I think that I have developed in many ways as a
film maker from creating our preliminary video- ‘The Exchange’- to our thriller
opening- ‘The Revelation’. I feel I have learnt more about what sorts of shot
look good and ones that are difficult to do well. For example I think handheld
shots are difficult and should be kept to a minimum because if they are too
shaky or uneven then it will look amateurish. We used quite a few of these in
the preliminary not realising how shaky it would look.
I also think that panning shots should not last
for too long, because in our prelim we had a lot of feedback saying that our
panning shot lasted too long, and this did not help the tension. We included a
couple of panning shots in our completed opening because I do think they look
good but we just ensured they weren’t too drawn-out. I think that it is
important to take pace into account as well, because the pace in our prelim
stayed on the same level. Our completed opening was not like this as the shots
started quite slow, getting shorter and quicker. They then became very short
and snappy for the build-up of the shooting and the few after that were slower,
to allow the audience to think about what happened. Another thing I feel we
improved upon was the credits. In our prelim they were much too fast and
difficult to read. The font also wasn’t right, but this time around the credits
were more gradual and were a memorable part of the film as opposed to something
put in at the end. We took our time with them, giving each name a few seconds
and an image to go with it. The font was improved because it was suitable for
the tone of the opening.
I feel that a strong point of our preliminary film
was the range of shots we used and the framing of them. The shots of feet,
hands and the mouth were more interesting than just seeing the whole picture.
We built on this for ‘The Revelation’ by having even more interesting shots-
the ones from higher angles, the one of her feet walking through the rubbish
and the over the shoulder shot of the message in the Bible. I think that these
shots were composed well too because the feet/hand were always the clear focus
point of the shot.
I think that we followed the 180˚ rule well in
both the preliminary and our production. We made sure that we did not cross the
line in either, and I think this is clear because in both films the camera is
following a character going somewhere. This could have caused problems as there
is a lot of moving around and it would have been easy to make a mistake. I
believe we avoided it though because both of the films make sense from that
perspective. I also feel that we were quite successful with match on action in
the prelim, especially the part when a character is hit on the head with a bag
of sweets. When the bag is thrown it is at the right level for when it hits her
making it look like it was one shot when we actually filmed it quite a few
times. We expanded on our match on action skills for our production, seen in
parts when the bible is opened, a door is opened and when the girl is walking
up the stairs. Shot reverse shot was not used so much in our production, as
there was not a typical moment where it would be used, like for a conversation.
A place where we did have this though was when the girl hears the door slam the
first time. We
see her coming in throught the door, then her looking back at the door and then
from inside the corridor again. We
did follow the rules of shot reverse shot here because the girl is in the right
place and the sequence flows well, even though this was not a complex example
of the technique.
My editing skills have improved because I have learnt about more of the transitions on iMovie and where they can be used effectively in a film. I have also improved in cutting down clips so we have what we really need and each part is interesting rather than having unnecessary shots that drag on. I think that putting in sound effects and music was probably the part of the editing that I improved the most on, because I experimented a lot with sounds and learned more about how to change the length of the music and how to cut it down.
I feel that we were very well planned for our production which can be seen through the brainstorming of ideas, the storyboards and the shot lists. Also, we got feedback from people looking at the storyboards so we knew what else we may want to add. In the story boards we had rough drawings that would show the framing of shots
and below we had a brief of what was happening and the name of the shot used. In our shot lists, for each of our shots we included: the location, shot description, framing, action, sound effects, actors, props and notes. The preparation was very useful because we knew exactly what we were doing on filming day. We were quite prepared for our prelim, but we did not get audience feedback for our planning, so we could not be sure whether it would definitely be appealing or be sure if people thought it looked good or not.
If I were to re-film our thriller opening, I would have looked into writing the names for the credits on the photos seen or on pieces of paper. This would be interesting because it would look like it was in the world of the film as opposed to text added in after. This would also improve the film because I feel that the font doesn't look quite right and we could make one that suited the theme of the film more. Also with the effect we used it sometimes looked like the film was in black and white and other times looked more sepia. If there was a way to make this more consistent I would do this to improve it. Lastly, I would edit the sound at some points. For example, there is a moment when the girl is walking towards the bloody newspaper and the music stops for a moment and for a split second you hear the start of what would originally happen next in the music, which we cut out. This was a mistake and I think it sounds wrong when watching the film. Overall though, I was really happy with our final result and think that it meets our intentions and would be enjoyed by our target market.
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