Yay! Holiday are near and I am therefore in a good celebratory mood for a wonderful and FINAL analysis reflection.

Question 1

My first reflection is that myself and my group member did this together. I think this is indicative of the working practises of this subject and how well my group did together.

Colour grading was quite simple really – I don’t know why I was so frightened by the prospect of it.

Original

Colour graded – pink tones

Colour graded – Blue tones

It was interesting how slight adjustments in colour could totally change the mood. Gabby and I noticed particularly in the shots of the greenhouse. The one with blue highlights looked especially cold and unwelcoming and we decided the one with pink highlights looked like a meth lab (not that I would know).

Original

Lowered birghtness, increased contrastLowered contrast, increased brightness

With these we adjusted brightness and contrast. When we increased the brightness and lowered the contrast we got really ugly results so added some yellow tones to add substance to it so it look less washed out.

Question 2

I am far more excited for this semester of work. I feel like there are less constraints, conventions and there is more opportunity to be creative. There is also opportunity to explore subject matter I really care about.

Last semester I took on a producer role because I knew I was capable of fulfilling it however this semester I would really like to become more technically capable with a camera and be able to explore the potential styles and aesthetic effects of the work my group creates.

I am so happy with this semester of work. I have enjoyed the semester a lot more and felt like my practical knowledge has increased.

Although I feel that I did take on another producer type role (because of my relationship with the subject) I feel like I was more involved in the production process and have involvement with constructing the narrative in our work.

In terms of timing, after having done Film/TV 2, I was able to scope the workload better. A timeline was really key to our success and the idea of looking forward meant we didn’t get complacent, there were always follow up actions. Having time on our side meant there were opportunities to work and rework the material in our film. Opportunities for feedback were vital to our work and I think we made the best use of them, listened carefully and changed accordingly.

Really what our film was about didn’t come into fruition until perhaps the 2nd rough cut of editing.

My main goal was to get a better technically, however with this came the construction of narrative. I definitely got better with the camera and certainly better with editing in Premier however as a result of this I was physically controlling the constructive of the narrative. Getting better at the basic technically elements actually complimented the creative side too.

ALthough it may not be the most efficient use of time, we all took on multiple roles. I think this suited our group dynamic. None of us were experts but it allowed us to share our learnings and each grow broadly rather then.

Working in a group of three, for me, worked amazingly. The initial complication in finding a group and idea reduced the group to three key people and forced us to really look at ideas rather than rely on somebody else’s. Production-wise there were less people to organise and it meant everyone really had to put in effort to produce the work.

The risk with this approach is accountability. There was more flexibility in our roles so there was responsibility to really nail one section of the process however I don’t feel like there was a lowering in quality because of it.

Editing happened in small sessions. Aside from one 6 hour day to get a rough cut together, we found the best working practise for editing happened with fresh eyes. By limiting the sessions to a few hours we were improving our work slightly each time.

They are just some of my reflections from the semester. Overall I’m so happy with what we have produced particularly as it wasn’t a reassuring beginning to the project. I definitely preferred making

I said in my original hopes for the semester that I could “explore subject matter I really care about” and I did. I feel very privileged that I was able to share my grandpa’s story with a wider audience and it allowed me to learn things about him that I perhaps would never have known.

Question 1

Learning number one – I need to be more actively thinking about shots BEFORE SHOOTING THEM. Not just aesthetically but thematically too.

Aesthetically we took lots of long sweeping shots which honestly did not look that great and were difficult to cut.

Although we followed a theme in terms of shadows it could have been much better if we could have narrowed as there was no real relationship between clips.

The sounds, although recorded well, did not relate thematically. They were also worked as whole sounds. I could have experimented with more of a sound scape and included dialogue and music but did not have the time to do so.

Particularly in the documentary I intend to produce which visually could involve many highly visual shots of cactus’s, sound will be vital in developing the narrative in the film. Whether it be music, dialogue or location recordings I think it needs to be a major focal point of the work and planned substantially better than I did in this exercise.

Question 2

Fiction and Non-fiction: The Great Divide

I think this reading is centred around the debate surrounding the relationship between fiction and non-fiction in documentaries.

Having studied ‘True Lies: Documentary Studies’, this concept has been pondered.

My understanding at the end of last semester was that there is no such thing as a completely truthful documentary. Film is a construct. Therefore it is the representation of somebodies reality or perspective.

It got me thinking about our film and how we engage in documentaries with characters and narrative like we would a fiction film.

This is a challenge for us as filmmakers, as we recognise the need for story and elements of fiction without moving too far away from the objectiveness of documentary.

2. I am far more excited for this semester of work. I feel like there are less constraints, conventions and there is more opportunity to be creative. There is also opportunity to explore subject matter I really care about.

Last semester I took on a producer role because I knew I was capable of fulfilling it however this semester I would really like to become more technically capable with a camera and be able to explore the potential styles and aesthetic effects of the work my group creates.

3.  The most unusual or unexpected of the “doco’s” that we watched was ‘Drinking for England’. Obviously not a conventional doco, it reaffirmed the amount of freedom we have in creating our own work. Also how the range of shots effected the way the central character appeared I found very interesting and I think camera angles and differing shots could be utilised in our own work.

4. Initially I was struck but the content; how it shifted from ambiguous to clear using effects such as layering and texturing sound. I also really liked the use of foregrounding and background sounds.

To relate this to our work I think, unlike in Film-TV 1 where the objective was to get clean sound, I think (depending on subject matter) we could experiment with, layering sounds and creating unclear audio to see what the effect could be for this semesters film.

5. This exercise and analysis took me back to Writing Media Texts and Editing Media Texts in Semester 1 of this course. I really enjoyed looking at how audio could be used for different effects. I think it is something very innate and powerful that can have real impacts on a piece of media. We experimented with echoing stairs which was really successful and set a naturally eerie tone.

LAPSE

I really loved the concept of time. I thought it was very well written, with little dialogue making it more powerful. The shots at night were great. A fabulous use of 5 minutes.

 

A LOVE LOST

This group was very brave to take on such moving and serious subject matter.  The shots inside and outside the window were very well done and the voice over worked too. It was well written, particularly the opening dialogue. I applaude the team on cretaing something that I found very powerful.

 

GRANNY THEFT AUTO

I htought this film had lots of really great elements, particularly the dialogue and performance of the central character. I found the storyline alittle difficult to follow. Perhaps with more time to plan preproduction or even a more simple plot would have helped the film come together more.

 

 

Reading my inital post “Goals and Desires of Film-TV1” I was clearly very stressed when writing it. Or perhaps not stressed but intimidated by the scope of work. My aim was to get through the semester without ‘going bananas’.

It is true that the course was stressful but not unbearable thanks to majority of my team being intelligent, easy to work with and dedicated.

I wish I took more time to develop my creative skills. I wish I had the time to master a new skill be it camera, editing or sound. I took on the role of producer because I knew I woud be good at bringing the elements together but could have pushed myself more rather than feel like I needed to get myself to week 12.

I was genuinley proud of the work we created and really loved working in my group.

Next semester I want to spend more time learning specific skills than project managing.

Audio is emphasised when the particular item is the main subject in the frame (e.g. putting out cigarette, opening envelope)

There is the constant atmosphere sound of the crickets. Sound of fan whirring emphasised to enhance suspense in the scene.

Dialogue between two central characters – cuts between characters occur before audio is finished. Able to show responses to dialogue.

Audio to aid off camera storyline (e.g. man being sick in toilet).