Editing for our Final Draft

Today Emily and I sat and renamed all of our re-filmed files before adding them to our other footage. We had to crop the starts and ends and change the saturation of the images we wanted to make look darker. We managed to do this quicker than last time as we are now more confident with using the software. However we did have to ask for assistance with changing the brightness of the shots as we have never done this before.  

We changed our title to make it look more like it was dripping. This added to the suspence and enigma as it portrays blood. 

Overall I am happy with how our opening sequence is looking as I believe that there is a large sense of narrative enigma and a slow build of suspense. As we edit we are ensuring that we do not break the rule of continuity and follow the conventions of a thriller. 

19-01-2016 Refilming

In today's lesson Emily and I went to re-film the parts of our opening sequence that our peers believed needed changing/improving. Over the next few days we will edit these pieces in to complete our final edit.

The parts that we re-filmed were the close up, pans of the trees as both myself and Emily and our peers believed that the camera quality could be improved as some of these were shaky. Hopefully when we ask our peers their opinion on our final edit these improvements will not be mentioned for the wrong reasons.

After we refilmed

Before we refilmed

In filming today I believe that Emily and I worked well together as we took it in turns to re-film. Also before we headed to our filming destination we thoroughly planned how we were going to shoot each shot. This made filming much easier and effective as we got straight to filming, giving us more time to watch over our footage and change anything we weren't happy with.

However in filming today I wasn't particularly happy with some of the background noises as there were lots of people in the park. Hopefully these sounds won't show up on our footage as the continuity of our filming with change as they weren't there in our previous footage.

12-01-2016 Titles

In today's lesson Emily and I created our titles for our opening sequence. We created a production name, added actors names, casting by and a film by. 

We mixed our last names to create our production company (Brook Farm Productions) 

Emily and I decided to search for logos that we could use as our production company, these are a few that we found: 

 
We chose the above logos as they are simple but effective. They also combine the initials of the production company we have created. The first logo is easy to read and fits the purpose, however it would be difficult to view on our background on which our production company title sits on. The second logo chosen is large and clear to read, it serves its purpose and is also more creative than the first one. This is why we have decided to use this one instead.

We created a list of casting by:

•  Emily Brookes
• Hannah Farmer 

We created a list of our actors:

• Harry Farmer
• Emily Brookes
• Leland Orser 
• Pamala Tyson
• Delilah Paltrow
• T.Ray Massee
• Rosallena Borden 
• Peter Starstruck     

 We created a list of people involved with the costume and filming:

• Costume by Emily Brookes
• Directed by Hannah Farmer and Emily Brookes
• Director of Photography Emily Brookes
• Filming Hannah Farmer
• Produced by Hannah Farmer and Emily Brookes          

First Draft-Audience Evaluation

We asked our peers their opinion on our first draft, below are their responses. We will use these responses to improve parts of the editing and filming for the final edit. Also the positive responses allow us to keep the good parts of our opening sequence the same.

Adding Sound Effects

To make the filming contain suspense we needed to add some sound effects. 

The diegetic sounds that we chose to use are:

• Footsteps
• Bird Song
• Children Playing

The non-diegetic sounds that we chose to use are:

• uncertain, suspense filled music
• loud bang when title appears 

Below are some of the sounds we used in our first edit. We chose to use these sounds as we both believed they would add suspense to our opening sequence. The reason we have chosen to add bird song of our footage is to create an eerie atmosphere but also to add some background sounds to our footage, this will make our thriller more interesting to our viewers.

First Edit

Editing-First Draft

We did a simple first edit of our thriller opening. We cropped down all of our shots before placing them in the correct order. After this we added very basic titles and sounds. After this edit we will show our peers and ask for their opinion before making changes to the parts they believe could be improved. (See blog post called 'First Draft-Audience Evaluation')

To make our editing faster we renamed all of our shots appropriately so the construction of shots was easier. As a result of us doing this I believe that it allowed us more time to carefully chose our sound effects and create some titles. However, when adding our sound effects we found it difficult to match the sound effects of the footsteps to the steps the actor was taking, this resulted in us finding a different sound effects before cropping it down and adding it in different stages. 

Our opening sequence is too short at the moment so Emily and I have planned to go out and refilm parts to make them longer for example when we film the trees to make the pan last longer to pad out the duration of our opening sequence.  

 

Filming

When we arrived at our chosen location Emily checked the battery on the camera while I set up and ensured everything was working properly with the tripod. In class time Emily and I planned every shot we were planning to film in detail. This allowed us to complete our filming quickly and efficiently. Throughout the filming process Emily and I took turns to film the different shots. While one of us was filming the other was positioning the actors and ensuring the shots followed the rule of continuity. 

However, while we were filming we noticed that the bag filling wasn't heavy enough, so it didn't look the way we had envisioned it. Also when filming some shots we didn't use the tripod as they were tracking shots, as a result of this our shots are slightly shaky making them look less professional and to an amateur standard. I would like to re-film our opening shot of the trees to improve the quality of our opening sequence. If I was to film the whole opening sequence again I would change the outfit of the male character to have him wear either a mask or hat to obscure his identity and add additional mystery and suspense to the thriller.