So... we made another short film! This time to enter into the Moment Invitational Film Festival.
All films had to be under 3 minutes, entirely shot on a smartphone and use the theme of "suspense". Here's our film:
This was shot using an iPhone 8 Plus, Moment Tele lens, Beastgrip and FiLMiC Pro (shooting 4K at 24fps).
Editing and color grading was done in FCPX using our LUT Packs, along with FilmConvert. The VFX work was done in FCPX and Adobe Premiere Pro (and a few things in After Effects).
We think this turned out pretty well and really think it has a nice cinematic look. Some of the more cinematic stuff we've shot on an iPhone for sure. One of the reasons being we were able to achieve some good shallow depth-of-field using the Moment Tele lens.
Now, we're not of the belief you need shallow DOF to create a cinematic look. The super shallow look of full-frame DSLR and Mirrorless cameras does not instantly equate to cinema (it can look cool though, don't get us wrong). There's a lot more to creating a cinematic look & feel (lighting, frame rate, color grading, etc.) - but often times a sign of smartphone video is that everything is in focus - so it does help here.
BTW, we are planning on doing some videos on this topic in the near future on our YouTube channel (have you subscribed?), so be on the lookout for those.
And in the meantime, you can watch all the entries of the Moment festival in this playlist below (and if this doesn't load as a Playlist click here to go there directly):
Wish us luck! :) The winner is announced March 9th.
***UPDATE***
We didn't win, BUT we had a great time making our short film - and importantly - we learned even more about making films with a smartphone. :)
Go here to see info on the winner and the runners up. We think they are well done shorts and really show what you can do today with a mobile device (pretty cool and inspiring we must say). And here's the winning film, "Forever"...
Did you enter a film? If so, please let us know in the comments below and/or hit us up on Twitter or FB.