Importance of Choosing an Aspect Ratio from the Beginning.
Courtesy of Columbia EDU https://filmglossary.ccnmtl.columbia.edu/term/aspect-ratio/
Our first series article was set upon the topic - The type of screen you see your movie playing on will determine everything about the storytelling production process and style.
Nothing can be more true.
Villeneuve sees his movie on an IMAX screen. Kardashian on social platforms like YouTube or Instagram.
Therefore, Villeneuve's approach to storytelling requires a 50mm format, which plays on the large width and the specific height of the screen. So now, let's look at the case for social media style production. Do you think of releasing your work on YouTube? Well, even then, your storytelling style is determined by that.
You will learn very quickly that you have to start thinking differently about your framing and turn your phone vertically when recording. This different frame dictates just how much of your props and surrounding make it into the shot.
The keyword of today's blog is: - THE FRAME.
On the first day on set, members of your crew will ask a crucial question.:" What are the ratio and the speed?" These are the most important technical details you need to determine before anything.
You don't want to choose just random technical aspects for your movie while hoping that you can still change your mind later. I invite you to think about these technical points in advance while considering your story and especially the screen where your film will be shown.
There are so many creative options to choose from, but they are then determined by the frame you choose.
In our next block, we will talk about the technical aspects of distribution, one by one, for different screens.
Today, I will explain the basics about the ratio of a screen in cinemas.
It has to do everything with your eye.
Therefore let's go for a little bit of biology.
Putting together 24 consecutive pictures projected at a speed of 24 per second will trick your eye and cause you to stop perceiving them as separate pictures; instead, you will see movement.
This basic trick gave us moving pictures - A.K.A. movies - and until today, this phenomenon lays true.
All Cinema Screens of today are still projecting 24 frames per second.
I'm sure that you have gone to the cinema at least once in your life and you have realized that they have different rooms, some with a kind of a larger screen and then others with screens that are comparatively smaller - we call them "flat "or "scope."
Therefore, if you are filming and considering going to the cinema or to any - ANY-, yes, any film festival, you have to observe those technical specificities.
In distribution jargon, we call it "specs."
24frames, with a 1.85:1 ratio, are the typical specs for a flat-screen movie.
But this is not the rule for all movies: the larger screens have a different aspect ratio; additionally, there is a hybrid 2:1 aspect ratio as well.
Educate yourself about the frame ratio as an independent filmmaker.
The discussions about ratio used to take hours and hours between the creative team and the production crew in major studios, and every movie had a determined aspect ratio before the work on production even started.
Just copy that clever behavior; we are not inventing anything new.
All of this will dictate where you or your distributor can take the movie once it is finished.
Yes, it's possible to change the frame rate even on the last day of postproduction, but it will not change how you filmed your images.
However, don't forget the movie has the sound - if you are filming for cinema in other than 24 frames per second and then need to change the rate later to 24 frames, your sound synchronization will change slightly and influence everything, from the dialogue up to the scores.
That is why the distributor always asks the question: "What is the native aspect ratio of your movie?
So let's go back to our first claim: before you start your movie, before you even begin to write the first word of your script, think about the screen where you will be projected or streamed.