Some Useful Final Tests for Filmmakers
from James Broughton’s book: Seeing the Light. (Available as a FREE download below.)
1. Look at your film upside down. This not only gets some blood into your head, it will show you how well your work hangs together. You might discover that it is really one for the bats.
2. Look at your film with your back. With a mirror, watch your film projected over your left shoulder. This will not only show you what a mirror sees, it will test the sturdiness of your compositions.
3. Look at your film sideways (lying down is the easiest way). Do left and right work as well as up and down?
4. Look at your entire film in reverse. Does Effect stream solidly from Cause? Do Alpha and Omega have good connections? Does the music hold together backwards?
A film is never finished, it is only abandoned. But if we are wise we are not expecting perfection anyway, since nothing in life is perfect, art included. All we alchemists can hope for: to arrive somewhere close to our original vision. Or, at some more astonishing place than we imagined.
“Making Light Of It” is the later revision of “Seeing the Light” both by James Broughton
We’re making a FREE version of this classic book, Seeing the Light, available to anyone who tweets or posts about it. Our Executive Producer describes it as “A textbook on poetic living disguised as a filmmaking textbook.” In it is something for every creative-at-heart. And it’s FREE as long as you tell your friends! Get the details here.