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Show TIPS ON HOME MOVIES CONCLUDING ARTICLE ON SUBJECT . 4- Thc movies are a language of pie-turee. pie-turee. Words are only permlssahle as a means of supplementing the i meaning of these pictures. But the; words In the subtitles must never t. li what is in the .scene, that follows, I otherwise the pictures become mere I illustrations of verbal captions. I There are plonty of scenario writers writ-ers who tell the whole story in subtitles sub-titles and the picture part of th. Ir stories falls absolutely flat, lor tin- audience knows what to expect In each scene before It appears Be careful " only to hint, that Is, foreshadow, scenes In your titles. Titles should seldom be more than 20 words In length. The first titles you will write wi'l be your theme titles, which should tell the point of your stor as Clearly, cleverly and conclnely as possible. Then come your introductory j titles, introducing ami characterizing the various plot people. Never Introduce Intro-duce more than one person In one title Never depend solely on the! title for characterisation, but bej sure your title gives the due to the business which follows. The lapse-of-tlme, and change-ot"-place titles connect the various se-quences se-quences of the picture. Spoken titles should be brief, writ-, ten In the colloquial language that the character ould use although i dialect is to be avoided because It looks foolish on tho screen and should never contain more than one idea in one title. Never let a character char-acter soliloquize that Is. talk to himself. him-self. On the other hand never let him say anything to another character charac-ter unless thee is a logical reason why he should nay it and unless ho looks as if he were sa Ing It. Illustrations drawn on the subtitle cards aid the picture greatly. These illustrations ar- made on separate cards by artists in soft black and white shades or perhaps are real uhotographs; and afterwards they are double exposed onto the lettered cards. Such illustrations. If not over- j done add' greatly to the atmospheric effect of the picture and can be us- 1 to give the key to the mood of the story where words would be too crude. Also they can sometimes be coupled to form an integral part or the title. These illustrations should be noted on your title sheet and should, as a rule, fade on after the title has been read The other lllu-j-I tratlons, which are merely beautiful backgrounds, should be purely designs. de-signs. If you have a good amateur artist In your town, ho rrn letter thr titles, In White on black cards, ana draw the pictures; and you can either film them yourself or send j them to a laboratory to be filmed. I The best scenario writers see to It that all the titles- are In the script In I practically their final form beforo the j picture Is made. Then the actors are j able to give fine shades of meaning I to their speeches Your picture will average about 2f to 40 titles to the reel. Take plenty of time, two hours at least, to write each one. and you will be surprised at the improvement in your photoplay. SELECTING TH I ST. Selecting a cast for an amateur movie Is Just as much an art as it is with the professional casting director. Beware of your friends' Rex Ingram and D. W. Griffith are two of the best models to follow m casting your picture. They look pverj a thousand applicants without play- ! Ing a single favorite until they find the one who la exactly suited to the part. Of course, this won't work for all time as a flat rule in casting Imparl Im-parl .nt parts because external ap-pi ap-pi urancc isn't enough In itself. Your actor must be able to act. Ingram and Griffith can make almost anyone act, and besides, their can-ll-J dates are almost all trained professionals. profes-sionals. For your first picture, m the other hand, you can't possibly i know who can or cannot act sol you'd better pick the ones who look the part; after that you can develop your own a.. tors. Frequently the ones who look exactly ex-actly right in re.il life, are altogeth -r different on the screon. The only( way of determining the final choice Is by actual film test, after the ac-1 tors have their make-ups on. Youj can't take enough of such tests If you.i want your casting to exactly right. Of course If you have any amateur actors of known talent, you will find that they have a great range in . part. It is not well to cast .:vi young people for very old people, or vice versa; but generally speaking, a really good actor can play almost any part within his age limit. One of the. most complained of faults of managerial manag-erial methods Is that they force an' actor who has made a success of one part to play similar parts' until he dies of sheer boredom. You must bear in mind your ensemble en-semble when you pick your actors If you have a very tall heroine, yon cannot successfully cast a very short man to play opposite to her. On the other hand, if you wish deliberately to dwarf your star, as they did when Mary Plekford played the child part In "Little Lord Fauntleroy," you can1 do so by having all the other parts played by very large people and. in addition, by building tho furniture larger than normal. Make sure your cast will work well together. One or two temperamental, trouble-making, fault-finding people can make a company so unhappy that no one can do their best work. One lazy actor can hold up the entire studio a few minutes each day and run up an enormous total of lost time through the course of a production. Also too many individualistic pco- I pie will make a discordant effect on the screen: even If you had the op-! op-! portunlty to cast a picture with nothing noth-ing but gr. -at stars, I should advise against It from an artistic standpoint. I You would find that each and every star was, by force of natural tab nt biaklng the most of the part and. In I consequence, that your audience was; watching a hlstronic thrc-rlngM I circus Instead of a unified story where ; some parts are naturally as colorless ! as others are colorfnl. sSFMBLING THE FILiM Assembling and editing a moti&n picture is a most Important Job Thl- is called "cutting." and it is both an art and a science Directors usually shoot a: least ten times as much film as they need. Aside from the retakes and duplicated I scenes, the picture, when first put to- j gether in "rough cut" form is always ! too long. "Foolish Wives" cam. out in 27 reels Instead of ten. and took six months to cut down. It Is up to the cutter to select the j best scenes, to eliminate whole se-QUences se-QUences from the story by .arious ingenious in-genious methods to cut out dead and uninti resting action, to mark tho col- or tints to get the titles In th. ii? r.ght places, to see that close-ups are Inserted In-serted wherever needed, to make sure, that the story is clear and that its dramatic- sequence is right and If It is not to make It so -an 1 finally to I assure correct tempo. That means, majof surgical operations. To edit a picture you must have ro-Winds, ro-Winds, purehaseable for about $15 on which to wind the film. and. if pos- j sible. a small hand projector made 1 from parts of an old projection ma- chin. . Thes.- machines can be turned by hand and. without any light other than daylight, give you t tiny animat-ed animat-ed picture at the bottom of the telescopic tele-scopic tube. Of course It la possible to cut without such a machine, for. With very little practice you will learn how to pull the film quickly through your hands In such a way as to cause a rough effect of animation First take all your film to the local I CllCIClie .mil .n I ,ui(c IIB, v 13 ii. iv.- lected. I nthis way you can pick out the best "takes" from a photographic and acting standpoint. Then put these takes together, following the scenario exactly and insert th titles. This is easy because at the end of each scene a boy walks In front of the camera cam-era with a Blate bearing a number corresponding to tho number of the scene on tho scenario. Thereupon you project It for the cast and director Everyone will Instantly In-stantly tell you that it is the worst I picture they have ever seen and that they ar-- sorry they ev er were m it Y-.u can't expect people who aren't cutters to understand that a ruugh cut picture is bound to be a bore Mechanically the making of splices between the different pieces of film each scene comes separately is easy. You simply tear tho scene off short I with your fingers where you want it to stop and paste it on the next pieei.-with pieei.-with splicer's cement In a small clip called a splicer's block ( purchaseabh-for purchaseabh-for about ?5i. The cement dries in 30 seconds and the film can be run I through a projection machine. I To assemble and edit, the picturo I you must know dramatic construction. construc-tion. Y'ou must be able to get the j viewpoint of the audience in order to keep the right tempo that is, in or- j der to go fast enough to keep ahead Of the audience and not bore it. and at the same time slowly enough to let the meaning of the various scenes take hold In the emotions of the spectator spec-tator Knowing just how long to let a facial reaction sink In, or just when to cut from the fight scene to tho galloping rescuers is a very' high art. 00 |