[The Story Lab] Sessions

 

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App Game (Written by Sarah)

The app will have a few elements to it. It will be quite a simple set-up like maybe birds eye view. Pretty much exercises your stalker skills. You will play Leo the stalker, who’s goal in the game is to win Steve’s heart. There will be a bar in the game representing steve’s heart and there are a few ways to fill up the bar. The best way to do this is by learning as much as you can about steve so you can impress him. On of the missions is breaking into steve’s house and maybe read his diary. Easier ways is to serf the wb, enroll into his classes so you can watch his mannerisms in person. When you’ve gotten past the half way mar of the game a notification will appear on your facebook and you see rose and steve are talking. Your progress shown on the Steve’s heart bar dramatically decreases and to prevent losing anymore your final goal is to prevent the agent ding this and hence kill rose. Do this successfully without getting caught and the game will end with you swooping in and impressing steve in his vulnerable state.

Lose and Steve will kill you.

[The Story Lab] Transmedia Storytelling

“The purpose being to not only reach a wider audience by expanding the target market pool, but to expand the narrative itself.” – Andrea Phillips, 2012

The Internet has provided platforms like Facebook, Youtube, or Instagram for modern individuals to engage, communicate, and interact with a pool of shared intelligence and potentially propagate information into different mediums. A good example here would be the viral marketing campaign that was launched by 42 Entertainment to promote Nolan’s 2008 film ‘The Dark Knight’.

“Who is Harvey Dent?” was the question that instilled a deep sense of fascination and curiosity in the public. By transcending the boundaries of multi platform interactivity, the viral marketing campaign not only intensified the interest of existing fans, it also introduced the movie to a demographic that would have otherwise not had an interest. Fake newspapers, scavenger hunts, and even a campaign for Harvey Dent for District Attorney, were all put into motion that further promotes the story of the movie instead of the otherwise unpopular preconceived notion of ‘official release date of an upcoming movie’. The campaign ironically provided fans an immersive sense of “reality”, basically by providing them with an “alternate reality”.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 5: Q1

As per lecture –  in a sequence you’ve called ‘colour’ you will have clips that are indicative of a particular colour or lighting state. To the right of that clip you will have that same clip repeated 2 or more times with different colour grades on it.
Take screen grabs of each clip then upload to your blog the series of stills that show us ‘before and afters’ of your colour grading. Provide a few different examples of at least two different clips – each with a description of what you did to the clip and why.
 
Before/After

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I adjusted the color temperature to a slightly warmer level, to give it a more balanced look throughout the documentary. As this was shot with a D-SLR, the color temperature preset was set to 3500k, as to even out the sunlight. With the limited amount of time with the interviewee, and the constant change of exterior color temperatures, I could not afford to stop the shoot and change my color settings every time the sun goes out.

 

 

Before/After
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10154407_10152324134347531_5953720157342238405_nAs the colors of our interviewee’s skin looks a bit pale, I gave it a slightly sharper contrast to give him a more natural and lively look. This also brings out the subject even more from the busy background.

 

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 5: Q2

You were asked this at the beginning of the semester. Now, could you review constructively what you got from this semester –  has the course lived up to your expectations, delivered what you expected, maybe even surpassed it?

After tedious weeks of filming (tedious, but fun, nonetheless), creating a documentary was, as expected, insightful and intuitive, as I learned to assimilate a more personalised approach to filming. We didn’t have as much of a time constraint as compared to Film/TV 1 and I thought this gave us much more room to improvise on our script and structure. I felt that NOT having an initial storyboard made us feel ‘unrestricted’, and unbounded us from the conventional ways of documentary production.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 4: Q4

Select from one of the readings and briefly describe two points that you have taken from it. Points that interest you, something you could apply to your own documentary.

They were to be flies on the wall.

It intrigues me, observational cinema. Watching “A distant gaze” further reassures that statement. It never occurred to me to approach a documentary in an observational way, maybe it is because I am so accustomed to the conventional ways of documentary making. Anything, and everything has to be narrative-driven. Come to think of it, it would be interesting to infuse observational principles our existing documentary format, and for once, allow the stories to tell themselves.

We filmed a segment of our documentary in a warehouse, with large potential of ambient sounds to intrude the voice and space of our interviewee. There were numerous cuts in between a conversation while filming due to planes and helicopters passing through, and constant car honking. We wouldn’t want to strain our viewers too much as to decipher the spoken words of our interviewees, therefore we had to place our sound person as close as possible to them, and to notify us of any substantial noise intrusions.  This is not to compromise the communicative intent of our film.

Ruoff, Jeffrey. Conventions of sound in documentary. In Cinema Journal,  vol. 32, no. 3, 1993.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 4: Q3

From a distant gaze …” (1964) directed by Jean Ravel, picture Pierre Lhomme & Chris Marker, words by Louis Aragon, narrated by Jean Negroni, music by Michel Legrand. Describe a few things that intrigue you – it might be shot construction, camera work, editing, overall structure, thematic concerns etc. Describe the camera work and why you think it has been shot that way.

This film, for me, is an amazing spectacle of observational cinema. It offers a wide spectrum of people with different style, age, and occupation. I like how the frame is constantly filled with an object, be it people or inanimate objects. As suggested by the title, I enjoy how the camera acts as an observer. We have a tendency to look and observe, the behaviour of other people and our surroundings. It really puts me into perspective and it is as if I am really there. The usage of cars passing by as transitions work really well, it is as if you are standing on the opposite side of the street, and the moment you lose sight of the subject, you lose interest.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 4: Q2

Most applications reserve keyboard shortcuts for the functions that you use most often. It is really good to learn all of these as it will speed up your editing and additionally alert you to functions that the software developers and other users find important. (You can learn much about the software by looking at keyboard shortcuts). Find the keyboard shortcuts for Premiere (hint, film-tv blog) and note four or more functions that you’ve never used before and why they may be invaluable to your editing. (Different functions to what you wrote last semester)

As we are working on a documentary this semester, there are bound to be interviews. CMD+T (Title) was helpful for me to add titles quickly to each and every interviewee in our documentary.

CMD+A (Select All) allowed me to easily select all the videos in my sequence for easy navigation and moving them around to suit my needs, and without ruining what I already put together.

As we used both a DSLR and EX3 for our documentary, M (Marker) allowed me to add markers to my video clips and significantly eased the process of syncing my audio and video together.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 4: Q1

In this clip from Forbidden Lies, Anna Broinowski’s 2007 film: describe in detail all of the audio, how it may have been recorded/sourced and how you think it has been edited / layered in post. (You do not need to describe how the music was recorded)

The audio in this segment is very prioritised because the message it is conveying is fairly crucial in . The clip begins with a music parody that is in accordance to a book that is claimed to be an accurate depiction of life of women in Jordan. It was mostly ‘foley’ sounds like a car driving past, birds chirping, and a scarf in the wind that accompanied the music. About 30 seconds into the music video, the music cuts off as though a tape recorder has stopped and a female voice interrupts, after which it introduces itself as Rana Husseini. The introduction was accompanied with prayer calls, a symbol of the Muslim community in Jordan.

There is a constant use of jingles, chimes, and rattles to further emphasise the ‘lies’ and misrepresentations that is present in the book. Silence underlines the interviews. There were also a few occasions where the voices of both women overlap and it gave me a sense of mockery. When more ‘lies’ were uncovered, the music gradually shifts to a more upbeat tone, giving the clip a light-hearted feel.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 3: Q2

Select from one of the readings and briefly describe two points that you have taken from it. Points that excite you, something that was completely new to you.

In documentary storytelling for film and videomakers, Curran Bernard writes on approach. He says that there might be added value in ways of conducting an interview. I find it quite amazing because I recently watched 60 Minutes by Nine Network, on Australia’s most hated couple. The interview gradually became more confronting, and all I noticed was how the wife repeatedly backing his husband, despite constantly being put in a bad light due to his wrongdoings in the past. This eased the amount of tension that surrounded the interview, but to me it somehow looked like an intervention.

“Your approach will evolve as your knowledge of the material increases as you have a better sense of what’s practical…”
I always thought that there was no definite answer to this because what is exactly ‘practical’? What are supposed to be good films/bad films? I mean, I encourage myself to experiment with different ways of approach towards films. So is there really an impractical approach?

 

Curran Bernard, S. Documentary storytelling for film and videomakers, (p. 27-37, 63-73, 75-79, 193-194). Burlington: Focal Press, 2003.

Film/TV2: Analysis/Reflection 3: Q1

Paste the link here from your version of the abstract editing exercise.
Then reflect on the whole process – Consider: the quality and usability of your recordings; the effect of layering and juxtaposition of both the audio and the video and; the things you learnt from working with this kind of audio and video.

My abstract exercise.
The quality of the videos were not as good as I expected because some of them turned out to be slightly out of focus. When we were recording sound, we had no specific focus as to what we wanted to record. However, on the day we recorded video, we were informed that it was to be themed. Thus, we went for loneliness. Result: The ongoing background music and constant chatter that accompanied the lonely main character depicted isolation. Surprisingly, forming a connection between the audio and video was relatively easy. The beauty of abstract is it does not specifically convey meaning.