“Man Vs. Meteorite” (Hombre Vs. Meteorito) won first prize in the documentary category at the 2010 Tandil Cortos Film Festival. The 10 minute film shows how an Argentine Knife master uses the skills his gaucho grandfather taught him to make a foot-long knife out of meteorite metal using century old techniques. The film was produced by San Telmo Productions and directed by Gabriel Balanovsky. The film was commissioned by Artisanal Knives as a way to publicize the high quality of knives made in Argentina by focusing on this unique challenge: to make a knife out of metal from outer space. Continue reading
Tag Archives: short film
San Telmo Productions Website: Cool New Feature
Due to popular demand, we have now added unique URLs (that´s web address, for all you non-techies) to our videos in our portfolio section of our website. No more scrolling to find what you want, and you can send your favorite videos to friends and contacts.
For example:
http://www.santelmoproductions.com/en/#/portfolio/goals_for_girls
sends you directly to our short documentary about girls who play soccer (football) in the Villa 31 slum in Buenos Aires.
http://www.santelmoproductions.com/en/#/portfolio/malaleche
Sends you to a short film about a woman seeking a really gross revenge on her boyfriend.
So pass it along!
Behind the scenes video of “The Hooker & the Transvestite 2″
Behind the scenes of “The Hooker & the Transvestite” Episode 2 (La Puta y la Travesti). Actors Lola Berthet, Luis Machín and Luís Aponte, a crew of 25 and DoP Jorge Crespo braved freezing cold temperatures to film the second part of a short film for the Filmaka “Hard Times” contest. Directed by Gabriel Balanovsky and Ginger Gentile. Making of and photography by David Castre Bravo.
It´s a Wrap: The Hooker & The Transvestite
Luis Aponte and Lola Berthet
The filming on Friday night was a great success: our crew of 25, plus actors Lola Berthet, Luis Aponte and Luis Machín braved the cold to produce one really funny short for the filmaka contest: The Hooker & The Transvestite. Our Director of Photography, Jorge Crespo, lit up over 1000 square meters of park for a dramatic scene (and coordinated that they turn off and on with the camera rolling). The photography he captured on the his Sony HD camera using a 35mm lens is incredible, he really got that film look.
We are now running around to finish the post production. This means the following:
1) Downloading the material to be edited (for a three minute finished product we filmed about 30 mintues of material).
2) Editing, and re-editing, the short until it´s just right (in this case we are under a lot of time constraints, normally this process can take longer than the two days we had!)
Luis Machín acting drunk
3) The film then is color corrected, in this case by the Director of Photography. Color correction can be a misnomer: more than correcting mistakes, Jorge Crespo changed the color of the lighting and pushed the colors to make them “pop” as they should in a comedy.
4) Charlie Yusim, who also composed the music for Gabriel Balanovsky´s “Enjaulado” and a fashion commercial that he produced, creates an original score, in this case very Tim Burtonesque.
5) Gaspar Scheuer, of Ñandu Sonido, one of the best sound studios in Argentina, corrects the sound recording and does the final mix when the music is done.
6) All these elements are placed together, with subtitles and end credits. Done!
(All Photos were taken by David Castre)
Lola Berthet was not harmed in the making of this film.
Lola Berthet (the Hooker), Luis Machín (the Drunk), Luis Aponte (the Transvestite)
It takes a lot of lights to light up a park at night!
Co-directors Ginger Gentile and Gabriel Balanovsky check a shot in the Sony HD camera with 35mm lens with DoP Jorge Crespo
The traveling track is ready.
The actors battle the cold!
Isn´t life a drag?
The HD monitor waits while lights are put in place (only about 30% of what we used is in this photo).
Filming Tonight, and everything is ready
There is nothing like going into a complicated production (crew of 25, night shoot, 20 lights, travelings, etc) and the day before realizing that everything is taken care of. Right now our production chief is labeling boxes, and instead of calling frantically is smiling. She was even able to sleep 8 hours last night!
We are so excited to have been able to have such good people working on “The Hooker & the Transvestite: Episode 2″ for Filmaka.com. As a director, it is a great feeling to know that all I have to focus on is directing, and not resolving problems.
“The Hooker & the Transvestite” in pre-production
The clock is ticking. . . we have less than 15 days to produce, shoot, edit, score, color correct and do the final sound mix for our sequel to the award winning “The Hooker & the Transvestite” (La puta y la travesti) and upload it to the jury round of the filmaka.com “Hard times” contest.
So, what do you have to do before you shoot? It´s an endless list, but here are some of the basics in a fiction shoot:
1) Write the script. That seems obvious, but before you have the script locked, you have no idea what locations you need, the lights you need, the crew you need, etc. And if you want to get the best people on board, you better make it good.
2) Get your key people on board. These are the heads of each area: production, direction (ast. director and script supervisor), photography, sound, art. Each head is responsible for finding their crew members and creating lists of the materials they will need. Production is then responsible for making sure these requests fit in the overall budget and coordinating the different areas.
3) Cast. We decided to continue working with the same actors, but our lead actress is in Spain. So we decided to replace her with the very talented Lola Berthet, who at 28 has played many supporting and comic roles on TV and films, and is quite famous for her original look. The “drunk” will be played by Luis Machín, a talented actor most known for his roles as the bad guy.
Lola Berthet strikes a pose. She can also do absurd comedy.
Luis Machín, a great character actor
4) Find the location, and have all the key department heads look at it and see how the lights will be set up, if the sound will be usable, and logistical concerns (is there a bathroom nearby?)
5) Get permission for that location. See my other post on how long that can take!!!!
6) Rehearse with the actors. For this short film, two rehearsals will be fine.
7) The script is the guide, but in a fiction shoot a storyboard (literally a sketch of each scene as it will be seen by the camera) is created as a guide for the technicians, and also so the editor can see if a key shot is missing.
8) Maps of each set. These aerial views show where the camera goes, where the actors and key set pieces are located. Mainly used to keep the technicians from getting lost on the set (which happens after 10 hours of shooting in the freezing cold).
As you can see, a lot of planning is done to make sure that in the heat of shooting nothing is forgotten or taken too lightly. Some people say this stifles creativity, but I think of it as enabling the director to be creative because he or she knows that every detail has been thought of beforehand.
“Hooker and the Transvestite” wins Filmaka contest!
“The Hooker and the Transvestite”, (La Puta y la Travesti) a short film made with almost no-budget in 5 days by San Telmo Productions, has just been named winner of the “Hard Times” contest hosted by filmaka.com
It was voted one of 18 finalists by the filmaka community. Now directors Ginger Gentile and Gabriel Balanovsky have less than one month and a prize of $1000 dollars to film the sequel, using the same characters and theme.
This second short film will be viewed by a jury made up of some of the biggest movers and shakers in the film industry: Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, as well as the producer of Che, Laura Bickford, and actor Colin Firth. If chosen as a winner, in addition to cash prizes, the team will enter into negotiations to turn this idea into a web series and compete for feature-length film funding.
Right now San Telmo Productions is building a dream team of Argentine Film technicians to create the best short possible, with a production quality worthy of Hollywood. Our second film will keep telling the story of these two characters, the hooker and the transvestite, who try to find work in order to eat, but keeping comedic tone!
To watch the film:
The Hooker & the Tranvestite: Short Film Now Published on Filmaka
Our latest short film was filmed in less than 6 hours with only 5 days of pre-production and a budget of less than $400 pesos (that´s less than 120 dollars!). “The Hooker & the Transvestite” is about a broke young woman who tries to prostitute herself in the transvestite red-light district. Comedy ensues.
I´m not going to embed the video here because I want you to go to the site, watch it, and if you like it, become a member of filmaka and vote. Filmaka is an innovative new portal for young filmmakers to show their work and win funding for future films. This short film was entered into the contest under the theme “Hard Times”.
http://www.filmaka.com/film.php?film_id=1af6a2ba-862f-102c-ad35-00301b4506f4
The Hooker and the Transvestite: It´s a Wrap!
We just finished up filming “La Puta y la Travesti” a short film written, produced and (to be) edited in last than a week. The shoot was a lot of fun and remarkably tension free for a low budget shoot. We even had the cops swing by but they let us keep on shooting as long as we blocked off the road. The actors did a great job with a script that calls for really pushing the envelope: one actor transformed himself into a transvestite with nothing more than a wig and a body stocking!
As soon as the final cut is finished, I´ll post a link. Now I´ve got to get back to editing.
Luis Aponte: Isn´t he lovely?
An important scene.
Back to Filming. . .
For the first time ever I´m working on a fiction film shoot where no one smokes cigarettes (I quit last August), which is quite refreshing. Just mate, coffee and streams of white paper that are filled with sketches of each scene we will film (called a story board). We start filming our short film, called “La prostituta y la travesti” on Monday, and the idea is to have everything finished within a week. I like filming this way, with small agile crews and time limits. But everyone on the shoot is super pro and we are filming with the SONY XDCAM, which we used to shoot our documentary on knife making.
We will be working as all co-directors, but each focusing on one aspect: the story idea is mine and I´ll be doing the continuity and co-editing. Gabriel Balanovsky is focusing on the production side, and Synes Elischka (who is visiting us from Austria) will be doing camera and coediting.
Hopefully in a week I will have something to show all of you!
