Presentation of 2 Minute Film

  Before the presentation of our film, I suggested that we met to check that it had all burnt to the disc ok - as I know that some problems can occur, such as the quality getting worse.
  This was a good idea as we found out that the picture of the film had stretched dramatically, cutting off the sides of most of the footage. We asked Chris to help us with this as we were unsure of how to fix it - after multiple tries of changing the aspect ratio. I'm not sure why the problem occurred but we managed to fix it by making the 'image+wireframe' visible on final cut, and dragging the picture size to fit into the viewer. I had to do this for most of the shots. After exporting it we still had a similar problem, however Chris assured us that 'Toast' would sort it out - which it did.

  After the viewing of our film, we gained some good feedback from our classmates. They specifically liked the warm tone to the piece and someone also mentioned that they liked the music (something that the tutors did not).
  Something that Chris picked up on was that he did not realise it was a woman  in the piece - but thought it was a child. I am glad that this was put across as it was our aim. After watching it so many tines throughout the process, you begin to doubt yourself as to whether it worked, so I am therefore very happy that it did. However, Chris also said that it was not to his taste at all, and to bare this in mind throughout his feedback. The main thing he did not like was the music, as it was far too predictable and stereotypical for this type of film - However I have mentioned the reason why we did this in a previous post. Annie however thought that it did work to a certain extent as it enhanced the character's repetitive mannerisms.
  Another thing that Annie thought worked was the use of silhouettes, and read into the fact that the opening image could represent Lola's changing maturity, as it goes from big to small when she wafts the sheet. Although this was not our intention, I liked this idea a lot and plan to make everything in our 10 minute piece have a reason - Something that each interesting shot symbolises.
  After watching other people's films, I became to understand the effects silence can have on a film. I think that this is something that we can experiment with in our 10 minute film - especially because I want it to be more sinister and dark in comparison to the 2 minute character study.

  Overall, I think that our 2 minute character study could have been better, through adding more interesting sound and more symbolic shots, however, I am happy with the end product we had despite the problems with last-minute filming due to an unreliable actress. I think that having a tutorial with Annie, prior to editing would have helped dramatically as it would have helped us to evolve our piece more.

Final Editing 08/11/12

  Today, we needed to add the sound to the film. I found a nice acoustic guitar piece by Jason Shaw on Free Music Archive - A royalty free music website. I had some reservations about putting this in the film as I think it could have been a bit predictable. However it does work well and represent Lola's mannerisms with it being repetitive, and the simple tune relates to her loneliness. I also felt a bit forced to add music throughout the length of the film because of the lack of independently recorded sound. Although Jacob had sync-recorded the speech of Lola on the day of filming as well as some foley, I didn't think it was enough. We only had certain foley sounds, such as the pen writing and the pen lids being taken off. This meant that sounds such as the 'wafting' of the sheet and smoothing down of the blankets were missing. I think that this would have meant there would be an inconsistency throughout the piece and may have caused the audience to become disengaged. To solve this problem, I added the sound on top of the piece up until the part where Lola begins to draw, at this point, I made the music quieter to make the sounds more easily heard. I then asked Jacob to sync the sounds better to the picture as I felt that it needed to be tighter. I think that this works because it highlights the section in which Lola draws - something that we lead on from in our 10 minute piece.

Once we had done this, I had to leave, so I left it up to Hannah and Jacob to burn the film onto the discs I had provided. 

Editing 07/11/12

  As the director, I have decided to help Hannah with the editing throughout the whole process. From what we have worked on today, I have found that this works well as we are able to discuss what works and vice versa. Hannah would edit the shots and I would give her feedback and tell her what I would like to include in the next section. I think that we worked well together and listened to each others ideas, agreeing on most of them.

  Today, we completed a rough cut of the film, by including these components:

• Creating the main focus on Lola building the den.
• Cutting and adding fades to the long sequence of Lola placing down her teddies (this was initially shot for the purpose of a time lapse but we felt that what we did worked better).
• Hannah felt the teddy sequence was still too long so we decided to incept sections of this with Lola placing the pens down in a perfect line.
• Added fades to show time progressing.
• Colour correcting.
• Adding the title.

  Lola's den symbolises her 'own world' and keeps her isolated from everyone on the outside. With the main emotion being loneliness, I wanted to capture this through having the main focus of her building the den. Showing that she wants it to be perfect. The use of silhouettes will be repeated at the beginning and end of the film, representing a full circle - the fact that things never change for Lola and she is constantly trapped in her surroundings.

  

  Because the location we shot the film in was indoors, Myself and Jen booked out a Kino and Dedo kit. This formed a warm tone and intimate atmosphere to the overall film and I think it worked well. However, some of the shots did not include as much of the lighting so Hannah had to colour correct.

  We added the title to the piece by making it look as though it was beneath Lola's hands when she smooths out the sheet. I think this worked well as it incorporated an interesting visual element into the film. 

Overall, I think we had a successful day of editing. Alhough the initial construction of footage amounted to about 10 minutes, Hannah managed to cut this down to 3 and still include all of the elements I wanted in our piece. After some more cutting, it us now 2 minutes long and has more pace.

Tomorrow, we plan to add both the sound Jacob recorded on the day and his other foley to our piece, as well as a soundtrack that will add to the films emotions.

Editing

6th November 2012

  Today I met with Hannah to go through the footage. We converted it using MPEG Streamclip and renamed all of the different shots. This took up the majority of the time we had. We are therefore planning on meeting tomorrow to give the piece more of a structure. Jacob will also be meeting with us to edit the sounds and add them to the picture.

Filming

5th November 2012

  Today, we shot the whole of our two minute piece in about 3 hours. At 12pm, Myself and Jen met with our actress Fiona Sheriff to go through the script and the concept of our film with her. I talked Fiona through her characters mannerisms and background story before Jen spoke about the costume, hair and make-up. 

  Whilst we did this, the rest of the group set up at our location in a typical city terraced house. When we arrived with the lighting (consisting of a Dedo kit and Kino-flo), the rest of the group had formed a den. However, it wasn't as I pictured and didn't include many of the aspects described in the script. I therefore altered it to make it closer to how I visualised it by for example, placing a broom in the centre to add more hight - this not only visually made it look better, but practically allowed more space for us to film inside.

We wanted the den to appear really child-like, because of Lola's mindset and characteristics. We established this through the simple design and use of bright colours.

  I was really happy with our actress, although she didn't really have to act much using facial expressions because this isn't going to be shown until the end of the piece, she listened to directions well and developed any second takes well after listening to any criticism. A main issue I had with the actress (which wasn't her fault), was that she didn't look as old as we wanted her to. Initially, I wanted someone with the appearance of a middle-aged woman in order to create a contrast to her mindset. This would have also provided more of a surprise from the audience at the end of the film when they see her actual age. However, I understand how hard it is to get an actress and the fact that she was willing to do it at such short notice was lucky.

  During the filming, Leon would show me the shots after filming to check I was happy with them, and we would do a second take if I wasn't. We did little sync-sound on the actual day, and Jacob will do some foley using the footage as soon as possible. 

  After looking back at the shots, we didn't get as many of Lola building the den as I would have liked. Ideally, the majority of the film was of this, as stated in the script, however, we appear to have more of her placing the teddies within it and colouring in. However, the drawing sections do set up the 10 minute film well and I do think that we have enough footage to fill 2 minutes.

  Overall, I think that we coped well in the short space of time we had, after being let down by our first actress. I think we have some nice shots, including the use of pull-focus and silhouetted outlines of Lola. To improve upon any future filming, I plan to do the storyboard with Leon, as although we discussed what I wanted, some aspects such as Point-of-view were lost in translation and we therefore have a lack of these shots to put in the piece. I think that we worked well together as a group and valued each others ideas.

  

Final Planning

  We have finally found an actress willing to be part of our 2 minute film at such short notice. We plan to film tomorrow afternoon. Myself and Jen will be meeting her at 12 before making our way to the location for the shoot. 

  I have written a script and given this to Leon along with some ideas of shots (in form of a shot list) that I think will work in order for him to complete the storyboard. With him being in charge of camera, I wanted to ensure that we both share the same vision.

I understand that the script is relatively short, in that one page of script equals 1 minute of film, however, the majority of the piece will be action. Lola will predominantly be making her den in the film, by doing so, she will demonstrate a wide range of her mannerisms, characteristics and personality. As well as this, her world and the film's storyworld will also be considered within the use of interesting angles and the overall pace.

I hope that on the day of filming once being surrounded by the props and knowing the actress' abilities, more ideas will be bounced off the members of my group to enable more elements to fill the film. 

Shot List for 05/11/12

Storyboard created by Leon:

Problems

  Today it was planned that Myself and Jen were going to meet with the actress to discuss the storyline and costume with her at 12pm before going to our location to film in the afternoon. However, last night the actress let our producer Luke know that she was unable to attend. Obviously, this has made things very difficult for us as we ideally need to have filmed something by Monday. 

  I know Luke is working hard to find someone else to take her place but this will still push us back on the schedule, meaning that we will all need to work incredibly hard next week to get it finished.

  It's hard to have to rely on other people so much, especially actors, because no matter how much preparation we put in, being let down at the last minute puts a great deal of stress onto us.

  Hopefully we will be able to find another actress by the beginning of next week and the short time we have to film and edit won't affect the final result.