Friday, 1 May 2015

Evaluation Q.7

7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?


From looking back at my preliminary task I learnt many aspects of how filming industry routine is, like our pre-production product, even though our team was very small in number, however we all went through the process of having a certain responsible role to complete the product in time. 

For the my preliminary task I was working as a solo individual, which means that I had all the responsibilities and roles to make sure the product is produced and in control. Though, I worked as a solo I had to come up with an idea of the narrative and plot of the product, by mainly focusing on to use shot-reverse-shot and the 180 degree rule as used in the opening of 'Pulp Fiction'. There where factors to think about, such as what I want to present to the audience by being creative and complex.
After planning my story I had to research actors to act the characters in my story and then arrange the shooting dates (I only needed one shooting date but having a second date for plan ‘B’ if the 1st shooting date cannot take place because someone is not in set) and organize booking for equipment’s. Also, making sure that actors can attend the shooting date. On the shooting day I  set up the equipment's and the layout of the setting in the room with some help of my friends as I did not have access to a classic modern room and only had limited time of shooting. At the stage of post-production (editing) I had to do all the editing by myself with no help. I did not know much about editing as it was my first to produce a moving image, which made me experiment around at this stage till I was satisfied with the final cut.

On the full product I was in a small team, and we created a pre-production pack together. Our task is to create an opening of a book, and there were lack of choices to find the right book that we all will agree to (we found ‘Running on the Cracks’ was suitable for our team). We shared the work load evenly between us to complete the pack and get on with the shooting, making it easier and faster to complete. Through this process I learnt that communication and teamwork is very important in this production to understand the plot of the story ‘what is needed to accomplish the task’. We all decided our responsibilities and roles of hierarchy (being the director/ Assistant director/ Production manager and camera man) throughout the whole product.

There are many things I have learnt throughout my AS level Media Studies, from the first preliminary task and our final opening product. The use of certain aspects of mise-en-scene such as lighting, costume, continuity and props have all be things I and the team have needed to consider, in order to make a successful opening.
When filming my preliminary task the main focus was on the use of shot-reverse-shot used in the opening of 'Pulp Fiction', and the 180 degree rule. At first I found it quite challenging to get these simple aspects right. And looking back on it now, there were little mistakes with match on action, as there was one part where one shot the character was sitting up straight and the following shot the same character was setting in a slouching position. In our final product we used titles in between the shoots that were not match on action which made it fluid, which makes me think how much I have learnt over the months from the preliminary task.
I learnt many progression from the preliminary task to the full product. The key aspect is communication and teamwork. I feel that my knowledge of different genres of film and conventions of them has been broadened and improved so now I am able to apply this knowledge when making films to create different effects on the audience, I feel that my editing skills on the Mac has improved as well, as I can now overlay sound, duck it out if needed, freeze a frame for as a long as I want, and I can organize fades using precision editor for transitions between shots. I also feel that my analysis skills have been improved and now by picking up on certain aspects of the film I can see who the main characters are, what the genre is etc.
Lastly I feel that my camera work skills have improved as I now realise how different shots and angles can alter the effect produced on the audience. From the skills I learnt creating the preliminary task; the 180 degree rule, match on action and shot reverse shot, we carried on using the 180 degree rule and match on action for the final product. I felt that the shot reverse shot was inapplicable for the final product as we did not have any dialect in our piece.

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