Digital Film Making

Mike Figgis, the director of 'Leaving Las Vegas', 'Internal Affairs' and other movies, is also something of an artist, photographer, cinematographer, musician, scriptwriter, and actor. If that weren't enough to cause envy, he 's also married to Saffron Burrowes. With the short book, 'Digital Film Making', he adds 'teacher' to his long list of accomplishments (actually he was already a qualified music teacher). Whether you are a fan of his movies or not (and I have mixed feelings; 'Internal Affairs' was fine, 'Leaving Las Vegas' over-rated), there is no doubt that if you have an interest in low-budget film-making this is excellent stuff. Granted the ins and outs of of scene set-up are touched on rather than elucidated (presumably Film School or other books fill in that gap), but he has something to say about every aspect of the film-making process, as transformed by digital technology, and it all seems perfectly sensible. It's also very inspiring (I dug out my video camera halfway through). Highly recommended for the student and still of interest to those with a casual interest. Oh, and with the 'Fig Rig' (a portable camera rig he designed) he shows himself to be an inventor too. B*stard!