Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Preliminary Task:

Faceless

Click on the picture for the video

Continuity Principles:

• The main thing I gained from the Prelim exercise was dealing with the different forms of continuity

MATCH ON ACTION

As Emily turns around we start with a close up on her face then cut to a mid shot from the point of view of where she is turning.

SHOT REVERSE SHOT

We used shot reverse shot when Emily's character and the faceless person are having their conversation. This way we get a clear sense of distance between the two people and keeps the conversation flowing smoothly.

180 DEGREE RULE

The camera remained on the right side of the conversation so we kept to the 180 degree rule. This helps stop the visuals from looking confusing to the audience.

What Was Different to the Film Opening:

• In our prelim task, it was to create any scene in a film so we did not have to worry about titling so that was something we had to learn for our opening sequence.
• Also for our prelim we were given guidelines as to what had to be in our clip whereas for our opening our group was given total creative control.
• Our final opening sequence was a lot more plot driven and we had to put in a lot more research into it

Film Opening:

Hurting

• We applied he continuity principles that we learnt for our preliminary task in our final opening
• E.g. From 0:41 to 0:47 we used match-on-action when she looked at the clock and then to the window
• Also we used the 180 degree rule when Violet was in the kitchen from 1:27 to 1:39
• However we made a few continuity errors in our opening:

1. At 1:42 Violet can be seen really scared and rushing to get out of the kitchen however in the shot right after at 1:44, she walks out from the kitchen quite slowly and calmly.
2. At 1:13 Violet walks into the kitchen and the door is already open however at 1:16 from the shot of the kitchen through the window, she can be seen opening the door fully

What Was Learnt:

• Group dynamics are important as we have to be able to work together to collaborate ideas and get things done. Luckily with both my Prelim group and Final group, we all worked together quite well. Obviously for the final opening, we were required to spend more time with our group members so it was helpful that we got along well.
• We had to put in a lot more research into factors like our audience and institutions for our main project because for our Prelim it was just to test continuity principles whereas our opening had to fit in with genre conventions and look like a professional opening. It was quite difficult to pick a distributor because for our Prelim it had not crossed our minds at all. A lot of research was put into that.
• For our final project, we went on multiple shoots: practice shoot, test shoot, the real shoot and a back up shoot. We maxed out each one of the shoots which was surprising because I originally did not think we would need the back up shoot but it ended up being very useful.
• We made use of set ups in our final piece which saved us a lot of time when filming. For example, all the scenes set in the bedroom (both at the beginning of the sequence and at the end) were all filmed at the same time.    

What We Could Have Improved in our Final piece:

• We should have focused on the continuity more so we could have not had the small errors
• Possibly maxed out our shooting time even more (it was difficult as for the correct lighting, we had to film when it got darker outside so we had to wait around a little bit, we would arrive at 3/4pm but wait until 5/6pm to actually start shooting footage)
• Think ahead about practical issues we would face. For e.g. we realised for the scene where Violet walks down the staircase, it was hard to place the lights as the space was quite limited

All in all, I learnt that it is all well to have an idea you want to film but it cannot just be done spontaneously. Every detail needs to be planned and every choice made should have a reason. In addition, you can never try and predict the problems you will face whilst filming or in post-production so the best you can do it try to think of innovative ways to solve it and there is never such a thing as too much footage!