As a group of 4 (me, Demi, Sophie and Agatha), we devised an under 1 minute short film and edited it. Our film involved a shot, reverse, shot with a context of a murder in China Town, London. We had to consider different camera angles, different camera shots such as tracking shots and background noise such as door being opened and closed. We filmed on a Canon 550D and edited on iMovie on an Apple iMac
Positives
1. We successfully worked together as a team sharing each persons ideas.
2. We shared the responsibility of holding the camera, directing, setting the props and acting.
3. We worked quickly and efficiently, finishing our prologue in the estimated time we had planned.
4. We used a different selection of props including a police scarf/neck tie, chinese umbrella, chinese lantern and folder belonging to the head detective. Using these props created an authentic atmosphere believable to the audience, believing it to be a real police case and set in a real police office.
5. We used a shot reverse shot - it was fluid and easy to recognise.
6. We found a variety of music from the internet, especially sound tracks and openings of television programmes such as The Vampire Dairies and CSI and added them to our short film.
Negatives
1. When editing we realised that a lot of our shots were out of focussed, we were not paying attention to the camera or weren't speaking loud enough. We realised that next time we film we have to take into consideration these factors.
2. We chose a location with a lot of background noise such as people talking, doors being opened and closed as well as people's footsteps on stairs for example, resulting in us having to mute the background noise and add a voice over (at the beginning of the short film - 'Please come in PC Sophie').
3. We maybe should have worn authentic police uniform making us easier to recognise as a MET police officer and head detective.
4. We should have used a microphone as our voice recordings from the camera footage were hard to hear and understand. Using a microphone would also level out the interference of background noise, level out the tone and volume of our voice.
5. We should have used a tripod in all sections of filming as some shots were not balanced or steady causing us to cut them from the original footage or have to merge them with other balanced shots - causing us to use valuable time. What have I learned?
1. Working as a team is better than working as an individual as you can complete the task quicker, have a wide range of ideas (bouncing ideas of everyone) such as different locations to film at, shot types as well as plot ideas.
2. A shot, reverse, shot is a great shot to create tension, suspense or fast paced interaction. For example showing direct eye contact and facial expressions to the co-stars face instead of directly to the camera.
3. Using iMovie is an easy software to edit short films and film openings on as it is quick, simple especially when dragging different shots into position and cutting footage.
Vampire Diaries Theme Tune with used throughout our short film
During the final process of adding opening credits to our film opening, we encountered a reference to film titles in the examiners report to centres (2014).
According to last years Media Studies entries "There was still an over-reliance solely on actors' names and film title to constitute film titles, showing a lack of understanding of the range of titles expected of a film opening and of their construction, appearance and timings".
From looking at this report, we decided that we must make use of adding the correct order of credits. Credits are determined by guild rules such as SAG, the DGA, WGA and other Media unions. We took into consideration that credits are billed generally following their importance to the film.
For example:
1. The Production Company presents - In our case 'RAZZLE DAZZLE PRODUCTIONS presents'
2. A .... production - A PARRY PRODUCTION
3. A ...... film - A BENNETT FILM
4. Title
5. Lead Cast
Thereafter, the list of importance is flipped and work backwards to the most important role of the Director.
6. Supporting Cast
7. Casting Director
8. Music Composer
9. Costume Designer
10. Associate Producer
11. Editor
12. Production Designer
13. Director of Photography
14. Executive Producer
15. Producer
16. Writer
17. Director
We decided as a group that we would name every single 'person' for each role listed above as we want our film opening to look professional, slick and efficient making use of the correct list of credits.
Whilst writing blog posts recently I have been making use of audioBoom. This is a free online website, much like SoundCloud, but you can listen to Podcasts and radio interviews from radio shows such as the BBC radio stations.
audioBoom came to my attention when I was completing the final week of Future Learn: From Script to Screen film making course. I thought this site was incredibly interesting as I can post audioBoom posts or just simply listen to other peoples.
An audioBoom account (as shown below) that I find interesting is the BBC Radio 4: The Media Show. This account/channel covers news regarding the media such as topics covered in the newspaper as well as discussions.
I have recently listened to this discussion on BBC Radio 4: The Media Show covering the role of advertisers and editors on British drama. They also covered the limitations of editing and advertising including 'phone ins' from professionals in the media industry addressing their views.
Today we completed editing footage of our film opening, The Unhinging.
Here are the final stages we completed today:
We re-watched our film opening,
checking for any areas we wanted to re-do such as the fluidity of the soundtrack
We thought it was appropriate to put a filter on India's flashback scenes.
Also we overlapped each shot of India's flashbacks creating a blurry effect; this was suited to it
as it created a 'hallucinating effect'.
We saved our film opening
We exported it to YouTube
We also finalised the font for the titles of actors and production company names that appear on the shots of our film opening. We wanted the font to appear professional but also suited to the action appearing in the film opening. For example, we would place text in empty areas of the shots such as on a darkly lit brick wall next to India's body. By doing this, the text was easy to read and understand whilst not interfering with the action taking place in the film.
We also added our distributors company ident, Warp, at the beginning of our film opening.
We also decided that it was appropriate whilst India was running through the woods reaching for her mobile phone to call the police, the words 'dialling 999...' would appear 3 times. We wanted the full stops '...' to appear three times creating a sense of dialling and progression in the phone call.
I took inspiration from watching this video below.
