In this scene, the frame looks static, and it is a very tight frame with lots of people in it. It is just perfect! Usually if we want to shoot a ‘lots of people dancing’ scene, first we think of panning to show audience the crowded environment. However in this scene, the frame is static, and we can see lots of people dancing around, the two main characters sometimes in the frame, sometimes out of frame. The male character looks a bit shy at first, the female character keeps dancing, looks very active. After a while, the male character is joined her and become even more active than her. Although I haven’t seen the movie, but I can feel the characteristics of those two in some level. The man is very sympathetic and a bit arrogant and the woman is bit earnest (don’t know if it’s the right word to describe her, something like that). People keep changing dance partners in the frame, and the music in funny too. This scene is just so different. I just like the feeling french movie expresses, sometimes reasonless, sometimes jumpy, sometimes doesn’t make any senses, but the way of expressing, is so unique and romantic.
At this weekend, Mona did some shooting exercise. I and Lisa went to support her. During the shooting process, we kept running into problems. Based on these problems, I will learn from them and be prepared for my shooting exercise next week.
‘GET INTO POSITIONS’
During Mona’s shooting, Mona, Lisa and me all did camera operating, also I was in charge of audio and camera assistant. Also one of mona’s friends was the pom holder. The problem here is there are too many people around and everyone didn’t actually clear about what they should do, what’s their positions, there is no clear divisions for everyone. Even though we got through the entire process, but it was frustrating and took a really long time to finish.
What I will do: I will need two actors, my friends Phoebe and Tan, a dop/director, myself, a sound person, Mona/Lisa, a camera assistant, Mona/Lisa, a director assistant, one of my friends, haven’t decided yet. I will talk to they all, and tell them what exactly what they need to be in charge of. Also I will send them the script, story board, shot list in advance. In this way it will be easier for us to communicate with each other and be more effective.
‘PRE-PRODUCTION IS IMPORTANT’
During Mona’s shooting, she struggled with different shot size, angles, framing. Also we ran into some practical problems like the male actor is very tall, it is hard for mona to get a shot over his shoulder. We tried to let the actor hunch a bit, but it came out to be strange. So finally we found a small chair to stand on it to get the shoot. This kind of stuff should be considered in advance. Then prepare for it. What Mona did good is the lighting. She was aware of the lights in her building, might be dark for the shooting, so she borrowed a light from Uni in advance. And the lights turned out to be great by using extra lights.
What I will do: I showed my shooting list to Paul the other day, he said one manner I think it’s great for pre-production, for example, WS of Prospero moping the floor, write this shot on a small piece of paper, then just like a brain storm, think everything related to this shoot you might consider like different shooting angles, framings, camera movement, what stage property might be used, what accident might happen, etc. I have to think about everything might happen in this shoot, and write them down. When shooting, all I need to do is check the list.
one spark I catch
To make it editing look more continuous and smooth, always shoot more clips. If they are not actually used is ok.
At this weekend, I shoot the exercise with Lisa and mona. We both shooting dialogues. I found the most important thing about dialogue is the shooting with different angles. Lisa shot three people’s dialogue, she kept shooting from different angles. For example, different people’s over shoulder, different people’s pov, different people’s face and back. Another important thing is when shooting dialogue, always remember keep the camera on the same level when shooting from different angles.
Mine is two people’s dialogue. In shot, I used panning. however I asked Pual for feedback, it turns out I didn’t pan well. Pual said there are two kinds of panning, first one is to pan optionally, the second one, two people are talking, pan when one is talking, and cut to the the other is listening, to show the audience the face of the listener, but we can still hear the one who is talking. About the panning in my exercise, when I saw the clip, I found it is like there isn’t enough time to watch when one of them is talking. I guess that’s why this is a bad pan. You need to give the audience a second to catch up.
About editing, I did two different visions. When I was editing, I tried to let the one talk first, then cut quickly to another who’s replying, then cut back again, after that, cut again to the other, just like this, cut forth and back, it comes out the same problem as above, there is not enough time to catch up for audience, it’s pretty strange and uncomfortable to watch. So guess this kind of cut is more suitable for long conversation not for this kind of short, ‘few sentences’ conversation.
In my shoot, one of them getting up to get some drink from the machine, in my two visions, camera just moved slightly, following Lisa. Pual asked me if there is a better way to cover this scene. Then he showed me two examples which spark me. One is I can have a wide shoot from side, a different angle, contains two girls both in the frame. Second, I can pan the camera with the frame where Lisa is on the most left side, then pan camera back with the frame where both of them are in. Both of these two are better than what I shoot. When it is hard to imagine, I can also draw some pictures to help thinking.
In this week’s class, we did some shooting exercise in a group form. I did some camera operating and acting. And I found that I’m not smooth enough with the camera movement, so I will do more exercise about it. The problems I have contains timing and speed. I couldn’t choose the perfect timing to move the camera sometimes. Also, I could’t catch up with actors in time sometimes. More practices must be done, there is no other way to improve this.
Besides this, I learned something about camera movements. In mona’s shooting, I did camera operating once, there is a shot a drunk guy is against the wall and slowly sitting onto ground. In this shoot, I chose to move the camera up to down, exactly the same way of the drunk guy. Then mona asked me to just tilt camera down is fine.
What’s more, when Tan did his single shot, (I think it is a really great one!) He hand held the camera, use the his sight point of view (POV) to shoot the entire scene. four different people at four different spots in a hall way doing different stuff, camera just move slowly into the hall way and has a very quick medium close up shoot of what they are doing and then move on, the entire camera movement is very causal and smooth, I feel like I was the person who pass through that hall way. It comes out like a single shoot plus a long shot.
Also Pual said one thing also remind me of framing. I think it’s something like ‘anywhere can be an elevator’. Audience can received the message from lots of aspects, like sounds, dialogue, settings, etc. when you have a very tight framing, audience usually pay more attention to the actors and what they do, what they say. so my you can just choose a wall with a television on it. So this elevator has a television in it. We can add lots of editing in it afterwards.
These I talked about is just like some little sparks which remind me of more different ways of shooting I can apply into my exercise to achieve different effect.
In this week’s class, we go through several shooting technique, focal length, focus, exposure, neutral density, gain, white balance.
Follow focusing
In this exercise, I learned to chose the spots you want to keep focus on first, then mark them. Let the object stand at the spots marked before, crush zoom in, then focus, after that, mark the focus and focal length on the stick tap sticked on the lens before.
When object moves, there have to be a focus puller who change the focus from one point to another. This person can be camera assistant. Also he/she also need to be familiar with camera movements, so he/she can keep it same with DOP. and then the process can be more smooth than without any preparation and communication. When I support mona to be her focus puller and camera assistant in her shooting exercise, it happened, when she moved camera very quickly, I didn’t prepared well and realize it, so I failed to pull focus well. Next time in shooting exercise, I will be prepared for that, and ask my camera assistant to be prepared as well. What’s more, if there isn’t a deep depth of field, there is no need to do the follow focusing. It is also found in exercise, there is no big difference if there is a shallow depth of field.
Exposure
To choose the right exposure, there is a way to test, turn on the zebra code button. The standard is the appearance of zebra code on object’s forehead and nose. Then you can tell it’s the right exposure. However, during the shooting exercise, I found that it is better if you choose the exposure amount under the standard exposure, the standard exposure is a bit over exposure. Also I learned a little tip about lighting and exposure during the exercise, when camera is tracking and the light is changing and become darker and darker, we can pull the exposure circle to gain the light. So there must be a ‘exposure puller’ for this. And remember the right direction of pulling the circle. This manner also works when you want less lights when tracking.
In week 6, we did a bit exercise of camera angles. Sometimes a transition between two different size and angles of a shot would look awkward without a good shooting location. In this exercise, I operated camera, firstly there is a wide shot of two people standing opposite each other. Then we changed the camera location to have a medium shot of both of them talking to each other. We need to make it look no big difference for audience, to achieve that we have to choose very similar background like white walls. But the most important thing is the connection and direction of actors’ eye sight. They should be looking at the same spot in different size of shot and frame. And also they should be looking at each other.
What is in the background does not matter too much, but make sure there are some related elements in background, just make it look fit. Audience does not care too much about background. Camera location is quite important, it affects the way of audience watching. So locate camera at the position which is a suitable and reasonable position for last shot.
During the weekend, I shot the scene of ‘You are a difficult guy’. During this practice, I found the importance of setting, lighting, framing, also the connection between dialogue and acting, communication.
We shot it in my friend’s living room. Before shooting, I did some changes on the original setting of the living room. For example, I moved the sofa a bit closer to the bookcase to get them both in the frame. Also I made sure that the angle of setting the sofa make audience can see actors’ movements and expression clearly, giving audience a looking space. The piano in the background was a bit awkward though.
About lighting, the sunlight is always tricky for shooting, so I shut the curtain half way to make it a bit bright, not too bright. And then I turn on the light of living room to make the room light more balanced. When I did the white balance, I used the wall to be the background. So the entire color is bit beige because of white balance and the lights. I think it is a good color for a living room and a casual atmosphere. At the beginning, pictures are a little bit out of focus, I forgot to do a focus at first two takes.
About framing, I think I did a pretty good framing in this scene. When I was shooting, I always keeps that in mind. When zooming out and in, always keeps the frame still. Also, I was careful about the angle of actors looking at each other, made sure they are same angles in different shot size and location. When I shot the dialogue between them two, I gave them both a middle close up shot, but kept the other out of the frame. When editing, I realized that maybe it will looks better if the they are both a little bit in the frame when the other is talking, like just showing a little bit of shoulder, to acknowledge audiences their relationship and connection better. But no big influence I think.
This ides just came up to me when I editing. I was think of the found scene of week6, in the scene of restaurant, audience first heard the voice of them two, then camera start panning around, finally audience saw the characters. To establish the connection between two characters, I changed the scrip a little bit. Instead of sitting next to Esteban, Roger walked around a little bit. camera started panning at the beginning, Esteban was in the frame, then Roger appeared in the frame when panning. Then she started talking when she appeared in the frame. I think it will be better she starts talking immediately after shooting, and then she appears in the frame. To achieve that, I can shot the voice and the movements separately. For the movement, I can shot lots of Roger walking around (shoot-to-edit) and then do some editing after.
Mise en sceneis a french word for ‘placing on stage’. Frame and camera work is important in Mise en scene. Usually a director needs to all of its elements like lighting, custom, location. In pre-production, director will discuss with his AD, set designers, prop masters, costume designers and scenic artists to determine the final look and feel the movie will achieve, the entire mood of the movie. More information and examples on here.
Montage is a kind of editing style. It cut a series of different scenes together to create time and space in film. Usually it is made up by the most important part, the most impactive part of the scenes. It would be New York this second, then next second it would be Paris, this kind of space and time differences will make audience excited and wonder. A montage cannot be two long or too short, too long would make it look boring, too short would make audience not satisfied by it.
Découpage, before we shoot a scene, we need to think about editing earlier before or during shooting. What kind of shoots are needed in later editing needs to be considered earlier. If we think it when cutting, it is too late. Sometimes we need a special angle, or special size of shot to get a better editing later, so think it earlier! ‘Almost universally confused in English-language writing on film with editing—when it isn’t completely ignored—découpage articulated instead an understanding by French critics that sequencing was conceived before and during the shooting of a film, not in the cutting, and that the camera played not merely a pictorial role but instead structured the film through its formal treatment and sequencing of the mise en scène’.
This week I found three scenes in the same movie, Fast and Furious 2 movie. Those three scenes have a common shooting way.
1. Brian and Mia, at dinner, the restaurant scene
This scene contains a very smooth, casual panning, but causal doesn’t mean that camera is panning with no certain framings and angles. Also it is a medium speed of panning, not very fast. Camera first stops at the statue, and then music starts, and camera starts panning as well. From audience’s view, it’s like the camera is our eyes, searching for Brian and Mia, stop for like nearly one second for some people and tables and check. After that continue searching. Audience hear their voices before see their face, so this is a good motivation for audience to search for them, and director satisfied audience’s thoughts by a camera panning. This panning also makes audience feel like going and sitting in that restaurant too, this makes movie mood nicer.
2. Brian and Mia in bed, Brian picking a phone call scene
In this scene, camera tracks wiggly with Brain’s phone ringing, tracking and phone ringing at the same time. As I wrote in the first scene, camera is like audience’s eyes, finding where does the sound come from? The frame is also clever in this scene. every time camera stop tracking for one second, in the frame there will be a shelf with car elements on it. Camera stops tracking when Brian sits up quickly, and the frame stay still with Mia sits up too.
3. Brian and Jesse, at the car racing site
This scene also contains two pannings. The first panning is from a high angle, panning with Brian’s car moving, through the entire car racing site. Audience can see a lot in that frame, gorgeous car ladies walking around, lots of cars parking there, people laughing, cheering… Another panning of Brain and Jesse walking through the site and talking. About this panning, it is like panning far away from the characters. There are lots of other people in the site walking pass the camera, and they also get blocked by something during the walking. But we can hear their voice clearly. This is a brilliant way to bring audiences into the atmosphere.
The common thing about those three scenes is that it makes audiences feel personally on the scene by shooting with different angles and perspectives. This movie is about cars, this theme is also very well presented in those scenes. There are lots of car racing scene in this movie which makes the movie mood cool and fast. The pannings and trackings are kind of fast, but is like stable and well framed kind of fast and with an aim, not like aimlessly panning around and confuses audiences. I found them very enjoyable to watch.
For rest of semester, I want to learn more about camera coverage and editing style. To achieve that, there are lots of aspects I can invesigate and practice. For example, I can watch lots of good scenes in films over and over again and analysis the certain shots. This would make me more sensitive about the camera coverage. Also, try different shot angles, size, perspectives, different locations, different framings on the same scene. With comparison, the better way to shot one scene will be easier to scene. Different versions of editing tells different meanings, and it also effects the entire watching mood. So a bad cut would confuse audiences in some degree. To express the plot in an good and clear way is important.