Your First Time on a Film Crew

So you’ve got yourself a job on a film set. That’s great news. Even if it is unpaid, that’s still great news. In fact, most first time film gigs are unpaid production assistant work, or intern work. This is to be expected. It’s a means to get your foot in the door. After all, if you have no experience working on a film set, you have little bargaining power, frankly. That is, unless you possess a specific set of skills (like make-up design, or set design, or costumes, or special effects) that you have acquired in other work—such as the theatre—that makes you a bit of a hot commodity to a given production. Most of us, however, don’t start off that way. And that’s to be expected. So embrace that and get in there. There is a very specific flow to working on most film sets, and being able to be introduced to it without the added stress of being a head of specific department is usually a good way to go.

The Light Meter and Digital Video: the Basics

For those of you with a background in still photography, or who may have gotten the opportunity to shoot motion picture projects on actual film, you may have some familiarity with an amazingly helpful tool: the light meter। As digital video cameras continue to develop, many shooters have moved away from using a light meter. Especially as the new generation of videographers develop their skills without ever touching a celluloid camera, a light meter can be a rather overlooked tool. I know several excellent videographers who often shoot without the use of a light meter. But this doesn’t mean it is an outdated device that is no longer applicable to the new workflow of digital cinematography. Quite the opposite! Whether or not to use a light meter comes down to two things: (1) your own working preference, and (2) the type of project you’re shooting. What I’d like to discuss here are the occasions where I do choose the use a light meter (even though I am shooting digitally), why I use it, and how I use it.

Hollywood: The Neglected Mission Field.

(Note: This article was first published in Missionary Church national publication, then called Emphasis Magazine, in the summer of 2002. It appears here with it's original source notation and bibliography. I felt it might be good to address some of these issues on this blog early on. - MJW)

Millions of Americans attend movie theaters every week. Film has become an almost unavoidable aspect of the North American culture. Millions of dollars are invested in the making of a single motion picture. Year after year, Christians across the country complain amongst themselves of how the film industry is becoming more and more blatantly sinful. Yet, I raise this question: By complaining within the Christian subculture, what has been accomplished to reverse the corruption of Hollywood?