The Digital Filmmaking Handbook

The Digital Filmmaking Handbook, Second Edition

Ben Long and Sonja Schenk

Digital movie making has gone Hollywood! Though digital video has been long-embraced by independent movie makers, with recent releases like Star Wars: Episode II being shot with digital equipment, it’s clear that digital is here to stay. Fortunately, even if you don’t have access to the higher-end tools used by the major studios, you can still create professional-quality productions with a reasonably priced DV camera and your computer. With The Digital Filmmaking Handbook, Second Edition, you’ll learn everything you need to know to produce your own projects. Whether your goal is a feature-length production for theatrical release or film festival, or a short production for corporate or industrial use, this book will explain every step of the production process, from writing and planning, to shooting, editing and post-production effects.

This new edition has been completely updated and reorganized to better reflect a typical DV production workflow. Extensive new material on writing is included, and expanded coverage of budgeting and financing can be found on the companion DVD. There is also detailed information on all the latest software and hardware, comprehensive new editing tutorials, and a new chapter on video technology basics.

Whether you’re a film student, advertising professional, instructor, or hobbyist, this book will explain everything you need to know to get the job done. If you’re already an experienced filmmaker or videographer, The Digital Filmmaking Handbook, 2nd Edition will help you make the transition to the latest digital technologies.

Highlights:

* Completely updated, revised, and re-written

* Extensive new material and tutorials on non-linear editing software and editing techniques

* Up-to-date coverage of all output options including DVD authoring and video-to-film transfer

* New exercises for further practice and challenge

* Detailed discussions of digital video basics, choosing the right camera, and planning your shoot

* Comprehensive coverage of writing, lighting, shooting, production sound, and building a workstation

ON THE DVD

* Demo versions of Adobe Premiere, After Effects, and Photoshop for Macintosh and Windows

* Over 100 pages of additional essays an articles on writing, budgeting, financing, scheduling, music supervision and more

* 1.5 gigabytes of media and project files required for the book’s tutorials

System Requirements: Mac 300 Mhz G3 or better 128 MB of RAM 1 GB+ of available hard disk space QuickTime 5 or higher

Windows Pentium class processor running at 300 Mhz or better Windows 98 or later 128 MB of RAM 1GB+ of available hard disk space 24-bit or greater video display card QuickTime 5 or later

Ben Long is a writer, producer, videographers, and the author of Complete Digital Photography. He resides in San Francisco, CA. Sonja Schenk is a freelance producer and film video editor who has worked on a number of popular television shows and movies. She is also the author of Digital Non-Linear Desktop Editing. She resides in Venice, CA.