Saturday, 7 May 2011

(Evaluation) Part 7 - What I learnt about technologies from constructing my opening sequence

Decisions about technology during pre-production, production & post-production:

pre-production:
- Before I began filming for my opening sequence, I went on a student protest march in London and filmed some practise shots using my mobile phone. This helped me gage how easy it would be to film footage in this environment. From the recci, I found out that using a mobile phone was easier to film with, under the conditions of a real protest, as it was more portable than a video camera.This was a successful use of new technology as the footage was good enough to use in the opening sequence itself and was a useful tool in teaching me how to film in similar locations when I went back into London to film more footage for my opening sequence.

Production:
- I decided to use a flip camera when filming footage of a student protest, because I felt this would make the scene feel more realistic and powerful. This is because the movements of the camera and close-up shots will allow the audience to connect with the scene and feel as though they are at the location of the scene. This was a successful use of new technology as the flip camera added verisimilitude to the scene and made it fit well into the British Social Realism genre.

Post-production:
 - As my time was limited, I decided it would be best only to use Final Cut in one scene in my TWO MINUTE OPENING SEQUENCE, as I had never used Final Cut before and having to learn how to use it would take to much time. I felt that using I-Movie would allow me to have more confidence about what I was doing, because I was already familiar with I-Movie from previous tasks,such as my CONTINUITY EXERCISE.

- By only using i-Movie when editing most scenes in my work, it helped the film seem more edgy and realistic as the scenes flowed together, which fit into the British Social Realism genre of being more interested in the storyline of the film than the editing aspects of it.

- I did however use final cut for one scene in my opening sequence, the news report scene. (below)


- Final Cut was useful to me in this scene as I needed to add non moving features to footage I filmed of a news report. I decide to use final cut to add these features, including a production logo of the news company and a clock, as I found that this software made the still features look part of the scene and make the scene more realistic as a news report.


- I decided to use music from the website FREE PLAY MUSIC to create the foley sound of a radio in the opening sequence, because this music fit best with the flow of the scenes it was played in. I used free music, that was not copyrighted, as this is what was asked of me in the brief.

- I tried to use a flip camera in post-production to create foley sound of a frying pan for a scene in my opening sequence where the mother character is cooking breakfast, however I could not get the sound completely perfect so that it seemed natural. As a result, I decide not to use foley sound of a frying pan here and instead left the foley sound of the radio in this scene, along side diegetic sound from the location, such as the sound that was original made from the actress moving the frying pan on the cooker and the singing done by the actress as she pretended to be singing along to the radio.


What I learnt:

from the process of creating my opening sequence I have learnt that:

- when I am editing my footage I should take care to make sure continuity is perfect, because it makes a big difference to the flow of scenes. For example, when filming an actor opening a door and then filming him closing it behind himself from another angle. To help make sure my continuity is perfect I have learnt that I should take advantage of the technology available to me, such as using a flip camera instead of a camcorder, as the cameras available to me have a bigger screen than the camcorders do, so they allow me to see more easily, in playback mode, whether my continuity is perfect or not.
- When editing sound I should spend more time changing a song I have downloaded to make it fit my piece of work and the British Social Realism genre better. I should take advantage of the softwares available to me on the I-Macs to do this.

- I have learnt not to question myself so much on whether I am doing something right or not, as even if I am doing something wrong, such as when editing music, in the long run it might sound better the way I have done it anyway.


This is a table of what technology I used, in what stage I used it and why I used it:

Technology used table

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