Some lessons learned

Wonderful Library - Don't play in a LARP on the weekend of the 48 - It is possible (but not sensible) to stay up writing until 4am on Friday, get 45 minutes' sleep, then act/LARP until midnight Saturday - Outputting a 'safety cut' of your film is vital - Pith helmets are awesome (I got one as an anniversary present in 2006!) Monster Hunter IV - Having 2 editors makes the job much easier, and probably more fun - Rain and mud may not be fun to film in, but they don't look bad on screen - Learning how to do good ADR would be a valuable skill - Having extras in a scene is cool Moviefest - Physical comedy has very broad appeal (Life Lesson 12) - Set dressing can really make a scene pop (With Mighty Power) - Lots of people on a film set will have good ideas, and it can be in your favour to be receptive to that (whilst still clearly being 'in charge') if you are the director (WMP) - You can acheive a lot with a small number of people (Teach Him a Lesson), but it's probably best to have at least 2 people in the crew :) Ephemeral - Music is a fantastic tool to link shots together. Ephemeral has a cohesiveness that is pretty surprising, given how it was filmed. I think a lot of that is down to the music track. - Slow motion and reverse motion need not be as tacky as you might think. In fact, slowing things down to about 80% - 90% is often undetectable (Premier Pro keeps the audio at the same pitch, whilst slowing it down) Missing - Dollies are fantastic. Camera movement gives a huge dollop of 'production value' (PV as Hix called it) if it's done well So You're Getting Married - 2 pages of solid dialogue ends up being more than 10 minutes of screen time - Verbal jokes work well when they have visuals to back them up - Windows Moviemaker doesn't always play well with avi files exported from Premier, and nor does WinDVD Horror Film - Scenes with lots of people in them are a nightmare for positioning continuity. Make sure your closeups contain only one actor, and be aware that you may not be able to use some closeups or takes because someone's hand is in a different position. Or you can just say 'screw continuity' and have your wide shots not quite match your closeups So, what did you learn from these films?