What is experimental film making, how do I go around it?

What approach should I take?

What Is Experimental Filmmaking?

Experimental film is difficult to define, not because its guidelines are so abstract or even esoteric, but
because it's such a wide-ranging genre that defining it almost defeats the purpose of the genre itself. In
one sense, it refers to anything that defies the conventions of traditional narrative and documentary
cinema. It doesn't have to tell a story. There don't have to be characters. There doesn't even necessarily
need to be a message of any kind. It can be visceral or mundane, engaging or a complete bore. It can
be highly personal or overtly political. It can be literally anything.

On the other hand, experimental film is an aesthetic and aural art form. Film inherently takes some of
the most expressive elements from other artistic mediums and combines them into a magnificent
smrgsbord of sight and sound. All films have elements of photography, music, painting, dance, etc.
However, narrative and documentary films don't necessarily use all of these artistic elements to their
full potential; they're more focused on creating an enhanced sense of narrative reality than creating
pure aesthetic art. With experimental films, however, the extent to which these elements can be mixed
and manipulated to evoke or portray emotion or ideology is infinite.

As a result, experimental filmmaking is an absurdly powerful artistic medium that can be matched by
few, if any, other art forms in terms of pure expressionistic potential. If that's not reason enough to get
started with this fantastic genre, here are a few more of its copious benefits.

Benefits of Experimental Filmmaking

There are numerous reasons why you might want to make experimental films alongside (or instead of)
narrative and documentary films. These reasons are varied, and there are certainly more than I can list
and write about here. But the following reasons should give you a basic sense of why experimental
filmmaking might just be one of the most beneficial things that you can do as a filmmaker.

Creative Freedom: First and foremost, this type of filmmaking is one of the most creatively freeing
things that a person can do. Narrative filmmaking, like it or not, is all about restraint in what you
show and how you show it. Even the narrative films that break away from convention are subject to
the idea that every image and every sound needs to be in service of the story and the characters.

With experimental filmmaking, however, you're free to throw any and all restraint to the wind and
make creative decisions that would be "unacceptable" in the world of narrative film. You can express
emotions, ideas, concepts, and literally anything else through literal or abstract imagery, through
juxtapositional editing, through creative use of sound design. You can disregard the technical, and
focus solely on the creative.
Still frame from "Control Freak" by Robert Hardy

Spontaneity: In narrative filmmaking, it's difficult to be truly spontaneous. When time is money,
which it always is in a narrative environment, people tend to stick to the schedule and get the shots
they need to tell the story. This isn't a bad thing in the slightest, but it's not conducive to creating art,
which requires at least a certain amount of spontaneity.

With experimental filmmaking, creative decisions can be well thought out choices made prior to
shooting, or the shooting can be a spontaneous act of expression in and of itself. When you're not
burdened with schedules and shot lists, and the AD isn't hassling you to get the next shot set up, you
are free to make creative decisions as you see fit, right on the spot.

Still frame from "Night Music" by Stan Brakhage

Personal Expression: Narrative filmmaking, by its very nature, is a collaborative craft. In order for
narrative films to be made properly, it takes dozens (if not hundreds) of individuals, each with a
specific role in the production of that piece. Even though we still promote the idea of the auteur in our
current filmmaking climate, pure personal expression is nearly impossible in an environment where
hundreds of unique voices coexist. Don't get me wrong, creative collaboration is a fantastic thing, and
it's the best way to make narrative films, but it can be detrimental to the idea of the personal art.

Experimental filmmaking, however, offers filmmakers the ability to express whatever the hell they
want, in any way they want. Your cat just died and you're all torn up inside? Make a film about it.
Girlfriend dumped you for a guy named Chad? Make a film about it. The point is that making films
like these can be both cathartic and productive, and oftentimes the process of making the film can
help you resolve, or at least gain perspective about whatever issues you might be going through.

Still frame from "Abstractions in Night" by Robert Hardy

Social Expression: A good many narrative films have cultural, social, political, or religious
undertones implicitly stated through narrative conventions. However, when tremendous amounts of
money are on the line, investors and EPs tend not to want their finished films to be political or
religious statements due to the fact that those types of films alienate audiences, which is the last thing
you'd want to do in the pursuit of making a commercially successful film.

Just like the previous section, experimental filmmaking allows you to focus your creative efforts
squarely on the statement that you're trying to make with your film, without any of the back and forth
politics that come with narrative filmmaking. If you want to make films about your displeasure with
the US Congress, then you can make the most scathing critique known to man. That's your
prerogative as an experimental filmmaker.
Still frame from "An Experiment in the Revival of Organisms" by Robert Hardy

Creative Betterment: With experimental filmmaking, anything and everything is possible.

You can try things with the camera that you would never think to do on a narrative set. In the
editing room you can stack, manipulate, and composite video to your heart's content. You can
create the most mundane or insanely abstract images and sounds and re-arrange them in any
way you see fit.

When you have no creative restrictions, you're more likely to try new things and, well,
experiment. It's through this experimentation that you can begin to bolster your creative
toolset, and create and master techniques that you may be able to incorporate into your
narrative and documentary films.
Still frame from "Birth Rite" by Robert Hardy

Defining a Unique Cinematic Voice: It might seem fairly cynical of me to say this, but most
narrative films these days are all strikingly similar to one another in terms of their style and
what they offer the audience in an artistic sense. Most of us grow up watching and studying
the same films, and when it comes time to make our own, we draw from the same cinematic
vocabulary that most other filmmakers are using. The result is relative conformity.

In my opinion, that's what makes filmmakers such as Steve McQueen so successful and
prevalent today. As someone with a background in fine art and video installation art,
McQueen has forged a unique style and perspective that has allowed him to take the narrative
filmmaking world by storm with his three features. No one is making films like McQueen,
and that can be at least partly attributed to his early career as an experimental filmmaker and
artist.

In the same vein as McQueen, you can begin to develop your own unique cinematic voice
through an exploration of and involvement in experimental filmmaking.

There Are No Wrong Answers: In the world of narrative and documentary cinema, there are
definite guidelines as to what constitutes a good or a bad film. Whether or not a film is good
or not all depends on the writing, the directing, the acting, the cinematography, the editing,
the sound, and so on. With experimental cinema, however, these "restraints" can be tossed out
the window because expression is the primary purpose, not technical perfection.

This might sound like a cop-out, and to a certain extent, it is. With that said, just because the
primary goal of this type of expression doesn't mean that we should be sloppy in the technical
aspects of making these films. However, technical knowledge isn't a prerequisite for
experimental filmmaking. There are no major barriers to speak of. You don't necessarily need
a camera or an in-depth knowledge of After Effects. The only thing you really need to get
started is an inherent desire to create and express yourself.

My Analysis of this information:

http://nofilmschool.com/2013/11/experimental-filmmaking-for-dummies-part-1

This website has made me feel less stressed to have a narrative. I keep on going back and forth on
whether to include a narrative into my music video, and how it is going to looks. I feel as though I am
over thinking everything, and this website has reminded me to be spontaneous and to use all of my
creative freedom. Doing an experimental music video gives me all of the freedom that I wish to use
when filming. I am looking more into McQueens work instead of completely and utterly focusing on
Wes Anderson and similar music videos for inspiration.

How Does Wes Anderson shoot his scenes and make them
look so perfect?
(http://www.vulture.com/2015/01/how-wes-andersons-cinematographer-shot-9-scenes.html)

January 8, 2015 8:30 a.m.

How Wes Andersons Cinematographer Shot These 9

Great Scenes

There are few directors with a visual style as distinctive as Wes Anderson's, and to find out
just what goes into his carefully composed shots, you'll want to talk to Robert Yeoman. The
63-year-old cinematographer has shot every one of Anderson's films (save for the stop-
motion Fantastic Mr. Fox); though, astoundingly, he's never been nominated for an Academy
Award. Still, with The Grand Budapest Hotel in the hunt for multiple Oscar nods next week,
what better time to talk to Yeoman about his storied career, using nine of Anderson's most
famous scenes and shots as prompts?
Bottle Rocket

Anderson's first film is more visually straightforward than most of his later works, but this
gun-firing montage shows distinct glimmers of moments to come. "That particular scene was
storyboarded, but I remember it had kind of a loose feel when we were shooting it," says
Yeoman. "As time has gone on, Wes has become even more controlled than he once was
to the point where the scene is totally figured out before we even get there, sometimes."
Yeoman had already been working for a decade on films like Drugstore Cowboy before the
then-25-year-old Anderson sent him a handwritten letter wooing him to come aboard Bottle
Rocket. "I don't know that anyone had a sense of who he would become," says Yeoman. "I
certainly didn't. But I just thought, 'Okay, this guy's kinda cool, and I like where he's going
with all this.'"

Rushmore

This montage of Max Fischer's school activities is one of the most iconic sequences in
Anderson's oeuvre, but Disney execs very nearly nixed it from the film. "I remember the
powers that be did not want us to shoot it," says Yeoman. "They told us, 'You don't have time
for that. Put the movie together, and we'll decide later if you get to shoot it or not.' But Wes
was so adamant about having it, so whenever we were on a location we knew we could use
for the montage, we would grab the shot right there. I think he was afraid the studio was not
gonna let him get it." Much of the film was shot at St. John's in Houston, where Anderson
actually went to school, and "it incorporates a lot of things that Wes grew up with and loved,"
says Yeoman. "The go-kart shot, I remember that when we were shooting that, Wes and Owen
[Wilson] both got in the go-karts and drove all around the schoolyard. It was like living
through his high-school life."

The Royal Tenenbaums

Who can forget this slow-motion stretch from The Royal Tenenbaums where kohl-eyed
Margot (Gwyneth Paltrow) steps off the bus to reunite with her adopted brother and furtive
admirer Richie (Luke Wilson)? "A lot of people have commented on that scene over the years
it was one of those magical moments," says Yeoman. And while the sequence is
gorgeously composed, it also proved to be one of Anderson's most perfect soundtrack
matches, with Nico's throaty "These Days" adding freighted context to the actors' poker faces.
"In the early days of our movies, Wes had pretty much chosen ahead of time every song that
was going to be in the movie, and we would play it on set," says Yeoman. "It just gave
everyone the right attitude toward the scene." As for those immaculately dressed sailors
marching into the frame behind Richie as he falls deeper into love, "That's one of those
details that Wes comes up with and he does it time after time that make the scene
memorable," says Yeoman. "You might have the shot ready to go, and he'll throw in
something like that to give it a distinct style. I really do think that's what defines him as a
filmmaker."

Most of Tenenbaums is bathed in warm light, but Yeoman painted Richie's Elliott Smith
scored suicide attempt in cold blues, lending the moment a dreadful gravity. Even this scene,
though, required Anderson's fussy touch. "I remember we set it up and Wes went in there and
spent a bunch of time rearranging all the hair on the sink to be exactly what he wanted," says
Yeoman. "We shot it in one take while Luke cut his hair, and once he cut off most of his hair
and his beard, we moved the shot over to the side Wes always uses just one camera." This
sequence may be one of the saddest Anderson has filmed, and Yeoman says it got to him, too:
"I was good friends with Luke at the time, and I think everybody was a little freaked out
when the whole thing went down. It's kind of shocking. Obviously, it's fake and a movie, but
that shot of the blood coming down his arms always sends chills down my spine."

We had to triple up on scenes from The Royal Tenenbaums just so we could include this
subtly marvelous shot from the finale of the film, where the camera drifts from character to
character in the aftermath of an accident. "There were a lot of moving parts, and it was very
difficult Wes was determined to get it in one take and didn't want to make a cut, so we did,
I think, about 20 takes of it," says Yeoman, who mounted a crane arm to a dolly for fluid
movement. "The tough part is that it ends with a very emotional moment between Gene
Hackman and Ben Stiller, and this scene was so difficult technically things didn't always
happen when we wanted them to happen, and we'd have to cut that it's a testament to Gene
and Ben that they were able to hang in there and really deliver on take 20." What was going
wrong before then? "I don't want to name names, but there was one actor about two thirds of
the way through it who kept blowing his lines, and we'd have to start over again," says
Yeoman. "That was a little frustrating, especially because Gene and Ben were waiting there,
getting themselves to a certain place emotionally. I felt bad for them, but that's just part of
making films."

The Life Aquatic

Anderson's exactingly decorated sets have often been referred to as dioramas, and the director
took that notion literally in The Life Aquatic, where Steve Zissou (Bill Murray) presents to
the audience an enormous cross-section of his research vessel, the Belafonte. The scale of the
film was much bigger than anything yet attempted by Anderson, Yeoman, and their
production designer Mark Friedberg, and after the boat was built on a soundstage at Rome's
Cinecitt Studios, they realized they may have gotten too grand in their ambitions. "I went
over there a few days before we shot that sequence and we took our widest lens, and even
with our backs against the wall, we couldn't get the whole boat in the shot!" laughs Yeoman.
"We knew that was not gonna be acceptable. Mark had given me a few extra feet behind the
boat so I could hide lights behind it, and so they had to physically drag the boat back against
the wall for that extra ten feet and it was huge. I called Panavision in a panic and asked,
'Do you have any wider lenses? Send them immediately!'" Even those fixes didn't prove
sufficient, and Yeoman had to improvise. "Literally, we had to shoot the whole scene with the
camera outside the stage looking through the door in order to get that shot. It was a nail-biter
for both Mark and myself."

Hotel Chevalier

Before he filmed The Darjeeling Limited, Anderson shot this short film, a prologue of sorts.
"After Life Aquatic, which was such a large film with so much gear so much of the time, I
think he wanted to go in another direction where we kept all that to a minimum, using only
what we needed," says Yeoman. "That was our first stab at it, and that's how it's been ever
since then." The two-day shoot featured a brief nude scene from Natalie Portman "She,
obviously, was feeling somewhat vulnerable," says Yeoman but the actress was assuaged
by Anderson's small crew and low-key approach to lighting. "There's a scene where she and
Jason Schwartzman are lying on the bed, and there's a backlight on them but I didn't have
anything to fill them in, so I just took a pillowcase and put it over the lens to bounce light
back into their faces," chuckles Yeoman. "I enjoy shooting that way. We came up from low-
budget independent movies where you never had the money and you were forced to come up
with your own homemade solutions to things, and that's pretty much what Chevalier was all
about."

Moonrise Kingdom

In much of Moonrise Kingdom, the characters either cross horizontally in front of the camera
or walk in a vertical line extending from it, seemingly fixed to an x- or y-axis. While that sort
of movement seems to be a recent predilection of Anderson's, Yeoman says there was a
practical component to it, too, and it was borne out of the film's Rhode Island shoot.
"Moonrise had a lot of great locations where you could only look one way, but the other
directions didn't work for Wes quite as much, so we'd tailor our shots sometimes to that,"
explains Yeoman. "For instance, the house where Bill Murray and Frances McDormand lived:
When the characters look out from the house, that was a totally different location, because
Wes felt like we could do better than the actual place where the house was. There was a lot of
that, where we were cobbling together a bunch of different locations to make one place." In
the scene we picked, where the film's young couple meet in the tall grass, there are plenty of
cuts but no alternate angles, and Yeoman says the domineering frame was intentional:
"They're two kids lost in this big world, and somehow they've found each other."

The Grand Budapest Hotel

Could this film have been Anderson's most pastel confection yet? In a shot like this, where
Zero (Tony Revolori) and Agatha (Saoirse Ronan) embrace in a car filled with pastry boxes,
"There was so much pink in there, between the boxes and skin tones, that I tried to use
bounce cards and white light so that their skin tones wouldn't be overly red." It's a shot that
incorporates a lot of Wes Anderson trademarks like deep focus and incredibly specific prop
placement, but these boxes are all arranged in a frame far boxier than Anderson typically
uses, since he adopted the Academy ratio 1:37 for the Grand Budapest sections set in
the 1930s. "The aspect-ratio thing came up after I got to Germany for prep," says Yeoman.
"We'd been talking, and Wes wasn't sure yet what aspect ratio he wanted shoot in. He'd been
so influenced by the Ernst Lubitsch comedies of the '30s, and he was in love with that style."
For the scenes set in the 1960s, Yeoman found old anamorphic lenses in Paris to shoot in the
wider 2:40 ratio, and he filmed the 1980s sequences in 1:85, though he admits he wasn't
initially sure whether it would all cut together well. "But I've seen the film several times now
and I never really question it," he says, adding a comment that could sum up his
cinematography in a nutshell: "Whether you're aware of it or not, it has an effect on you."

What am I going to take from Wes Anderson? My

analysis:
TOP TIP: To put a pillow case over a camera lens to reflect light off of faces!!

Wes Anderson has a very specific colour palette, and plans out every one of his shots down to
a T before he gets on set. I want to also have a specific colour palette or at least have colour
very relevant to the meaning of my music video. I also want to get the symmetrical look that
he seems to get across in every short film or feature film that he creates. Wes Anderson
inspires me to take a lot of care and notice into each shot that I do, to make sure that each
shot is symmetrical, and to have a distinct colour in each of my shots. For example, when I
am screening the happy one I could have shots similar to these ones (from previous Wes
Anderson films):

And for the depression shots I could have them similar to these: