Evaluation

Year 10 Media Arts Genre Film Production – Term 03 Mr. Andrews

Self-reflection and evaluation:

Please answer each question using complete sentences to justify your responses, include as much detail and provide examples where possible.

Looking back on your production task this term, respond to the following:

·       Are you satisfied with the final film?

I’m not satisfied with the final film because a lot of the shots are blurry or has a/with weird lighting. This could have been fixed if I rechecked every time we shot a shot, but we didn’t have enough time. I guess time management comes into play, but one hour wasn’t enough to shoot and recheck each shot. This problem could have been fixed if we shot outside of school hours, but a lot of my group members weren’t free in the afternoon nor in the weekends.

I also despise the outside scene with a passion, which is half of our film, as the lighting is inconsistent in most of the shots. We tried fixing this by using a reflector, or by even using an LED light, but the natural sun was too bright to control. The only way we could have fixed this was to lower the exposure and saturation during the editing phase. In all honesty, I wished to film during the afternoon sunset, but one of my group member could not stay until that late, so we couldn’t. It would have been a good idea to make the main character someone with a flexible time schedule.

Not being able to shoot during the afternoon nor the weekends also meant that we couldn’t film outside the school premises. I was thinking of filming at Owen Park to have some forest scenes, just like the actual Little Red Riding Hood, but we couldn’t do that. I could have filmed in Owen Park by myself, but that meant that I had to borrow help from my parents, and I didn’t want to trouble them again like last time.

Some of the shots were also shaky, and I tried fixing this by using the stabilisation tool in final cut pro, but it just made the shot have some weird moving motion. This couldn’t be fixed due to not being able to use tripods in some shots, i.e low position.

I guess I’m just disappointed by the fact that the film didn’t turn out the way that I imagined for it to turn out. I had this strong image in my mind, but it didn’t appear in these shots.

·       Would like to change or improve any aspects of your film (storyline, shots, editing etc.)?

Other than the things that I listed earlier:

First, I would like to change the storyline so that it’s the one that I originally suggested in the early stages of planning; investigation room. I really liked the idea of the wolf being an imaginary friend, as it keeps the original idea of little red riding hood where the wolf is actually evil. It actually makes it appear as if Red is psychotic to a significant extent, as she’s the one that wanted to kill Grandma from the start, not because of this revenge thing. Furthermore, this would have lessened the amount of time spent outside, allowing me to manipulate the light use more.

I would also like to change the shots to have a wider range of cinematography. A lot of the shots were boring, as it lacked angles. They were mostly shot straight on. It makes the whole film boring and bland. If I had more angles, it would have created more confusion, making the film relate to Red’s mind. It would be cool if the angles were extreme as it went further into the film.

As for editing, I tried my best. I can’t really say what I could improve on, because I really did try my best.

·       Did you encounter any problems or difficulties during production? and How did this affect your project? (Difficulties may include; shooting, technical, time-management, teamwork, absences or editing etc.)

We encountered some problems with absence of team members. My team members were absent in rotation at the end of our planning and at the start of our editing phase. I can’t really blame them, because they were sick, but I it kind of affected our production as we didn’t have our actors. Especially when Girl A was absent, we couldn’t film our scene of the dad’s jacket, nor the upstairs, because we didn’t have the jacket. It would have been great if she gave us a notice earlier, but she forgot to.

In addition, my team members didn’t ask for the footage until the very end, so we had some conflict when handing over the footages. I was the one who had all the footages, because I was the only one that brought the laptop to our filming spot each time.

As mentioned in my previous answer, we also had problems with time-management, as we had some scheduling conflicts. We couldn’t follow our production table from absence and the unexpected time it took us to film a shot.  

I luckily didn’t encounter any technical difficulties, as I downloaded the trial version of the Final Cut Pro. I didn’t lose any files, because I imported every file onto the library. Just in case, I also imported the videos onto my hard drive as well.

We also faced difficulty in borrowing the equipment. We always forgot to email Ms Gravel for the fabric.

·       Did your group use the planning and analysis tools effectively? (Production schedule, ingredients list, storyboards, shot lists)

In my opinion, we didn’t really use the planning tools effectively. The production schedule was used effectively until we started having problems with the absence of team members and the extension of shooting a scene.

The ingredient list…we didn’t even have. It would have been effective if we had it, because we forgot about the murder weapon. Other than that, it was okay. I brought all the props that we needed on the first day of filming to create a prop box.

The storyboard was “used” effectively. We didn’t really use the storyboard, but we used it as a guide to where we wanted our lighting to be, since I included this in my storyboard. We didn’t check the storyboard every few minutes, but I had what the storyboard looked in my mind, because I created it.

We used the shot list every now and then. Dayna used it the most, because she created the shot list and it represented what she wanted in the film.

·       If you could start the project again, what would you do differently?

For the love of God, shooting the scene outside into indoors, or at least making it in the afternoon. I regretted it in my Term 1 task, I don’t know why I thought it would be a good idea again. Other than that, it’s all the same things that I listed in the; Would like to change or improve any aspects of your film (storyline, shots, editing etc.)?.

As this task focused on creating a Genre Specific Film, describe:

·       How you used specific lighting to enhance the narrative (provide some examples)?

As I mentioned in my blog posts, I had Annie Levibotz’s lighting style as an inspiration. I wanted this sharp and bold kind of lighting, that made the characters’ pop. This can be seen in some of the shots, i.e Aunt’s death, taking out jacket from closet. Also, I tried using lots of sharp lighting on the character’s faces to show their position and emotions clearly. Low key lighting was used in the background to make the focus be directly on the character. This is to show the importance in the shots where the character’s actions are key to the ending. For example, the shot where Dayna’s walking towards upstairs has a low-key lighting in the background, as she’s walking towards a place that’ll tell her who the murderer is.

·       How you used specific shot types to convey the visual narrative?

I tried to use a variation of angles to convey what emotion and position the character is in. High angle was used to make the character vulnerable, and low angle to make the character powerful. I used a low angle on the Aunt a lot of times, but a low angle on Charlotte after she found out who the murderer was. A shift in power.

I also tried to use frame space to convey the same message. The more frame space the character was facing, the more power it had. The less frame space the character was facing, the less power it had.

·       Whether you used specific sound or music to enhance the atmosphere?

I used music throughout my film to enhance the atmosphere. I used soft, melodic but creepy bgm, to create the eerie atmosphere of the story. I also used soft melodic sounds, as fairy tales were made in the olden days, where only soft melodic sounds were used/made. The piano sound also got harder during the climax scene. I had to tone down the music whenever an important dialogue was delivered. I was kind of inspired by the music style used in the Memoirs of the Geisha.

Personal reflection and evaluation:

·       Discuss how your film is different to the other members of your group?

I haven’t watched Dayna’s, so I can’t compare mine to hers.

My film is different from Sarah’s, as I use different colour schemes to convey the mood of that particular scene. For example, in scene 2, where the Aunt first appears, the colour palette is blue because the household is cold and lifeless, just like the Aunt’s heart. However, in Scene 5, the Aunt’s death scene, the colour palette is red because there is blood lust.

I also used a lot of desaturation in my film to make the film feel lifeless, like a cold dead body. Furthermore, it follows the symbolism of sadness, as one sees the world in black and white after a tragic event.

I also flipped some scenes so that they appear smoother with the previous shot. For example, I flipped the closet as the closet direction was not in the spot that Dayna walked towards.

I also used melodic organ sounds without lyrics. This was to send the whole fairy tale vibe, where orchestral sound is commonly used as a BGM.

·       Discuss how effectively you used your blog, to reflect on both the planning and production stages to support your work?

I haven’t used my blog very effectively, because I didn’t have time to write my blogs. Therefore, I couldn’t reflect on my shots properly for me to improve my next shots. I think this affected my production of the work, because I couldn’t reflect on what I could do to make my other shots better. I could only do that during the final stages of editing, for me to regret.

·       Did the project require more or less time than you thought?

The project required more time than I thought as it took more time to shoot some scenes than I expected. This is because of some absentees, but other than that, it was just shooting shots in different ways to suit each other’s needs.

·       List some steps that you could implement to manage your time more efficiently for your next production task.

First of all, we should choose an actor with flexible time schedule as a main lead, so that we can shoot in the afternoons for important scenes. The actors should have also gotten changed during morning tea or lunch, but they couldn’t, because they needed to enjoy their meal. Other than that, we honestly did everything that we could to manage our time more efficiently. We borrowed the equipment, what we wanted to shoot and the permission to shoot in a place before class.

After your previous task, you were asked to identify one particular aspect (either planning, production or reflection), which you hoped to improve.

·       Please explain which aspect you chose to focus on for this task and whether you were successful in making improvements.

I wanted to improve on the lighting. I believe that I did achieve to a successful improvement, because the lighting appears so much better this time. Since I had actual teammates to help me this time, I could place the light wherever I wanted. (Please ignore the lighting used during the outside scene)

I think my editing is better than last time as well, because we were able to use a range of colour schemes this time. I think I showed the emotions of the scene well enough to pass.

Other than that, I don’t think I improved on anything J (I’m smiling but crying on the inside)