Today, we’re thrilled to finish our two part interview with Marshall Fine, a multifaceted videographer and editor. In this episode, we'll explore Marshall's journey from capturing high-speed activities on his GoPro to mastering the art of videography. We'll discuss the nuances of frame rate importance, the challenges of live event filming, and the creative satisfaction that comes from documentary work. Whether you're a seasoned professional or just starting out, this episode is packed with valuable insights on navigating the world of video production, enhancing your technical skills, and embracing the unpredictability of creative ventures. Join us as we uncover the layers of filmmaking with Marshall and maybe even share a laugh or two about the trials and triumphs of video creation.

In this episode you will hear about and learn:

•Marshall’s nterest in further exploring Adobe After Effects

•Marshall’s preference for being part of a production team

•Desire to work on documentaries, features, and live event coverage

•Reflecting on past projects with nonprofits and their impact on growth

•Importance of clear communication and understanding client expectations

•Experiences of starting projects pro bono and transitioning to paid engagements

•Influences from watching TV shows aimed at children like Pixar and Nickelodeon

•Using creativity to overcome technical limitations such as poor lighting or inadequate gear

•The ability to improvise with available resources during shoots

•Importance of understanding video production terminology

•Strategies for enhancing video quality with limited equipment

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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@mtyproductions15

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Erika Christie is the host of Creator/Shift and as a Filmmaker/Writer/Producer has worked professionally in many different fields. Erika will be interviewing all types of amazing art-folk and delving into the best ways that artists up skill themselves- meaning, what they do to better themselves and their artwork. We'll also be putting a special focus on transitioning your skills into new artistic mediums and how to best work and collaborate with artists who have very different skill sets from your own.

The Creator/Shift Podcast is both Video and Audio. The Audio portion can be found on Apple Podcasts and all major podcast platforms. Live Streamed interviews, workshops, and gear reviews can be found on YouTube and Twitch.

Some interviews that are highly visual are best seen in their video form and may not appear in the audio-only portion of the podcast.

To support our growing community, follow us on Patreon at IMAGINE ALLEY X  https://www.patreon.com/imaginealleyx

Patreon will have exclusive interviews, workshops, Q&A sessions, and resources not found anywhere else.

TRANSCRIPT

Erika Christie:

Let's look forward at skills. Now, you mentioned something a little while ago, which I think is a really good example of. This is, like, camera operating for ATL live, and I'm one of the producers, the director, and the technical director. So most of the time, I'm calling camera cues and that sort of thing. And then a little bit here and there, I'm kind of giving direction to the camera operators. And one of the things that you mentioned a little while ago was, you know, tracking for those who don't know who. But tracking is like, if a stand up comedian is on stage and they're just walking around, that's just the camera operator is following the stand up comedian as they're walking around stage.

Erika Christie:

And as far as skills go, one of the things I like, the way I kind of, like, refer to it as, like, what's the thing that you need to do in your craft that you have to practice a lot? And to me, doing a live event tracking sounds easy, but it is not. The person is moving now and then. My, the way I want to distinguish it is like, for example, on our show, a stand up comedian versus an improv troupe. Stand up comedian is one person, and most of the time, they're just kind of casually pacing back and forth. And once you've been watching them for 30 seconds, you kind of get what their vibe is. You see how fast they're walking. You see how quickly they're doing turns. And for the most part, they're just kind of, kind of walking to the right, pause, walk to the left, pause, and come back and forth.

Erika Christie:

That's something you have to certainly have to practice that, but you can pick it up pretty quickly. An improv troop on the complete other end of the scale, especially when you're, you know, in Atlanta, which is one of the improv hubs, improv troops can be crazy. There can be as few as two people. I've seen as many as eight people on stage, and I'm sure there's even bigger troops than that when you have that amount of people. And improv troops are all over the place. They're standing, they're sitting, they're lying flat on the floor. They're jumping around. They're walking out into the audience.

Erika Christie:

They're walking through the back curtains into the back room. They're all over the place now, tracking, figuring out who you're following, getting your focus right, getting your positioning right, following someone. One person's talking to another person. How quickly are you going back and forth? Like, all of that stuff is stuff that's really complicated to learn. And it also depends a lot on what the show is like, how quickly you're going back and forth. How much have you been joining, getting into that process, like, understanding the difference between the different acts, musicians? We do a lot of musicians as well. Like, how much have you been enjoying that process, and what is it that you focus on every show that you're trying to get better at?

Marshall Fine:

Yeah, I think that. Honestly, I think that it's. It's kind of, it's kind of both is, um, I think that every, every, every time we show, for a show, it's kind of, it's kind of more of a, it's kind of more of you're showing up. Kind of showing up with a blind eye, if that makes sense, because it's, it is, it is live. And anything in being live, anything can happen. And so, like you said, like you said, watching, like, the last comedian, I think he was a rap. I think he was a rapper. The, he was kind of, after watching him for 30 seconds and I know that I was tracking him, it was kind of like, okay, I got the sense that, okay, you're going from stage left, stage right, you're coming forward some.

Marshall Fine:

So kind of trying to move the. Move the zoom. Move the zoom in and in and out. So, like, all right, I know you're going to come forward, so I need to zoom out. I know you're going to go backwards. And it's. I mean, it is not a. It's not a.

Marshall Fine:

It's not a perfect science, I would say it definitely. I would say it's definitely not a perfect science, but it, you kind of, it's kind of that thing that you kind of, you kind of play with it. And after, you know, 30 seconds or so, it becomes, it becomes almost, almost like, it becomes almost like a second nature, I guess, but still not always. Not always perfect. If it was something like, if you're doing something like, say, the oscars, for instance, where you have a true set of like, okay, your point, you're. You have somebody walking from point a to point b, and you're switching from this camera to this camera to this camera where it's still live, but there's a set, like, there's a set way that somebody. That somebody's moving that's much as, that's as much all as live. It's just a different type of live.

Marshall Fine:

Yeah.

Erika Christie:

A lot of that stuff is done in sequence. It's this, this, this. And those four things always happen in the same order.

Marshall Fine:

But, um, I enjoy it also is, I mean, it's something that definitely actually also helps to kind of keep you awake.

Erika Christie:

Marshall. Marshall. He's lying on the floor. Go down to the floor. Go down to the floor.

Marshall Fine:

Exactly.

Erika Christie:

Yep.

Marshall Fine:

Exactly. And it's because it's like, I mean, I. I've worked. I mean, I've worked on a couple of short films, one of which I had to do for my exit review class. And one that was, that I had worked on was a group of people, and it was, it's like, I, and I was out the camera op for, for both of them, and it was kind of like, great, we got to reshoot this. We got to reshoot this. Oh, it's like, and just in that, in that kind of thing and depending on honest and depending on where. What it is that you're doing, depending on how you're like, I was the short film, I did my, for my class.

Marshall Fine:

I was actually up on the hood of the car, or, that's not the hood, I'm sorry, the roof of the car and shooting down through like, the sun window and stuff like that. And so some of that is. But at the same time, being able to track and being in, having to pay attention to like, okay, this is where this person is going. This person's where that's going. All the, all the fire. The fire stuff that I was doing and all that is like, there's two stages, and, but being able to, because I'm doing it handheld, it becomes the, you know, all right, you're here. You're here. And I really have no clue what's going to happen because one person can I do one person to the next is gonna do.

Marshall Fine:

So anything can. Literally anything. Anything. There. There's zero planning that can be, that can really be done. So. But being, having done those things, I think, has definitely helped me a lot with atli because, okay, I know, like, all right, I know I gotta follow this person, the in with at. With all the people with, whether it improv or rappers or artists.

Marshall Fine:

Artists of. Well, I guess rappers are artists. The is that. Yes. You get that. You get that sense of, okay, I got to follow them and follow them, follow them. All right, now, where do I think that they're moving? You kind of hope that you're right. And if you're not, you got to kind of be prepared to fix that on the fly.

Erika Christie:

Yep, definitely. Let's move on to vocabulary.

Marshall Fine:

Now.

Erika Christie:

As you know, filmmakers and photographers, we tend to spend a lot of time thinking of, you know, frame rates and shutter speeds and what degrees kelvin we're shooting in and that sort of thing. And generally speaking, that's all irrelevant to someone if to, you know, a graphic designer who's like, hey, I need a video. They're not going to say any of those words unless they want, like, something in slow motion, they're not going to say any of those words. Words at you. So if someone who doesn't know film comes up to you and is like, hey, I need, like, I need a video done. Give me a couple of words that you wish they would know in order to, like, help get their point across.

Marshall Fine:

Um, I was. I mean, I would say frame rate is probably one of the biggest ones. Um, just because it's one of those things that I don't think that people necessarily think about. And I say that because, like, I'm part of a lot of, like, GoPro forums on Facebook, and people post things all the time. I spend an hour last night talking to somebody about how to. How just to import footage, like, literally messaging him back and forth through messenger. Anyway, sorry, but where people say, oh, yeah, just. You can do it with just, like, your phone, and you don't need anything big and fancy or come and do this.

Marshall Fine:

Just come and shoot this. And it's like, oh, wait, hold on. What are we talking about? Because if it's, you know, you driving down the road and doing a donut and doing donuts, well, that's not exactly something you can shoot with your phone, because it's really, really fast, and you need frame rate to be able to do that. You need frame rate to be able to do that. Because if you want to do slow mo and all that stuff, like, so I guess that. And I would say. So I guess that's maybe one of. One of the things.

Erika Christie:

For me. Not to interrupt, but for me, I feel like I don't need someone to tell me the frame rate. What I. What I need to know is, what is the style?

Marshall Fine:

Yeah.

Erika Christie:

Because if they're saying we need to shoot donuts, then I'm thinking, then. Then I'll. And then, of course, if I say something like motion blur, they're not necessarily gonna know what that means. But. But since all of that stuff. Or do they want something in slow. Slow mo? Like, to me, it's like, if they're saying something, I want to know stylistically, like, what it is that they're trying to get to, and then maybe I'll say, oh, I'll try this or this frame rate, and then. And then that'll give this kind of effect.

Erika Christie:

So to me, I'd rather know, like, what it is. What's the style? What's the tone? Like, what are they trying to do? And then I will insert, like, what the frame rate is.

Marshall Fine:

Right. And actually. And I take. I take that back. Yes. Style is definitely probably the better. Is the better way to. To go.

Marshall Fine:

To go with that. And that's. I think that's actually what I. Is what I meant.

Erika Christie:

I. Yeah, I. I think that's where you're going with that.

Marshall Fine:

Yeah, yeah, I am for, I mean, as you just saw, it's like, I am not. I would say that vocabulary is definitely not my strong suit. Even inside of, like, school, you know, you had to. The vocabulary words in the vocab books and all that. It's like, I mean, to this day, I don't know that I've ever used a single word inside of the vocab books, but still, like, but even then, I struggled with vocabulary, and it was. And even being able to take that to, you know, to now, it's like, some of that. Some of that I do understand. And then there's other things where it's kind of like, okay, I know what you mean, but here's how it's interpreting in my mind.

Marshall Fine:

And exactly what you said was like, is you took exactly what I was saying. And it was like, hey, I think this is what, I think this is what you. Is what you meant. Exactly. Exactly that. Where, okay, I'm not exactly saying the right. I'm not saying, I mean, one thing, but I'm kind of saying. Not saying what it is that I mean, but trying, like, trying to say what I.

Marshall Fine:

What it is that I mean, but not really, you know, not really saying.

Erika Christie:

Saying, yep, absolutely. What about, like, I think because of we're so far into the age of social media, I think at this point, most people probably know what zooming and panning is like, I think even non film people kind of have an idea. Zoom in, zoom out. Pan just means moving left and right. So I feel like those two are probably fairly, fairly well known. First, even someone who doesn't know video, like, oh, I really want to zoom on this part right here. Is there any other words that you can think of that someone came up to you? Like, I really wish they kind of knew what this one word was just so it would make our conversation go easier.

Marshall Fine:

Not really. I mean, I think that. And I may just be, I mean, like we talked about earlier, I think it also has a lot to even do. Just me being very early in, in on things where I've not really been inside of. It's more than me just show up and do something and kind of planning it. Kind of planning it on my own. It's not really. Not really been able to say, someone give me orders and say, okay, here, this is what I.

Marshall Fine:

Give me what I want. What I want. What I want. Unless it was like a, unless it was like a short film kind of thing. But at the same time, like you said, with, like, social media and even in terms of, like, like, video games and drones and all that, where it's like, I mean, I mean, who doesn't want a flying object through the sky? Like, and same thing with, with, I mean, panning is. Panning is literally no different than turning a character in a video game left or right. So it's. And I think that's one of the things that people kind of.

Marshall Fine:

Yes. Do. They do begin to kind of understand that because they can relate to that with. On those. On those, on those things or with a drone. Oh, pan to the left. Okay. I'm turning the drone to the right.

Marshall Fine:

I mean, to the left, not right or to the right. So it's like, so, yeah, awesome.

Erika Christie:

Emerging technologies. What, what. Broadly speaking, what's one of the most recent, like, new technology things you've either taught yourself or you kind of been in the middle of that could be software, that could be some kind of gear. Like, what's the most recent new thing you've jumped into?

Marshall Fine:

Um, the most recent. So I'm actually, I'm trying to. I'm trying to buy a second camera. Um, I. My dad has actually very much pushed me into the FX 30. I just need to kind of pull the trigger and do it, and I just haven't, haven't done it and just haven't, and haven't done it. But like I said, I'm a very much more of a run and gun kind of style, and so, but having a something that's more of, like a DSLR just like this, it makes it kind of harder to do, to run and gun. And especially with, like, when you have a monitor and all that and trying to, trying, trying to kind of get there.

Marshall Fine:

So I guess it would be. It would be that. I actually, I did. I rented it a few weeks ago, and actually, I, one of my scouts happened to be having an eagle project, and I was like, you know what? I can. I have a reason to use this. Like, it's not just me saying, okay, let me go out and just shoot birds flying through the sky. It was, okay. I have a real reason to be able to try to use this meal to get experience with it and all that.

Marshall Fine:

I mean, I guess that's kind of it. I mean, I don't really, I don't really branch out that much out of, like, premiere the. I do a little bit with. I do. I use premiere a lot. I'm not great with, like, Photoshop or illustrator, but I use them little bit. Like, I'll use it for photos or I'll use it for, to try to maybe draw something. But so that's kind of, so I mean, kind of doing it little by little.

Marshall Fine:

I think the best thing that I actually learned recently was Adobe, the Adobe podcast. And using that for like speech going through school, my teacher was all about audition and I hate to audition. It was just like, it was, it's like, I mean, aside from the fact that I have the textbook on it and I think the steel has been broken maybe once the, it was just like, what am I looking at? I don't really get any of this. It just, I just, I just, I don't like, I don't like it. And the end. So when I, when we had done the project that, when I had done documentary that I had sent you, the, the company who had sent me some of the, the interviews because I wasn't able to get the other stuff they, he was saying that he ran the people's like interviews. He ran them through Adobe podcast and I was like, huh. And it like cleaned up the audio really well and all that.

Marshall Fine:

And I was like, huh? That's like, that's awesome. So the interviews that I took, I actually ended up running them through, I would edit them down to what end of, you know, whatever it was to be in the inside of the documentary and then I would export just that chunk and I would run it through Adobe podcast and I was like, wow, this, like, it sounds so much better. I mean, while I've done documentaries with GoPros and I have a GoPro 360 and has a shotgun mic on board, if I'm going to use a documentary with GoPros, that's what I'm using for audio because it's got a shotgun mic, so why not? But I was like, all right now. But now that I know that Adobe podcast is there, even though I know it's a beta, it's a nice tool to be able to have there, to be able to say, okay, I can use this to clean up the, that it'll clean up the audio. All I gotta do is drag it in. Boom, done. And that kind of thing. So I guess, in short, I guess Adobe podcast would be the newest, the newest and greatest technology that I've gathered.

Marshall Fine:

I know. Long way to go to get there.

Erika Christie:

Awesome. So, so that's as far as programs go, that's kind of the most recent thing that you've really been going after. And then as far as gear is that second camera you're looking to buy. So what's, what's the next thing that you keep telling yourself, I have to learn more. You mentioned both Photoshop and illustrator. Is it one of those, is it after effects? Like, what's the next thing that you keep telling yourself, I really need to jump into that.

Marshall Fine:

I think maybe it would be like more of like, something with, like, after effects or learning other stuff inside of just the adobe suite. I wouldn't say necessarily really anything in, particularly, just, it's kind of like, you know, I have the adobe suite, and the more things I know how to use in it, the better. But at the same time, it's just, it comes from just experience and all and that kind of thing. If there's something I'm like, oh, I want to try to do this, I'll either go to YouTube and YouTube it and all that. It's, I kind of, I tend to be kind of a creature of habit where it's like, okay, once I can really do things with, with it, I tend to kind of, you know, try to work as much as I can inside of that. So, yeah.

Erika Christie:

Yeah, I, in grad school, I very stupidly took the most difficult Adobe Photoshop class, followed immediately by the most difficult adobe after effects class. Because I'm insane. There's absolutely no reason for me to have taken the most difficult of both of those. I really enjoyed the Photoshop one. I got my butt kicked the entire time because I barely knew Photoshop, and it was a really, really intense class. But the after effects class I did not enjoy in the slightest. And for that particular class, they were really into using it for animation, which some people do use it for animation. I don't like after effects for animation.

Erika Christie:

Now, I love animation. I love writing for it, and I love directing it, but I don't like being the one who's, like, physically at the computer doing all of that. I do use after effects every single day, however, and I always use templates. And whether that's something as simple as lower thirds, that could be promo videos or sizzle busy videos, could be making transitions. Like, there's all kinds of things I use it for, but I don't like using it for animation. And I learned that the hard way. But, yeah, as far as after effects goes, just being able to use templates and being able to go in and change colors and change timing of animations, all of that, it makes everything else so much easier. Like just being able to learn that one program and knowing that will certainly make understanding Photoshop and illustrator, because a lot of them tend to have the same design like the actual, like, you know, Ui design itself tends to be fairly similar inside the creative suite, so.

Erika Christie:

But yeah, if after effects is on your list I would definitely say go for it. And I've got lots and lots of template so I can always send you stuff if you want, but just, just being able to like follow through with a template and get something really simple done, it makes, it helps everything and it makes your video so much better. So I would definitely, I would definitely recommend that if that's something on your radar. Alright, last main question. Resources. Where do you go if you want to be inspired?

Marshall Fine:

Um, mostly honestly, where I go to be inspired with things is kind of just shows, um, my parents in particularly kind of crap on me about the fact that um, that I spent a lot of time watching.

Erika Christie:

They sound lovely, Marshall.

Marshall Fine:

They are. But it's uh, but it's um. I spent a lot that I spent a lot of time inside of I guess kind of the little kid world of, in the terms of like I've always, I've always been a fan of, I've always been a fan of Pixar, I've always been, I grew up with Disney Channel and Nickelodeon and that kind of stuff. And so, like, and so, but watching, I always, I watch those things and I'm like, whoa, that was cool. Like the, it's like, we'll sit down and watch, watch tv. My parents will be, oh, that was a cool shot. Oh, this person, this person, like, stop talking, please. It's like, I just want to, I want to be able to sit down and yes, while our careers are about, you know, about all of those things, it's like, okay, I just want to sit down and be able to watch it.

Marshall Fine:

But at the same time it's kind of like, you know, you just kind of just think of, think about things and think to kind of thinking about things from other shows or other movies. I know that, I know that when you watch one of these big budget movies, you know, they're this big, this big and we're like that big. But, and so the, in terms of resources and the think that, that we have to be able to do these different things is much more minimal but thinking about, okay, how can I, how can I maybe do these things? One of the shows that I grew up was, and actually watched a million times is that show victorious. Like just the way that, the way that it shot and the way the camera like moves around and all that. I mean, no, that's not something I know how to do, but like in a whole effect and stuff that I know how to do, but it's cool to kind of. To kind of watch things like that where kind of like, okay, I'd like to be able to do something like this. I have these. These kinds of ideas do.

Marshall Fine:

Getting stuff from lower angles, getting stuff from this angles. Being able to take a drone and fly it from here to here. All those things. It's like. It is. So I guess, in theory, I guess my inspiration really comes from kind of tv, but also, at the same time, when I am somewhere, I'm a very adventurous person at lune for adventure. So not saying that everything I do is the smartest, but, you know, oh, you know, it'd be really cool to put, like, to mount this on maybe the very front of this motorcycle or on this door or, oh, wait, what if someone stands, like, right. Right here? Or I'm like, I'm gonna stay crossed right here on the ground, and you're gonna drive up and.

Marshall Fine:

Well, don't hit me. And we. We actually did that for one, my short film at school. And it was an idea that I had, and then I didn't. I didn't do the editing for it, but we ended up. They ended up not using it. I'm like, why? It would have been so good. And it was.

Marshall Fine:

But it was just like, all right. You know, so. So coming up with I was ideas, but at the same time, it's kind of just the fact of also kind of being sometimes resourceful to what's around you. I did kind of build a tripod once, sort of out of. Out of a rock and a stick because I was on camp out, and I had. I had the GoPro, but it was just like the handheld thing that I had just didn't really. I couldn't get it to where exactly what I wanted, and I was thinking, all right, maybe I can do something here. And so I put it down, and I, like, put it on rock and, like, okay, all right, I got something kind of here.

Marshall Fine:

So, you know, it's. Being resourceful with the things that are. That are around you.

Erika Christie:

Yeah. The list of things that I've used as impromptu tripods, that list goes on forever. Just ridiculous. Ridiculous shoes. I mean, just any. Any weird thing you can think of. I have definitely already put a camera there. Yeah.

Marshall Fine:

Yeah. So it's. I mean, like I said, I mean, it's about. I mean, there's not a. I mean, I'm a. I'm a. I'm a potter, and it's like, I do pottery, and I, as I say, to people when they ask me for help, I'm like, there's not a wrong way to do things. There's not a right way, and there's not a wrong way to do things.

Marshall Fine:

There's, yes, there's the basics of things, but once you kind of get, have that basic, the, you know, it's not about what's wrong, what's right and wrong. It's more about the, it's about the creativity of what can you bring, what can you bring to that? What is the touch that maybe somebody else has not, maybe thought of? Or what is something that somebody has thought of that you can kind of steal that idea and be like, hey, I'm going to do this, too. And, and using, using the things that are, that are around you. It's like, you don't have to have, somebody had told me once that, you know what? This is one of those industries where it's like, yes, we all want, we all want to have the best gear, but, and honestly, I, you're probably, you're probably gonna laugh when I say it, but one of my favorite movies, top gun, top gun, Maverick in particularly, my favorite quote from that movie is, it's not, it's not the plane, it's the pilot. When I, when I, when I, I'm a double black diamond skier, when I do, when I ski, that's like, that's my thing. I'm like, it's not to ski, it's the pilot. It's not. I actually was updating stuff for, on my Instagram and all that, and I actually rearranged that quote and I said, it's not the camera, it's the pilot.

Marshall Fine:

And then I used something also from, like, Yoda, since actually my nickname is also Yoda. That's a different story. But it was. But realizing that, but realizing that after that movie, I was kind of realizing that, you know what? It's not about, yes, it's about the gear, but it's also about taking the gear that you have and what can you do with it. And so it's not always about having the best, the best of the best of the best gear, but what can you use, what can you do with what you have and all that? So, because not everybody can afford to go out and buy a hundred thousand dollar camera, I sure as hell can't do that. The, I'm struggling just to buy a $3,000 camera like that. FX 30. And, like, I really want to spend three grand on this.

Marshall Fine:

Like, because I want to, like, I want to deck it out with, I want to get the whatever, the free or whatever world. Free world monitors and stuff like that. And I want to kind of build it out some. And I'm like, well, I don't know, like, but, you know, doing what you have and stuff like that, but at the same time, not being afraid to. Not being afraid to take. To take risk.

Erika Christie:

Yep. No, I am 100% in agreement with you. As far as gear goes, I say all the time, I am not a gear snob. I'm not. I don't care. I don't care how fancy your camera is. I don't care. I just don't care.

Erika Christie:

If you cannot operate it, if you cannot get the best out of your gear, then it does not matter how fancy your gear is. Same thing with the editing conversation. If you're not a good editor, throwing a bunch of graphics on top of it isn't going to make the edit any better. So, no, I do not care in the slightest about what the gear is. You. You said a little while ago you can't use your phone for this or that. I use this phone for a ridiculous amount of stuff. I use this phone all the time.

Erika Christie:

I had been doing. I was doing a real estate video, and I walked in to shoot the house. $4.3 million house, totally empty. And it's one of those houses that physically did not have lights. There was no lights except in the bathrooms, and it was empty, which meant there was no lamps in it. It was so dark in the house, even with all the shades open, all the windows open, so dark in the house. I literally could not use my expensive camera. And I had to take my phone, and I took my phone out, and I shot a $4.3 million house with my iPhone.

Erika Christie:

We did not tell the people that were selling the house, and the house sold in three days. So it is not about the gear. In that case, it was about the gear because my fancy camera couldn't handle it. But it's not about the gear. Like, you have to be able to accomplish whatever you need to accomplish with. With whatever you have on hand and just get the best out of that. So I'm 100% in agreement with you.

Marshall Fine:

Exactly. I mean, I had done the highlight reel documentary thing that I did last summer. It was like, we had, like, some dance party thing, and, you know, the lights are off and, you know, there's some flashy light, but not all that. And, you know, I mean, and, you know, you probably know, you know as much as I, as well as I do that GoPro sucks in low light. And I was like, it was not something that I had thought about that, you know, hey, we're gonna have this dance party thing, and this is not gonna work real well. And I ended up literally turning on the flashlight from my phone and using my flashlight on top of the GoPro like this as a, as a, as a.

Erika Christie:

As an impromptu light for.

Marshall Fine:

It worked beautifully. It worked beautifully. And, yeah, you can use your phone for a lot of things, and sometimes you can. Sometimes you can. It just depends on what it is that's actually being done, what's trying to be accomplished. We were, when I did my. The short film that I worked on, I. To this day, I scratched my head, and I wonder what went through this, this electrician's head when designing this place.

Marshall Fine:

This place had the worst lighting ever. Like, it was a cabin, and it had the worst lighting ever because you turn on the light switch in a room and, you know, you would expect the lighting, that room to go on. Well, no, it went on somewhere else in the house. Like, it was. It was. And this was the entire place. The only place that actually probably was accurate was in the bedroom. And we didn't shoot anything in the bedrooms, so that didn't matter.

Marshall Fine:

And so me being the camera guy, I didn't know. What I didn't know up front was I didn't know that I was gonna be the primary guy. And so. But I had brought a. I have, like, a led little light panel that I had been using for, like, shooting the fire stuff, shooting night stuff and all that, because I was like, okay, while canon shoots really well in low light, I need something. Something more. And so that I had brought that light with me, thinking, you know, might come in handy. And so, and I'm thinking about the fact that, oh, you'd be in a cabin that, you know, the lights don't work, that someone owns, and the lights don't work.

Marshall Fine:

And so I had that one light, and we ended up literally using. I was like, well, all right, let's use this light. Let's see what. Let's see what we can make happen here, because that's all we got. And so then because of that, I actually went out and I bought two led, like, bigger led light panels from some guy on. On a Facebook marketplace that I found for, like, like $200. It was like, I mean, they're, they came from Amazon that he was like, yeah, I got them from some, like, some raffle. And he didn't know.

Marshall Fine:

He didn't know squad about them. But they're, I mean, they're, they're decent, but, you know, $200, like, you know, whatever. So, but because of that, I bought those thinking like, all right, if I find myself in a spot like this again, maybe this might be useful. And I actually used them for those, for those interviews, for that. The documentary that I did, I used them for that. And they were, they worked fine. It was so, yeah, and that's one.

Erika Christie:

Crazy thing I have, is that because the just sheer amount of shoots I've been on and there's always some emergency, does not matter how well you plan, does not matter how well things are going, there's always some kind of an emergency. And so every shoot after that, I have to stop myself from adding that one item to my pack or my pack is going to be bigger than my car. Just the question, like, every time you have an emergency, you're like, I need to make sure I have an extra one of those. It's like, what? You can't have an extra one of 117 different things. So that's. But, yeah, there's a very short list of things that's like, I absolutely cannot function if I don't have one of these. And make sure you have one of those.

Marshall Fine:

Yeah. I always struggle with the fact that it's like, like when we, I'm going out to the Montana again this summer and they hate, actually, I had asked him about, hey, do you want to do like another video of, of some kind or whatever? And they, when I just found out a few days ago that I got in for camp for the retreat this summer and they were like, yeah, we want to do this. We're going to contact you actually in like, in a couple months because we in the camp, they want to do. They want to, they have something new that they want to do. And I'm like, well, thinking, like, all right, well, still flying across the country with my bigger camera and all this, like, that's not going to happen. But thinking, okay, maybe I'll use my drone. I'll use, I'll use Gopros. I'll use the Gopros again.

Marshall Fine:

I'll bring these mounts and all that. And so it's like, it's always the fact of trying to think about, okay, what is it that I might, that I might need and making sure that you have those things. When I go and shoot, I'm always like, shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting. People are like, oh, why are you shooting so much? I'm thinking, well, because if I overshoot that it's fine. I have enough to play. I have a lot to play with if I don't. And I think, I really wish I had that. Well, I have to use what I have.

Erika Christie:

Yeah. That line between shooting the right amount and overshooting is so hard to see. It's so hard to. To see where we've got enough versus. I shot ridiculously too much, and I shot too much, and I still missed the one important thing I needed to get. That line is so hard to find.