Editing our footage

During the editing process  of our film opening sequence, we first made sure all of the videos were on the shared documents so that we could have access to them all and use them.

We then first put all the videos on to adobe premier pro in order so that we knew we had all the footage we needed before we began to start cropping the videos and adding titles etc.

Once we finished cropping the videos in order to make the opening sequence flow, we were then given feedback by a media coursework teacher on what he thinks should be improved.

We made notes on what he said:

Here are some pictures of the editing process:

(The first photo shows Niyi recording his narration for our opening sequence)

Sophie and Niyi

Sign-in- Editing our footage

April 2nd, we began to edit the rest of our footage in school and planned to finish all of it on that day.

Sophie and Niyi

Booking equipment for our second filming day

After filming our first part of the film, we then had to consider another date for our second filming day. We then decided to send an email to the IT technicians again to book the cameras.

Here is a screenshot of the email sent to her:

Unfortunately we were unable to get the same cameras as last time and instead ended up with a HD dvc handheld camera along with a charger and a spare battery.

Sophie

Booking equipment for our second filming day

For our first filming day we had to book the equipment a few days beforehand in order for some of it to be available us. Niyi sent an email to an IT technician who is in charge of all the equipment.

Here is a screenshot of the email sent to her:

In the end we managed to get:

• Two DSLR cameras -Nikon and Canon
• Two microphones
• Tripod
• Flycam

Filming by Sophie, Niyi and Amber

Group Communication

Since we are using this day to edit the rest of our 2 minute film opening sequence, we needed to get the rest of the footage sent to us from different members of our group since we used our phones.

Sophie imported all of her videos recorded from her phone on to the media drive and Amber sent her videos that she recorded to Niyi.

This is what we copied all of the videos on to:

Sophie, Niyi and Amber

Filming Update-Time management

After filming the first part of our film opening and editing it to find it to be 1 minute and 37 seconds long, we decided to organise another filming day to finish the rest of the opening sequence. We were unable to book the same cameras again (Nikon Dlsr) therefore we were given a handheld camera instead. When it came to the actual filming day, our iPhone 5’s appeared to have a much better quality camera than the handheld camera which was supposedly a HD camera therefore we continued the filming with our phone cameras instead.

We filmed the last part of our film opening on 30th March.

Here is evidence of organising dates to do the second part of filming:

Filming by Sophie, Amber and Niyi

Organisation of Actors, Locations, Costume and Props

Now that we have decided as a group that we need to make a massive improvement with the filming, we have now finished planning the storyboard and are ready to film.

Actors The only actor we needed to film the first minute was Niyi. He was required to show a variety of emotions such as frustration, anxiety and anger. I feel that during the film process, he successfully portrayed this and followed the storyboard and instructions very well.

Locations The location of where the scenes will be taking place is at a member of the group’s house. We felt that this was a good choice of setting as it is the road at the end of the house which means our filming will not disrupt any neighbours. It is also a good choice of setting as we can get an extreme long shot of the whole road from the end which helps to set a calm mood as nothing is happening at the moment during the scene. We took a variety of scenery shots within that particular location so that we can pick out the ones we like to use during editing our final cut.

Costume and Props For props we only needed a very sharp knife and some fake blood. We did however run out of fake blood therefore we resulted in using ketchup instead which turned out to look realistic in the end as it was filmed during the night so it didn’t look as clear as it would of done in broad daylight. For costumes, Niyi had to wear casual clothes as he is going to a party. It wouldn’t look realistic if he was still in his school clothes.

Organising a day to film

Filming by Sophie, Niyi and Amber

Lighting Problems/Solutions

During our draft filming process, we experienced problems with lighting as we were filming quite late at night and we weren’t properly equipped with the right cameras etc. We, instead, used the cameras on our phones, seeing as it was a test run/draft for our actual final draft. We only relied on the lighting from the torches on our phone and the streetlights making the best use of it bearing in mind that we shouldn’t expect to see the highest quality pictures from the videos. This problem actually helped our group to have a discussion on thinking of ways of making the quality better for the final draft and final cut. We were considering putting money together to buy some floodlights to enhance the lighting in the scenes however we thought of perhaps seeing whether the media department in our school will have some studio lights or any ideas of helping to make the quality better.

We first sent an email to our media studies coursework teacher to ask if he knows of ways to use more lighting or if another teacher may be able to help us. Here is the email sent and the reply.

Sophie and Niyi

Our time as a group

In the lessons we have had with one of our media teachers (Mr Gilbert), at the start of each lesson we are starting to allocate people with blog posts so more people in the group get a chance to write a post on their desired topic which will help them contribute to yardproductions more. This will then help us cover more sections quicker and also make a more detailed analysis on each section. We have communicated through instagram to arrange times to meet to film and edit our opening. This has also helped to discuss things we will need for the filming and the times we will be meeting at.

Parts of our conversation from Instagram

Phoebe. M and Sophie C

Problems in our group

We have had many problems in our group which have enabled us to be behind completing our coursework. One was that some members of our group had not contributed on the blog by not doing any blogposts so before we started to do any more filming we pushed them into doing one to show that we are all putting effort in. Another problem was that one member of our group wasn’t in the past two media lessons and they have the story board which created a problem for us as we were behind on filming. One of the main problems in our group is communication, this is because we mostly argue to get our point accross to the director, and this then causes us to keep going over the same things rather than moving on to other tasks that need completing. Next lesson we may need to change roles in our group as Sophie and I both agreed in todays lesson that the director isnt pulling their weight and not doing their job properly, this was also discussed and agreed with our media coursework teacher.

Phoebe, Sophie, Niyi