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My old film professor told me my edits were 'too safe' after I turned in a 5-minute short about a lost dog
He said I played it by the book and never took any risks with jump cuts or weird audio, so I went back and added this jarring silence right before the dog runs away. It totally changed the feel of the scene and actually made my classmates uncomfortable, but the professor finally nodded. Has anyone else gotten a criticism that made them rethink their whole approach to storytelling?
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hollyramirez8d ago
A bartender I work with used to edit music videos (weird side gig, I know) and he told me the same thing. He said I was playing it way too nice with transitions, like I was scared to make the audience feel anything. So I started cutting out the sound entirely during the worst moments of a scene (a breakup, a car crash, whatever) and it was like a gut punch every time. Suddenly my stuff had this weight to it, even if people hated watching it. That professor of yours sounds like the kind of person who wants you to fail a little so you learn to swim, you know? The uncomfortable silence trick is a classic, it's like forcing people to sit with the emotion instead of letting them hide behind the music or whatever.
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piper_flores698d ago
Hmm... I dunno, silence is powerful but cutting sound completely can come off as kinda cheap or manipulative if you overdo it. Sometimes people lean on that trick cause they don't trust the visual storytelling enough.
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