Hi Marcella,
I live in SoCal too. We’re having a gathering in LA on 4/16, you’re welcome to come. :)
I’ve been making videos for a long time with a point and shoot camera, a Nikon Coolpix S620. I only recently got more serious equipment. If you check out Garage’s Microcinema project, you may find others like me who have used pretty available equipment with fun results. I tend to like effects a lot, and have been using iMovie like no tomorrow but also have Final Cut Express and Studio Artist which I am still exploring. But that’s just my style.
Work with what you have. Practise, develop your craft then when you’re comfortable move up to more pricey “proper equipment”.
Don’t worry about equipment at the moment.
If you don’t know what you want to shoot, it doesn’t matter what you own. Cart before the horse.
You can always get an individual with decent gear.
When you say “get started”, what do you mean exactly?
Do you want to direct?
Do you want to write?
Do you have an idea you feel would make a good video?
If so, can you write well enough to create a script?
Some useful advice in the above.
Contact a college, and see who is doing video class projects.
Such folks are always looking for free help, and you can get at least a bit of an idea of how scenes are done. Also, you can possibly make contacts for collaborators.
Claus.
joe
I have zero experience in filmmaking and was wondering if anyone had any recommendations that they could give me as to how to get started…
I have a sony digital camera that i bought around the very low end ~$300, would that be too low quality? Also what additional equipment do I need?
also I live in the southern california area so if anyone is working on a project I would love to help in any way to observe the filmmaking process.