Preliminary Task

After completing our AS media studies exam in January we were told we had to make a preliminary video. We had to choose a group of four and start filming and blogging after doing research on filming and editing. Our task was to film some dialogue, match on aaction, 180 degree rule and a range of camera angles.

I chose a group that I knew I could work with well and that would work hard, my group is Tom Gillespie, Alex Baines and Gregg Sullivan. Together we are called Ouch Productions.

As a group we came up with the idea of Alex Baines (playing Douglas McKeowen) assaulting someone and being caught on CCTV. This clip is then followed by Alex walking down the corridor and into the police stations interview room. At this stage the 2 investigating police officers question Alex on the incident. Alex denies everything said saying 'you can nae prove this' and walks out.

Our story board... above clearly shows that during the making of our storyboard we concentrated on the types of camera angles we were going to use in our preliminary video.

Box 1 of the storyboard consists of the incident happening with the camera held up high looking down on the action like a security camera. The image in box 1 also shows that we had decided to edit the picture by adding the text 'security camera 01 18:00' to the bottom of the screen.

Box 2 whereas shows and tells us of the match on action going to be used when Alex is walking down the corridor.

Box 3 once again shows the camera being held high up in the corner like a security camera and also again containing the editing text of 'security camera 02 09:48'.

Box 4 and 5 of the storyboard indicates the use of the over the shoulder camera shot. Box 4 is from one side of the table and box 5 from the other side of the table. This is shown being used during the interview between the police officers and Douglas McKeowen.

Box 6 is a close up of Alex when he says 'cos i frickin hate pigs!'. This camera angle on the storyboard is going to be used to show the facial expressions of Alex's face during his interview with the police officers.

Box 7 is showing the first stage of the 2nd use of match on action in our preliminary. In box 7 you can see Alex exiting the interview room of where he says 'you'll be hearing from my lawyer, I don't have one yet, but i will do!'. During the dialogue the camera changes to outside of the door, using match on action for the 2nd time.

Box 8 is the final box of the storyboard and shows the final part of our preliminary video when Alex has exited the interview room and signals foul hand gestures towards the 'security camera'. This is then followed by the 'Ouch Productions' written across the bottom of the screen.

The 180 degree rule...is simply a basic guideline in film making that 2 characters in the same scene must always have the same left/right relationship to one another. If the camera crosses the imaginary axis connecting the 2 subjects the 180 degree rule is destroyed.An an example of the 180 degree rule being used in our preliminary filming task is when Alex (Douglas McKeowen) is being interviewed. The camera in this scene never crosses the centre line from one side of the room, making it the 180 degree rule.

Match on action...is when some action is picked up where the cut left it. For example in our piece when Alex is shouting at the police officers from the door, the camera cuts from inside the room to outside in the corridor. We made sure this cut carried on his dialogue in flow and that he was in exactly the same position as before.

Range of camera angles... we used a variety of camera angles for example over the shoulder view when Douglas (Alex) is being interrogated, this shot consists of the shoulder of a person in the foreground with the focus on the person or object over there shoulder.
Also we used a close up when alex sais "I fricking hate pigs" to add effect as we see his emotions more clearly, this shot is self explanatory as it is just a close shot of the object or person.
One of the shots we used is a high angle shot from the CCTV camera as this makes it more authentic because CCTV cameras are usually high up, again this shot is literally a shot looking down on something or someone from a high angle.
A low Angle shot is also used when Douglas is walking down the hallway and steps over the camera and walks towards the door, this is the same as a high angle just the opposite way round. These different camera shots we use are for authenticity, and to show when an actor is showing strong feelings or emotions.

Panning... is simply the horizontal movement of the video camera. It is often used in establishing shots as it means you can get alot of scenery in the shot. It can also be used as a point of view shot where a character looks from side to side and that is there view of what they see. We didn't use panning in our preliminary video but we will try to incorporate it in our final piece as it can be used very effectively.

Continuity... is where everything such as props, clothing and location are all exactly the same, this also ties in to authenticity. throughout our preliminary we ensured that we would do this as we were filming on different days. We will make sure that we take this into account during our opening sequence.

Tracking... is when the camera is mounted on a wheeled platform and moved along steadily, often following a character or object. There are different shots that are linked with tracking, side to side, forward and back and a curve. We didn't use this technique in our preliminary as it is very hard and takes alot of skill but we will look to use it in our final piece.

Below is our final preliminary video, after taking into account everything we have researched from camera angles to continuity.

Evaluation of preliminary

I believe our preliminary was successful as we used a range of camera angles and learned alot about film making and how hard it is. There is one part were I (Henry) am caught laughing on camera and we will make sure this doesn't happen in the film as it would make it look tacky and very unprofessional. The best part of our preliminary is the match on action used when Douglas (Alex) is walking out the door and shouts "but I will do", this looked really professional and I hope we can get the same effect in our opening sequence. The successful of this shot is the continuity of the clothes, body position, accent and timing of the cut.

Another good thing that we did is the close up of Douglas when he sais "I frickin' hate pigs!" this means the audience can clearly see his facial expressions and know that he is very annoyed. Even though he is annoyed the repetition makes it humorous and nearly everything Alex sais is funny, we weren't sure if the SScottish accent would be funny or authentic but after great feedback we decided to use it and are happy with the result. It helps us to establish characterisation of the character instantly also.

The 180 degree rule was used effectively throughout the video and was never broken, we need to make sure we take this into account during our final piece.

Overall our video was successful even though we have alot to learn and alot to improve on for our final piece, it was a learning curve that will help us for our final video and only shows a percentage of what OUCH Productions can do. From the feedback it was entertaining and there were good use of camera angles and techniques used, we hope we can improve on our final piece though.

New York

During our AS media studies course we were lucky enough to go on a trip to the Big Apple. On this trip we didn't just shop and sight see, we also had a 4 hour film masterclass with the New York Film Academy. On this course we learned about acting, editing and filming.

Editing... was a recap and extra what we had learned back in England, they taught us how to cut from one shot to the other smoothly. This helped us alot because it meant that we could make our match-on-action shots alot better. They also taught us how to add captions etc. which we used in our preliminary and added to it alot. This was very helpful to us.

Filming... was very helpful as it showed us the basics of making films, that we have to have close ups, long shots and tracking shots to make successful short film. There equipment was alot better than ours but the basics of film making are the same whether its low or high budget, this is what they taught us, so all the techniques we got taught can be used in our opening sequence.

Acting... just got us used to acting in front of the camera. It made us very aware that mistakes can make a whole sequence look tacky and cheap, we needed to cut this out because in our preliminary I laughed and this makes our piece look bad. Only 2 of our group are acting in the opening sequence so me and Alex listened very carefully. We will take into account and remember everything we learned in the acting part.

A bonus for OUCH Productions was that all of our group were lucky enough to go on the trip and so everything we learned we don't have to repeat to another member back at school. Also everyone remembered different things so as a group we had everything covered. Everything we did in New York was very helpful even just walking round and seeing all the adverts for T.V and Movie adverts. I would love to go to New York again and learn more about Film Making.