film/tv analysis reflection 6 – question 6

Consider Sandra’s lecture “Directing Actors” and describe at least a couple of points that you took away from it (even if you’re not the director).

as director of our film, i took a lot of really great points away from this lecture that i thought would really assist me when directing on set.

i felt one of the most important  points Sandra made was to always keep the script on me and keep  notes about the the emotions of each scene or shot written in the script. this is imperative for shooting to edit as the scenes and shots are filmed out of order and it is highly important to ensure that the correct flow is felt between shots and scenes when editing by keeping continuity running in regards to the emotion of whats going on in each shot. if these do not match up then the film will not come together well and will not tell the desired story. as the director the most important job is directing the actors to get the right emotion to tell the story properly and emotion is how to get the story across

another really useful point was when sandra discussed the standard way of shooting vs the not so standard way. she brought up some really great points that i would not have considered when shooting the film. first off… how to make it interesting. i had created a shot list for the film but Sandra’s point was to go beyond just the general shots that you can do to show the scene but to also take different kinds of shots that would tell the scene. make the audience see it in a different way and create a real emotion or feel to the scene. to do this, Sandra suggested to simply experiment. put the camera at odd angles or weird nights and interesting locations. create different blocking or framing or set ups. don’t just make it normal. also to think about cutaways. this is something that i think is really important that again i would never have considered. of course, cutaways require time which can often be a stretch on shoots, but they are still important and can add an extra layer to the film that just your basic wide shots can’t do.

lastly, a really grew point was about directing the actors. as this is my first time directing, this is a really important part for me as i have never directed actors before. a really good point was to rehearse with them before hand with a  camera, especially to cover non-dialgoue sections of the scenes. this is because o the day a lot of time will be taken up with working with the DOP so it is important to get a good relationship with the actors and let them know what i want before the shoot. another really great point was about how to talk to the actors on the shoot. these guys are volunteer and it may be there first jobs. i want them to be feeling as comfortable and happy as possible as they re doing this for us. Sandra said it is really important to be honest with the actors. however, she also mentioned we need to be delicate. if something looks wrong or isn’t working, don’t just tell them that, rather give a way to change it r a different outlook approach to it so that everyone can be working on the same page and can all try to get as much out of the scene as possible. i big issue for me will be correcting them as i am not one to tell people what to do or what not to do so the idea of telling them instead what can be changed rather than just saying they’re wrong was really helpful so that i can maintain a good communication with the actors on set.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *