Construction Post 10: Looking back-Reflections on our final outcome

MY FILM OPENING SEQUENCE:

I'm proud of how far we've accomplished with the project and that we've finally made it to the end

Aims..

• That the audience can connect to the character and the situation he's been put in (which is supposedly relatable to many-their first day at a new school) 
• That the audience is immersed by the realism we tried to connote through use of editing and be engaged and want to watch beyond the opening
• That the audience will understand the storyline of the opening sequence and that it's Arthur's first day of school
• The audience will appreciate the niche audiences we've tried to represent in order to reflect everyone's experience of sechondary/high school

Highlights...

• When we were able to over come our creative differences and come up with a storyline and innovative ideas that suited all of us
• Shoot sessions with all our actors, although hard to manage and keep quiet on set, was fun

Low points...

• Edit week 2 was really rushed and came to the point of being stressful as we had so much to complete in so little time
• Finding a title for our film (we were literally only able to think of one that suited the themes of our film on the last day of editing)

In Hindsight...

• If we had permission to have the school to ourselves for a shoot our actors would have been free to make as much noise as they could to reinforce the mood of 'school' for the camera and would've made it easier to sort out shoot days&times.
• Lighting was a main issue,so we had to stick to filming only one side of the hallway, if it wasn't we could have had a wider variation of high angle, low angle and reverse shots
• More time to explore different ways we could have utilized the go pro camera and its waterproof features as there were only one shot we used out of the whole sequence that was filmed with a go-pro camera although there were other shots we had taken with it but had not time to check if they worked.

Construction 9: My technical learning curve (Production and Post production)

My Personal Contribution:

The whole group played a part in all aspects of the processes (filming&editing) of creating the opening sequence 

• In Production I was mainly in charge of organising shoot logistics (getting equipment release forms signed, shoot schedules signed on behalf of the group so we could take kit out of the school, updating the shoot board dependent on changes made from the shoot before, relaying information to actors regarding shoots and sometimes transporting kit)
• In Post-Production we all sat together to select the best clips we wanted to use and all did our bits in putting those clips together but from then on since we all knew what each other wanted we were able to divide up the jobs. I was mainly in charge of sound and titles.  

What did I learn?

In Production

• How to manage people
• Setting up a dolly
• Setting up lights
• Overestimate time needed for shoots instead of underestimate because shoots actually take a really long time
• How to manage with lighting issues
• How to contra zoom (although we never used it in the end, it was an idea for one of our school long shots, the tutorial we used as inspiration is found on the side)

Me setting up the tripod

In Post-Production

• Split screen technique
• Creating key frames
• Grading
• Constructing Titles
• How to record a voice over

My strengths:

• Organisation and Planning
• Using a camera/microphone
• Setting up a dolly/tripod/camera
• Constructing titles either on Adobe Premier or Typewriter



Me setting up the camera

• Acting

My weaknesses:

These are all things I also need to improve on...

• Grading
• Visual effects (manipulating a clip)
• Setting up lights (mainly because we didn't use lights during any of our shoot apart from the test shoot because we realised we didn't need them)

Construction Post 8: My Personal Contribution to the Edit Sessions

Me at the Edit Suite editing
the voiceovers

Me and Amber grading

My individual contribution to the edit sessions, I found to be much more challenging than to the shoot session. Probably because I'm more inclined to the non-technological side of media. However it was definitely the area where I learnt and gained from the most. I am now able to edit on a higher level than the usual simple cutting and sticking together of clips. The use of the split screen, grading techniques and various transitions and creation of titles challenged me, especially as time was too short for me to grasp the techniques
 and implement them.
I still think I need to improve in grading, in terms of identifying when a shot is too contrasted and when it isn't enough as I find it really hard  to tell the difference. This is because I didn't spend enough time on grading since we all decided to split up jobs in editing (I was in charge of the sound scape, mainly voice-overs, and construction of the titles)

Me and Ela choosing fonts for the
titles on 'Typewriter'-after she helped
 me decide the fonts, it was up to me to
replicate those on the next few titles
we needed, render them as a movie,
import and give them proper
composition on our sequence 

Me editing together clips in
edit week 1

Construction 7: My personal Contribution to the shoot sessions

My Individual Responsibilities:

Me testing out the Go
Pro camera

Me acting as one of the Chavs in the
main school shoot

Me working the
Canon Legria HD camera- I did get to have time filming shots 

I helped organise the
communication between our
group and the actors via a
Facebook group 

Me as a replacement for our actor
Michael who was sick when our test
shoot was scheduled for 

Me in charge of the shoot board-
during the shoots I was in charge of
taking notes on it (e.g. how many takes
had been done  a particular shot) and
as preparation for a shoot, I was in
charge of updating the shoot board
on the computer for every shoot
(test/main/back-up) we had where
 we were reordering timings/replacing
shots for shoots

I also had roles as:

Me as director using the clapper-board
 during the test shoot-the most challenging
 time when I took the role of director was
 during the main shoot at the school
where there were so many people as
cast and managing them was really hard. 

-Make-up artist for some members of the cast, who needed make-up (mainly the chavs and emos)

-Transporter of kit from school to shoot sessions; I would usually store the kit at my house during the time in between shoots and give it to Amber after the sessions to transport back to school 

Reflections:

Working together in a group gave me the chance to build on my skills as an individual because I was able to diversify myself as a media student by not only being behind the camera in shoot sessions, but also as an organiser/coordinator, management of people, actress, director, handling equipment etc. If I had just worked on my own, I probably would have been able to experience those roles but not in as much depth. This is because there'd always be someone covering a different role at the same time as me attempting one instead of just me having to be bombarded by having to fulfil all those roles myself at once. We were able to divide our responsibilities equally and work to each others strengths. I'm naturally someone who likes to be in front of the camera, so I had more acting roles. 

Construction 6: Reflections on Edit week 2

This week was a finalization of the whole process therefore we touched up on a lot of things we'd done constructed beforehand, like titles, voice-overs, grading all our shots and altering our sound-scape so they match the action in each shot appearance and disappearance of titles. We also added more transitions so that cuts aren't too sudden.

Grading technique used on 
'She's the man'-Our influence on
 how we graded our shots

Effects of grading on some of 
our shots using a split screen 
view- Before on the right, After 
effects on the left

Grading is a really intricate piece of work and took the longest amount of time because you neither want the hue/balance/contrast/saturation on a shot be too much that it starts to connote an abstract feel to the sequence or too little that it the shot looks dull and lacking realism. With grading, especially for this type of genre where the mood is usually light (due to it being a comedy) it needs to be bright and full of colour.
We didn't leave much time in this week to grade, if we had more time we wouldn't have rushed the process so much and it may have turned out better.

Three way-colour corrector on
Adobe Premier Pro that we used to grade

Me and Ela at the Mac, choosing
fonts for our titles

How we finalized and edited our
titles using 'Typewriter'

 We wanted our font to signify the kind of happy-go-lucky attitude behind our film's storyline. Therefore we chose a simple font, called 'Brain Flower', available to us from the software 'Typewriter'.

Sample of our chosen font

Me working on our Voice over

Voice-over:
We decided to get Amy Bauco, who also acted as our 'Crying Girl' in the corridor scene, to speak as the mum. It needed to be a voice-over since the mum is not to be in any of the routine scene shots, but in the storyline of the opening is shouting from downstairs to wake up Arthur. When recording into the microphone, instead of speaking from 30 cm like one is meant to, we had Amy stand 2 metres away from the microphone so she would be forced to shout and make the voicoever sound more realistic when played simultaneously with the first shot of Arthur waking up.

Construction post 5:The Back-up Shoot

A back up shoot was needed for the house scene shots. We couldn't have one for our school scene shots as our main shoot had to be re-scheduled. Many of those shots needed re-taking because of several framing/continuity errors or just that the shot did not work with our storyline anymore.
Below are some of our main shoot shots contrasted with our back up shoot shots.

1) Putting on jacket shot- because the framing was too close up for the split screen and we had too many shots taking place in the bathroom, so needed some variation 
BEFORE

AFTER

2) Walking out the front door shot-Arthur should say "Bye mum" before opening the front door not after so that it would be easier to edit the match on action of opening the house front door with the walking into the school shot. Framing also needs to be panned more to the left to show less of the door on the right hand side and more of the corridor.

BEFORE

AFTER

Reflections: Although these were all minor changes, it improved our footage a lot because framing was essential in us pulling off the split screen technique our transition from the house to the school depended on continuity. It also brought the level of our actor, Michael,who played the role of Arthur, up because he was able to act his scenes over and over again to a better level each time.

Construction post: Reflections on Edit Week 1

Our two week rota edit schedule- 
our group is from class 12C

High school ambience SFX we
downloaded for our sound-scape since
 it's a copyright free sound

How we created our transitions

Split screen technique we
 used from the film "127 hours"

How we created the split screen  

Our sound-scape

How we created our draft of titles
we started to construct the placement
 of our titles using a simple font
("Sim Hei") on Adobe Premier Pro
before using the mac to create proper
 titles with our ideal fonts and effects

Reflections so far:
1) We decided that some of our shots needed re- taking, we initially wanted to have a peeing shot for comedic effect but realized the framing could not work at all so had to re-take it as a mirror shot where he washes his face instead.

2) We also realized for edit week 2 our priorities would be to grade our sequence, finalize the construction of titles and finish our voiceovers

Construction Post 3: Reflections on our Main Shoot Session

When shooting in location 1, the school, we had to take some of the following factors into consideration:

• Placement of camera (e.g sticking to the 180 degree rule and 30 degree rule)

Not so much important in this location shoot as it was in the house main shoot session because the main part of the school shoot was of a one shot and not several different shots that need to be edited in such detail that continuity techniques when filming need to be used.

• Constantly making sure the acting is exactly the same in every take
• How much time we had to shoot due to lighting issues as it's still wintertime and it gets dark latest by 5:30 and the school itself closed at 7:00 pm

we wanted all the school shots to look like it was the morning so we needed bright lighting and needed to be finished before it was dark

Lighting at 4 pm at the school

Lighting at 6 pm at school 

• Retaking shots (but varying angles/pans/framing etc.) so we have a lot to work with when editing

For example the one-shot corridor track took approximately 30 takes, taking up most of the time of our shoot, because of mistakes from the continuity of actor movements and because this is one of the most important and eye-catching shots of our opening so had to be perfect. Some of the takes of our that shot can be found below

• Management of actors (since we had a big cast) 

So things like making sure everyone was quiet on set before shooting each scene took a long time. We also had to give the actors enough time to change into their costumes and get make-up on, therefore we ended up starting to film at 4:30 instead of 4 like we planned. Below is a behind the scenes video of us trying to manage our actors during the shoot.

• The sound of the dolly wheels overpowering the sound-scape of the one-shot track

We found, during our test shoot, that the dolly wheels made a rumbling sound due to the friction created between them and the floors. In order to dull out the sound, we taped felt to the wheels and this improved the sound during our main shoot

• Continuity of actor movements

So that editing the shots together will flow well together and look seamless.

When shooting in location 2, the house, there are different factors we took into consideration:

• Decorating Ela's bedroom to look like a teenage boys bedroom, create the right mise-en-scene

Behind the scenes- set design

To the right is a video of the location we had to work with  and how girly it looked before we cleared away indicating a girl uses that room and filled it with more stereotypically boyish things. 

• Framing in much smaller spaces

Because some of our shots were taken in such tight spaces, like in the bathroom scenes (brushing teeth) and fridge scene, which would've been hard for a person operating the camera to film comfortably and with good framing, we used a go pro camera. This is smaller and more compact and helped us achieve the right framing we wanted, even in tight places. 

• Lighting issues

Because we wanted the house routine scene to seem like it was morning, we started filming at 9am since morning produces the best and brightest lighting.

Implementing the changes we decided would be needed from our test shoots

Snagging list-changes for main shoot

Snagging list-changes for main shoot

Construction Post 2: Our Post-Production Kit

Our edit suite

Microphone- because it enables us to record external sound
straight to the computer we used it to record voiceovers

Adobe Premier Pro (Software)- to edit our sequence,
also used to edit our animatic and rough cut sequence

Adobe Audition(Software)- to organise/edit the voiceovers
we recorded using the microphone 

Typewriter (Software) on the Mac-
to construct the font/effects and transitions of our titles

Construction Post 1: Our Production Kit

GoPro Camera-to film shots where
 it's hard for the camera to reach since
it's small and has a waterproof function

Headphones- for the person who's 
working the camera to focus
 on only the sound in each take

A dolly- to move the tripod 
around easily fro track shot

A clapper board- to organise 
the set and make it easier 
when editing so we know what 
shots and takes we're  using 

A microphone- to boost sound
Canon Legria HFD30

A tripod- to adjust camera
 height and angles and keep
 the camera steady when
 taking pans

R+P Post 20:Reflections so far/looking ahead

Through the pre-production stage, we've encountered a lot of problems that we didn't initially think about before going on our shoots; for example, lighting issues in the corridor where we can only shoot with the camera facing side otherwise the light gets messed up on the other side and the sound of the wheels on the dolly of the tripod being picked up by the camera. However thankfully with all the rehearsals we've had with actors, test shoots etc. we've been able to have time to encounter these problems and think of solutions to fixing them before the real shoot.

I'm positive that we'll be able to implement these alterations to our shoot so that the post-production/editing stage is made easier. 

R+P Post 19:Our rough cut

We compiled all the footage from our test shoot into a rough edit in the format of how we made our animatic so we it's easier for us to visualize the practicalities of how we'd shoot and edit our main shoot. From the rough cut we learnt a lot about things we'd need to improve for our opening sequence and in filming for the main shoot. Issues such as timing/framing of shots, choreography/movement of actors, positioning of titles in relation to the framing of shots came up. Directors also gain from making rough cuts because it helps them figure out any shots that need to be cut off from their film sequence, shortened/lengthened or reordered.
We therefore compiled a snagging list which we'd implement the changes we decided and suggestion on alterations from teachers into our next shoot. On the left is a picture of the snagging list(s) we made.

R+P Post 18: Our test shoot

In preparation for our test shoot we have to...

make a shoot board- because we have two test shoots on separate days, since we have two different locations and it's not possible to get  permission to shoot at Latymer on a weekend (so instead have to shoot on a weekday), we have to make two separate shoot boards for the school (weekday) shoot and the routine (weekend) shoot.
sign a shoot organisation form- shown in the picture below is what we created so that everybody is clear on the logistics of the shoot& who in our group would be transporting kit (e.g. camera and tripod) to the location (Amber had that role), what actors are needed and what days we'll be shooting and so on.

Shoot schedule

Rehearsal days- to teach the actors their choreography since the corridor scene is going to be one long take. Therefore acting and timings of what actors do/say have to be precise. A video of one of the rehearsals that took place is directly below.

For the test shoot we're not going to finalize on costumes, props and full cast yet as we want to use this shoot to test lighting, camera movement and how our shots flow. Hence why we're also not using a full cast yet. 
Below is the behind the scenes footage of our test shoot and one of our rehearsal days. Ela was ill the day of the school scene shoot so unfortunately couldn't attend. I was the director and Amber was in charge of the technical side (lighting, camera etc).

R+P Post 17: Our planned costumes and props, hair and makeup

Group	Costumes	Props	Hair	Make-up
Michael-final chosen school costume Arthur	Tshirt/hoodie Jeans Trainers	Map of the school	NA	NA
Seb- Final chosen costume Emos	Fake piercings Fake Tattoos Dark hair Heavy eye-makeup Black clothes	Fake piercings and drawn tattoos		Heavy and dark eye makeup, minimal on lips and face.
Geeks/Nerds Seth-final chosen costume	Glasses Cardigan and checked shirts Flats/smart shoes	Chessboard, Science Textbooks and Backpacks	Neat and hair sprayed	NA
Chavs Okkor-final chosen costume	Adidas trainers Tracksuits Hooped earrings Slicked back ponytail hair Heavy makeup	NA	Gelled and slicked back into ponytails
Athletic	Tshirts Jogging bottoms	Basketball (from Sports hall at school)	NA	NA
Alisha- final chosen costume Hipsters	Chic trendy clothing	Handbags		Light on the eyes with bright lipstick for girls

Amy (crying girl)-final chosen costume
Makeup- smudged eyeliner
Props- box of tissues