For filmmakers of all experience levels, this guide to freelance video production provides information on technical and creative aspects of shooting video for a variety of small scale projects. Beginning with three general chapters on imaging, audio, and lighting, the work explores specific scenarios such as marketing and promotion videos, music videos, weddings, and live events, providing readers with detailed explanations of technical considerations as well as key aspects of storytelling appropriate for particular situations. Color photographs and illustrations, special notes, and tips are included throughout, and access to additional online resources, including checklists and cheat sheets, is provided. Artis is an experienced film maker and is a professor of film at New York University. Focal Press is an imprint of Elsevier. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

"If I want to send a message, I'll call Western Union." This famous line has been attributed to various movie moguls, yet while these moguls ruled the Hollywood studio system, movies were in the midst of a golden age of dialogue. Films included more messages, ideas, themes, and pontifications than they ever have since. Although producers trembled at commands from the front office, writers (the low men and women on the totem pole) went quietly to their typewriters and, as the subversive revolutionaries that most writers are, turned out prose that did send messages. How could they resist? They had the biggest and best platform in the world: Hollywood movies. The 200 speeches collected in Ready for My Close-Up! are from some of the best - and a few of the worst - films ever made. From Groucho Marx's "I shot an elephant in my pajamas" to Julia Roberts's "What it takes to be a movie star," here is the wit and wisdom of the great Hollywood screenwriters.

How many times have you missed the best bits of a Marx Brothers movie, failing to catch Groucho's famous one-liners because you were still laughing at the bit with Harpo and the zipped-up banana? And what about the lemonade stall? The mirror section? And the blue-tined ballet sequence? This book offers what the videos can't, ant that's a short cut to some of the funniest films of all time -- Monkey Business (1931), Duck Soup (1933), and A Day at the Races (1937) -- scripted by some of the wittiest screenwriters Hollywood ever produced. In addition to a generous number of stills from each movie, this bumper edition also includes a cast and production crew list for movie buffs as well as an Introduction by Karl French.

Rolf Canton explores the careers of Minnesotans who have worked behind the scenes in the movie industry. Canton draws from many sources to flesh out the film careers and the Minnesota connections of the talented individuals who make movies happen.

Award-winning independent filmmaker Glenn Berggoetz shares all he knows about making a marketable feature film for $2,000. While most books on independent filmmaking talk about how to make a film with a budget of anywhere from $50,000 to half a million dollars or more, the reality of the indie film world is that most filmmakers rarely have more than a few thousand dollars at their disposal for making their film. This book is written specifically for those filmmakers, and for filmmakers who would typically waste years trying to raise tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars to make their film simply because they're not aware that there's another, more efficient way to go about it.

Edited by Brigitta Burger-Utzer, Stefan Grisseman.

The writers of Reno 911! and several other feature films trace their haphazard experiences in the movie industry, revealing the process through which they worked on script development with executives and stars, pacified exploitative decision makers and fought to be paid for their work.