Final Editing Process

Yesterday, I spent the majority of my day doing the final process of edting for my main task. The main thing I had to do was add the opening titles to the video so that it fitted the conventions of an opening sequence. However, this is not all I did as there were a few things that needed to be corrected. As I was doing this editing at home, I had some new programs available to me. These were Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects.

Adobe Premiere Pro
After the initial edit, we figured that our production was at a high enough standard. However when I watched it home, I realised that some of the diegetic sound was either poor quality or was not syncronised with the action on screen. Therefore I decided to edit the sound, mainly the footsteps as they were way too loud and not in sync. I also added some extra diegetic sound such as creaking and birds in the background to try and make it more realistic. There were also some visual tweaks that needed to be made, such as slightly lengthening and shortening clips, and in some places the video had glitched and needed to be replaced. As well as this I added some of the titles that would appear in the finished piece which was made very simple by Premiere Pro. Adobe Premiere Pro as a video editing software is fantastic! The ease of use was great and the video editing options were vast.

Adobe After Effects
To do some of the titles for the final piece, we wanted to make some of them more dynamic and we thought the best way to do this was implementing the text into the enviroment. After research, I found the best program to use for this is Adobe After Effects. There were a variey of features available to me, however many of these effects were not possible as some features. An example is the feature known as rotoscoping. This feature puts an object from the video in a seperate layer so that you can insert things behind it while the video is in motion. Initially, this was a plan but as the rotoscoping is usually done with a still object and/or with a selection of colours in the picture. Due to the camera moving a lot and there being little difference in colour it could not pick up myself as a layer within the video and therefore did not work. However, there were some features that did work. The one I used was camera tracking. This feature is used to track all motion within a selcted clip and then find 'track points' which you can then link with text, for example. Therefore as the track point stays in place so does the text and moves along with the camera movement. I used this twice, once where it says 'Cinematography, Thomas Ewart.' and I attatched this to the ground and secondly when it says 'Starring, Abel Clarke' and this was made to look like it was written on the wall. This is fairly simple to do and is very effective. Overall, Adobe After Effects is a really good program when implementing video effects into a video. However, as I was a beginner to the program, I felt I was thrown very much in the deep end and it took me a good while to understand what I was doing.












After all this was done, the final piece is now complete. I will be putting it on my blog soon.  

    

Changes in the main task

After many hours of work and effort, me and my group have now finished our main task. Overall, I am impressed of what we have achieved. However the final product which was produced was nothing like I imagined and this was due to all the changes we made from the initial pitch. There were a variety of reasons for these changes and they were made in all three areas of production, pre-production, production and post production. In this post I will go through all the changes we made and why they were made. 

1. The Actor

Initially we had cast Daniel Cadoret, as mentioned earlier in my blog, to play the main character. We did go out filming once with Daniel and he did a good job at presesenting the character we wanted. However after this it became apparant that after this seesion he was unavialable for filming when we needed him due to what he had planned. Of course we respected this as he was only helping out through kindness so if he has other plans he should definetly do them rather than go out of his way to help us. Therefore we had to find another actor star in the opening sequence. As mentioned before on my blog, I was the other choice to be the actor so I took up the role. Overall this didn't affect the overall piece as the audience didn't know this and the only drawback was having to re-film three or four shots. 

   

2. The ending

When we first thought of the initial ending, there was going to be a lot more going on and was even going to involve another actor. However half way through the production process, we realised that there were two problems with this ending. Firstly, the ending would invovlve the character being shot, and if this were to happen it would of closed a lot of doors to who this character was. However the main reason we changed his is due to timing. With what he had already filmed, the piece was already two mintues long so adding an ending which would be just as long would mean our piece would be going gainst the brief of making at most, a two and a half minute opening sequence. Therefore we had to go back to the drawing board and rethink our ending. This took two attempts as the scond idea for an ending was also too ambitious for the little time we had left for it. What we producedin the end,  I feel was sufficent to work as the ending and honestly would've been better than the ending we had planned in the first place.



This is the initial ending in stroy board form, with the car pulling up and the driver then shooting
the main character.



3. A couple of shots

Our shotlist was something which, as time went by, we struggled to follow. This was for two reasons. Firstly the shots we had in mind may have been overly ambitious however the main reason was that once we were on set we realised that some shots we had planned would not be as effective as we first hoped. however the location also gave as a lot of inspiration for different shots and some of which wouldn't of worked without what we had available. A good example is there was part of the wall which had fallen away and we took advantage of this with one of the shots. This wouldn't of been possible to plan if we didn't know the wall was like this.



When we first did our storyboard, this is the shot we intended for when the
character hits the creature, and it was going to be a simple mid shot. However, when
we got round to filming we figured that a worms eye shot shot looking up at the character
would be better and have more of an effect.









Fourth day of filming

On the fourth and last day of productive filming, we finished off all the shots that were left to do as well as re-shooting shots which were not as good as we first thought. The initial shots we filmed this day were most of the shtos outside of the compund, including the follow shot. As well as there shots, the shots we refilmed are the panning shots of the character entering and leaving the building and the basic mid shot within the building. Unfortunatly we did not film a video diary when we were on set so instead I shall show so you a few snapshots of the shots we filmed.

A change of plan

Recently we have been rethinking the ending of our opening sequence, as what we had planned originally may not work how we hoped. At first, we were going to end ou piece with the main character being shot by a mysterious person in attempt to shock the viewer. However, after some thought we realised this will close a lot of doors to what the main film will be about as it gets into the action to quickly. After consideration, we thought a better idea may be a montage after the character leaves the compound walking through a variety of different areas to emphasise how alone he is. Along with this, we would like the final shot to be him looking over a dessolate, lonely landscape, preferably a built up one to show what the character is going to have to overcome during the rest of the film. By doing this we will have to change the beginning as well. We were thinking that the actor could be walking down the road and hear some strange sound which could well be something alive, and then in the very last shot you would hear the sound again. This will also link with the worm eye shots used for the rat part of the piece, to build a false sense of tension.

I went looking for potential locations for the final scene yesterday, there is quite a large hill which, on a clear day, you can see Oxford in the distance as well as a village in the foreground. This would work well as you can clearly see the obstacles our character will have to overcome. Underneath is a few pictures of the view, its not great as it was a rainy day but I've been there before when it was clear and know that it would be ideal.

Third day of filming.

Last sunday we went out for our third day of filming. We got a reasonable amount filming done, including the pan at the beginning and the shot which will be used for our prouction at the start. One of our group members, Victor, unfortunatly could not make it on this day. Once again, we made a video diary explaining what we got done.  

Second day of Filming.

On our second trip out to the location, we re-filmed all the clips we did before as the actor from when we originally filmed was not available as much as we needed him to be. We also filmed a few extra shots such as the rat scene. Enjoy!

Story Board

This post is just to show the inital storyboard for our production. Here it is.

First day of Filming.

Last tuesday we went out and filmed our first shoot. We got quite a lot done in the time we had available and are hoping to get some more done this week so we have a good amount of time for editing. There is a video in this post explaining what we did as well as what we'll be doing next. There are also some pictures of the filming in action.

The Actor

In our piece, we need an actor who can present certain things which will help clearly show the type of character we have in mind. To do this, the actor needs certain qualities, the first and most important quality being that they have to look like an everyday teenager. This is crucial as the piece is going to be focusing on a young person trying to survive and if we make the character seem they only belong to one specific social group, it will be hard to relate to. Another quality needed is for the character to look fairly sinister. By this, I don't mean in such a way that they look evil, but instead in a way that makes them look like they have been through a lot and has maybe seen some things that you wouldn't want to. This will help emphasise the whole post apocalyptic feel. With these sort of qualities in mind, we then had to find somebody who fitted this role as well as somebody who would actually be up for playing the character. So far we have the option of two people, these are me and a friend called Daniel Cadoret. Both me and Daniel would fit this role as we do not fall under any physically distinctive social group so we can be related to easily and we can both look sinister if we have to! At this point in time, we are probably going to get Daniel to act purely so I can focus on the direction of the product. Underneath are a few key features about me and Daniel which can help determine who is better for the role.

Name: Abel Clarke                                       Name: Daniel Cadoret

Age:16                                                        Age:17

      Height: 5'6'                                                Height: 5'7'  

Hair: Brown                                                Hair: Brown

Availability: Whenever needed                   Availability: Weekends

     

Props

In nearly all media productions, props are used for many different reasons and they can sometimes have some sort of meaning behind them. In our piece, there are not many props which are needed, in fact there is only one. This is the weapon which the main character will have throughout the opening sequence. Although this sounds like a pretty basic prop there was some thinking that had to go into what the weapon will be. Stereotypically, weapons in films tend to either be firearms, knives and so on but this isn't going to be the case in our piece. We want the weapon to be something that realistically will be found in a post apocalyptic environment, as there wouldn't really be guns lying around. Therefore we decided to think along the lines of the sort of thing you would find in a typical house, shed or garage. This gave us a massive list of choices although some were not appropriate such as a cleaver or kitchen knife as we would be filming in public and we didn't want to look suspicious. Here are a selection of potential tools which could work as weapons in our piece along with the positives and negatives of both.

     

Hammer - Is a good example of a household item which could be used as a weapon and in many films does just that. However we want the audience to clearly see the weapon throughout and this can be hard to do with such a small object.

Knife - This is also something which is stereotypically seen as a household weapon and would work however it is also too small and if I was seen carrying a knife then there could be trouble. 

        

Spade - This is something that may not always be seen as a weapon but will work perfectly within our piece. I think this as it is something that could be found in any home and is easily visible to the audience. We will probably use this in our piece unless we can find anything better. 

The Pre Production shot list.

This is a list of the shots, angles and movement that the camera will do in our production. This is useful to have as it makes it clear when each shot will bed used and in what order. It mainly means you don't have to remember if the storyboard is unclear. In the far left column there is the number of what the shot is, the next one along is the type of shot and/or camera angle or movement used. the next one is the description of whats going to happen in that shot and finally on the far right is how long each shot will be.  

Shot Number	Shot Type	Description	Time
1	Establishing pan	The camera will pan over the hole area and establish the location	8 seconds
2	Medium shot of main character	The camera will look at the main character (D) who is stood at the side of the road	3 seconds
3	Over the shoulder long shot	The camera will show the car driving towards D	3 seconds
4	Mid shot with focus on character	Main character jumps and hides in bush	4 seconds
5	Medium close up	Character hides as car drives past	5 seconds
6	Long shot turns in to a medium close up of character	Car drives past, character climbs cautiously out of bush	6 seconds
7	Master shot	Character continues to walk down road	3 seconds
8	Mid shot (tracking)	Character continues to walk down road (Camera at side)	5 seconds
9	Long shot	Character walks around corner to confront gate	4 seconds
10	Medium shot (low angle)	Character starts climbing through gate	2 seconds
11	Medium shot (high angle)	Character finishes climbing through gate (Camera on other side)	2 seconds
12	Establishing pan	Character looks about and walks towards building.	8 seconds
13	Pan (High angle), (medium long shot)	Character enters building and walks in	5 seconds
14	Medium shot focus on character	Character starts scavenging for supplies.	4 seconds
15	Worms eye	Perspective of creature moving towards building	3 seconds
16	Close up	Main character continues to scavenge	4 seconds
17	Worms eye	Creature gets closer to building and enters the building	3 seconds
18	Close up	Main character looks at item	3 seconds
19	Worms eye	Creature behind character	4 seconds
20	Close up	Character senses something behind him	2 seconds
21	Low angle( worms eye)	Character turn to hit creature with weapon	2 seconds
22	Long shot	See character putting creature in bag	5 seconds
23	Mid shot	Character walks and looks about in building	4 seconds
24	Mid shot	Looks some more and leaves building	4 seconds
25	Long shot(pan)	Character walks toward the gate. (ref.12)	8 seconds
26	Medium long shot	Character climbs back through gate	4 seconds
27	Close up of main characters face, focus on car and other character	Character steps into view and looks right to reveal car from earlier with new character next to it	6 seconds
28	Close up of character, focus on end of prop(gun)	New character looks at main character and raises gun into view, aims and shoots.	7 seconds
29(extra)	After gun goes off cut to black	Title revealed	4 seconds
30(extra)			seconds