Neill Barham, CEO, FiLMiC Pro, Taking Mobile Filmmaking to an Incomparable Professional Level

January 25, 2020 Film & TV, Gear, Technology 00:42:06 0 Comments

Cirina Catania, OWC RADiO host, talks with Neill Barham, CEO, and the guiding vision behind FiLMiC Inc. and the primary architect behind FiLMiC Pro.

An independent filmmaker from Seattle turned serial entrepreneur, Neill studied at the Vancouver Film School before working on projects large and small in countries all over the world.

With the advent of the iPhone 4 and its ability to shoot high definition video, Neill saw a vision of the future where everyone has the tools to become an artist or storyteller. The company began working on the initial designs of the FiLMiC Pro in 2010 and has been relentlessly updating the app ever since. Under his leadership, FiLMiC Pro has become the pre-eminent high-end video app, used by filmmakers, artists, educators and journalists the world over.

You can find out more about FiLMiC PRO here.

For more about our host, filmmaker, tech maven and co-founder of the Sundance Film Festival, Cirina Catania, visit cirinacatania.com.

If you enjoy our podcast, please subscribe and tell all your friends about us!

We love our listeners. And, if you have ideas for segments, write to OWCRadio@catania.us. Cirina is always up for new ideas!

In This Episode

  • 00:08 – Cirina introduces Neill Barham, CEO pof FiLMiC Inc.
  • 04:38 – FiLMiC Pro’s new Multi-cam or DoubleTake features explained by Neill.
  • 09:15 – Neill shares his background story and talks about how he ended up going to film school.
  • 13:06 – Neill shares the advantages of today’s generation, where they have tools available to create projects without going to film school.
  • 16:35 – Neill elaborates on FiLMiC Pro’s mission to democratize media to enable artistic creativity.
  • 20:01 – Neill describes how FiLMiC Pro’s Cinematographer Kit works.
  • 25:03 – Cirina has her opinion about the LUT/not to LUT argument amongst creatives.
  • 28:06 – Neill favorite part of his year is also the most rewarding. It’s the FiLMiC Pro’s contest.
  • 35:18 – FiLMic Pro gives $25,000 cash to the grand prize winner for their next FilMiC project.
  • 40:35 – Visit www.filmicpro.com to learn more about FiLMiC Pro, view amazing projects from various artistic people, and many more.

Jump to Links and Resources

Transcript

This is Cirina Catania OWC Radio. I spoke to you guys a moment ago about Neill Barham of FiLMiC Pro and how accomplished he is and how much I love all of those apps. And now we are lucky enough to have him on the phone with me. So, Neill, how are you today? 

I’m doing great. Thank you so much for having me. 

Before we get too far down the line, I want to thank OWC for sponsoring the podcast. Without them, I wouldn’t be able to be talking to you today. So thank you, Larry, and the team over there in OWC. We’re grateful to you. 

Neill, I watched you on stage at the Worldwide Developer Conference, and we won’t talk too much about it because I noticed the new version isn’t up yet. But we affectionately call that the dub dub. You’re on stage at the dub dub talking about a new multi-cam version of FiLMiC Pro. How’s that coming? Can you tell us any more about what’s happening with that? 

Sure. And just a quick clarification, I was in the venue and may have been seen, but it’s Sean Baker and our CTO Chris Cohen, who got the luxury of being on stage. And Chris is probably the best person to articulate the technical underpinnings of what rolled out with iOS 13 on the iPhone 11 Pros that will make the next generation of FiLMiC Pro possible. So multi-cam is a revolutionary capability. Kevin Buonagurio and I were recently at CES last week, and we had a great time testing out the latest FiLMiC beta with the multi-cam on the trade show floor at CES.

Multi-cam shoots are always compelling, especially if you’re aiming for a journalistic perspective. Click To Tweet

I’m jealous. Now I was at CES, why didn’t I see this?

And it was fantastic because that made a richer presentation and interaction. We would wander from one booth to the next after we shot an interesting clip of the Sony booth where they unveiled, I’m presuming it’s an electric car I had seen on maybe TechCrunch or Mashable. It’s kind of hideous but that when I saw it up close and personal, I was like, “that’s amazing.” And so Kevin and I had this great interaction, where he’s filming me with a rear camera, and he’s on the front-facing camera of the Sony cars. I’m talking about it right over my shoulder. Then you hear him adding his contradictory color impressions on it, and it became this sort of nuanced piece of media that was actually unlike any that I’ve sort of been accustomed to seeing in a store. It would have been the interview with the microphone, and they’re both standing in front of the lens. This, I think, actually managed to pull the viewer into the experience even more. It’s like they were operating the camera and looking at the same thing that Kevin was and had their own opinions and wanted to interject it into the conversation. So it was a validating moment for us because we knew that multi-cam was compelling, at least from a sort of a journalistic perspective. Still, I think had posited that it was going to open up new avenues, especially in things like narrative production that haven’t really been imagined yet. Some of the conversations early on are what would Spielberg or Soderbergh do with this sort of technology? And I’m not 100% sure that there is something specific that they would do for that, at least when it comes to like a Hollywood theatrical experience, certainly behind the scenes type content for the expanded DVD or iTunes extras, that would be a really compelling option. But this definitely proved that for like 15 to 25-year-olds, they’re going to take this technology in new directions that I couldn’t possibly imagine. And so I think the media landscape five years from now is going to be really interesting and how much multi-cams had an impact and that will also be a fascinating thing to watch.

It’s fascinating. I mean, when I shoot recently, I’ve been using two iPhones, the A cam and the B cam, which is the more traditional way of doing it. But now it seems like you could get quite a few angles using two different iPhones plus the multi-cam that would be awesome. So can you explain the way it works so your shooting one angle would be I call the selfie angle and then can you pick any of the three cameras that are on the back? 

Yep, with FiLMiC’s implementation of it, you can. Actually, there’s an important thing for your listeners to make sure that they grasp, and that is that different camera angles are one thing, and then a different field of view is another thing. You’re absolutely correct in using the selfie in any of the three rears here. You’re going to get two very distinct camera angles, but if you’re choosing a multi-cam experience from the rear lens array, you’re actually ultimately going to have the same camera angle. It’s where your singular device is, and then you’re going to have two out of three available fields of view. So whether it’s super wide, wide or telephoto lens, I guess we’re on an audio call because I’m using my hands here to try it.

I know, me too.

But if you want the equivalent of a 13mm lens and you go to the ultra-wide, then that’s going to give you your most environmental presentation. Wide is probably the most user-friendly 24mm equivalent, and then the telephoto if you want to get a nice, clean close up for dramatic emphasis. So in that respect, I think it has amazing potential for the single person shooter. But I also think that some people immediately equate that to that you can have three different camera angles. So ultimately, you need to have two devices. And then you could run two multi-cam lenses on both, and then in the edit room, you have four different options from a single live take. So I think that’s incredibly compelling and it’s either twice the coverage or half the time. It’s definitely going to just speed up productions and give people options in the edit room. And also potentially like a fail-safe device, if you’re filming with a tally and either the wide or the super tally, and your talent maybe moves their head too much and ultimately cuts off a little of the headroom that you intended in the shot, then you can immediately just go to your wide-angle, and you don’t have to bang your head against the wall and be like, do we have time in the production for a reshoot? Can we even get back into the location? So I think there’s going to be untold waves that are going to benefit small and upcoming productions.

I’m really excited about it. It’s amazing. How on earth did you come up with this idea?

Well, I wouldn’t say that we’ve specifically come up with the multi-cam technology, and actually, I don’t even think we can give Apple credit for it because I think there are some Android handset manufacturers that brought it out first. But I think in a similar way that the iPod probably perfected the mp3 performance, then that’s very much what Apple is going to bring to the multi-cam experience. So I’m not sure what I’m allowed to say here due to confidentiality agreements, but we were basically invited to take a look at the new technology as were some other companies. We brought our ideas there, and they were met favorably, so it’s been off to the races. 

Whether you went to film school or not, it ultimately doesn’t matter where you learn lessons. As long as you realize the value of knowing what they are.

Well, I can see why it was met favorably. Everybody’s really looking forward to it. I’m assuming, tell me if I’m wrong, that since you were demoing it for yourself and using it at CES that it’s not going to be a long time before we can actually have it. I keep checking the FiLMiC site to see when am I gonna get this?

Yeah. So I would say that there’s definitely going to be a large scale announcement before the end of the month. 

Awesome. That’s good news. All right, we will definitely watch out for that. So let’s back up for just a moment, and then I do want to cover all of your different products and what they do for people who might not have used it, but you were born in?

Hawaii, of all places, actually, this will be a lingering bit of a family drama. My parents moved from Hawaii when I was six weeks old, to Maryland, of all places, and I’ve never been back to Hawaii. Basically like fear of holding it against my parents, resenting the fact that I wasn’t able to grow up there. So probably the least attuned native Hawaiian that there is it in terms of the islands. Someday It’ll happen.

Oh, you need to visit. It’s beautiful, and I know you would love it. So you went to college in Vancouver, right? Tell me about growing up. How did you get involved in the creative arts? How young were you when you first started?

I mean, I think I actually approached it from the creative writing standpoint. So my parents were both English majors. I was halfway decent with the language from a young age, and I think I went to undergrad basically, wrestling with whether I wanted to be a creative writer or whether I wanted to do something completely different. So I was a double major in English and geography and a minor in art history, which is sort of a long-winded way of saying I have absolutely no clue what I want to do. And I had a friend who’s in the Liberal Arts College in Southwest New Hampshire. And I kept threatening him to jump majors and join me, and he’s like, “It’s not that easy.” So I ended up taking a film history course, which was actually amazing. Everything from Cecil B. DeMille to Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, things like Contempt, Grand Illusion, Children of Paradise, 400 Blows,8 ½, all of these wonderful films from the world that most 20-year-olds have never heard of. My mind was completely blown, and that was something that I could get inspired and invigorated behind, whereas maybe like Hollywood was telling stories that weren’t speaking to me so much. But like a lot of people, I didn’t quite take the jump and pursue my passion at that time. So after undergrad, I had a job in Utah of all places. I was working at the Snowbird Ski Resort as a hotel front desk clerk on the graveyard shift, which was a mistake in all sorts of ways because I thought I would have my days off and ski all the time. But when you stay up all night till six or seven in the morning, the last thing you want to do is grab your skis, go up the gondola and try to make it down a black diamond mogul see all the witches. It’s hard to do even in your best well-rested days. So a lot of the time and when we get people checking in at midnight or one in the morning, two in the morning, and then people checking out at four-thirty or five. But there was definitely a gap between two to five in the morning where not a lot happens, I watch one mostly horrible movie after another and keep saying, “I can do better than this.” And so I ended up going to film school in Vancouver Film School, expedited one year program. 

Utilizing different camera angles is one thing while making use of different fields of view is another. Click To Tweet

We’ve chatted in the past about whether somebody should go to film school or not. And I think it’s interesting, and there’s no right or wrong answer to that there are certain circumstances that money plays a part. And there’s definitely the opportunity to make your own film now in a way that was much harder to do then. So whether you’re going to go to film school or not, you could definitely make a handful of short iPhone related projects beforehand. See how much you like and see if you have the aptitude for it, but there’s a ton to learn to be versed in the language of cinema and ultimately doesn’t matter where you learn those lessons, but there’s a huge value to knowing what they are. So what’s the psychological impact of pulling back on a person versus the psychological impact of pushing in on a person, same single shot, and you’re just changing the direction of the camera and potentially the speed that would cheer moving that. But the actual effect that you’re having on your audience psychologically is profound. 

Absolutely.

I happen to live in that in film school, somebody who’s 15 years of age now and just trying that out with FiLMiC Pro and iMovie or Luma Fusion, they might just learn that lesson by experimentation, and doing like, “Oh wait, this isn’t the effect that I want to have. I’m going to go reshoot that and do it again.” 

Ever since I started using this app, and watching your tutorials is like going to film school. When I teach young kids or people who are using it for the first time how to use it going through all the steps you go through to set up your shots, it’s like a little mini class in filmmaking. It’s just a wonderful app. Well, we should do the FiLMiC 101 for people who haven’t used it. Can you explain what it is and what it does and why you started it? 

Sure. The ambition for FiLMiC Pro is to basically take the broadcast level control and functionality that you’d expect on a $10,000-$50,000 camera and reduce it to roughly a $15 iPhone and Android application. So if you’re accustomed to starting it out with frame rate control, and when we first launched FiLMiC Pro, the native app just shot 30 frames a second bring in 24 frames a second for the cinematic motion was vitally important, offering separate control for focus and exposure. At the time, the native app didn’t do, was FiLMiC Pro’s second, primary, or initial calling cards. Subsequently, native apps have gotten extraordinarily better over the years, but there are so many other things that we’ve been excited to layer into the app since then much higher data rates. So if you’re going to project onto a big screen or color grade in DaVinci Resolve, then we give you data-rich footage that’s gonna hold up to that and that you express yourself, artistically, however you want to, which is really the mission statement for the company. We want to enable artistic creativity wherever it happens in any way that we can. It often manifests itself in a sort of line that we’re all about the democratization of media, and a lot of companies say something similar, which is good because I think that that’s actually powerful and profound and the 20th century was probably typified by media that was controlled by a handful of gatekeepers. If the seven studios didn’t want your film going on to a theatrical screen, then you were done for it, and you weren’t going to make your money back, and nobody would know who you were. And whatever your passion project was that you’d spent two years willing into existence would wither on the vine. And people would have real psychological issues with that and potentially give up their dreams or ambitions of being a filmmaker.

And financial concerns, too, because a lot of people and I’ve been guilty of this, you put everything you have into these movies, and if you can’t sell it, you’re in trouble. You have created a world where people can use the equipment that is now available to them, and shoot amazing visuals with an app that is easily affordable and accessible. And now you even have FiLMiC Remote, which I love. Can you talk about FiLMiC Remote for a moment?

Sure. So it just gets back to the enabling creativity mission statement and trying to replicate at an accessible price point. I don’t know if I’m gonna say consumer price point because I actually don’t think that necessarily FiLMiC Pro and certainly FiLMiC Remote is exactly a consumer-oriented product. It’s definitely more of an enthusiast advanced professional product, but so FiLMiC Remote allows you to leverage the peer to peer connectivity between an iPad and an iPhone. So if I want to put my camera on a hood mount or a jib arm or a dolly slider, or potentially I have it on one of the innumerable affordable gimbals, but I have my camera operator chasing my actor in any field, forest, cemetery or something where the camera operator is not going to be able to control the camera interface because they’re dodging objects and trying to keep up with the main actor. Then you can have an assistant operator handling focus and exposure on the iPad. So that was the simplest or initial implementation of that. And then we expanded it to also take the place sort of like a video village. So if you need to see your waveform monitors or your histograms, then you can huddle around that, or if the director just needs to see how the scene is playing out but can’t quite get close enough to the action, then they can watch it in a full-screen preview on FiLMiC Remote. And we think it’s fantastic and just opens up more avenues for people to realize their vision.

It is fantastic, it really is. So talk to me about Cine Kit. 

It’s actually funny that you say that because officially it’s called the Cinematographer Kit, but we’re certainly planning to truncate it. In a handful of months, hopefully, everybody will be calling it the Cine Kit. 

Oh, cool. 

Chris, our CTO, has a fascinating brain. I don’t know how else to put it. But he had basically been remapping the gamma splines of iPhone footage, and then it came to us and said that he thought that he had a way to deliver logarithmic footage on an iPhone. So the initial response was fantastic, amazing, great, let’s do it, and then we had a sort of concern about how to ensure that people who knew how to handle vlog footage. And we’re ultimately going to color grain it afterwards and have access to it where people who had never shot log or didn’t know what it was wouldn’t be able to potentially wrap their footage by accidentally recording and log and then be like, “Why are all of my colors washed out? What’s the problem with this desaturated footage?” So that was the thought to protect it, put it behind a paywall, and so only the people that needed to get to it, and then we tend to get carried away, and we’re like, what if we gave people control over their RGB sliders or their block of white points which actually fit the Cine Kit concept. If you don’t know what a black and white point is, or why you want to adjust it, you probably should adjust it because we might do something to your footage that we don’t want to do.

Yeah, like whoops! 

So it ended up we think actually working out great. And actually an interesting anecdote, I guess for your readers. Sean Baker, who probably most of the people know and certainly helped FiLMiC immeasurably by shooting Tangerine on FiLMiC Pro a while ago, actually shot the last scene in the Florida project, highly regarded in the spirit nominee film with an alpha version of our log. So we were thrilled, and that was a great opportunity for us. Unfortunately for Sean, it was an alpha version instead of a beta version, which means one version is still in development, so it’s even better now. He ultimately got the effect that he wanted, but he had to wrestle with it a little bit, so that was the beginning coming out party, and now a ton of our users adore the Cinematographer Kit. I was just looking at some stats the other day, and almost 30% of our Android users have bought the Cinematographer Kit for over $10 in-app purchase to convert at almost 30% when the average in-app purchase conversion is around 1%-3%. Staggering, so it definitely shows that our audience is enjoying what we do and put value in the products that we’re bringing to market. 

That’s awesome. So a companion to that would then have access now to LUTs. How’s that working?

Yeah, so right now, we essentially have a DLog LUT, which accelerates your color grading and taking a log footage back to rec. 709 container 8-bit and a 10-bit. So it’s an essential step, but it’s not necessarily like a creative, what I think in FiLMiC Pro v7, you’re going to see an expansion in our LUT support level. I’m gonna get myself in trouble when I talk about this stuff publicly before it’s in the market.

I don’t want to get you in trouble.

I think there’s going to be a lot more attention paid to the artistic finishing steps of the process in FiLMiC not just in our version seven update, but I think throughout the year following, so we’re exceedingly excited about that. We’re just scratching the surface of what we’re going to do with LUTs. And it’s also important to point out that LUTs are one way to color grade your footage, but certainly not the only way and people who shoot in log or shoot in the less aggressive flat color profile can do spectacular things in color grading software without ever leveraging a lookup table. So either way, you want to do it. We’re there for you.

Yeah, I think the LUT or not to LUT argument is ongoing amongst the creatives, and it really is a very personal decision. Sometimes you want to use them because you want to show your client what it might look like in the end. Sometimes people are using it because they’re in a hurry to get something done, and they need to get it out, or it’s for the web or something. But do you have any hints for filmmakers who are using all of your solutions and getting ready to go into post-production, anything they need to know that could make that transition easier for them or give them really better results?

That’s a fascinating question. And I don’t actually think it has an easy answer like it’s almost akin to, what should my settings be in FiLMiC Pro for the best results? And it’s like, Well, that depends on your project, what your objectives are, and what your distribution platform is going to be. I mean, and it’s also interesting because we have everything from the one-person band who’s going to shoot at it go straight to YouTube, I guess. Actually, this week we were tickled pink because there’s a new short film that came out called Daughter that I think was done for the Chinese New Year that was by the director of Hidden Figures and the cinematographer of Joker chat with FiLMiC Pro. What that team needs to consider before going into post-production versus the person who’s like I’m going to shoot my unboxing video of a Zhiyun Smooth Q2 gimbal are going to be completely different, it isn’t a hard-fast rule. To try to sum it up, ultimately know where you’re going, and that will help you choose the path that you take to get there. One of the things that I think we’re most proud of over the last handful of years is implementing a robust customer support staff that is not outsourced. It’s all directly in-house, and we try to respond to any customer support requests within 24 hours. So if you have questions about how you want to finish your project and don’t know the answer, then just drop us a line. 

It’s awesome. And you have amazing tutorials on your site, too. There was an exciting announcement in December regarding your contest that you ran recently and talked to us about the FiLMiC Pro contest and the judges. And I haven’t seen all of them, but I’ve been watching as many as I can of the films. It’s amazing what is being done with FiLMiC Pro and with mobile applications now that you could never have done years ago. So I don’t even know where to start with it because some of these films are breathtaking.

Yeah. So this is our, or at least for me personally, our favorite part of the year and the one that’s most rewarding, it shows why we do what we do. And as a former filmmaker, the god corporate executive, I ended up having to live vicariously through the beautiful art pieces that other people make. So this was the fourth year that we’ve done the short film contest, I think we actually finally landed on a favorite branding of it just a short hit on the little filming fast, and we got over 1500 submissions from about 85 countries around the world. Historically, we’ve always done across six categories fiction documentary music, travel experimental, and then have a floating sixth category. It’s just unbelievable, the scope of people’s imagination, so far beyond mine, the level of connection, heartfelt emotion, passion conviction, immediately relatable. And so I actually had an earlier discussion with one of our partners on the phone, and we’re kind of talking about how some of the bigger companies in the world still miss or don’t recognize the value in that like everybody’s chasing people who’ve already made it, and nobody is going to appear suddenly, like Steven Spielberg, or Oprah or Ellen. I mean, they’re all fantastically talented people, and they should have content out there because people respond to it favorably. But they’re not the only ones, and I think that’s the whole motivation for starting FiLMiC is before you had to be anointed to be allowed to tell your story and now you can just tell your story. I guess I’ll just tell one or two anecdotes about the contest. This year, there was an incredible documentary that came in early on; it was called Tokio Underwater. It came from Colombia, and it was about a paralympic swimmer.

We should all enable artistic creativity wherever it happens in any way we can.

She’s a Paralympic swimmer who couldn’t use her legs because of a genetic disease and is losing the ability to grip with her hands to write. Is that the one you’re thinking about? 

Yeah.

Beautiful.

And devastating. I mean, so you take what you think is sort of going to be like a sad, tear-jerking story, and then you realize that she doesn’t have time for that, and she is like a warrior. I’m watching this film and just weeping, my heart swelling and I’m just like, oh my god, well, here’s not only our documentary winner here, it’s our grand prize winner like it’s over. I don’t even care what else comes in. And this is to take nothing away from the story because it is fantastic. We did a screening of all of the best ones in front of a live audience, and it slew them too. It didn’t even end up winning the best documentary because something came in that was possibly even better, and I would have never dreamed it.

Then when that new documentary came in, they were just like, oh my god, this is potentially even better than Tokio Underwater so like, Okay, well, this is definitely winning the grand prize. And it won the category, and we shipped off our six category winners to our celebrity judges, which I just have to give a shout out to them because I’m so thrilled that they were part of it. Steven Soderbergh, Rachel Morrison first woman ever nominated for Cinematography Academy Award, Matthew Cherry, who is a former NFL player turned aspiring filmmaker who shot his first feature film for almost no money on FiLMiC Pro a couple of years ago, and then today got nominated for an Academy Award for Best Short Film. So we contributed in some small part to his journey to being an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Sean Baker, who we’ve talked about a bit. Jed Brophy, who may be at least I don’t know how many of the US audience might know him by name. But everybody ultimately will know him by sight because he’s been all over the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogy. And another actor named Mark Hadlow, who is also in the Hobbit trilogy, shot a $10,000 feature film called Blue Moon in a small town in New Zealand, and it’s been cleaning up on the festival circuit. And so the director of that, who’s a police officer, had basically seen enough interesting things in his life on the beat that he turned it into a screenplay. I think, actually, a grant from the New Zealand police department to help make the film for $10,000, and I’ll even admit they invited us down to the set, and so we went for a day. Actually, a couple of the team members got to go for two days and sort of like, hey, that’s nice best of luck and had low expectations for it. And yet again, it’s going all over the place becoming a crowd-pleasing festival favorite winning awards. And it’s like the El Mariachi story all over again, like you have a story, you have conviction, you can do it. And so, like that’s the message that I sort of feel that needs to get out to anybody because you hear that $10 million, that’s not really obtainable. $100 million to do a Spider-Man sequel you’re not getting that for your first film. Being at $10,000, almost anybody can scratch their head, put together their friend, family connection and see a path to potentially achieving that or else going to GoFundMe or Seed&Spark and getting the backing that is possible.

So anyway, just to close out the story before I go off into any more tangents, so we sent the six winners off, including the new documentary that was somehow even better than Tokio Underwater though that was as amazing as can be. And yet a different film won the best picture for the contest, and it was equally deserving too, it was amazing. I guess the maraschino cherry on top is that this year we rolled out a $25,000 grand prize cash for the grand prize winner to do their next FiLMiC project. Well, the grand prize winner was already shooting his first feature film with FiLMiC Pro. So what we had thought was going to be like a six-eight-month process as well as write the script, send us the script, we’ll give you your first installment, get some actors, get your footage in, then we’ll send you the second installment. And the guy’s like, “No, you don’t understand. I’m already on set, and I’m shooting right now, and I could use that money right now.”

Using a wide lens is probably the most user-friendly 24mm equivalent. And then use telephoto if you want to get a nice, clean close up for dramatic emphasis. Click To Tweet

Oh, wow. So you sent him the money? 

Yeah.

That’s great.

The first installment. The second one comes when we see the dailies, and right now, I think actually, he handed that off. So he’s getting two installments when the dailies are done when he gets the post-production budget but amazing. So that’s incredible, and for us, that validates exactly the story that we want to tell. And one other interesting example of that is a filmmaker named Sven Dressbach, who won the second FiLMiC Short Film Contest. And then this past year, I saw this amazing video that was produced by Apple called The Reef, and who’s the director? It’s Sven Dressbach, so Apple ends up sending him halfway around the world to go make an underwater story about biologists who are documenting whale sharks and other aquatic life. And he did it partly because of the visibility that he got from winning a contest. So that’s fantastic. We would ultimately like to open up those doors of opportunity to scores of FiLMiC users and not just the people who win the grand prize. 

This is all amazing stuff. Isn’t it wonderful to be able to take something that you love so much, and give it to so many other people, and then watch it flourish? It’s just got to be wonderful.

Yeah, I will admit, I occasionally lose sight of that a little bit. As companies get bigger and bring on more people, the pressure and the stakes get larger to the ability to run an organization. As it gets a little bit larger, it also gets more challenging the pressure to potentially raise money to compete with other people. Kind of intrudes itself in an almost unwelcome way. FiLMiC really doesn’t have any interest in making wealthy guys wealthier. We care about opening up doors to opportunities for people who might not have it. So if we can find people who were specifically interested in empowering that vision, then that would be great. But definitely don’t want to get roped into somebody who’s like, okay, I gave you x, now you have to sell the company in three years, so I can get 10x. So that’s not why we do it. But other people don’t make that same decision necessarily. And then we suddenly find ourselves competing with people who have a lot more money and then that introduces all sorts of internal handling, that just brings it to full circle back to the contest. That’s why it is so welcome for us, and it’s sort of like the North Star like it always lets us realign our priorities to exactly where they’re supposed to be. And like, oh, yeah, this is why we do. This is why so that guy can tell the story about that wonderful swimmer, and her courage and her conviction. Like you can’t watch it and not be moved or affected. And I would take the emotional import of that and put it up against the last ten superhero movies combined, the production budget of over a billion dollars, and I still think this little five-minute movie said more.

The scope of people’s imagination, level of connection, heartfelt emotion, passion and conviction are all incredibly unbelievable.

Absolutely. Because it goes to people’s hearts and I can tell you anytime you get mired in the business side, which you have to do running a business, but if you get mired in that you just remember that there is a huge army of people out there, creative people who are using what you have given us to reach people’s hearts. And that’s what it’s all about, and we’re grateful.

Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And everybody on the team does. We take an enormous amount of pride and satisfaction in reaching those people. And just to see where all of the stories come from. So phenomenal. 

Well, I know that you have a lot to do. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you taking the time to talk to us, and we’re going to share this with everyone out there. Where do you want people to go to learn more about FiLMiC Pro?

So certainly, our website www.FiLMiCpro.com is the starting place for any of that social media channel. So certainly a great way to keep up on everything we have on YouTube and Vimeo channel but you can actually reach most of the important content through the website or either of those avenues to get both the tutorials which I think is a fantastic way to ensure that you get the richest experience possible out of the application. But also then getting to see some of the best content that’s been made with it, which I guarantee will inspire anybody to begin their own journeys. 

That is awesome. Well, you have a wonderful evening. Thank you for doing this, and everybody listening, remember what I always tell you; get up off your chair, and go do something wonderful today. And thank you to OWC for sponsoring our podcast. We really appreciate it. And Neill, we really appreciate you and the whole team of FiLMiC Pro. Take care.

You too, Cirina. Thank you so much for having me.

Checklist

  1. Use multiple cameras when filming. This enables you to be more creative and have more options for how you portray your story. 
  2. Create compelling content with the help of mixing audio and visual techniques. Create a script, shoot artistically, and add more elements in the editing phase to produce something worthwhile.
  3. Be mindful of your fields of view. Decide which is best to use for a particular scene so it conveys a message more dramatically. 
  4. Utilize different lenses for different types of scenes. Wide lenses are great for landscape shots while telephoto lenses are great for shooting close up faces or objects. 
  5. Shoot multiple takes so the editor has more to play with during post production. It’s better to have an excess of clips and be sure rather than having to shoot again because something is missing. 
  6. Let film fuel your freedom of expression. Watch other great films and let them serve as your inspiration for producing quality content. 
  7. Don’t forget to color grain. Enhance your visual presentation through outstanding colors. 
  8. Have a vision from the very beginning. When you know what you want from the very beginning, it’s easier to pave the path to your end goal.
  9. Keep creating. Don’t stop improving your knowledge and your skills. Continue working on your craft with different talents to upgrade your art.
  10. Check out FilMic Pro to download the app, and learn more about mobile filming.

ABOUT OWC

If you work in tech and haven’t heard about MacSales.com, you’ve had your head in the sand. Other World Computing, under the leadership of Larry O’Connor since he was 15 years old, has expanded to all corners of the world and works every day to create hardware that makes the lives of creatives and business-oriented companies faster, more efficient and more stable.  Go to OWCDigital.com for more information.

Here’s the company’s official mission statement:

At OWC, we’re committed to constant innovation, exemplary customer service, and American design. 

For more than 25 Years, OWC has had a simple goal. To create innovative DIY solutions to give you the most from your technology.  

Beginning with 100% compatible memory upgrades, reliably exceeding Apple’s maximum RAM specs, OWC’s product offering has grown to encompass the entire spectrum of upgrade and expansion possibilities, all with a focus on easy, DIY setup and installation. 

Our dedication to excellence and sustainable innovation extends beyond our day-to-day business and into the community. We strive for zero waste, both environmentally and strategically. Our outlook is to the long term, and in everything we do, we look for simplicity in action and sustainability in practice.

For us, it’s as much about building exceptional relationships, as it is about building exceptional products.


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