Preliminary Questions

1. Who did you work with and how did you manage the task between you?
The group that i worked in consisted of myself, Becky, Ben and Jamie. I found this group very easy to work with as we all listened to each others idea and added our own opinions to other peoples ideas. We managed the tasks between ourselves by starting off with giving each other the option to say what they would like to do within the film. Becky and I did the main filming, whilst taking on board what Ben and Jamie's opinions of camera shot, where Ben and Jamie took the role of the main characters in our short film.


2. How did you plan your short filmed piece? Did you use any other films for your inspiration?
We planned our short film together in a group, using a time line of the key events that our film will have. For example the first shot was of feet coming towards the camera, we liked the idea of not showing the persons face until the last moment because we liked having the idea of our film having a mystery feel. Therefore, we did take some inspiration of other films, such as James Bond, with the feel of it being sneaky and secretive.



3. What technology did you use to complete the task, and how did you use it?
The equipment we used for this task was a video camera and the macs. We used the video camera for taking different action shots within our film and the macs for editing the films and clipping our clips to make them run more smoothly.


4. What factors did you have to take into account when planning, shooting and editing?
When filming we had to take into account the camera angle that we were using and what affect this may have on the out come of the film, we also took into consideration the use of lighting in the room, because we wanted the lighting to reflect on the atmosphere within our film, therefore, the lighting was dark and suspicious. For planning we took into consideration what was possible to film within our environment and we also had to with stand health and safety policy. Also we couldn't get too carried away with what we wanted to do with the short time that we had. With editing we had to take into account what clips flowed well with each other and whether it was effective or not.


5. Which film conventions does the piece follow? e.g. music, match on action, 180 degree rule, camera work etc

The piece had to stick to the 180 degree rule and the camera work had to be smooth and of a professional use. We had the choice to add music, however it had to be music that we had made but we all found the music to be a bit "cheesy" and nothing seemed to fit in with our movie. 

7. How did you consider mise en scene? e.g. lighting, camera work, setting, costume, props etc

We did consider mise en scene when we were making our movie, as we used a dark room with only one light on, which was over the table. This gave an intense feel to our movie. We also considered costume, as Jamie was dressed as a stereotypical "Geek" as he was undercover from the bad guys. We wanted the setting to be secretive and detective like, i think this came across in our film as the setting was intense as we couldn't see who Ben was at the start and the anticipation of whats in the bag that Ben is holding.

8. How did you consider narrative? Is there a sense of a storyline? Can any theorists be applied e.g. Barthes, Todorov, Propp, Levi Strauss

Yes there is a story line in our film, that something dramatic and action like is going to happen with Ben and Jamie with use of the bag of which the audience does not yet know what is inside. 

9. How successful was your filmed piece? Identify what worked well, and with hindsight, what would you improve/do differently?

I think that our filmed piece was very successful as we used unusual camera shots which were very affective and we followed our first idea, and within the group there were no disagreements. However i think i would improve things by adding more drama within the short film and adding music which fitted well within the drama, because that would of drawn the audience in more, also adding more dialogue would of made the film have more to play with. 

10. What have you learnt about producing a short piece of film? Looking ahead, how will this learning be significant when completing the rest of your foundation coursework?

From this i have learnt about all the different and effective camera angles i can use, taking ideas from other people's films to adapt into any further film making. This will help a lot in my foundation coursework as i find this more fun than making a magazine cover as i find the editing and filming enjoyable as i can show more of my ideas within my finished work.

Preliminary, Using Photo Shop

As I wasn't there for the lesson when the class got shown how to use Photo Shop, i found it very difficult to understand. Also my partner being away and having all of her work saved on her user didn't help either as i had to do all the photos again, therefore not having enough time to learn how to use photo shop and fully develop my finished piece. 

As my magazine cover is not yet finished i will update this blog once done so. 

Preliminary Activity 2

Task:

Using DTP and photo shop, produce the front page of a new college magazine, featuring a photograph of a student, in a medium close-up plus some appropriately laid-out text and a masthead. 

In addition, produce a DTP mock-up of the layout of the contents page to demonstrate your grasp of the program. 

Or front cover had to include the date, web address, master head, price, cover lines and a image. 

 

I went in a pair with Becky, and we both had the same idea of doing a fashionable front cover. We thought because the magazine had to be aimed at a target audience of our age group and had to be suitable for school use, we decided to do a magazine which could be used in textiles. 

The title we cam up with for our magazine was "City Art" we decided on this title because of the front cover we had decided on. Our front cover is going to be of a girl in a elegant dress, wearing worn our worker boots. The back ground of the shot is going to be in a rough end of a city where broken glass and grafete are. We wanted to do this as our front cover as wanted to show the contrast between the rough city and the elegance found within it. 

The cover story's we're going to put on our front cover are; Rural Meets Elegance, The Way Of Making The Weird And Wonderful Cat-Walk Dresses and Make Fair Trade Your Style. We thought all of this topics fitted in with the magazine as all of them have something to do with textiles or fashion. 

On the contents page we wanted to have two photos, one of the front cover girl in the same rough place, but in a different pose, the other photo is going to be of a review of one of our topics from the front cover. We decided to make our contents page look more attractive we would have a dirty brick wall as the border, this would then also fit in with what our magazine is about and what its about with the inside issue.

We rented out a camera and went out into Lutterworth down Water Works Lane where there's a big grafete wall, which in our real magazine cover we'll use something with more variety and in a more rough area. 

Because the girl who we want to use for our real front cover was in a lesson me and Becky had to stand in and do a draft of our photos, we decided on what we want the "model" to pose like, we thought that if she was standing up against the wall with her dress and boots on full view with a vale in her hand, again showing her elegance.  

Second Practical, Filming and Editing

After doing our planning we got to work on filming our film. We started with the low shot of the character walking towards the camera, it took a few shots to decide what angle and height we should have the camera. We then decided that the most affective angle was to have the camera on the floor with nothing holding it up. We then had Ben walk towards the camera, starting with only showing his shoulders down to his feet, this was affective because it left the audience in suspense of who the person is. We also thought that if Ben was carrying a bag it would make the film more exciting for the audience as they would want to know what's inside it. While filming this shot we talked about sound effects we would add into this clip, we all agreed that we would use a simple walking click of the heels sound, because Ben's shoes didn't make the right noise, this would be effective as it would make the scene more intense. We then moved on to the next shot which was the back of Ben's shoes, as he stepped over the camera, while editing this we had to make it smooth to fit in with the shot we had done just before. It took a bit of time to edit it to fit in with the shot before, but once it was done it looked very affective and professional. 

We added in an extra shot, which was Ben turning and with his feet facing the camera and the camera on the floor, in front of the door. We thought this was effective as the audience still hasn't seen who the character is, and also because we were still using the same camera shot. 

The next shot was of the door opening, we decided to do a shot of the door knob twisting for about five seconds, we thought this was effective as it held the tension, then slowly opening the door... The next scene was of Ben walking into the room, this is when the audience first see Ben's face. We decided to do a high shot of Ben walking in, as we hadn't done that shot yet and it would give our film a variety of angles. We kept with the idea of Ben walking in with the brief-case, as this would hold the audience's attention of whats inside it. 

The next shot was of Ben walking into the room and walk over to Jamie, who was our other character. We then used an over the shoulder shot facing Jamie, we decided that the talking in our film would be a bit comical with a James Bond twist, this is where the brief-case would come in handy because he'll show Jamie whats in it but not the audience, therefore keeping with the mystery feel of the film. As we wanted to show more variety in our camera shots we decided to do a high shot of Jamie and Ben shaking hands, we made them shake hands a number of times, all of which were filmed from a high shot and then zoomed in each time, this made the audience know that whatever Jamie and Ben were exchanging it was now a "Done Deal". Our film then ended on the handshake. 

During editing our film we shorten a lot of our clips to make them fit in easier and not seem so jumping. During the editing process i said what needed changing while agreeing with the other members of the group. Ben and Jamie had main editing over the film on the mac, where me and Becky agreed and gave our opinion about what they were editing. After we had made our film run smoothly, we then had to make music to fit in with our film. Me and Becky had main control over that. However, we all found that none of the music fitted in and although the music was okay, we all thought that it was a bit "cheesy" so we didn't find anything to add into our film, however the only place where we wanted to put music in was when Ben was walking towards the camera, this is because it would add tension for when he's walking to and from the camera, it will also introduce the audience to the film.

Second Practical, Planning

Our task was to film and edit a character opening a door, crossing the room and sitting in the chair opposite another character, within this film we had to include a demonstrated action shot and reverse shot, all of which had to go with the "180 degree rule".

We chose our own groups. I went with Becky, Ben and Jamie. We then came up with a step-by-step action plan of what our film will include. After brain storming with each other about what we should include we came to the decision of having our first shot with the camera on the fall and a someone walking towards it, then reversing the camera to show the person walking away towards the door. We thought this would be a useful shot because at first our idea was to have the person as a mystery person, so this made it affective, but also because its a shot we all agreed wasn't used a lot. Our next step was of the person opening the door. We thought to be different from the other groups, who were doing a shot of the person opening the door with their hand on the handle, we thought we'd do a shot of the handle moving, this would give make the audience feel tension to how the person was going to open it and who the person is opening it and why they're going into the room. We then had to do a shot of the two characters talking at a table, holding on to the idea of keeping it as a mystery person, we thought about doing over the shoulder shots, while keeping to the 180 degree rule, we also thought this would be effective because the shot will show what the character sees.