Narrative films shot in uncontrolled cities

[QuickHitRecord]

Can you think of any narrative films that were shot with natural lighting minimal crews in busy areas/cities? I’m doing some research for an upcoming zero-budget project, trying to figure out a solid approach to the aesthetics. I really want to get out of a locked set for this one.

[BTM_Pix]

Elements of The French Connection and The Day Of The Jackal (original version) were shot were shot guerrilla style without permission.

Escape From Tomorrowland was shot completely surreptitiously inside Disney theme parks.

Of course Chubby Rain* is a classic of the genre where even its star Kit Ramsey was unaware a movie was being made around him.

Chubby Rain* also established the principle that without deduction, profit percentage, deferment, ten percent of the nut then, for cash, every movie costs $2,184 to make.

 

 

* Obviously a bit tongue in cheek but Bowfinger is a great movie that does offer the proposition that if you want to do it then do it. 

[BTM_Pix]

The Guerilla Film Makers series of guides is getting on a bit but offers some solid insights into zero budget that are still very relevant.

https://guerillafilm.com/books/

[EduPortas]

Some Woody Allen films, maybe?

[mercer]

What are you trying to do? As long as you don't have a big rig with lights and a shotgun mic, then you should be good. I've walked around Philly and NYC and see plenty of people shooting video everywhere with gimbals and even tripods sometimes... although I wouldn't recommend that. The key is to look like a tourist and find locations where there aren't many people passing by, or it's so busy, people don't even look twice at you because you look like a tourist. And be prepared to move to a different location if you have to. Philip Bloom, hardly a narrative filmmaker, but his use of super long lenses gives him the freedom to be a little far from the talent. Separation between camera and talent can be a good thing if you're trying to steal shots. 

[kye]

Lost in Translation was famously shot in Tokyo without official permission.  They shot in public with a very minimal crew and moved fast to try and keep ahead of the authorities.  They chose this approach primarily because it was almost impossible to get permission to film there at the time. 

I saw a great doco about the making of it but it's been removed from YT now so can't share it.

I don't know what sort of info you want to know to prep for your film, but there are snippets of BTS online if you dig.  This video shows a bit of BTS from on location (linked to timestamp):

From what I can remember / piece together:

• shotonwhat says it was shot on Kodak 320T and 500T using Aaton 35-III Camera and a Moviecam Compact Camera with Angenieux and Zeiss Super Speed Lenses
• they moved fast to stay ahead of the authorities
• the cast and crew when out shooting in public was only a few people (camera, sound, director, and talent and I think that's it?) and were all non-Japanese people, and if anyone official came to tell them off the they would just be apologetic but use the language gap to effectively prevent any communication.  They had a Japanese fixer who stayed a distance apart from the group (so they wouldn't be noticed by the authorities) but that was helping with logistics etc and could step in if the situation required it
• they had challenges with locations (link to timestamp)
• another snippet of them on location - tripod but not clear if they're using any lights

What information are you looking for specifically?

[kye]

7 hours ago, QuickHitRecord said:

Can you think of any narrative films that were shot with natural lighting minimal crews in busy areas/cities? I’m doing some research for an upcoming zero-budget project, trying to figure out a solid approach to the aesthetics. I really want to get out of a locked set for this one.

Further to the above, and further to what Mercer wrote..

• The smaller the camera package the more amateur and less pro you look, which impacts how the authorities treat you
• Often locations care if you have a tripod or not, especially in crowded situations where a tripod takes up a lot of space and is a tripping hazard.  Alternatives to a tripod are obviously hand-held and also shoulder-rig, but the often overlooked options are a monopod, and Mercers trick of having a monopod where the foot is resting in a pocket of a belt, so the camera effectively gains the stability of the operators waist
• Depending on the focal length and type of shot (medium, close-up, etc) the primary consideration in crowded places is if people will walk in between the camera and subject.  My travel shooting with my family was done mostly on a 35mm F1.9 equivalent and this enabled medium-close-ups and closer in very crowded places without anyone getting in-between and wider than that with people or obstacles in-between.  If you want to get more distance than that and not get wider then you'd need to go to a 50 or tighter depending on the distances involved.  I personally find this hugely situationally dependent as it depends on how crowded things are, how noticeable the operator is, how willing to walk in front of a camera people are (or how much/little they care about you) etc.
• Combined with the distance / density / shot-size / focal length interactions are the DOF considerations, specifically how much do you want to separate your subject and at what distances.  Normally this also blends into low-light requirements but I think these days if you use a dual-ISO camera then that consideration drops away and you can get by with F2.8 or even F4 at night in well-lit areas.  
• The main reason that aperture isn't an obvious choice (just go F1.4!) is that if you can choose a slower lens then you can consider a zoom, which changes the shooting equation drastically.  Depending on how you're planning and scheduling the shoot, the ability to move fast without changing lenses might be considerable.  The French New Wave approach of getting minimal coverage and preferring longer takes is something to consider.  There's a huge difference in logistics between storyboarding the whole thing within an inch of its life (and having many setups and doing hair/makeup/wardrobe touchups between takes etc) and running the whole scene a couple of times with a wider master then going a bit tighter and grabbing the more interesting shots as colour for the edit.  Noam Kroll has shot short films on film and only had ratios of 2:1 or similar, and for certain sections only shot one take because he wanted to spend more film on making the important parts more interesting.
• For aesthetics it's also worth considering what you'll do in prod vs post.  The traditional prod approach is to use filtration and select a lens / aperture combination that gives the rendering you want, and then you'd shape the light and control your lighting amount and ratios etc to suit your ISO/aperture/filtration.  This makes prod very cumbersome and if you don't control the location perhaps impossible.  The alternative approach is that you choose much more neutral equipment and push a bit of a look in post.  There are obviously limits to this, but for example by picking a lens that's sharper across its range you can vary the aperture to control DOF and exposure in prod and then degrade it in post (soften it globally and in the corners, add distortion, add diffusion, add vignetting, etc) and you'll have a consistent look despite using the lens at different apertures, etc.
• Think about DR.  The more DR the camera has the less of the scene you will clip and the more flexibility you'll have to adjust exposure and ratios etc in post without making the clipped areas visible.  The less DR you have the more carefully you'll have to expose, and the less flexibility you'll have with moving shots that go between dark/light areas.  The more DR you have the less you need to vary the aperture on the lens to compensate, or the less you'll need any lighting etc to compensate.
• Think about the contrast of the final film.  The more contrast you apply, the more leeway you will have with the cameras DR, so the previous point gets easier.  Film was great in this sense as the negative was so wide and flexible and gave a lot of leeway in post.
• Monitor as well as you can.  Use a large monitor and a viewing LUT.  The more you can visualise the end result while shooting the better.  I find that shooting in uncontrolled situations means there are always things in the frame that I'm reacting to.  This is in alignment with the situation and performance too - shooting in crowded public places will have the cast reacting to their surroundings, so you should be reacting to their performance and to your surroundings too, so the more clearly you can see the shot the more coherently you can react to it.
• Embrace the chaos.  Separate the ideas of controlled coverage and creative experimentation as much as you can.  The idea of getting a master in the can and then experimenting is great because you can ensure you've got an edit that can work and then you can grab risky but potentially great shots after that.  Much better to have the final edit cut between neutral shots and really great shots that embrace spontaneity and add to the film than struggling in the edit by having to cut between shots that are neither safe nor creative nor sensitive to the surroundings.

Some example 35mm F1.9 shots I've taken (please ignore the grading - these were from a long time ago!!!):

More recent shots with 68mm F1.5 equivalent:

and more recent with 70mm F2.0 equivalent:

If you really wanted a minimal set of focal lengths, I'd suggest a 28mm for wides and ultra-packed situations, a 'normal' lens in the 35-50mm range, and a longer one in the 70-100mm range for shots where you are at some distance and don't want a wide.

Your aesthetic should really begin with the emotional arc of the characters in the film, filtered into scenes, then the equipment chosen to express the intended aesthetic while shooting in the specific circumstances of the location and logistical assets and challenges. 

[QuickHitRecord]

So far, we have:

• The French Connection
• The Day Of The Jackal
• Escape From Tomorrowland
• Chubby Rain
• Woody Allen (Annie Hall, Hannah and Her Sisters, Deconstructing Harry)
• Lost in Translation

I think this is a great list! I know that Sean Baker’s Tangerine was shot this way, but I’d rather not sit through another of his films.

 

6 hours ago, mercer said:

What are you trying to do? As long as you don't have a big rig with lights and a shotgun mic, then you should be good. I've walked around Philly and NYC and see plenty of people shooting video everywhere with gimbals and even tripods sometimes... although I wouldn't recommend that. The key is to look like a tourist and find locations where there aren't many people passing by, or it's so busy, people don't even look twice at you because you look like a tourist.

I've written a drama short. Two characters, 11 pages, lots of walking around town. I live in Portland and I’ve shot all over town before without ever once being hassled (except by some in a crisis of mental health). But I’m really more interested in seeing what kind of aesthetic choices might even be available to me when balancing that with coverage needs, moving quickly, and not attracting too much attention.

6 hours ago, mercer said:

The key is to look like a tourist and find locations where there aren't many people passing by, or it's so busy, people don't even look twice at you because you look like a tourist.

I'm always so envious of New Yorkers for this very reason. You can fill the frame with sidewalk commuters and often no one will even bother to give you a second glance. I can’t think of any other US cities where this is true. 

5 hours ago, kye said:

The French New Wave approach of getting minimal coverage and preferring longer takes is something to consider.  There's a huge difference in logistics between storyboarding the whole thing within an inch of its life (and having many setups and doing hair/makeup/wardrobe touchups between takes etc) and running the whole scene a couple of times with a wider master then going a bit tighter and grabbing the more interesting shots as colour for the edit.

Lovely screen grabs, Kye. If any of these were publicity stills for a film, I’d want to check it out. Especially the 68mm shots. Great mood and sense of place.

I think that this quote sums up some of the decision-making that I am facing. I could totally go in there and “wing it”, just figuring out my shot as I went. But I want to rely on natural light, which means timing certain shots for certain times of day, and then that raises the question of how much planning I want to put into each scene, and ultimately how the visuals will compliment the story. I’d rather not lean too far into the documentary aesthetic.

After shooting my last five shorts with my C70s, I’m actually thinking about shooting this film on a hacked EOS-M with c-mount lenses. I’ve been collecting them for a while and have three sets of primes, plus some great zooms. I’d personally put the aesthetic available with this (windowed) sensor and these lenses up against anything, I like it that much. I think the reason that no one really wants to do this is because it’s one of the most difficult digital cameras to work with, AND on top of that, the most difficult lenses to work with. But I’ve been tackling the challenges presented by these one by one, and I think I have them pretty well sorted. We shall see!

Current plan is to hide a Deity PR-2 recorder with a lav on each actor and attach a timecode box to the audio input of the camera. Stabilize with a steadybag. Transmit the image wirelessly to a producer and make up artist in a car, along with refreshments for the actors. If I end up working with long zooms, I might give direction over a phone and provide a discrete earbud to each actor so that I could also monitor.

[kye]

1 hour ago, QuickHitRecord said:

I think that this quote sums up some of the decision-making that I am facing. I could totally go in there and “wing it”, just figuring out my shot as I went. But I want to rely on natural light, which means timing certain shots for certain times of day, and then that raises the question of how much planning I want to put into each scene, and ultimately how the visuals will compliment the story. I’d rather not lean too far into the documentary aesthetic.

I'm once again reminded of Noam Kroll, who has gone a long way into this rabbit hole.  

My recollection of his method was a balanced approach, where you make a plan and then improvise and adapt within a limited range.  My impression was that he would storyboard things as a way of mentally rehearsing the shoot, and would end up with a clear idea of the logistics of the shoot, the equipment required, etc.  Location scouting and anticipating the light etc as you normally would.
I believe he also gained a clear idea of which shots were required, and which had some flexibility.  Then when he was shooting he could make sure that he got enough for a functional edit, but was also clear enough in his thinking that he could adapt the plan to compensate for any challenges that arose and also to take advantage of any serendipity or inspiration that occurred.

I suspect that this is a very deep skill, to plan and then improvise a shoot with an understanding of how the choices being made will go together in the edit.  I know enough about editing to know that it's a jigsaw puzzle where you can have two small sequences that work well but don't cut together directly, so unless you can find a way to get from one sequence to the other then you have to change one of them so they're compatible.  To do this for a whole scene, or whole film, in your head while you're still shooting it is beyond what I could even imagine, but I'm sure that the talented cinematographers are easily up to the challenge.

Noam actually went further, describing a process where he worked with two actors and where he 'designed' what would be shot ahead of time, with the major plot points and story beats, but didn't fully script it.  On each day of shooting the three would have breakfast and discuss the motives of the characters and how the scenes should go.  Then they'd shoot while improvise the scenes, filming as they went and exploring ideas.  It was freedom within a planned structure.  
I believe he was shooting one or two days a week, and so after shooting he'd review the footage and do rough edits, seeing what worked and what didn't.  Then he'd 'design' the next shoot day accordingly, sometimes keeping on with his overall plan for the story but other times seeing something in the footage that made him adapt the narrative.

I suspect that the skill is in knowing how much you can stray from the plan and knowing in which ways to adapt to make the end result better than if you just shot it as planned without any adapting to the situation.

Certainly if you make a plan and then prioritise which shots are the most to least important then you'll have a good chance of coming back with a functional edit.  My impression of great travel content is that most shots are good-but-not-great, and the art is in the edit and how they're combined.

1 hour ago, QuickHitRecord said:

After shooting my last five shorts with my C70s, I’m actually thinking about shooting this film on a hacked EOS-M with c-mount lenses. I’ve been collecting them for a while and have three sets of primes, plus some great zooms. I’d personally put the aesthetic available with this (windowed) sensor and these lenses up against anything, I like it that much. I think the reason that no one really wants to do this is because it’s one of the most difficult digital cameras to work with, AND on top of that, the most difficult lenses to work with. But I’ve been tackling the challenges presented by these one by one, and I think I have them pretty well sorted. We shall see!

EOS-M and primes and a Fujinon-TV 14-70 f/2 will do a lot of the heavy lifting in making it look like cinema instead of video.  In my mind you'll need to pay attention to how to keep the camera stable and then look at your references and study their coverage so you can design yours.  

By shooting on less than pristine equipment, you'll have to get things right in-camera as you won't be able to mess with it in post as much.  Specifically, being able to zoom in a little in post can be useful if a random passer-by is staring.  If you were shooting this with a modern mirrorless and sharp/neutral lens then I'd suggest using the highest resolution possible just so you have that flexibility.  

Your concern for getting stared at is legitimate, but the focus is to not get people staring while they're in the frame.  As such I'd suggest getting more coverage using tighter framing and shallower DOFs, and for shots that are wider, simply getting more footage so you can edit around people staring.  AI can potentially help if there are random people staring in shots you really want to use, but if you can edit around these moments (or prevent them from being in shot in the first place) then all the better.
It's also worth considering that there are a number of things you can do that will lessen the changes of people noticing you and the camera, or lessen the people who are currently in frame noticing it.  

Another strategy is to investigate how much b-roll can be used in the edit without it taking away from the story.  You may be able to get away with putting b-roll on top of a good audio edit, essentially having an L-cut followed by a J-cut where the audio goes from one character to the another but the visuals go via a b-roll shot from the location.  I'm sure there's a deep art to doing this, but it's worth grabbing as much b-roll as you can while on location (especially if shooting has to wait for any reason but you're able to shoot).  You can even return at a later time to get more footage, or better yet, take your kit and go shoot the location ahead of time so you can do a dry-run with the actual rig and also get a sense of what the location is like to shoot by actually shooting in it.

[maxJ4380]

What happens after you release the "film" for public consumption ? Could a city come after you legally ?    Since we are talking guerilla style, you know your being a little bit naughty 😳 

 I personally dont see an issue with two friends talking on the side of a street with another filming unless of course you start closing down streets. Then i can understand the need for permits and counsel approval.

Half or three quarters of youtube must be filming outside. I watched a youtuber shoot a timelapse in Italy a week ago.  Set up a tripod right in front of some famous place, plonked a dlsr on top and away he went . Mind you he did set up close to a large rock to stop people tripping over it.  He also moved around did some behind the scenes stuff. So he was there for awhile, it was very touristy, nobody bothered him.

No idea how car parking works in your area. If you could access a minivan, throw a couple of magnetic signs on it, saying such and such tours. When a bunch of loud tourists jump out of it  and proceed to wander round willy nilly taking photos,  if three of those people are of to the side, it wont alarm any one. You could also do make up and have cold drinks and snacks in the van. Heck have some people tossing a football or baseball around, nothing can be more American than that.  

I live in an agricultural area, we rely on backpackers to help pick the seasons fruit. I'm always seeing backpackers hanging out in the main street using the free wifi from the banks i think. Seeing phones and tablets is pretty much accepted.