Preliminary Post Productions

The Rushes are uploaded to the Fianl Cut Server from which you can access and Edit Proxy of the raw footage which you can then open in Final Cut Pro to begin the editing/post production process.

• Continuity Editing is important for the clarity of the footage, such as: connecting all the same points to the storyline, to shorten space and time, to make the audience to identify with the right characters and to make sure the story makes sense.

Selecting and rejecting different scenes from the footage is important because there may be some better takes and some bad ones which may not want to be included. A way to do this would be to watch the scenes and cut every scene you want and finally putting it into a "Log Bin" which is practically a new folder where all the wanted takes are put in to then follow with putting them together. The next step is to find the "best fit" which is the process of putting together the same scene but with different frames, keeping the movement smooth by following the movement of the character. For example, a man picking up something, close-up on him reaching for it then close-up on the object and finish the movement.

• Organising the shots

We tried to follow the storyboard as much as possible. There was also the choice of shots to show which side the audience was supposed to be on. To do this, we did many over the shoulder shots from the bad guys side as if to show the other person were threatened by them. We chose the shots also according to pace and how to build up tension. In order to do this, we did quick cuts when tension built up in the discussion between the characters, this will give the same effect on the audience. We initially did close-ups of the characters to show their relationship and secondly building up tension by adding some wide-shots to show the situation of the scene. We cut from the door handle to her reaction in order to create a threatning effect. We decided to cut from her's to his close-ups at a fast pace to show the relationship between them in that moment.

By the end of our Preliminary task, looking back on it there were some bumps which affected the quality of the seqeunce. Such as: the crane shot, the short zoom on the body on the floor looked quite cheap and badly edited. There are some benefits about these shots seeing that we learnt new ones

Preliminary Post Productions

Preliminary Task Evaluation

Our preliminary task was shot in the studio which to me was the most appropriate and useful location to film in because of the made-up set which made it more realistic.
At the beginning of the task I felt a bit awkward and a bit self-conscious about talking to the actors in a "bossy" manner, but as it went on I realised how there was a limit of time and that it had to be done, therefore I tried to take part in it as much as possible: I helped the actors with their lines and positioning them to get the same shot every time. The role that I played mostly was the director.

Lighting:
In the studio, there is one bright light right in the middle of the set which gave a hard effect which was adapted to the scene we were doing, and because there is a window in the set, there was a white light on the outside of it to show daytime.
The importance of lighting is the effect and feel the it gave to the scene. The light in the middle helped outline the actors and create a sharpness to it.
Personally, I thought that there was a lack of shadows and the light might have been too revealing.

Filming:
There were no problems with the camera and it was set up correctly and up-straight. I did not work much on the camera however I checked mostly the continuity of the frames in order to get the same actions every shot. We bubbled the tripod, this means that we get the tripod exactly into level. We checked if our angles were right and by using a storyboard, we easily put into place what shots we had to do in order. We started off with a long-shot to then move to an over the shoulder shot on both actors in order to get a view of both them. We also used a third actor who played a dead body in-between them to make sense to the lines and have more effect on the shots. We continued by doing some close-ups. Since we had one more shot of our own choice, we decided to do a shot from the top of the ladder to make it look like a crane-shot. The 180 degrees rule was hard to avoid since we were working on a fixed set which had only three walls.
We made use of the terminology to make sure that everyone knew when and what to say or do. "Stand by", everyone gets ready, "role camera" everyone has to be in position and camera starts recording for five seconds until "action" is said and the scene starts. After the scene is done the director is supposed to wait five seconds and then say "cut"; this is when the camera is completely stopped.