Vimeo Film Festival Winners – Some Pretty Amazing Videos
Symmetry from Everynone on Vimeo.
I just returned from New York City, where I attended the Vimeo Film Festival. If you remember my comments about the first festival, I was incredibly impressed with what the folks over there had put together – not to mention all the wonderful films that were awarded for being just that. This year was no different. The Festival offered a number of incredibly educational panels and lectures from a variety of industry professionals. If you weren’t able to make it out this year – you can see some coverage of the festival on Vimeo’s site to get a taste of what the festival was like. However, I truly recommend going to the next one if you are able to- there is so much to learn and absorb. It’s a heck of a party as well!
Aside from their excellent panels, Vimeo also handed out awards in 13 different categories to some amazing films. Above you can see the Grand Prize winner, "Symmetry" by filmmaking team, Everynone, which also took home the prize for Best Film in the Lyrical category. Click for more to watch the films from the other 12 winners.
REMIX CATEGORY
Rear Window Timelapse from Jeff Desom on Vimeo.
ANIMATION CATEGORY
Umbra (HD – 2010) from Malcolm Sutherland on Vimeo.
MUSIC VIDEO CATEGORY
Manchester Orchestra – "Simple Math" from DANIELS on Vimeo.
DOCUMENTARY CATEGORY
Amar (all great achievements require time) from Pilgrim Films on Vimeo.
CAPTURED CATEGORY
SWEATSHOPPE Video Painting Europe from SWEATSHOPPE on Vimeo.
EXPERIMENTAL CATEGORY
Prie Dieu from Cokau on Vimeo.
FASHION CATEGORY
Mulberry ‘Skirt’ from Academy Plus (A+) on Vimeo.
NARRATIVE CATEGORY
Blinky™ from Ruairi Robinson on Vimeo.
ACTION SPORTS CATEGORY
DARK SIDE OF THE LENS from Astray Films on Vimeo.
ADVERTISING CATEGORY
K-Swiss – Kenny Powers MFCEO from Caviar on Vimeo.
SERIES CATEGORY
Often Awesome The Series from All Aces Media on Vimeo.
MOTION GRAPHICS CATEGORY
A History Of The Title Sequence from jurjen versteeg on Vimeo.
What?! ‘Symmetry’ took the Grand Prize? This must be a joke… One of the lamest videos I’ve seen on Vimeo.
What a downer!
Vincent,
Thanks for your blog.
I have a question about your use of shutter speed with DSLRs. You read a lot on-line from people suggesting always pegging their shutter at 1/50 or 1/60, claiming it gets more of a “filmic” look, getting as close as possible to a 180-degree shutter at 24fps (1/48sec exposure per frame). My experience has always been that my Iris/depth of field are my top priority, and I can use faster shutter-speeds if that’s what gets me the right exposure with the iris setting I want.
Last night, we were shooting a dinner scene, so no explosions, no splashing water, no fights or fast cars. If your chosen aperture and lighting demand it in a situation like that, would you ever shy away from using a faster shutter speed to get the right exposure?
We had two cameras, two very different lenses, and to maintain a good exposure for both, some people on my team were arguing that we should not let the shutter be different from one camera to the next, but to change the ISO instead. For me, ISO/electronic gain is always going to impact the image quality more than changing shutter speed on shots where there is essentially no motion-blur anyway. Matching the look & feel between those two cameras for me was much more impacted by bumping up ISO or sacrificing good exposure than it would be impacted by having disparate shutter speeds. I argued that in this scene the different shutter speeds between the two cameras would be completely un-noticeable because both were too fast for there to be any motion-blur given the scene. Was I wrong?
There are countless articles on-line suggesting that fast shutter speeds result in “juttery” footage, like Saving Private Ryan. But in 20 years of shooting stills and video, that’s not my experience. I’ve always adjusted shutter-speed freely (as long as its fast enough to avoid much motion blur), and never noticed a change in look&feel from one scene to the next despite very different shutter speeds.
To summarize, I think I can ask three simple questions.
1. Motion-Blur: How often are you concerned with motion-blur? Is it something you’re always considering as a high priority, like depth of field? In your experience, when do you want some motion-blur and when do you not?
2. Shutter-Speed: When Shooting with DSLRs, do you try to maintain a consistent shutter-speed, thus using only your iris/lighting/ND to get a good exposure, or are you freely adjusting shutter from one shot to the next?
3. Was I wrong?
Vincent Laforet Reply:
June 13th, 2012 at 4:21 pm
Your solution should be to keep everything at 1/50th and add ND filters in front to cut down light to maintain that shutter speed AND you low depth of field from wide apertures. You won’t notice the motion issues much when subjects are relatively still – but you sure will when people move, and especially on athletes/fast moving subjects.
1. Motion blur is what makes the video look filmic vs video. Depth of field is equally as important – ergo the need for ND filters at ALL times when outdoors.
2. I never change the shutter speed unless I am trying to create the staccato effect, or shooting at higher frame rates for slow motion.
3. I think you were just missing the ND piece of the puzzle.
wow!so cool
At the end of Symmetry, which is a compelling piece of work, it says that the film was produced “in collaboration with” Radiolab and WNYC in New York. This would suggest that Radiolab and WNYC deserve some credit as well.
http://www.radiolab.org/blogs/radiolab-blog/2011/apr/18/radiolab-video-symmetry/
Vincent Laforet Reply:
June 15th, 2012 at 2:39 pm
They were thanked at the awards ceremony by the filmmakers
Symmetry in my opinion deserved the win. It has got a nice feeling, so much emotion and it’s well done. Lots of different angles, close ups and playing with frames.
wow!cool!i like it very much
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