Evaluation - Question 6 - Amy Homewood

Question 6: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt a lot more about technologies from the process of constructing this product. Although we learnt the very basics on how to use a digital camera and how to edit and cut clips together for the preliminary task, I feel that I was still very clueless on the way I could show my skills through a camera and editor. I hadn't had much experience in operating a camera before, except from GCSE media coursework, of which I had to take a photo and use Photoshop and then film a preliminary similar to the one we did at A Level, therefore after constructing my thriller sequence, I feel as if my confidence in the practical side of Media Studies has massively increased. 

Camera

• I have learnt that when using digital camera to film, in order for it to be successful you need to 'make a sandwich'. Which is where leave excess footage on the beginning and end of your recording in order to edit and trim them at the end. This gives you more footage to experiment with and doesn't leave any risk of not having enough footage or the footage starting at a 'jump'. A sandwich became really helpful in our final task as we had a lot of 'mess ups' between clips and to where the lighting wasn't exactly how we wanted it to be, especially as it was at night. Because of the sandwich technique, I was able to make our title opening as I used access footage that was left over.

 

• I have also learnt to use the white balance, which is something that I personally am most proud of learning. In the preliminary task, we had a lot of trouble within the pre-production stage as a lot of our footage came out yellow (our fault completely) to where we didn't white balance very well. I think learning about white balance has made our footage almost exceptionable as the way we used lighting and white balanced went well together. Here is a photo difference to where we light balanced to where we didn't.

LEFT- FINAL // RIGHT-PRELIM

Due to some shots in our preliminary task resulting in the camera wobbling slightly even though we used a tripod. The way in which we used a tripod through-out the sequence looked a lot more professional, especially when filming a close up or long shot. A tripod enables the camera work to look stable and the quality wouldn't have been as good without it. Here are two gifs showing the difference of a walk- notice that the camera shakes in the prelim:



notice how shaky the camera gets // prelim

VS our final that is smooth and stable

•  Lighting is another huge impact that we had within our media sequence.  Lighting has a big influence on the look and mood that is created within a film. Natural light can vary from bright, clear and sunny. When we took on the task to dodo our prelim, this was the first time in which I was introduced to lighting, despite the fact it seems easy; lighting has a huge impact on creating effect. As we decided to film in the dark, lighting was inevitable and vital otherwise the camera would not pick up any of the characters or surroundings. In relation to the prelim, we used lighting a whole lot better to show facial expressions and movement.

Here is a few well lighted shots from our final that I personally like:

Screen grabs from final

click here to see editing blog post

Editing

•  In regards to editing, we expanded our knowledge and expertise by advancing from basic cut transitions to fades, and match on actions. This has a greater effect on the sequence as a whole and makes it look a lot more realistic when comparing our thriller opening to one realised in cinemas. Although I personally feel like I did have quite a lot of experience on Final Cut Pro already due to taking media for GCSE. I did expand my knowledge in changing key frames and colour correcting images.

• Also, I have learnt about titling from the process of constructing this product. The title 'Unanswered?' dissolves in and out therefore it has a very transparent effect when it first appears, which gradually becomes bolder and more visual. The font is spaced out, and in the same colour as the lighting on the actual frame. The aspect of the titling that I think I have done well on is the line underneath the actual wording. I have taken a screenshot of the shadow and lighting used on the protagonist and placed it underneath the titling by stretching it. I think this has such a good effect on the title and makes it look like we have thought about it a lot more than we had.

the fade in of our title sequence

Sound

• In terms of sound, I learnt a lot about making foleys through the use of garage band, one of our tasks before we started our final was to create a sound scape fitting the scene that we picked out of 10 files. Myself and Imogen chose to pick a James Bond film. To where the film clips that have had Sound removed and we had to create your own sound scape for a minute. No dialogue is allowed also. This definiently taught me to line up different types of SFX with movement that you wouldn't particuarly put together, click here to see our soundscape. 

• Another sound technique that I used and learned to do was parallel sound, this is where the sound we hear should usually go hand in hand with the image on screen. For example; if we were to watch a horror film and we are about to witness a murder, you would accompany some dark, fast tempo music with the action. There is only a few small examples of parallel sound within our sequence, and it is placed at 0.49, where the antagonist magically disappears, a 'bomb' happens at the perfect time.

0.51-0.55 is where parallel sound occurs