Hello all. I suppose I never really developed any sort of rapport here at the DVi forums but I still feel like I owe a lot of thanks to a handful of you who gave me quite a bit of advice when I was starting work on my first ever film (which just happened to be feature-length)...

You guys helped me on issues such as What to do first with my newly-arrived XL-2 (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=62332), 16 vs. 12 bit audio in post (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=62338), and oddities such as the safety of pointing the XL-2 at the sun (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=69261).

I suppose I'd just like to point out that I knew nothing about cameras or filmmaking or video or anything. I figured it out by reading the XL-2 manual (there's a PDF around here somewhere), reading posts here on the DVi forums and website, and by asking questions (and having them answered by all of you)... And I'd like to sincerely thank you for that.

Having said that, I just wanted to post that my feature film, Oceania which premiered to a sold-out audience at the 2008 Cinequest Film Festival this past March is now available for FREE under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/).

A captivating drama that explodes with an intense visual style and sharp storytelling, Oceania is a rarity for such a young director. At 17-years-old, Dehal wrote and directed a film that reveals a talent and a cinematic eye far beyond even the most seasoned Hollywood directors, and based on his debut film, there is no doubt that Dehal is one of the big discoveries of the year (by Tamee Tanoor, 2008 Cinequest Film Festival).

You can download it via BitTorrent (the kind folks at LegalTorrents.com are hosting us at the moment):
http://www.hdehal.com/oceania/download

View pictures at: http://www.hdehal.com/oceania
Download .torrent: http://www.hdehal.com/oceania/download

Once again, thanks for all of the help! Please enjoy!



P.S. The quality isn't great as I had to shrink it down to 700 mb via XVID. I have a properly-encoded DVD ISO in the works and will be posting that soon. And please feel free to email me or send comments/critiques at harrydehal@gmail.com. Cheers!

No comments or critiques at all, guys?

Hey Joe, I think the lack of responce is because you first have to download it from a torrent and it's pretty long, people on the internet tend to be a bit lasy i suppose.

Anywayz, I skipped trough the movie because a lack of time to watch it completely, but I must say it looks very good. Seems a pretty serious subject, especially for someone at a age of 17, to handle in a film. But I must say you get a great performance out of the actors. I also like the close photography, even though i felt personally that the framing sometimes was a bit 'off' but that was just my feeling. Also the recorded sound sometime didn't match the professional look.
Ca you say how much your budget was for this film?

BTW, is Joe Desmond your internet alias instead of Harpreet Dehal?

Thanks for your response!

The camera was a Camera XL-2 and the budget was a little less than $4,000. A lot of it went towards rentals and food. We never had a sound guy so the audio is one of my bigger regrets (often times it was just a cast or crew member, or even myself after hitting the record button aiming the mic and boom pole)... I fed it into the back of the XL-2, as well, so that might be another issue.

The actors were great, I agree. The adults were cast off of Craigslist and the teens were my fellow classmates from high school.

BTW, for those of you who are wary, the download is smoking fast. I downloaded it yesterday to test the speeds... On a FIOS Verizon line, it took only a few minutes to download the whole 700mb movie (connection belongs to a lucky friend, and with 100+ seeders, the download speed was averaging 2000KB!!)

Cheers,