1. Who did you work with and how did you manage the task between you?
I worked with George Henry, Michael Greene and Claire Buswell. We all worked hard to make sure that all of our suggestions and ideas were considered when we were coming up with the idea for our short clip. We talked about the brief and what we had to include before going ahead to decide on roles, locations, scripts and other technicalities. In the process of making a film, there are usually several roles; director, the sound technician, camera operator, actor, lighting technician, and director's assistant, so with the small amount in a group we did our best to fill all of these roles. It was decided that Claire and I as the two girls would be gossiping over George's new Facebook photos. Michael would film most of it, but so as the roles were distributed a little more evenly George would film the parts of it that he was not in. George and Michael also shared the role of sound techinichian, and between us we shared the duty of holding up the clapperboard and stating the shot and take number. There was not much we could really do to alter lighting as we were filming in a room with large windows anyway.
When it came to editing, George and I shared most of the editing job, trying to make the clip smooth, and continuous and appear to the audience as a seamless flow, and that all of the narrative followed on. I really enjoyed working with my group - although obviously we came across issues, such as a disaster involving filming, I think we shared responsibility effectively and dealt with it reasonably well. Everyone in the group also proved to be reliable and good at time-keeping.
2. How did you plan your sequence? What processes did you use? What theories did you try to take into account?
We started with an initial planning meeting to work out what we wanted to film, and start to write out shot lists, brainstorms, scripts, shooting schegules and storyboards. This was useful because it allowed us to share all of our ideas and make sure we all agreed upon everything. The brief stated that we had to include: a character walking in and sitting opposite another character, and a brief dialogue, and observe important continuity rules including the 180-degree rule, the 30-degree rule, shot-reverse-shot and match-on-action, so when planning we made sure to take all of this into account.
When we decided on a location, we all went over to check it out, making sure we knew where we were going to place our camera and how we wanted to position everything. We had to take into account that we would have no control over the lighting in the room due to the two large windows, and we had a check to see how sound-proof the room would be. We then settled on a date and time for a second meeting in which we finalised the small details of our shot schedule and storyboard.
3. What technology did you use to complete the task, and how did you use it?
Our school techinchian and media teacher gave us a session before filming in which they included a run through of how to use and handle the camera and sound equipment we were given. This meant that when it came down to shooting we all new exactly what to do with minimal questions asked. They talked us through how to use the Cannon HDV Camera, using a mini DV tape format, with the choice of either a detachable camera mic or a large boom mic. For the task at hand, we decided to use the small detachable mic as we were filming indoors and at close-range, and the major advantage of the boom mic would be the ability to get in closer to the sound. We also decided to use a tripod so that we didn't get the 'home-video', shaky effect of a hand-held shot and to allow us the ability to pan and rotate smoothly. Headphones that connected to the HDV Camera meant we could listen for any background noise before we started shooting, and allowed for a cleare play-back. We also used a whiteboard in place of a clapper board to keep track of our shot and take numbers.
On the editing side of things, we used a PC-based digital editing suite, and the editing programme Adobe Premier Pro, to cut up and put together our final piece. The main tools we needed were the razor tool, to cut up each clip into the sections we did and didn't need and to cut away mistakes and shots of the clapper board, the drag icon to transport clips between the timeline and the over-view windoe etc, and the drag icon so that we could move the clips up and down on the timeline and fit them together. As we stuck with a 'cut' transition between each shot, we were not reliant on any other effects to join the shots together. We did however use the title tool to add text to the beginning and end of our clip, and the source and output moniters, which stored and allowed us to watch footage, picking and choosing sections we wanted to keep and scrap.
4. What factors did you have to take into account when planning, shooting and editing?
There were several factors that needed to be taken into consideration when carrying out all of the above three taks. During planning, we needed to make sure that all of the roles amongst the group were distributed evenly. We had to decide on reasonably confident actors - obviously taking into account that none of us are ever going to win Oscars! - and make sure that everyone was comfortable with the position they were being asked to play. We had to make sure that the storyboard matched up the shot schedule and script, and that the location fitted in with all of this.
With shooting, there were yet more things to consider - most significantly sound and lighting. We were lucky on the day of the shoot, as due to the two windows in the room we were shooting in, the weather could have really caused our lighting to fail, but the day was not too bright or too dull. Also sound was important - there were lots of other groups filming at the same time of us so it was important that we made sure they didn't interrupt our shoot too much. Luckily, we chose a location which was mostly sound-proofed. Also it was important to make sure the actors, myself and Claire, were speaking loudly enough at all times. Obviously, with continuity as the main focus, we had to make sure that we didn't break any of the 180 and 30 degree rules, to ensure that everything flowed seamlessly. Our shot logs and schedules made sure this all went according to plan.
We decided to stick to the transition of simple cuts between each shot to not take away from the main focus on continuity. Also, time management was important with editing as it was easy to get carried away with playing about with the order of shots etc., and we had to bear in mind that we only had a certain amount of time to get finished.
5. How successful was your sequence? Please identify what worked well, and with hindsight, what you would improve/ do differently.
I think that although the proccess of filming the sequence was definitly something I learnt a lot from, there was definite room for improvement, despite some areas that I was quite pleased with. We observed all of the continuity rules and included both match-on-action and shot reverse shot. We also tried our hardest to make sure that it flowed as seamlessly as possible. I think we did complicate things for ourselves by including three characters instead of just the reccomended two, so in hindsight I would probably consider using just the two characters. The first shot of Claire walking in, despite a small amount of unintended background noise, and opening the door with the match-on-action from the other side of the door I feel was particularly effective as it was very smooth and without any mistakes. I think some of the shots of myself and Claire having the conversation about George were well-framed and I was pleased with them overall. However 0.11, the framing is really poor at the establishing shot of the two girls. There is far too much space above the girls heads. Given the chance to redo this sequence, i would definitly chose a different location, as it was this that limited our ability to frame the shots nicely. Also the conversation is too fast-paced and there aren't enough pauses. It just cuts to each girl without any chance for the audience to absorb what has happened.
6. What have you learnt from completing this task? Looking ahead, how will this learning be significant when completing the rest of your foundation coursework, do you think?
I definitly think that this task will be beneficial to me when completing the rest of my foundation coursework as I have learnt a lot of valuable lessons. It was good to learn some of the continuinty rules first hand, for example at one point in one of our takes we broke the 30 degree rule and I know that I will now never break the rule again. Furthermore, after we had a disaster in which our camerman Michael pressed 'record' instead of 'stop' and we ended up filming a lot of stuff we didn't need and not filming any of our sequence, I learnt that it is best to deal with situation like this without panicking. Our group's first reaction was one of shock and we were all talking over each other and not giving each other any attention which did not get us anywhere - we realised when we slowed down and took things one step at a time, agreeing to stay behind for extra time to re-film that things went more smoothly. Ive learnt a valuable lesson from this, and know that none of our group will make the same mistakes again.
I also learnt what all of the roles in a filming enivornment are, such as the director and director's assistant, camerman, lighting and sound techinichans etc., and the things they all say to signify that they are starting such as 'Camera rolling!'. Also, I learnt that storyboarding and shot schedules and lists are all very valuable - at first I was sceptical about how important all of this planning would be but it turned out to be very useful to have a solid plan of what to film when.
Group 3C - Preliminary Exercise Paperwork (Storyboard, Shot list, Script)
