I recently completed a :30 second short film for the Cellflix Festival. It's nothing special, and certainly nothing I'd pay to host.

The stipulations were that it needed to be shot on a smart phone, it could be edited, and it couldn't be over 30 seconds.

I shot this and edited it in about 25 minutes. Admission to the festival was free, and if I had found out about it earlier, we would've planned to make a better movie. However since we almost missed the deadline, this is what manifested.

http://ia300017.us.archive.org/2/items/TheTime/thetime_256kb.mp4

Critique if you'd like. If you hate it, I can't say I don't agree with you. However, sticking crap into a film festival is a lot better than sticking nothing into a film festival. At least I have a chance at winning those sweet 5 g's.

Cool, but lol, it might be a bit graphic though for a Cell Phone contest. But man, good quality on the cell phone :P

haha it was kinda funny, but the credits were longer than the actual movie, lol

yeahhh...

It was from this cellphone/camera/PDA whatshamacallit thing my friend has. It captured (i think) 640x480 video onto a memory stick.

The credits are indeed longer than the movie. It happens when you've got a 30 second time frame, and you want to cover up the weaknesses of your 'actors'.

At least it's not annoyingly long credits. I've seen poorly made student films where you've got the director crediting himself on five or six title cards... Directed by John Doe, Written by John Doe, Music by John Doe, Edited by John Doe. I kept it simple, took a page right from my boy Robert Rodriguez "Shot, Chopped, and Scored." It covers everything and makes the viewer chuckle.

If we win, we win. If not, ::shrug:: We've got an amusing 30 seconds worth of movie that I'll always have.

I'm glad you guys like it.

Uh... if you have a thirty second time frame I would have used 3-4 seconds for credits. You don't need to repeat the damn title at the end. Yeah, I forgot what it was - even though it was just on screen 15 seconds ago

It was literally over in the blink of an eye.

Yeah, in retrospect, that would've been the way to go. ::shrug::

I wish I had had more time to work on it. I would've found better actors and probably had a more thought out and thought provoking story.

My problem is that in my experience, thirty seconds is not anywhere near enough time for me to tell a story. My aunt who happens to work in Hollywood told me watch/time commercials, since many times a commercial tells a simple story in 30 seconds. In my experience, approximately 17 short films, three music videos, many training videos and one almost full length, I can honestly say that it's significantly easier to tell a story over 7 minutes or more. With 30 seconds, I feel as though I had almost no time for character development.

Of course, I was somewhat rushed obviously. What I contributed to the film festival is by no means a great movie. It's 15 seconds of entertainment padded by 15 seconds worth of fluff. I'm not saying that had I found out about the festival earlier, my film would've been a million times better, but it might've been a bit more improved and there probably would've been a bit more there.

Using a smart phone type of thing was kind of interesting. I think I might like to do that again some day.

Thanks for the feedback guys, although I expected some of the negative comments (I was waiting to see what Evan would say, he never fails to tell it like it is.) It comes with the territory, and I appreciate it.

I've actually considered making a video on a cell phone. It would have to be something that justified the poor image quality, though - maybe a recreation/critique of snuff films?

That's a cool idea. It could also be a faux real-life thriller during a terrorist attack or something.

Well, I clearly couldn't make the Hobbit with the cell phone. It has to be something somewhat intimate, and somewhat gritty since the image quality is no where near pristine on most phones.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: paul,