what better way to break down what works and doesn't work in a short film than by critiquing real short films made by you the viewer now we've got five or six short films here they're all under 5 minutes long I'm a fan of all of these in their own different way and they range from kind of beginner level to a more advanced level let's jump into it first one is called admin by Vinnie Pagano [Music] solid first shot now this shot not sure if this is intentional or not but there's a lot of uh tension here you see how all this negative space is on this side of the screen and our subject is all the way over here creates a lot of tension like an unbalanced framing is that intentional or is it not well we'll find out as the film progresses the use of black and white is interesting choice especially considering that we have color with the texts here was that scene necessary we'll find out now one thing I'm noticing already is that there's really no ambient audio here we're only hearing the sound of the typewriter which could be a stylistic choice but I think it's more of a didn't do much sound design type of choice even just having some distant sound of like an office telephone ringing or traffic outside or some birds outside to kind of show that hey there's a whole vibrant life waiting for him after he clocks out in a few minutes here would add some life to the scene to me very Quick Cuts here lots of coverage I don't know I'm just I'm kind of wanting some build in the sound design or maybe some music and we got the classic relatable scenario of retyping the same simple email 50 times like don't you just want something going on soundwise right here it just feels uh the pallet just feels too blank here I mean the visually he's doing a lot to like ramp it up and kind of keep the cuts going faster and keeping you on edge a little bit another interesting thing is that the text is so pixelated in this one angle but if you notice like the shots of the clock on the computer screen super Sharp so I think either one can work but I would like to see consistency there in that [Applause] choice now we've got some music keyboard music I like [Applause] it and I like this uh Montage of different sign offs [Applause] [Applause] I mean he's turning sending an email into an action scene which I enjoy uh yeah before you take off I just want to grab that expense report dialog audio is clean uh oh the sexual harassment web training that needs to be completed by next Friday you could just shoot off a quick companywide email let everybody know that that'll be great thanks great love it the most difficult of emails to send is on his plate now all right that's a garage fire film for you I think the biggest takeaways are I didn't mind the black and white cinematography but I do feel like it was generally kind of like this shot's pretty nice looking there's a little bit of depth in the frame back there but one of the early shots let's see where it is this one didn't do much for me it just felt more Awkward than anything and this shot too you notice how there's just no depth in the frame here you've got the subject and then the wall is just right there it's just kind of flat looking there's actually a little bit of depth here uh I think if I was shooting this I would probably want to play this up more knowing that I'm jammed into the corner here or I would just try to move the desk entirely so that the blocking of the entire film isn't just kind of like shoved into this corner and we can set ourselves up for Success more with some more uh interesting compositions minor notes overall well done and this is clearly a a lowbudget short uh a lot of time was taken in the edit it gets pretty nutty here especially with the split screens I did enjoy them a lot this section in particular awesome it reminded me of the I don't know if you saw the video on my YouTube channel about editing the film missing where they had to recreate the entire Mac OS user interface in Illustrator files so that they could zoom in infinitely on these little like text or icons anywhere on the screen and it would be Crystal Clear sharp so they could project it in the movie theater and everything would look sharp but great job and let's hear what Vinnie has to say about this I intended it to be black and white to highlight the monotony of the main character's existence but I know that my chrom across is pretentious or cliche I didn't think it was pretentious it wasn't even that cliche either I think it's just a a choice you made and it's it's totally working I think uh just more Dynamic lighting and compositions would have just made the cinematography stronger and then that would be that interesting thing about the project didn't want to use royalty-free music so during filming I used my zoom H6 to record a bunch of off supplies edited those sounds together and po to create the score awesome I love that that's kind of what we did with our first feature bad is bad we used things that we would find in the kitchen like a spatula or a whisk or whatever and we made all the music using those things like banging them together and doing a bunch of weird stuff okay onwards we got a short film from Matthew Gomez called ask 3 minutes long let's take a look Christmas time this is nice I like the lighting pretty good composition looking good and notice this one already we have some ambience in the background here I'm hearing some birds I'm hearing some Walla we call it when there's like a crowd of people indistinctly murmuring at the same time that's Alan Chadwick who's what do you mean who's that he's only the biggest film producer in the industry love it bro you should go talk to him the amount of time we used to spend creating fake names for characters was disproportionate to the amount of time that we should have been doing it I also like how this guy appears to be typing nonsense down here but I can't quite tell for certain I don't know hello sir my name is Isaac Smith I like what he did there I like that choice he jumped ahead so he kind of fooled Us by cutting into the closeup you think he's going to be talking back to his friend again but he's already ahead and now talking to the guy is Isaac Smith go I'm an aspiring writer and director and I love your work I just I wanted to come over here and introduce myself another one one match cut beautiful cutting ahead in time these shots are very difficult on a low budget oh a bunch of fancy transitions here think we might have storyboarded this one ahead of time and it shows another moving up in the world you got a lot of extras for this cut hold on let's wind it back a little bit transitions are just getting fancier and fancier here look at this one we got we masked out this woman wiping frame here to do the transition way good all right guys that's a [Applause] [Music] ratp so what was your props for this short because from a production standpoint this stuff is so annoyingly difficult to do to get all these people to come together to take part in your short even if they just have to be there for a half an hour getting a dozen people in one room is just so annoying process creating such a unique and intelligent story well I'm still kind of learning the ropes of everything you know this is my first film and it has its ups and downs but I feel like some areas where Corners got cut though now I think this Set uh is probably the weakest set that we've seen so far this is kind of where some uh shortcuts were made uh I think you could have made this look a little bit more like a talk show set just by extending this black curtain back here to cover all this up and I would probably just lose this little Oscar statue it's doing more harm than good and if you had time you know something on this table here because when he moves his hand I think it looks a little unique and intelligence yeah just oh it's a little chest uh I would put some kind of drape or something over that and all those things would help just a little bit story well I'm still kind of learning the ropes of everything you know this is my first film and it has its ups and downs but I feel like I'm getting a good hand over my name is set this is spicy things where the questions are spicy and the guests are even spicier thank you I'm happy to be here happy to have you man yeah thank you for coming on tell us a little is Isaac Smith still directing movies this is only my first one okay look we got a TV show coming out the hair there's a lot of clever choices being made here by the way because you can tell that he has access to some kind of like uh studio right like backdrops and stuff the whole part where he's is walking through the crew uh that's like a little Production Studio space you can create a pretty close version of hot ones just with any backdrop in studio space yeah thank you for coming up and a bald man is Isaac Smith same with this one dir mov chair this my first one okay we got a TV show coming out the hair I got to ask about the hair the hair oh thank you so much honestly I just try to stick look better CL and uh so you've had quite a journey starting as a production assistant most defitely honestly like I said I was just always waiting for someone just to give me a chance I go get someone C I'll go get someone anything that they want just to show them that I am the guy because I'm going to keep directing until the day I die let's see next one is Isaac Smith directing we want to ramp upamp up ramping ramping okay I will say I feel like that ramp up wasn't the best because we reused so many shots we've already seen now granted if you're going to do a montage where you suddenly start flashing images you want you don't want to have to go out and shoot a 100 new setups just so you can cover 5 Seconds of your film I'm not saying that but uh I think you could have maybe shortened some of that whole buildup of the Montage of the dreams and fantasy and all that just for the purpose of saving a few shots to throw in there so that they weren't all angles that we've already seen which it seemed like they were and that would just add a little bit of more freshness and like honestly production value to that sudden ramp up part right there was all a dream missed opportunities it was good I liked it one thing this is totally like a directing thing but like on paper this shot's great but then in reality when you're on set um it's not the most flattering for the actor so it's just something to keep in mind you know if you don't have like a makeup department or whatever then you have to be the one that's looking out for your actors I like this com to frame turning around it's it's well shot listed or storyboarded you can tell tells a nice story you know somebody else shook the hand somebody else is going to live his dream thank you Matthew Gomez now let's jump into the next one this is called the last request and from writing the full script to shooting to the final edit this short film took a total of 7 hours of work which is nuts was deliberately a speedrun for a simple idea I love that love to hear it and I think it turned out great let's take a look this is the last request by hugs are optional written directed by Caleb stringini I'm probably messing up all these names I apologize love this first shot great landscape jumping straight into it we love that [Music] this is a particularly difficult type of shot to get without any additional lighting or grip gear because it's just super bright white wall getting slammed with sun and then you got Shadow right next to it really going to push the dynamic range whatever you're shooting on same with this white door I wonder if they planned out the time of day to shoot it though cu the sun must have been pretty low if you look at where their Shadows are they're straight on if the sun was directly overhead right here this would look very ugly but right now now it looks great freeze put your hands up drop the needle drink it Walter solid blood spurt okay up until now things have looked pretty good and like passable especially with the editing the pacing everything's just moving and going uh had that great blood hit when he got shot this title really throws at though it's giving Windows Movie Maker you know what I'm saying my recommendation to beginner filmmakers this if you're not confident with graphic design or anything like that just like downplay just like less is more you know do something that's clean and minimal and simple and that'll give you the best shot at um looking good also the other general rule of thumb is smaller titles tend to look uh better and Slicker and more professional so like the title itself is good I just feel like different font Choice color and potentially different animation into it would really do a lot because when you have one title in a film it's like make it good make it make it hit you know what I'm saying hello we need an ambulance at 6767 Woodville drive a man's been shot please hurry keeps the Sun the ambulance will be here soon no I'm not going to make it don't say that I can feel it this is the end I I want to see my son ni one last time I don't know how I'm going to do that he has a YouTube channel what what's the channel name it's super gamer Archie Su super gamer Archie no spaces no [Music] spaces all right okay is this it no scroll down a little bit this this one yeah he looks more like me in that one his performances are killer the guy who's dying is just we're playing content creators are you tired of making unprofessional sloppy looking YouTube videos what you need to do is learn to use a damn it's an ad are the there's 30 I can't skip it there's 30 seconds left in just music is great I mean when you're doing like a spoof or parody like this you have to know enough about the genre and the type of film that you're parodying to be able to do it well and then just you know change out what what's happening for a ridiculous situation so they got the right music they've got the right angles the lighting is good enough the you know they got clean audio like everything on a technical level is like good enough for it to work and if it wasn't enough the comedy wouldn't work as well either it was the interesting thing like you that's why Key and Peele were so killer at what they did because they were able to do these parodies of like Rambo or something like that but it looks really legit at first and then as it turns into something ridiculous you're still along for the ride and the comedy just works even better same thing with the almost Friday guys on YouTube and Chris and jack on YouTube like really good sketch comedy channels that kind of blur the line between what even is a sketch and just an actual film bit if you want to be of that damn indry click the link filming movie and take our gig gim and learn to become a gig gimble guy Walter you still with me come on I love the fake commercial three and here have you ever consider question Dam a second ad it's also 30 seconds but just glass kind of guy or G Premium Water you'll never go Walter stay with me 10 more seconds 10 more seconds it up with the blood coming Weise bring you the highest quality product that's water with don't Fade Out On Me Now this one the focus is kind of going in and out it's starting to lose me and also the framing is really rough on this shot I can see what why this happened because they're trying to get they're trying to get this guy in frame and they're also trying to get this guy in frame so that's why it's tough this guy if he had stayed super low then it would have worked out but I think the cameraman right now is trying to like follow but keep them both in the frame and then what you end up with is getting a severe haircut on his framing here I think the only thing you could have really done would be to get the camera way lower on like a high hat or something and angle up past this guy in the ground's face instead of being above his face already and trying to still get this guy that's above him so if if you're below or like at level with his face shooting up past it then you have a lot more freedom with your framing water drink water and done now let me just turn up the brightness okay perfect hey guys this is super game wter it's your son today we're going to play vola Tycoon I just want to give a shout out to all my Patriot supporters we just even the voice of the kid is great the retainer let's go alter uh yeah I don't quite buy the police light in the background that looks pretty phony but it doesn't really matter at this point and again the end credits fonts the same as the opening title font it's just a little too cartoony I feel like I'm about to see I don't know Beetle Juice or the mask or something with this as opposed to if you want rip off the title font of one of your favorite movies that's actually in this genre and then your work is done for you just grab like Mystic Rivers opening title font or something and look how small this crew was 7 hours they made this thing in awesome I'd love to see it I'd love to see what they would do with a longer production timeline than 7 hours all right good job hugs are optional give them a like and a follow and I'm going to put all of the channels in the description here uh give them a subscribe give them thumbs up support your fellow filmmakers and if you want to see your film featured as one of these critiques then go to standard story code.com and join Friday film notes my free Weekly Newsletter for filmmakers 10,000 of you are already reading it every week and I'll put another call for entries in the near future so you can submit me your shorts all right we got a great short film next oh lunch was here by our dear sponsor Factor how would you like to get Chef prepared meals on your table in two minutes flat well Factor's ready to eat meals let you do that so you can get back to soaking up this beautiful 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code standard story 50 to get 50% off your first factory box and 20% off your next month of orders that's code standard story 50 at factor75.com to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month of orders thanks factor that was delicious let's go on to the next film huh all right this next one is called bottle Treasure by Santiago musachio hope I got your name right here we go when I was seven okay since we're talking about titles already notice how this title is huge and fills up the frame but it looks kind of nice right to me opening titles they look great when they're either quite small in the frame or just huge in the frame and taking up the whole thing and I don't think there's that much room in between so that is just my simpleton Layman graphic design tip that I've picked up small titles or big titles in the middle is when it starts to look clunky and not that polished but again Noti this is just a really simple clean minimal font over a simple clean minimal backdrop so it just looks a little nicer I solved a mystery see that bottle that was the first clue and that's me nice that was the beginning of my grand Adventure well shot so far framing up that bottle in the wave wonder how many times it took tossing the bottle out before the waves cooperated the note red a treasure is yours if you choose to seek I warn you though it's not for the weak if you accept my quest for you I'll help you out with a clue oh look at thisd look at this tracked Motion Graphics of the text popping out on the Note as he reads it under the third think you're tough call my bluff that's a nice little effect was it necessary no I don't think so if these Clues come back later on in the short then it's going to be nice to have seen those words highlighted in that way one thing that I'll say about this narration which is funny cuz I just did this video about narration last week is uh I do feel like the audio quality of the narration itself isn't the best like I want it to sound deep and sorous and uh really present and it just sounds a little tiny and not very full so when you're doing a narration voice over like this try to get the best possible audio quality however you can it should be easier because you're in post now and you can record and re-record and make sure that you're set up is As controlled as possible under the third think you're tough call my bluff the game was a foot home of the bird possibly a nest but why the third the paper had oil stained and the bottle had dry dirt inside which meant the seal held and the dirt inside was the same as when it was bottled of the clue if I could find a dirt sample which matched that inside the bottle I could confirm the location of I found a series of possible matches but I needed more starting to abuse some of the little quick whoes in my opinion uh even the camera flash effect it's nice and it was very effective in the beginning but now we're starting to approach like okay let's drop that and kind of move on to something new editorially and the oil it wasn't a natural occurrence and it wasn't a mistake it was a clue they were telling me the species of the tree it must have been eucalyptus oil under the third home of the bird it was under the third tree but the third quickly this is mov my bluff call my bluff Bluff wasn't a taunt it was a landmark a bluff as in an ocean Cliff I had solved it the treasure was buried under the third eucalyptus tree on the Bluffs and yet it wasn't there what was I missing lots of coverage lots of solid cinematography throughout honestly the sound is more lacking than anything I really want that ntion to just pop bird under the third okay we got more the text coming up on the I'm starting to like it more now because it's more integrated into the entire short now if it was just popping up over the note as he read it in that one scene then I'd be like seems a little extra maybe for no reason but now that it's filling the frame back here in like different ways it's more integrated into the film and I'm liking it had to and then it hit me it had to be under the third [Music] tree I like that little sound of zoma dropping the music bringing in this base drone bring it back up kid actors have so much fun in scenes like [Music] this well done part of the style of this film too with like the tons of coverage they got might be partially because they're working with uh child actors when you're working with child actors that is just get that coverage you're going to want it later on it just makes everything so much easier when you and it makes it easier for the kid if you don't have to like nail a perfect take emotionally and the timing and all that stuff you can just be like oh that was good okay I'm going to flip it around and get this and then I can cut it together and uh you know I don't have to berid a child on on set yet again for messing up great take I don't do that found no gold do not dismay the real treasure was the friends we made along the way it was at that moment I realized that I had just spent an entire weekend accomplishing absolutely nothing man I missed that was good yeah if it had just ended on uh the real treasure was the friends we made along the way obviously that would be very cliche and uh sappy oh great The Gardener's here folks doesn't he know I have a YouTube channel doesn't he know here we shot this thing on our camera was this 5D Mark 3 that worked pretty well considering it was older than both of our actors when we were outside our lens was the Canon 24 to 105 F4 and I just bought that lens indoors it was the Canon 50 mm Prime f1.8 we had to use this F world monitor since the 5D screen is way too dark to see anything and we used this Ronin s for our tracking and moving shots voice over audio was done with this Blue Yeti microphone and the on location dialogue was picked up with this Tas Cam dr10l and our lights were this on Amazon for 80 bucks and there you go that that's all the takes to make this film nice I mean you can see how minimal the shoot was it's really just looks like a director/ DP kind of covering all the action they did have a decent amount of production design they had to do like these little setups for this swash buckling mystery tale but uh they did a good job it felt kind of appropriately childlike but still competent you know oh and by the way I think the only reason they included this little breakdown behind the scenes thing was it was for yeah it was for a contest or challenge to use under $2,500 worth of gear equipment so purposely done with the cheapest gear we had access to all right well done I mean it was entertaining and working with child actors always poses a lot of challenges and I like some of the attention to detail here like the bottle looks good it looks weathered the paper looks pretty good treasure I could confirm the location of the treasure and uh it seems like they took time to actually write out the clues and make it clever and thought out so good job thank you Sky Pig films all right the last two are a little more polished than the others and as a big fan let's jump into this one I'll call you back only 3 minutes long let's see what they are able to pull off oh no oh no Jim Jim composition he's not lighting I don't know what to do camera movement Go please great yeah okay not that what an effective intro right there's so much going on I feel like it's worth breaking this all down we've got this shot strong uh composition see this woman's feet see this guy's feet he's clearly not doing well we're in a basement Jim he's not moving little slider shot here get a little bit of blood and then I love her uh wardrobe it feels like scary old grandma clothes in a younger woman and I believe that she would kill somebody I don't know I just get that Vibe like she could seem Innocent but she could also just murder you with a hammer I I believe it and also is this a period film I don't know she's using a older Wireless telephone so maybe that's where the sweater is coming from performance is great sound quality is great cinematography is all you need you know as far as the lighting goes it's simple but it's effective strong lighting where we're getting good harsh Shadows down here uh this practical I don't I wonder if this is actually doing all the work lighting her face probably not because it looks like it's kind of far away and more behind her so there probably is a soft box over here that's kind of like coming down on her but probably just a one light setup plus this practical and then over here you even have a little accent light with a color temperature variations blue daylight maybe coming through a little window I'm not sure what that is but it's just a nice little touch but the performance is really taking Center Stage here she nailed it that first line read of okay not that maybe it's Jim Jim please please wake up I also used this exact same music track from art list in my editor versus his high school short film video when I re-edited my old horror short film he's not moving must be a popular one no I am a trend Setter I need an ambulance again nice cinematography here just very simple techniques at play but you see how we've got again kind of like a softer light coming down on her here no fill or maybe actually a very little bit of fill coming from back here almost like a rim but importantly just the color temperature contrast here with this blue light uh splashing on this wall back here and potentially another blue light just giving her a little bit of fill from back there uh but it's just just simple but effective does the job we're at number 37 n g place please send someone quickly he's not breathing he's not breathing he's not breathing he's dead he's dead unfortunately this actor is doing a great job because this is all monologue the other thing they're doing that's nice is she's delivering monologue but she's also doing stuff you see how she's like putting the gloves on she's taking the hammer she's noticing Blood on the table there's still things happening it's not just her doing a monologue in a void you know of plots avoid of plot on perspective angle that blood looks a little bit like jelly or Jam I'm going to get nitpicky I told him to be careful but I was um I was uh sorry I was upstairs and but you notice how when the action stops I heard this noise it starts to feel a little slower like I feel like if we had something for her to do still or throughout the entire thing as opposed to her just like she cleaned up the stain she got the thing out of the box but now she's stopped again and she's still doing the monologue and to me the pacing dips right here so if we had something more for her to do you know she had to like take his clothes and she's putting them in a big barrel that she's about about to light on fire whatever it is that would keep the story moving on top of her monologue he was yelling he was talking to someone like he was yelling at someone to to stop no it's okay I can carry on I like this they're they're keeping it visually interesting though like now we're jumped into this really wide angle lens shot really close up on the actor giving us more Distortion in the frame making her look a little more crazy it gives the impression that somebody's a little more crazy when you get the lens right up on them like that with a wide angle I heard all this yelling and then and then and then and then and then and then and you notice the little bit of sound design they're doing to help along the performance like she did a great job bouncing between the fake performance and critiquing her own performance but the sound design listen to it as it helps that transition really nice okay oh no oh no it's Jim he's not moving oh no oh no it's Jim he's not moving so so so cry cry cry by the way look at the crew here got two writer directors two actors and a first a pretty minimal oh no oh no it's Jim he's moving I'll call you back great last line which is also the title it really finishes the story strong you know that she's about to murder this man AKA she's going to have a reason to call them back am I just explaining the joke too much I I don't know but I thought it was quite effective now at 3 minute yeah about 3 minutes on the dot for the actual story and then you get the credits for a little bit uh also respect for the fact that the credits are appropriately short they don't drag on for an additional 2 minutes after the story is actually ended uming I think that as is this probably still could have been cut down by like I don't know 30 seconds maybe it's just those moments where she doesn't actually have anything to do physically and she's just practicing the monologue still it just this pacing dropped too much for me so I wanted her to still have things to do which effectively keeps the story moving ahead at least the plot element of the story moving ahead so yeah just I I would have just bull up pointed out like okay she's going to burn his clothes she's going to write a fake suicide note whatever it is and she can be doing those things while she's practicing and then it pacing stays solid for me but loved that short great job to David Harding Thomas Young meline hat Simon staler Georgia Rose solid five person team got together probably shot the in one night and it looks really slick and Polished right a lot of that's in the post but a lot of that's in the production too they knew how to light they knew how to shoot it and they had great performers and that's it they just shot in somebody's basement and lastly but not leastly we have the one that probably has the most production value of any of the ones that we've seen so far it's called peanuts and although it is technically over 5 minutes long a lot of that last minute is credits and it's an interesting film I wanted to include it so let's jump into peanuts submitted by Derek Hughes fun [Applause] here you are man have a good one you too all right so immediately we're 8 seconds in and what do you feel from this like what what's your impression of the film just from the very very beginning to me I'm like okay this is polished This is highly polished we got some sound editing from this song that cuts into a diagetic version of the song that's playing in the story or speakers it immediately starts with an action like giving this guy this uh have a good one purchase and then he wipes frame Dynamic still good to stick around and put the [ __ ] away yeah I got it all right thanks I owe you we have the was undoubtedly actual employee of the store and a cameo here uh we are closing in 5 minutes please bring all purchases to the front thank you and it looks pretty nice all right I'll see you tomorrow dude this shot look great I'm wondering if this is real the Stitch and time shop it looks like it could either be composited in or that's the actual name of that shop right there yeah yeah yeah yeah we can we can watch it tonight when I I'll be home in like an hour or so there a soft glow on the highlights I swear to God if you watch it without me I'm leaving you this evening I don't know if that's filtration like some kind of promist filter or what no I'm just the [ __ ] is this no no sorry no I'm I was talking to myself listen I got I got to go I got stuff I have to do okay not I love you too I'm not sure if this phone call was needed in the film really he's just finding a tape and he's putting it in I guess it establishes that he has a loved one but I don't know if that's needed for this again nice anim motography throughout lighting color palette this looks like it was nicely [Music] colored get stranger from here [Music] a little soft on the focus yeah I'm good on that I love a confident cut like that a hard [Music] cut that's creepy [ __ ] [Music] townies I don't know I while I love this shot and kind of the idea of this shot of this woman out here part of me wishes it was even wider than that there's something about seeing a figure out in the distance and like not getting a lot of detail but wanting that detail that makes it a little creepier but then again I don't know what this parking lot looks like that might have been an impossibility anyways but I do like the idea of seeing this in the wide here just the one street light overhead Illuminating her yeah I like the cool tone the cool color palette throughout this lots of Blues whites not much warmth works for the story I [Music] think but it's cool color palette in a way that's not cheesy like one of the easiest things to do with horror shorts especially for beginners is to think okay I want it to be creepy looking I want it to be scary so I'm going to give it like a lot of blue lighting and then you just Blast Your actor's faces with blue and everything is blue and it just looks kind of crappy like you need actual skin tone like you see right here we have like a fairly natural looking skin tone now this is pretty desaturated but it's still like a natural skin tone and then everything around him including his clothing which is a part of the color palette like these are important choices to make are much cooler and more blue the lighting itself is probably just more white than anything it's just like a maybe like a cool white like a 6,000 degrees or 6500 or something like that but it's not over the toop Party City Blue old music and weird animations like this are always creepy yep no thank you all right all right all right we switched into handheld now what the [ __ ] okay that's that's [ __ ] terrifying I'm [Music] that's love that Reverb on the music excuse me we're closed great how the hell did you get in here I love this song starting to feel David lynchy right get out [Music] [Music] now I Love [Music] This creepy we'll go back to that jump scare in a minute I don't want to break the flow too much you shouldn't have gone in there he's in there one of the easiest effects with horror just turn off the lights in part of the scene come on looking into pure darkness is always going to be effective and having a character emerge from Pure [Music] Darkness nutty PE nutty okay and that is peanuts real quick before we talk about anything great job with the end credits here look at this font choices look how small in the frame we got the thin title font and then the thicker Bolder name fonts right there lowercase uppercase taste F okay take notes folks all right let's talk about this one wild right uh had a lot going on first of all let's go back to this jump scare real quick get out now it definitely worked it creeped me out the first time I saw it but I had a feeling that okay he the light goes out behind him he turns around and then the sound design sweeps up hard it's actually kind of like that artless music track is that the second one that has used this very funny how popular that track is I'll have to maybe not use that one in the future but uh it turns back around I'm kind of feeling like this scare might have been creepier if the sound had gone down before she screams at him but I don't know I'd have to see it both ways there's no real science to this I love this s cuz you know it was already up so I feel like that hit and bringing the sound design in as she says that might have been creepier in there he in there now I definitely don't understand this film from a story perspective except that he put on a tape and I guess it summons this uh peanut guy do you want one but also do we need to understand it and great makeup on this hand by the way maybe the nail is like a presson nail and I can kind of tell here but it looks great overall and then you have this wacky sequence uh which is almost feels like something out of Mandy and I don't know how they got this one visual at the end of it see if we can frame by frame our way there yeah wild I don't know if that's AI generated or what but well done and another great thing about the credits is they got the backdrop of the peanut animation anything you can do to the credits to just give it a little something you know whether that's a little bit of music a little bit of footage you didn't use in the film or something that just kind of brings back something from earlier in the film if you're going to watch this at a film festival for example you're watching these back to back to back and then you have to sit through the credits for each one the credits become so tiresome so Qui quickly so it's nice to do something like this just softens the blow of those credits especially because you know he had a decent amount of people working on this sound operator second AC makeup artist production assistant I like how for us that's like a lot of people but yeah he didn't have that many people he had maybe a half a dozen people but well done Derek Hughes I think with horror you know you really don't need to explain everything and it's better I would much rather watch a horror short film that attempted to explain nothing than one that actually attempted to like tell you okay well here's the peanut guy here's where he came from here's why he likes peanut so much I don't really need all that the Peanut Vendor animation and song uh part of public domain so we probably found these old things and like that's kind of creepy could probably use that in a creepy short film and then boom you get peanuts thank you everybody for submitting your films I know it's very scary to submit your film for a public critique so give these guys some props subscribe to their channels I'll put the links in the descriptions and if you want to submit your short film join Friday film notes my free newsletter at stand story code.com I'm not accepting submissions right now but when I am accepting submissions for new short films for this now monthly series I'm going to be doing where I break down your short films then I will put out that call on that newsletter all right thank you all for watching hope this got you inspired to go make something yourself let's make some movies huh