These notes are based on the article ‘Eat My Shorts’, found here, at: http://www.bfi.org.uk/sightandsound/feature/237/
Everybody is different, so all short film makers choose to make short films as opposed to feature length films for all sorts of different reasons according to their interests.
People take the time and go to the trouble of making short films because some people see it as being a form of art work, such as, two short film makers of the 1960’s and 1970’s called Derek Jarman and Peter Greenaway.
On the other hand however, the film industry see short films as a way for aspiring feature film makers to show off their work in the hope to get funding for feature films.
These days, feature films are so popular that short films have been brushed aside - rarely watched and the audiences that do watch them are more than likely people that are related to the short film creators or are involved in the making of the films. Although this is a valid point, short film makers still make these films out of enjoyment and to fulfill their interest most of the time.
Back in the 1990's, before DV Cameras, it was difficult for an amateur short film maker to produce a film because there were only a limited number of opportunities for a handful of people to gain enough funding to make their film and very little investment of new talent. However, the available budget for 35mm celluloid shorts had risen under FilmFour's Short & Curlies strand to between £60,000 and £90,000. The problem with these budgets though, was that they were hard to justify because it was a lot of money for a short film that only a small number of people were ever going to see, when this money could be put into other, bigger projects, such as, feature films.
After a few awaited years, a technology called DV was introduced into the film industry. This technology had a huge impact on the industry because it enabled almost anyone to be able to produce short films on their own without a huge budget.
Because of the mixed opinions these budgets raised, the UK Film Council decided in 2001 to launch a 3 year project that supported digital short films, dedicating £1.5 million into the scheme to produce 100 a year for the 3 years as part of a short films initiative. The rules of this project were that each film was restricted to a £10,000 budget; they had to be produced digitally and could not exceed 10 minutes in length.
After producing these short films, there are possibilities of being distributed and exhibited just like with feature films, however, the distribution of short films is much more restricted. Possible ways of these short films being distributed and exhibited are, being distributed in theaters, to be programmed with a feature film and being shown in small art house cinemas.
Although the DV camera has made it possible for almost anyone to make a short film, the quality will not as good as if it is filmed on a full size camera on a 16mm celluloid as opposed to a DV camera on a 35mm celluloid. This affects the film quality and therefore could affect the interest of the audience, because if it badly made from the start, the viewer might just turn it off straight away, affecting the viewing levels as well as the reviews and ratings.
The writer of this article says that although some web-streaming websites had be shut down due to the need to consolidate all of these websites because there were too many and some of them wee not making enough money, there was still a boom for web-streaming because if producers could not get their film exhibited for free, they could pay to have the film uploaded to these websites for a small amount of money for a set period of time, of 3 or 6 months, for example. Here, the writer is trying to say that these websites enable the producer to get their film out there and seen, even if it doesn’t make it to the exhibitions.
They also say that it is the responsibility of the film commissioners on the arts boards across the U.K for nurturing talent and experimenting with it.
I feel that this article is reasonably out of date compared to the progression that short films have made over the years since the article was published, because the editing quality of software that is used now has improved as well as the knowledge and understanding of how to gain the best quality of filming from the DV cameras.
