G321: Final Cut of Film Opening

Charley 

G321: Second Rough Cut of Opening and Feedback

This is the second rough cut of our film opening. We have again received feedback from a range of people. This time, instead of receiving feedback from our teachers, we asked a range of pupils about what they thought of the opening. We asked a range of ages from 14-18, who commented on what they both liked and disliked about the opening. The feedback is layout below the video link.



Feedback from pupils:

Year 10 (14/15 years olds)

• Music is relevant to the genre and plot line
• Liked the titles and the way they entranced and exited
• Liked the actual title of the film
• Liked the use of tracking across the desk
• They like the way the actress circled the name of the film in the notebook
• They felt that the actress could have acted a little more panicked to fit in with the sound of the voice over

Out of a class of 26 15 females and 2 males said that they would watch the rest of the film

Year 11 (15/16 year olds)

• They said it reminded them of 'Bridget Jones' (2001)
• The liked the use of background music and felt it fitted in well with the genre
• They like the fact that you didn't see the full face of the character as it added to the mystery of who she was

Out of a class of 26 12 said they would watch the rest of the film

Year 13 (17/18 years olds)

• They felt that it the most like an opening out of the all the other openings that they watched and analysed
• The shot showing the computer screen was very 'Sex and the City' (2008)
• They said that they didn't understand why the tracking shot repeated across the desk
• In contrast to the year 11 students, they did understand why you do not see the face of the character at any point during the scene

Out of a class of 15 10 said they would watch the rest of the film


Just as with out first rough cut, collecting feedback for a second time is very important for the development of our film. At this point in the editing process it will be hard for us to make any major changes as this may involve re-filming certains shots, which would take a lot of time to complete. However, all the feedback is still very valuable to us and will help us to further improve the opening for our final rough cut.

Charley

G321: First Rough Cut of Opening and Feedback

This is the first rough cut of our film opening. We have recieved feedback from both our teachers and our target audience. It was important to get feedback at this stage to ensure that our film is successful in attracting our target audience. Receiving feedback throughout the editing stage is effective as it means we can improve as we go along, instead of having a lot to improve when we receive final feedback.



Feedback from our teachers:
Overall our film received good feedback our shots were steady and well framed. The mise-en-scene was well selected and suits the piece and the editing was good and made sense to the audience. To improve our opening we need to add a soundtrack to our piece, work on our titles and complete our institutional logo.

Feedback from our target audience:
We previewed our film to a group of teenagers aged 15 and above (both male and female). The feedback we received was all very positive. They clearly understood it was from the romantic-comedy genre and could gage that the overall feel for the film was a 'chick-flick'. The did comment that sound would further improve our opening. This is something that we have already considered and plan to edit in background music.

We will now make these improvements and take on board the advice we have received before we upload our second rough cut.

Cath, Charley

G321: Feedback on Initial Filming

16/03/2011

Today we recieved feedback about our initial shots from our teacher. We recieved mainly positive feedback about our shots below:

• Good Tracking shots, steady camerawork
• Good lighting throughout
• Nice framing of the over the shoulder shot
• Generally good camerawork

The negative feedback we recieved was:

• Not so good framing of the close up shot of our main charactrers eyes
• Writing on the computer screen is quite difficult to read

To resolve these problems, we have decided to re-film the close up of the computer screen with the writing and we have decided that we can crop the close up of the characters eyes when editing.

Re-filming

We re-filmed the close up of the computer screen on the same day we recieved the feedback so that we could proceed with editing as planned. To do this, we used a dolly, a tri-pod and a camera and we managed to complete this re-filming within 30 minutes. We filmed a few different variations of this shot so that we had multiple ones to choose from when editing to give the best effect. We worked equally as efficient and managed our time just as well as our first day of filming and we are now ready to continue with our editing.

Joanna

G321: Filming Diary

  

15/3/2011

 

Our first day of filming was very successful and we worked very well and efficiently together. We arrived at our location: a bank office in Chelmsford town, and we were very efficient when setting up all of our props and camera equipment. We all brought different props with us and brought along our storyboard, so that we could look at how we imagined the set to look and could place all of the props in the correct places. We made sure that our actress had the right costume and helped to style her in the way we imagined her to look.

 

Setting upprops on desk

 

Setting up props



 


Working on costume with our actress

 

Setting up the props



When we were setting up our equipment we came across some problems. One main problem was the size of our tri-pod as it was not as tall as we had expected and did not have a spirit level on the top to tell us if the camera was straight. Therefore to resolve this, we had to stand our tri-pod on a small coffee table to get it to the height we needed and we had to use all three of us to use the camera: one two to hold the tri-pod at an angle that was straight and one to be in charge of using the camera itself. This meant that filming some of the shots was more time-consuming that we had hoped but we did manage to work very efficiently in spite of this. Another problem that we had was framing our shots. To get a full long shot, we had to move the tri-pod out of the door peering in on the room to create a successful long shot. This did actually work very well as we managed to get the shot we needed without any huge problems.



Our Camera stood on a small Coffee table



Our camera through the doorway



Although we had our shot-list with us, we did not entirely stick to it as we had some issues with the camera equipment. This therefore meant that we had to pay careful attention to which shots we had filmed to ensure that we didnt miss any out along the way. Our shot list showed that we should have filmed in the following order:

Setting up Props

1) Long shot of desk

2) Second Long shot of desk

3) Tracking shot of desk

4) Second tracking shot of desk

5) Close up of computer screen

6) Over the shoulder shot

7) Close up of characters eyes

8) Ariel shot of character's handbag

This was because we had ordered the shots by the typoe of shot they were however our difficulties meant that we needed to film it this order instead:



Filming the shot of the desk



1) Long shot of desk

2) Second long shot of desk

3) Ariel shot of phone

4) Close up of characters eyes

5) Over the shoulder shot
6) Close up of computer screen

7) Tracking shot of desk

8) Second tracking shot of desk




Filming the hand-held tracking shot



Mostly, once we had overcome the problems with the camera equipment, our filming of each shot went fairly smoothly however there were one or two shots that we still had a lot of difficulty with. The first difficult shot was the shot of the phone ringing. We has issues with the sound in particular with this shot. Because of our location, outside the office was a main road and it was difficult not to pick up the sound of the cars passing by when we filmed this. Therefore we decided to film this shot a number of times to make sure that we had choice of the best shot when we are ready to edit. Another shot that was particularly difficult was the tracking shots. This was because we were filming them hand-held adn it was difficult to keep the camera steady. Another problem with these shots was the timings as we had to make sure that our actress did things in sync with the camera as well as having a steady speed ready for us to edit.

When filming, we all equally contributed to the work and worked very efficiently together. We managed to film all of our shots in one session which meant that our time management was very successful as our filming schedule actually stated that we were planing on filming over two days rather than one.

Joanna

G321: Health and Safety

When filming it is important that we consider the health and safety aspects in order to ensure the safety of our actors, ourselves, the filming equipment and those around us.

Due to the fact that we are filming in a secluded office for the whole sequence factors such as traffic and dangerous environments do not need as great consideration as things such as interacting with the general public, disturbing people working at the location and getting permission for filming.

For our opening we need to consider:

• Getting permission to film in our chosen location - we have already recieved permission from the bank mananger saying we can use the facilities for filming.
• Being polite and respectful to those working in the location - on the day of filming we will ensure we are quiet and do not intrude on those working and cause them any distractions. As we are using a private office it will be easier for us to remain in one place and not have to move around too and not get in peoples way. 
• Being aware of electical equipment - as our setting is focused a lot on a computer and other office electrics we have to be aware of the danger these could lead to. For example, drinks and other liquids near plugs and computer screens could cause electricution. In order to avoid this happening we need to take care in ensuring that props such as coffee mugs do not actually contain any liquid and also when taking breaks etc we need to make sure we are away from computers and other electrical equipment.

Cath, Charley, Joanna

G321: Considering Sound and Effects

For our opening, we wanted to use both a voice over and non-diegetic music to accompany the filming. This is because we have noticed that a lot of other films from the rom-com genre also use this technique such as Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009) and Bridget Jones (2001). Our main character Penelope Fox speaks in the voice over and so we plan to audition different actresses to find someone with an appropriate voice. The voice over is extremely important to our opening as it introduces the main character as well as directly showing the particular genre of our film. It is one of the main features of the opening as it narrates what is happening and makes the audience want to ask questions about what might happen later in the film.

We would like to have a romantic piece playing in the background and to add the comedy element to our piece we plan to cut off the music when a phone rings loudly. This is to introduce a mood change from relaxed and calm to frantic and panicked. Whilst the voice over is playing, we would like to have the piece of music playing softly in the background that has romantic connotations but is still happy to emphasise the comedy element. It is important that we use royalty-free music because of the copyright laws and so we have been looking for music that is copyright free. Below are some of the songs that we are considering using for our opening and we have evaluated what their strengths and weaknesses.

'There is Romance'
This piece is a soft piano piece that is very romantic and is very simple and calming. We liked this piece because it connotes the romantic element of our genre and wouldn't be too overpowering with the voice over playing on top. However it does not add to the comedy side of the genre which is an important part to our genre and would not give a good representation of this in our opening.

'Somewhere Sunny'

This piece is a guitar duet that is both calming and uplifting. We liked the sound of this piece as it would fit nicely beneath our voice over and compliment the slow camera movements. Also the relaxed sound would also effectively contrast with the change in tone when the phone begins to ring. However, we do feel that the guitar sound is slightly too 'country' for the sound we desire and doesn't quite fit with the romantic atmosphere of the opening.

'Porch Swing Days'

This piece features both acoustic guitars and a chorus, which enters early on in the piece. These sounds together work to create an airy, carefree atmosphere. We like this piece as it has a feel-good melody which is calming but fun. The sound would fit nicely underneath the voice over and would not intrude and prevent us from hearing the voice over. Again however the guitar instrument makes the piece sound a little 'country' but played quietly underneath this could still work effectively.

'Clear Waters'

This piece is a delicate solo piano piece which is simple and light. It is very calming and would fit with the film we are creating. We like this piece because it has a romantic feel and enchanting melody which creates a relaxing atmosphere. As the piece is going to play alongside a voiceover we need to choose one that won't over power the film and take away the focus from it and this piece is soft enough to do so. However, we feel that this piece may be too quiet and may not be heard under the voiceover. Also, it may be too romantic and not cover the comedy side of our genre.

Cath, Charley, Joanna