I know I could shoot a better POV movie than 90% of the directors out there.
Most importantly, I would edit my own material. Do you guys know that a lot of porn directors have OTHER people edit their product? What kind of mess is that?
In my fuck flicks I would have total control end to end.
NOTE: I've got a Canon GL2 & website skills. Just you wait and see. The best porn is made by total perverts like myself. Not jaded jocks/pretty boys who are just going through the motions.
Edited by - tritone on 3/8/2007 6:29:57 PM
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BoogieNights Deactivated User
102 Posts 2/07
Posted - Mar 8 2007 : 6:34PM
So, how many people would want to work with you once word got out that you were a total control freak?
That's a good thing. The problem is usually when companies insist on giving the editing, package design, etc., to staff hacks and chuckleheads. The best directors have their own editors, and sometimes backup shooters, handle the costumes and music, and so forth.
Steph thank you, and I totally agree with everything you said. It was very well thought out.
My Goal from the moment I got into this business, was to produce a better product than the crap that was being pushed onto the fans. I make movies because it is in my blood. It is my passion. But I don't make them for myself... I make them for the people who make it possible for me to fulfill that passion. The fans. Connecting and listening to those people is very important to me.
Maybe I am an oddity in this business, but as I said before, money doesn't motivate me. People who know me well, know that I just want to make great movies and be able to pay the bills, anything else is a bonus.
Most film directors don't edit their own work. Most don't handle photography or camera operation.
Why in porn are these the hallmark of a director who is committed to his work?
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tritone Deactivated User
1009 Posts 4/03
Posted - Mar 8 2007 : 7:31PM
I am talking about small-time porn production. In my eyes, I would do everything: produce, direct & edit. I have a vision of exactly the end prodcut I would like to see. While I am shooting I am constantly thinking about -- how is this going to look when I am jerking off to it at home.
Now you see why I would not want anyone else cutting the film and deciding what stays in and what gets kicked out.
Your analogy to mainstream features or even bigger budget porn movies doesn't apply here.
Hmmm, I am really starting to like you skronker. Couldn't agree more. I think I might be able to dig out a compliment in what you wrote.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I shoot and edit all of my movies. I oversee package design. My female partner and I pickout/buy all the costumes/wardrobe for my movies. And I hand pick every piece of music that I use for a scene. To me these tasks are the fun part of making a movie. And in a way it is my signature. Why would I let someone else take my fun away.
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AlexPanzer Deactivated User
1593 Posts 6/03
Posted - Mar 8 2007 : 7:44PM
I can care less who is behind the camera if only the product is what I like. If the monkey makes a good DVD then I dont care.
TonyC maybe I didn't make my point clear. Because you so eloquently expanded on it for me. We are thinking the same thing. Anyone with a DV cam thinks they can do it, and they do, and usually not so good... The proof is in what is being sold today.
I think what it really comes down to is that there are no handouts in this world. Nobody's going to say "Hey this guy/girl has some really great reviews! Let's throw some at 'em and see what they can do."
Realistically it's the same as with anything else. If you work hard enough (and you happen to be good enough) you'll find a way to do it.
The idea of a person's prowess at reviewing translating into a solid job in the industry without anything else to support the fact that they have any kind of talent is lofty at best.
Fucking super talented directors are having problems getting signed up for gigs right now, so I kind of think novice fanboy scribes are not going to be in demand anytime soon. Personally, I think I could have a lot of fun just working up some brief vignettes without getting too convoluted, and see if it adds up to anything promising. But, really, there's no need to replicate what Von Swine is doing, or what Jonni Darkko is doing, or what William H is doing or what Jules Jordan is doing ... it gets done everyday. But porn could use some different flavors that aren't Euro or "alt" or "Ninn" or whatever ... I'm really turned on by a lot of the stuff at Kink.com, and the possibilities of exploring some of the headspace in a somewhat less gothic ambience. There also are certain performers who work incredibly well together, and it would be thrilling to see what they came up with given absolute freedom and a non-San Pornando environment to explore it in.
Of course, you may need to have an Emergency Room nearby, fresh oxygen tanks and a sewing kit ...
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Pocketcomb_Pimp Deactivated User
1921 Posts 7/03
Posted - Mar 9 2007 : 2:33AM
Some of the best porn I've seen has been mae doe about 10% of your big budget (Shows how much you know about the industrt) Beyond that, I wouldn't trust anyone with a can o WD-40, it's major compound is water and it leaves rusty parts in worse shape than before. I suggest you get silicone pray and a book on home and self improvement.
those i quoted are not differents. they have the same ideology of the cinema. I am not into "études de moeurs". it's fuckin boring. but i like Louis Malle (which was rejected by the movement), robert Bresson...
but i can admit that some new wave directors had influence on other directors. like american ones and actually corean directors.
anyway, I prefer Italian directors: Pasolini, Ferreri, and neorealists Fellini, Rosselini, Antonioni...
I met one day Noé. and he is a misanthrope like me. he rules.
De Blangis.
Edited by - le duc de blangis on 3/9/2007 7:33:16 AM
It will have to be pretty good to make into a series!
It would be best to: 1> Star the gals that post on ADT! 2> Produced by Drew and Bill. 3> Scenes from AstroKnight, Bono-One, Shronker, Pagoda & Steph! 4> BTS from the Coach and featuring interview with Nicki Hunter!
TonyC wrote [/quote] If this "anyone can do it" handicam porn is (the majority of what's) being sold, isn't that proof that anyone can do it? [/quote]
Yes, you are correct, that is my point of contention, that any untrained, unskilled person can do it with a Best Buy home DV cam. I am not debating semantics. I am giving my opinion as to why this Industry has such low standards and horrid production values. Yes, anyone can make a movie. Doing it well is another story, and my whole point.
If this "anyone can do it" handicam porn is (the majority of what's) being sold, isn't that proof that anyone can do it?
Click to expand
I am giving my opinion as to why this Industry has such low standards and horrid production values.
Click to expand
I guess I'm still not clear on why you think the industry has such low standards and horrid production values.
The same technologies are available to people who aspire to make non pornographic film and television, yet that aspect of the business has not seen the perciptious drop in the basic quality of what's being produced. Popular film and television may not be to one's taste, but anyone who compares the average quality of craft demonstrated in mainstream productions to what's found in typical porn is delusional at best.
Why has mainstream entertainment able to maintain it's standards, while porn seems to be in some sort of a death race to the bottom?
Buuuut, I have to rebut your point about Television as far as keeping its standards high and production values intact.
ALOT of people within the industry constantly complain about the Influx of "reality" based programs. I see it all the time, for every Sopranos or Entourage..Theres several Wife Swap, Housewives of Orange County, Laguna Beach(although that shows looks fantastic with the 16:9 Progressive), and random Car explosion shows on Spike TV.
You're making a pretty blanket statement just to shit on most Porn..Maybe because you're frustrated or embarrased to be put in the same bracket as Preggo Abusers and Anal Whorgies #27..but I don't really know.
I think worrying about Presentation and Production values should come secondary to content and intention. Although I do agree with you that we(and by we I mean people that enjoy eroticism) need to do a better job at helping those on the outside understand and appreciate the beauty of Sex..Believe me Tony Im on your side.. I just do not enjoy superficial Candy Coated, Scripted, No Interaction Sex.(Strip, Blowjob, Cowgirl,Doggie, dissolve)
Popular film and television may not be to one's taste, but anyone who compares the average quality of craft demonstrated in mainstream productions to what's found in typical porn is delusional at best.
There are interesting ways to get your stuff out that don't even have anything to do with film, let alone porno film. I have friends who get their CDs and indie DVDs out in the market. I may be naive, but it seems to me that a quality "adult" DVD with an original slant and the right spin could sell 2,000 copies in New York alone. Just take them with you to the right parties, get a screening at Two Boots Pioneer Cinema in the East Village with some of the cast in town, do a lot of street level promotion and tie-in to the hipster cross0ver market (and that IS the market here) -- most media people I know are total pervs, or perv-curious, and they'd drop $15 on a fresh-looking porno ... a martini is $15 now.
But I'm thinking mostly of a glam/SM/fetish 90% girlie thing ...
The thing is, great porn can be as "simple" as just lighting up the fireworks and stepping back with a camera. If you have energy between two performers who can wind each other's clock, you have something great -- I can't really explain it, but there's times when you objectify the girl --- Veronique Vega and a bunch of cocks, om CoverMyFace.com. You're projecting yourself into the moment, feeding on the starlet's unbound avaiilability -- she's giving up EVERY hole! eeeeeyuggggghhhhhahahaha! When she begs to have her 18-year-face plastered over by molten trouser grout, those cocks are all your cocks. And you just want to wipe the floor with her and send her back home to Daddy like the slutty slutty pig she is -- too lazy to work at Starbucks! Well, this is what happens to you, then! Of course, with a smile on her face and a fat wad of Benjamins in the back pocket her sweet plump little 18-year-old ass curves against to deliciously. And no herpes, warts, or vaginal tearing.
But when there's a heavy one-on-one and the performers are getting off AND killing each other, I'm sometimes floating around in the woman's head ... like as if you were having real sex with someone real in your own real bed ... like Vulcan Mind Meld Super-Jedi Fuck Machine shit. The best kind of scene, the performers might as well be objectifying YOU.
Re-reading this thread I realize I'm coming off as more of a crank than is my intention.
I'm all in favor of people saying "Well I gues if I want to see the film I want to see, I'm going to have to make it myself," and then going out and making it. That's what I did back in 1995 when I decided I wasn't going to waste anymore time looking for the one porno video that actually delivered what the box-cover seemed to promise (Remember back when porno box covers made it look like there was a 'real' movie inside?) I sized up everything about what resource I could bring to the party (money time talent) and went to work. A decade later I've made a couple of films I'm proud of, make a decent living, and haven't asked anyone to give up their dignity or health in the process.
If anyone's got their own idea for what their all time perfect porno would look like, I'm the first one to say go for it! But go for it with your eye open! Look around and ask yourself, "Why are things the way they are? Why do people make porn the way they make it? Why do they sell it the way they sell it?" The better you understand the business side, the better you can avoid the pitfalls that get people caught in the trap of quantity over quality.
But by all means do it. Cameras are cheap. You can edit on a $1000 laptop. If you really think you have something new and different, you can't afford not to do it!
With many it's churning out the movies, not a mission to be the most dauntless producer in the face of deadlines, embarking on a quest for the holy grail of porn. Indeed, Mason-esque ways of working to get it right pays off in the product, but churning out also finds its quality through random chemistry, the cosmos align, - whatever.
Is porn art.. doesn't matter, we can draw parallels anyways. Sometimes art is inspired and can't be rushed, other times it's just a splash of paint on a canvas. It's easy to say you'll get it right.
Needless to say none of this applies to neglectful mistakes, like 90% of a scene being closeups
I don't think being an astute critic translates into a being a promising director. The ability to view a movie and deconstruct it in words to convey your likes and dislikes is a specific talent. It's not the same as the ability to create a movie from scratch. Even if you come up with a great, original concept, it doesn't mean you have any talent for dealing with all the other human beings on a set.
I don't think that's slowed down too many pornographers ... though I think that's essential if you're going to make the best stuff,
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Pocketcomb_Pimp Deactivated User
1921 Posts 7/03
Posted - Mar 12 2007 : 5:31PM
Being a good athelete doesn' make you the best coach. Being a smart student doesn't make you a teacher, but this is porn! Your ability to know what works and doesn't work is what it's all about. Do you buy movies for the acting, plot and budget? If you do, I can't help you. If you want the natiest possible sex, I suggest you let a solid reviewer put his critiques to work.
Once again, not solictation, but personally I think a reviewer is a mush better choice than 90% of the industry talent that directs. Truth be told, if you watch the BTS is most of those titles you see that the talent doesn't even run the show. They call the shots and typically only manage to piss off the camera guy.
If I were a porn director, I'd have a stock company of performers that work well together, based on past chemistry. Unfortunately today's market is all about "what's new," not what works. I would pair the same performers together in a variety of scenes for various projects. I'd cast for good teams, not novelty. Yes, I might better my chances of making a genuinely arousing product, but I doubt that would translate into financial success.
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Mar 13 2007 : 12:01AM
I was almost with ya there! This thread is largely about how current directors suck. Do you think that all of the ones that suck didn't at one point in their lives think they knew exactly what would make good porn.
I suggest that everybody with great ideas but no production knowledge get into the producer or screenwriter's chair, not the director's chair.
Otherwise, you run a huge risk of being just another director who thought they knew what would be hot but had no idea how to capture it.
Bingo! I could make kickass porn with my warped MaloneMasonMeatholeMentality. However I have never held a camera in my hands, have difficulty adjusting the lighting in my bathroom, have never even edited a home movie, and have no interest in doing so. I would love to put my most bizarre fantasies on a DVD so that they leave my head and quit haunting me at night; but the only interest I have in a director's chair is figuring out how to fuck it.
I write short stories, and have had some published. I also edit and proofread. But I don't review. When I try to review it gets in the way of writing.
I think it's an end result versus process thing. I know the process well enough that I can imagine the effect of a story, the overall emotion and the interaction between characters and how I want it to balance and so on... I know that part of the construction will be moments where I think "no, that's too strong, it needs a little delay before that big a reversal" and such. But I don't know exactly why I think that, it's a judgement that comes about within the process. When I try to review I'm all end result and no process.
What am I trying to get at... I think some reviewers would make good porn, no doubt about it, just because they're fans and would try hard. But I think most reviewers know what end result they like, not what process factors would produce that end result, or what judgements to make to get them.
Alfred Hitchcock used to say that he found making his films rather boring, because he already had the entire thing in his head and the process was just a couple of months of problem-solving. I think most fans, including reviewers, would feel the same - they'd have a very good idea in their minds what they wanted as the end result, and find the actual process intrinsically irritating. But Hitchcock said his piece with immense talent and after he'd already been making films for thirty years. He already had the process down pat, notwithstanding technical progress and experimentation. If someone started out with that feeling, they'd make crap.
Personally, I don't want to shoot scenes .. if I were ever in a position to make a dirty movie, I'd find someone who had the limber reflexes and lack of squeamishness necessary to get up with it -- as Miles Davis said -- except, I'd be outlining the way I'd want a scene shot.
There are enough people making porn that I think is amazing. I'd just try to come up with a different amazing based on my own desire to see certain people shot in a certain way ... I'm pretty sure my ideas would not fly at all with the average raincoater, though I also think 3SB would dig it ... There are a LOT of aspects that happen when people are fucking that gonzo usually misses entirely. People like Mason and Jake Malone (and Joey Silvera) often "get" it for a few minutes or moments in their scenes ... this kind of blazing hot-wired explosion of intense intimacy coupled with what looks like total physical and emotional surrender/possession. I can't even explain what it is, but it's what really great sex feels like when you're actually having it, and to be able to watch it in a form as professionally impersonal as gonzo is "the decisive moment." It feels like falling in love.
Edited by - skronker on 3/13/2007 12:41:17 PM
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Pocketcomb_Pimp Deactivated User
1921 Posts 7/03
Posted - Mar 13 2007 : 7:10PM
I'm almost with you as well. What I do believe is a lot of people in the director chair as of late have gotten their through opportunity, not knowledge or skill. I won't menton snames, but every girl that does anal is not exactly the best bet to have a one. I take that back, I will drop a name. Jessica Dee did shitty porn. RLD stepped up and gave her a chance and she just didn't have the skill.
Performer, "A", Director, "D". I can tell you from my experience in film school, the guys that could afford the high end gear for the most part lacked the skill and creativity that less fortunate students had. That was not absolute, but like I said, Van, Jules and Wood are three example of strong shooters in my book.
The same way game playing chumps get into porn, some of them get behind the camera. TO use van as an example again. He started out with terrible lighting, now his productions look hi budget because because he got the technical side down. Sure, we may not buy porn for lighting, but when you take titles from DVSX circa 2003, flawless lighting, but no heat.
Hell Trish, I'll leave you with two words. Micheal Ninn. You know who that cat is and what's he's about. Sure, that persona is artsym but look at the chameleon that makes him that image.
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Mar 13 2007 : 11:38PM
yea, i kinda noticed that too. wonder what the difference was? :) Hey, I'm all for wanting someone who knows how to make things look non-distracting technically and still have lots of heat sexually. And I used to like Michael Ninn's stuff before it got a little too disjointed.
I'm sitting here thinking that the audience eager for porn directed by me would be about the same size as the audience for porn starring me...and even I'm not in that crowd!
So...why do we think amateur porn doesn't exist? Why do we imagine a fantasy world in which the populos has access to porn distribution?
This is already happening. Even before self-distribution on the net, there was Homegrown Video. We can already see the result of everyone's argument here. Not only via amateur videos, but via all the success stories of famous porners who started off doing their own thing. With their own money. There's no need to "search" for new talent if you're a professional porn producer, because talent is beating down your door at all hours of the night already. With completed product.
People who have the motivation to realize their vision ("realize" or "make real" being the etymological root for the phrase "direct a film" in many languages) don't need some golden patron to step down and hand them money. Having the motivation means gathering your own G.D. money to prove yourself. This is America, G.D. it, not Trustfundia. Do your own shit with your own hard-earned money muhfuckah! If someone's offering you, an unknown, money just for your "ideas"...trust me, that muhfuckah is either gonna steal your ideas or turn you into a reality show. Or both.
This is what "The Secret" is all about. Envision your thing and do your thing, honey.
Posted - Mar 8 2007 : 6:21PM
