resolve I noticed it was faster and had
less crashes so I decided to jump in
with this project as well after a few
days in the Edit it became second nature
it's very intuitive and coming from
other software it's it's really easy to
learn with resolve it was nice to have
the extra speed more stability and have
audio edit and color all in the same
place no need to export out xml's or
have issues with reconnecting clips
everything was just there and ready to
go I want to thank Kati Hussain for all
of your hard work bringing this film to
life Ryan Thompson for your incredible
VFX work and Cullen Kelley for the
amazing color grading thank you all
there's no way this is possible without
you film riot thanks for having me on
the show and I hope everybody enjoys the
short film any question hit me up on
Instagram or send me an email I look
forward to talking to everybody sooner
and that's it for today a massive thank
you to Joe for putting this together and
I do get a lot of questions from people
starting out about how they can make a
film when they can't find anyone to help
them well this is your answer be
creative think outside the box look at
what you have and build something around
that be the cast and crew if you have to
if you really want to tell stories
you're gonna find a way so until next
time don't forget to write shoot edit
repeat
[Music]