As I will mention in the visual look section, this short film has an absolutely amazing credit sequence both before and after the film. Unfortunately, when you have acting and story problems in the film, the amazingly professional credits make the audience feel like too much time was used on the credits versus getting the best story or performance out of the actors. While the credits were likely done when other things couldn’t be done, it would be a good idea to be aware that most audiences will subconsciously compare the work in the credits to their perception of the work represented in the film. This can be problematic if you don’t nail the content well enough to live up to their expectations.
Visual Look
Alex Ferrari is well known for his stylistic cinematography, with stark lighting, professional color grading, comic-style shot composition, and amazing credits. The camera placement and framing are quite nice in Cyn, although not quite as well-laid out as those in Broken. The effects chosen for this film are well done and convincing, from a simple muzzle blast to a bullet-head cam and a believable explosion at the end the film. Due to time constraints, the effects are not nearly as elaborate as those in Broken, but they are quite well-orchestrated. As to the credits, they are the singularly most amazing credits Mr. Ferrari has yet created, and are fully on par with most of the recent James Bond film credits.
Unfortunately, in regards to the other elements, a six day creation schedule and an “upgrade” from the SD DVX100 used in Broken to the HD HVX200 conspired against Mr. Ferrari achieving the same success he had in Broken in Cyn.
Cyn's compressed shooting schedule,
caused color issues to come up...
...like the differences between
Cyn and her captors color space.
The shots seemed to be underlit, which caused a fair amount of low-lux noise to be generated, especially in a climactic ending sequence involving an explosion. If I had to take a stab at guessing why this occurred, I would guess that Mr. Ferrari lit for the HVX200 the same way he did for the DVX100. Unfortunately, the fact that the high definition HVX200 crams so many more imaging sensors on a 1/3” chip than the standard definition DVX100 causes it to be a much bigger light hog. (The fewer sensors on a chip, the bigger and more sensitive to light they are. Conversely, the more sensors on a same sized chip, the smaller and less sensitive to light they are. This is very similar to the difference between ISO 400 SLR film and ISO 100 SLR film.) Because Mr. Ferrari rents his cameras, I would guess he wanted to get the best camera he could afford, but my guess would be that neither he nor his new DP were as familiar with the HVX200.
Because of the light issues and the time issues, the color grading and color correction was a bit sketchy, as well. For example, Cyn’s two kidnappers seem to be mostly desaturated and to have a somewhat sepia tone cast for most of the short, whereas Cyn herself, under similar lighting conditions, is much more saturated and much less sepia tinged. While this may be intentional as a visual way to showcase her as a more feminine heroine, it comes out looking mismatched. Now that there is no longer the time crunch that there was when he made this film in six days, I would definitely recommend that Mr. Ferrari spend extra time fine tuning the color grading, if possible.
While there were problems in the visual look of the film, I was very impressed with what Mr. Ferrari accomplished in only six days from this regard. Of course, similar to the comment I made in the content section, the overly elaborate, lushly colorful credits alongside footage that had these issues draws more attention to the footage problems. As such, for future films, I would try to allow the credits to more closely match the look of the film itself, otherwise the experience feels very unbalanced. I would also encourage that, for shoots in which time is essential, that Mr. Ferrari rely on renting cameras he’s most familiar with, even if a more advanced upgrade has recently become available. This will help eliminate lighting problems due to the learning curve of the new camera and gear.
