Class exercises

The first three studio classes we have had for ‘Film 3’ have been filled with practical learning with equipment. Today’s class we were put into groups of 3 or 4 and were given the task of capturing 50-second shots with directed action. Working in groups is not usually something I am totally comfortable with, but being thrown in groups and sent out with some equipment and a task isn’t that bad.

We all brainstormed some ideas of some directed actions we could film. Our first idea was to go to a vending machine and kind of go from there. It was considerably easier to direct the action of someone in our group than someone on the street, so when it came to it, a few of the shots were not directed action, which strays away from the task at hand, but felt more comfortable in the moment. Setting the camera in a spot and waiting for people to do something seemed like a good idea, until we are faced with a filming a game of giant chess, which is not as action packed as one would think.

When it came to my turn of capturing directed action, I found a location that I really liked aesthetically, and just directed some of my group members to move around and make the shot not look like it could just be a photograph in a frame. It is quite easy just to tell someone “walk up that staircase”, because I am directing them, and I know what I want to add to a shot, but it is quite difficult to find action happening and shooting it. I used to watch a film and see shots of people on the street doing interesting things like skipping or dancing, and I sometimes would wonder if the director just saw them doing this and was like “hey this would be a GREAT shot”, but now that I am actually going out and filming, I am finding this a lot less likely.

Film 3

Never having done a studio subject before, I really had no idea what I would be facing. Although upon entering the classroom I was happy to see a whole cart of cameras and tripods, it looked as if we were going to be thrown right into the technical stuff, and not spend a two hour class doing the awkward ‘getting to know you’ games.

The first task we were assigned was to pretty much just go out somewhere and take 50 seconds of footage. Paul introduced us to some new equipment I had never worked with before, so it was pretty daunting task to just have to figure out how to use the camera on my own. Although, I believe this worked out much better than a class walkthrough would have, because I got to actually fiddle around with different parts of the camera and I was able to learn from my mistakes. Paul also made the task less intimidating after stating that we will all probably fail this, which took the pressure away from bringing back this perfect shot.

The shot I took was way too over exposed. I liked the composition of the shot so I wanted to use it, but I just couldn’t find a way to fix the exposure, so I figured this would be one of those “learn from your mistakes” moments, which admittedly, it kind of was as I soon later learned how to correct the exposure.

This type of learning through practice method is something that I really look forward to for the duration of this studio. Some of the goals I had at the start of the year were to learn all different aspects of filmmaking and be confident in doing so, and so far it seems as though this studio offers this. Because I am not sure what area of filmmaking I want to pursue in the future, I am glad I will be given the opportunity to explore different types of equipment and technology and expand my knowledge on things I already have experience with.