Prelim Filming Task

My Media teacher told us we had to create a short film for our Prelim task. The idea was for the film to be a hort sequence where one person (Baris) walked into a room and exchanged a couple of pieces of dialogue with another person (Katy). The film had to include a variety of different shots and editing techniques. We had to include a match on action shot, where you see someone push a door open on one side and then the shot would change to the other side of the door and you would see it opening, as if no time had passed. We also had to do a shot-reverse-shot sequence, where two people were having a conversation and you saw one person talking, before the camera switched to show the other person talking. Throughout the video, we also had to include the idea of the 180 degree rule, which meant that you never saw all the way around and only saw the front 180 degrees of the people.

The first thing we had to do was get into groups of four and then groups of two within that. In our pair we had to come up with a location and storyline for our video. This I found quite hard at the start as it was difficult to think of something interesting enough to film. Once we had finally decided on the idea of someone trying to steal a bar of chocolate and then getting caught, we had to begin storyboarding. We did this by coming up with a range of shots and interesting camera angles to include in out video. We also tried to fit in the shots and editing we had to as part of the brief.

In the end I think my storyboard was good as it had lots of detail and description of sound and camera movements. However, if I was to do the storyboard again I would take more time in making sure that the drawings were detailed enough to explain what was going on.

Next lesson after we had storyboarded, we had to begin the filming of our video. We found an empty classroom and got it set up ready for the scene. I was responsible for filming the beginning of the video and filmed Baris walking down the corridor, which I desided would be a mid shot.. The next shot was the opening of the door, which included a close up of the Baris hand on the door as he opened it. I was also responsible for another mid shot of the door opening on the other side and the Baris entering. The final shot I filmed was Baris spotting and picking up the chocolate bar, this shot was again a mid shot, but was split into two different shots, with a low angle shot of his feet as he crossed the floor in between. My partner then filmed an over the shoulder shot of Katy spotting Baris and asking "What you doing?". The next shot was a close up of Baris's face, from Katy's point of view, looking shocked and saying "Oh No". The final shot of our video, was a close up of Katy's face from Baris's point of view saying "That's my Chocolate!"

I think the filming went quite well, as I had never used a camera before, but managed to figure out how to record and zoom in. I think I could have got some better shots of the close up of the door handle, as at the moment I think the angle of the close up is wrong and means that the video doesn't flow together very smoothly. I also think I could have used a better variety of shot types as the shots I filmed are all the same shot type. My partner was responsible for the rest of the filming and at the end of our filming session, I think we could have spent more time making sure we had every single shot we needed for the video and were happy with the quality of them. When I do the filming again, I will make sure I take more takes of each shot, so we have a better chance of getting the shots we need.

Also as we were pushed for time, I do not think we managed to effectively shoot the shot-reverse-shot sequence as well as we could have. If we were to do it again, I think we would spend more time ensuring we were able to film the characters having a conversation using shot-reverse-shot. This was an important part of the brief and i was dissappointed that i was unable to shoot it effectively.

When we had finished filming our video, we had to go back and begin the editing. I had edited a video before, but it was still relatively new to me, so I was quite pleased how quickly I was able to find the right programme. We uploaded our filming and selected the shots we needed. We then watched the shots and decided where to cut them to get the right timings for our storyboard. We had to try and use continity editing in our video, to make it the video flow together better. We had to try and make the change of shot less obvious and look more like a continuous piece of filming. I did quite well with cutting the shots down to make them shorter and also to make them fit together with the rest of the video. I had a bit of problem trying to fit in the close up of the door handle as the the angle was different to the beginning shot, but after a few tries I think I managed to get it pretty close. I think I was able to add the match on action technique quite effectively onto my video and I think it is successful in looking as no time has passed. Overall I think my continunity editing was quite successful, but i still think more time needed to be taken to make sure that every shot fitted in exactly with the next.

Disappointingly, we did not have all the shots we needed to complete the storyboard accurately, this is a fault of our bad filming, but the shots we did have we managed to fit together and in the end I think the video runs quite smoothly. I was unable to find a way to remove the sound from my video, and when I do my real coursework task I will make sure that I do not have any of the unwanted sound that I have in this one. If I was to do the editing again, I would make sure that we had filmed all the shots correctly and therefore i think that would have given us a better chance and opportunity to fit the shots together and make the video flow better.

I think we were quite succesful in filming the 180 degree rule, but I think more time and care could have been taken trying to ensure that we completed this as accurately as we could have.

We finally had to render our video and get it ready to be shown. After I had finished my video i was able to reflect on my performance and the task itself and in the end I quite enjoyed this prelim task, as i think it gave me a lot of experience in using a camera and editing.

During this prelim task I learnt, how to use a camera, including how to start and stop recording and how to change to a close up shot quickly. I also was able to get a bit more knowledge on how to use the editing software and cut between one shot to the other and make it look fluid using contunity editing. I also learnt more about the different shot types, such as low angle and high angle and what the effect of using them is.

Overall, I think the video I have produced flows quite smoothly, but I think it needs a lot of improving if I were to do it again. I would make sure the storyboards were more accurate and most importantly I would spend more time and care trying to get the correct shot types and variety of shots that were needed if I was to successfully meet the brief. I would also spend more time editing the video to make it run smoothly and not look as jumpy or uneven.