Quick disclaimer: I’m not affiliated with Shotdeck in any way, just sharing tools I use.
www.shotdeck.com
I’m a filmmaker. I make films/videos for my day job. I’ve been making films ever since I attended an experimental independent film school in Sedona, Arizona. Many years ago. To give you an idea how long ago, I was filming on miniDV tape primarily and 24p for digital video cameras was just becoming available. Panasonic HVX was my camera of choice. Panasonic had released the P2 card. The PowerMac G5 was in its prime. A little while ago.
Anyhow, all these years I would study films, break them down by scene and camera angles, story, lighting, etc, you know. When working on projects I would sketch storyboards and collect images or screenshots from films during R&D and pre-production. It wasn’t easy to find references from my favortie films. Then the internets got better 🙂
For the last few years I’ve been beta testing Shotdeck. Shotdeck has a huge selection of screenshots from many films. It is now out of beta and if you need to find perfect shots, create decks and share them with your crew, then you’ve hit the jackpot. Shotdeck has a great film selection from some of my favorite director/cinematographer duos and metadata to go with each shot. I love being able to check out the focal lengths of the shots personally.
I use shot deck often in early project stages to create mood boards or just to create a series of shots that give me early ideas or inspire new ideas.
I highly recommend to take a look. If anything, I realize, just looking through the images teaches one how to spot an image that evokes feelings and in many cases tells a story, ideally. This is not just for the filmmakers out there but for the imagination of the experiential explorer. Have fun 🙂