Week 7 The editors cut!

Week 7 and the final video finished, this has been by far the most productive week we have had. The group has worked together really well over the past weeks and from the look of the final video this is no different. Iwan and I brainstormed some ideas on the Friday of week 6, we first of all looked at a zombie film, but as this has been attempted so many times we decided to look towards a different horror genre (A Night to Remember was born). Iwan set to the script over the weekend creating what we thought was the most impressive one so far with a lot of potential. On the Monday however, the group had split two ways on which the genre would go, a comedy or a horror?! Rod spoke to us on the potential of the slasher that we were eager to create and told us that it would be wise to go for a generic horror story without the comedic styles that we desperately wanted to convey, although we wanted to do this, the shooting turned out differently.

The Opening Design and Layout

The kitchen scene!

In the editing suite, it was clear from Nicci’s instructions and the footage supplied that we were to create the black comedy which is what we initially wanted. The film footage was very similar to the horror genre, but the script and the actions allowed us to construct an original film. The first scene we created was in the kitchen and Luke arrives back, I chose to have him speaking while I picked different shots of the individual house mates to convey how they were feeling. The individual shots were also used to create irony in the film as they were using what they would later be killed with in the story (Seren with an iron, Sara with the cooker and Ali with the knife). This was a clear choice for me as the film needed something special at the beginning.

Effects and Cuts

SFX

There are a couple of moments in the film when the character requires some effects to change his appearance. The reason for this is to make the character appear to be on drugs, as this is an essential part of the plot I used a blurred effect with a ghost trail to look like he is seeing things in slow motion. We chose to do it this way so that we could allow the audience to see what he was going through, so they would also able to witness the drugs take on the user. When Luke wakes up after consuming the drugs I decided to have a lot of jump cuts, the camera doesn’t move but Luke does inside the shot. Having the jump cuts gives the impression that time has passed, and using this way of displaying it was really effective.

The Struggles With Avid!

As everyone knows on the course we have to use the infuriating software that is Avid Express Pro, this program is used by the industry and comes highly respected, the only problem is, is that it doesn’t seem to do as it is told! I have learnt to use Avid pretty well now and I have used it for nearly every film. The problem with Avid mainly is that everything seems really complicated and complex as nothing is obvious to the eye. The problems this week was finding the effects in the correct place. The effects are very difficult to use and apply in avid as there is a complicated way to apply and change the effect which never makes sense! The other complication we found this week is the slowing down of a clip. In all other software it is extremely simple and you are able to do it on the actual timeline, but with this program it needs to be done from the original material making you redo the section. Oh Avid how we have a love hate relationship with you!

Anyway that’s all for now, Ali Watson

From Beginning To End!

As the final week has now ended I have decided to look back at our group and see how we have (or haven’t improved) over the 7 weeks we have been working together! The first thing we were asked to do was to get into groups of about 5 or 6 and think of an idea for a film to do with chase! The group merged together straight away as most of us knew each other one way or another! We sat in our group on a monday afternoon in the room and thought of ideas to do with the theme Chase!

As you can see we thought of a lot of ideas all of them still scribbled into the pages of my book! The film itself on the first week was awful and this was agreed by everyone in the group and also by the peers, as it was our first week filming, we didn’t bother taking it seriously and just wanted to have fun while running around the campus enjoying the fact we could do anything! (This reflects in the quality of the video!) The following week we decided to take a much more serious aproach with Iwan directing and working on the script which was later pushed aside for a new one as we were unable to get an office! This one was called ‘The Promotion’. This film was an immediate improvement on our first peice of work, although it was sloppy and we still didn’t manage to impress it was better in many ways! Over the next couple of weeks we improved a little bit more each time, ( with Return of the Ex and Help Me) but the film we showed the most promise in was Gambling. This film conveyed a lot of talent in our group as we did everything that we needed to do and on time! The lecturers were pleased with this and praised us for the unique style at the beginning, following from one character to the next to reveal the main actor. This was a  shot that was decided by the group during the beginning of filming, fortunately it fell to our advantage. The final weeks film I thought showed that our team was able to work under extreme pressure and were able to come up with a film that was funny for the audiences who saw it. ‘A Night To Remember’ was written by our very own Iwan Davies, we developed the idea together and then I left it to his creative juices to come up with the finished product. Iwan thankfully bought what was needed to the table and it was an extremely good script, and as soon as we began to shoot we descovered that with a few lines and certain techniques we were able to turn it into the black comedy that it was set out to be. This weeks director was the lovely Nicci Beachum and she did a great job even though she hates being in charge, whenver she needed help the group was there to help and that way she managed to keep everyone on task. Sam, Ilvo, Scott and myslef were running round with the camera and set list making everything the way Nicci and Iwan envisioned, dressing the characters and doing the gruesome make up that set the tone to film! From working with the group I have seen the vast improvement in all of us over the weeks and I am very happy with what we are now able to achieve.

I hope this hasn’t been too boring but you can always look at the pictures! 😛

cheers, Ali Watson

Week 7 A Night To Remember

This is our final film – Loved by Peers hated by Lecturers!

This week’s film is rolving around a central character who goes on a ‘trip’ of a life time. he takes drugs and blacks out waking up the next day in a state of confusion! He can’t remember what he did staright away, but what will he find in his flat?…..

Misogynistic!?!?!?

Today we had a screening in the cinema in the arts centre of everyone’s film! I had been quite thrilled that we had all got the chance to show our work on the big screen to everyone else to see the reaction we would get… unfortunately this excitement only lasted 4 minutes and 2 seconds, (as soon as the film finished), because of the absolute slating we got afterwards. I have always believed and will always believe that making films for people is based on the foundation “to entertain” apparently this is not the case anymore! The film we produced ‘A Night To Remember’ is a black comedy revolving around one man and the ‘trip’ of a lifetime, as the drugs take effect he blacks out and kills his flat mates. To make this film as humourous as possible, the group and I took it as light-heartedly as possible and brought in as many jokes as we could to make the audience (our peers) laugh. The way the industry makes films is to aim their work at a certain age range which is exactly what we did, to make our audience laugh we included what can be seen as slightly sexist jokes, but as we only had 2 female actors, it was the best thing to do with only 2 hours of filming time! The work we produced had tremendous reviews from our peers from all over the campus in different departments and also from the friends and family at home when they viewed it on YouTube (which has also exceeded 200 views in under 5 days) . As the work has received such good feed back from people I thought it was going to be well received by the lecturers and was going to be seen as a decent piece of work, but what seemed to happen today is the complete opposite. To ridicule a group’s work as being misogynistic and then not allowing them to explain the terms in which it was perceived was a wrong way to go! The criticisms of the whole event was creating an experience none of us wish to repeat as we did not get a single word of praise from any of them! Now the other point that I would like to put across is the fact that the pointless shots of  the characters at the beginning were neither pointless or a waste of time! As I have been told in the past by the same team is that we need to put shots of certain people or props that would later be used in the film, this has been used in film making as early as D.W.Griffith, and then to be slated for using such a technique is rather confusing, the dramatic irony is flowing through the film which unfortunately isn’t perceived by any other generation other than that who the short was created for!!!!

Cheers, Ali Watson

Despair

Once again the weekend is coming to an end and I find myself struggling with the ability of finding a way to create a script on the newest of the themes given to us by the lecturers. ‘Help Me’ is this weeks topic and being able to create a story has been a hardship I have struggles with since Friday. The group and myself have been tossing ideas back and forth and we have found the best way to make a film with such a reality for the audience to believe is to take a time in our lives that we have needed help. I’m sure that once the script has been finalised it will pass the expectations that many people have on the group and we will be able to again make a film that our peers might enjoy!

Cheers, Ali Watson