Best overlook near Corvallis for watching the sunset. Set the timer at 3-second intervals and captured about 1200 images over the span of an hour.

Ebert is so much more than a film critic. He’s a journalist and writer, an unabashed middle western liberal voice in an age when most progressives consider activism to be making excuses for Obama, car pooling, taking those easy potshots at morons like Bush and Palin or shopping at Whole Foods.Ebert’s latest post on the film Insider Job is filled with his even handed contempt for what’s been happening in Washington since Reagan:

It is easy to say Republicans oppose financial reform, because they do. But too easy to say Democrats support it, because they hold back from meaningful reform. Their measures amount to pissing on a forest fire.

The film is an expose about the “Masters of the Universe” on Wall Street who encouraged bad debt, betting against their own customers to enrich themselves, and consequently drove the world into a financial crisis that we may feel the effects of for the balance of my life.

Ebert, even voiceless, is louder than ever. He’s smart, angry and passionate about film. And he’s a decent guy. I used to work in an office across from the television studios where he did his show with Gene Siskel. During the opening credits, Ebert was seen wandering the streets of Chicago giving a thumbs up and a smile to random passers by. This wasn’t some affectation for the cameras. I passed him several times in the busy streets, and he shared it with me.

What’s most interesting to me is the blend of fiction and reality. The producers of this film used a real wedding as backdrop, and they wove actors and a fictional story into the periphery of this real event. It’s reality programming, but done with grace, elegance and storytelling.

This is where documentary meets fiction, and I hope it lives up to the promise of a new genre. Even if it doesn’t, it’s a fascinating idea. The guerilla filmmaking possibilities are endless. Imagine assembling actors and filming a scene with Obama’s inauguration as a backdrop. Or how about mixing some current ongoing phenomenon, say some of these protesting Tea Party nincompoops, into a fictional, scripted film that uses actors.

I love the new possibilities created by technology. I suddenly have so many ideas for a blend of documentary and fiction. And what helps make it possible is an inexpensive, portable system of producing big-screen quality footage that DSLRs provide.  Can’t wait to see what’s next. I hope I can somehow be a part of it.

It’s amazing how many folks, a lot of them young, who write recreationally as part of this program. I suppose there are plenty of screenwriters who would shrug this sort of activity off as amateurish, but I find it enjoyable. Plus it never hurts to have a deadline.Writing can be painful. It stings to use both sides of your brain in concert, struggling with a blank screen or the banality of a cliche-ridden draft you’re cranking out at warp speed.

But then storytelling is inherent in us as a species. We do it around meals, beer, cocktails, business lunches, on the phone or in 140 characters of SMS. Might as well capture in in Courier in feature film format.

The vast majority of the 20,000 people signed up to write a script in April won’t finish. Most of the finished scripts won’t be very good, mine included–at least until another dozen drafts of the material are completed.

Some of us might get lucky. Maybe I’ll option another screenplay or produce all or part of this on my own. None of that really matters, though, in the short term. Right now, I just have to finish this draft, stealing an hour here and there.

The photography is stunning in both pieces. The first is shot with a newer DSLR, and the second, a previous generation SD camera.

These pieces are similar in their technical precision, but they’re quite different in the pacing of their editing.

Nocturne from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.

SIMILO teaser from Macgregor on Vimeo.

But you don’t make short films for money. You do it to learn how movies are made, to have fun, to build a portfolio or maybe a combination of all three. I recently saw Rodriguez’s award-winning short film, Bedhead, for the first time. I’d just watched a rough cut of our short and was feeling pretty good about the technical quality and the beauty of many of the shots. But watching Bedhead made me realize that polish and technical quality are probably the least important elements of a short film. What is more important is the story and style.

You can see the evidence of clear brilliance in Bedhead. Sure it’s 16mm, black and white with overdubbed sound and a hand drawn title sequence. He edited that film on two VCRs. But none of this matters, because if you start watching this movie, the next ten minutes fly by and you’re a little sad when it’s over. To me, that’s the mark of a quality short film.

How does Rodriguez make you care about the characters? How does he pull you into the story and make the time pass so quickly? He does it through solid directing and creative camera work. The performances are natural. The editing style and shots are whimsical and fast-paced. You don’t even notice the technical details after a while.

It’s amazing to think what he would have been able to accomplish with Final Cut Pro and a Canon 7D. Or even a Flip camera. What kind of movie would Bedhead have been if he had all this gear 20 years ago?

Anyone interested in independent film has probably read Rodriguez’s book about breaking into the film business. And they know that he spent years making short films with the most crude equipment imaginable. But he still managed to make films that are as watchable today as when they were released nearly 20 years ago. And that’s made me realize that you can get seriously sidetracked worrying about the technical details of a film. It’s dangerous to spend about what camera to use or whether to shoot SD or HD, or to be thinking about what sort of color treatment you’re going to give your movie. It’s more important to focus on the story and style of your project, because that will ultimately determine whether or not it’s successful. Would your movie still be watchable if you were limited to the same equipment that Rodriguez had in making his first films?

Technical details are still important. With amazing filmmaking equipment available at reasonable prices, the bar is constantly being raised, and you need to proceed with care and attention to detail if you want your work to stand out. But I’d be willing to bet that Bedhead would still be a winner at film festivals today, even if it were stacked up against a slate of films shot on an HVX with adapters, edited in Final Cut Pro and color corrected with Magic Bullet.

Check out the official site for the project at countryweddingfilm.com.