Fan Man - Test Shoot and Assembly Cut

Fan Man has turned out to be a fantastic (pun not intended) project thus far. The footage that we shot for our Test version came back looking brilliant. There are only a few things that we need to change for our finished film.

The mistake that we made during both our test and final shoot was not shooting enough coverage. We only shoot the beginning of the film up to a certain point rather than letting it all play out. Doing this would have allowed us much more footage to play with in the edit. Thankfully though, the assembly cut that I managed to put together was well received and there is no need for us to re shoot anything.

A problem that arose during the shoot that we managed to greatly overcome was the fact that none of our actors turned up. Normally it is would be a disaster to cast 3 of the 4 of in our own film, but in this case it turned out great, (largely thanks to not having any dialogue to worry about!). Having studied acting in the past and enjoying playing different characters, I don't have a problem with being on camera at tall, though I won't claim to be a Brando or DeNiro. I just use my face to convey the emotions and try not to look at the camera.

What we really need to think about at this stage is the soundtrack for our film. We were given the suggestion of using voice over, which I think could work quite well if done right. Another idea that I have considered as an alternative is the use of comic book panels to convey what would otherwise be said in voice over, and I am going to investigate how this could be done in Final Cut Pro. We also need to think about music and sound effects.

Nesting Sequences in Final Cut Pro

Final Cut Pro can be a complicated program to get to grips with when you first start out. There are many different features and functions that I need to get to grips with before I can truly start editing like a pro, however I am improving all the time. I have made a target that I am going to get into the edit suite whenever I can to finish off editing the coverage that we shot in our Practice Enrichment session. We wrote some simple dialogue and shot a simple scene consisting of a conversation between two people on what they would do if they won the lottery. We shot it from different angles, including a master shot, over shoulders and close ups. We then transferred this footage over to the edit suite and have been given the task of putting together an edit.

When putting my video and sound captured from Tascam when working on my edit, the first thing I tried to do was use a time consuming process, of
individually linking up every clip and the appropriate sound together each time I found the one that I wanted to add to the timeline. I have now discovered a much quicker and easier way to do it then this. This is to create a new sequence for every angle and sync the appropriate sound and video up within that sequence (Master Shot, Overshoulder1, etc.). This way once you have synced everything up it is easier to simply scan through your sequences, find the clip that you want to use, and pull it into the master sequence.

In conclusion,  Final Cut Pro is a program which allows many different methods of working. You have to figure out what works best for you though the experience of editing. I am confident that through my editing practice I will be able to find what works best for me.

Exit Tinnitus, Enter Fan Man

The Tinnitus project proved to be a disastrous failure. There was a total lack of organisation and initiative within the group. The director was hesitant to move forward and make definitive decisions with his film, which left us with a lack of storyboards or shot lists. This left me to take the initiative and write the story myself, which made me feel uncomfortable as I was taking someone’s film off them. This all resulted in us not being able to produce a finished draft version of the film, save for a couple of bad test shots. I felt so embarrassed on the day when every other group was producing great stuff. This experience has taught me a valuable lesson about the media industry. In the end, a film needs to come from the director, and if the crew beneath him/her are forced to pick up his film through their lack of initiative, then it truly won't result in a good situation for anyone involved. Organisation and planning ahead is key, and the cast and crew need to know what is going to happen ahead of time. If this is not done then the whole film will fall apart.

The end result of all this is that Tinnitus has been shelved. We have instead been assigned to work an exciting film whose pitch did not initially get picked. The film is called 'Fan Man' and it tells a much more concise and defined story about a nerdy man in a cafe who stands up to a bunch of ruffians who come in and harass a girl that he fancies. We are shooting a draft version tonight and I am going to play the protagonist. I have come into college wearing a white shirt with pens tucked into the breast pocket and thick glasses. I think that this will add greatly to the Mise en scene and allow the audience to clearly identify the kind of character this is supposed to be. We have a much better script and storyboard this time so I am feeling much more confident this time. We have the use of a cafe location and cast members this time. I am much more confident with this project and believe that the draft version of the film that we shoot will come back looking great.

Samm Haillay - The Gun on The Mantlepiece

Sam Haillay is one the most important and exciting up and coming producers in the North East. Through his independent production company ' Third', which he founded with Duane Hopkins in 2001, he has been responsible for supporting a vast array of new talent. He was responsible for producing Hopkins award winning short films and his feature debut 'Better Things', which received high praise when it at the Cannes Film Festival's International Critics Week, in 2008.

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to hear Haillay speak yesterday, and found his advice and stories highly engaging and inspiring. The advice he gave was invaluable for a budding young film maker such as myself. Samm talked at length about every phrase a film goes through, from the idea generation and pitch through to filming and post - production. He gave some novel ideas on ways which one might raise money to make a film, recalling one time when he and his colleagues worked overtime packing in a Supermarket during the busy Christmas season, and managed to raise over £1000 in the process. He gave a fantastic tip for the casting process which stuck with me, which is to ask any non-actors who you want to cast in your film to simply look into the lens to see what they do. They struck me as a great tip, as everyone has a different reaction to being in front of the camera, some are too theatrical in front of it, some shy away from it, and some have a natural or even dominating presence when in front of it. Therefore simply asking them to look into the lens can allow to know early on if they are the right person for the job, by simply how they react to being in front of the lens.

One of the things which Haillay talked about which stuck with me the most was the concept of 'The Gun On The Mantlepiece'. This refers to a narrative technique in which a seemingly unimportant item is glimpsed or discussed briefly at the beginning of the story, only to turn out to be important in the last act. My mind immediately went to Edgar Wright's 'Shaun of The Dead'. In the film a rifle is appropriately seem above the bar in The Winchester pub, and the characters argue at several points in the narrative over whether or not it is a real gun. In the film's final act, it does in fact turn out to be a real gun when Shaun accidentally fires it, and it is then used by the characters as a way to fight back against the zombies that are closing in on the pub. This technique is also known as 'Chekhov's gun' after the Russian writer Anton Chekhov, who summed it up as "If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there." If it isn't essential, then you shouldn't include it in the story.

 I also had the opportunity to watch a fantastic short film that Haillay produced, Jade, directed by Daniel Elliot, for which he received the Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival. The film takes a rather generic soap opera - esque plot, that is, a teenage girl gets pregnant by her boss and tells her boyfriend that it is his, and films it a such a subdued and cold way that really makes it feel fresh. It's a very bleak watch and really makes you feel uncomfortable as you watch it. There is very little dialogue throughout and no music whatsoever, with much of the story being told through characters faces and actions.The final shot of the film, which can be seen above, really stuck with me. It ends with Jade looking directly at the camera, at us the audience, as if to ask "what would you have done?". The director then breaks the 180 rule by showing Jade's POV of the rain outside the car windscreen, and then cuts abruptly to black, leaving us feeling melancholy as the credits roll silently. I really thought this was a great piece of film making and urge anyone reading this to check it out.

Aesthetica Short Film Festival - ASFF York 2014

As part my degree, I want to take advantage of every opportunity outside of Lectures that comes my way, in order to gain experience and knowledge. Film Festivals are something which I have always been interested in but never had the chance to attend before. You can imagine my excitement then, when we were given the opportunity to visit the Aesthetica Short Film Festival (ASFF) taking place in York from the 6th to the 9th of this month.

The festival showcases some 300 short films from all around the world, spanning genres as diverse as Drama, Comedy, Music Video, Fashion and Experimental. The Festival also features a number of masterclasses featuring talks with Industry Professionals in various fields. It was amazing and inspiring for me to be able to hear these pros talk about their experiences.

The first masterclass that I attended features 3 camera operators who have worked on films such as SkyFall, Gravity, and the Star Wars series. One of them had just finished working on the new Star Wars film and we were given a fierce warning not to ask him any questions about it! These guys talked about how the way they worked, explaining it requires a combination of physicality and creativity. You get to discuss with the director, make the decisions about the correct composition and camera movements for a shot, but situations such as chase sequence where you have to run along with the actors require you to keep in shape as well. We also got a description of the StediCam and how it can be used. They said it weighs about the same as a rucksack you would carry around with you, so it is quite comfortable to film moving shots with it. We were shown an incredibly complicated tracking shot from Joe Wright's 'Anna Karenina' and they talked us through the incredibly grueling process by which it was filmed, using a moblie phone clip that had been captured the filming. This was incredibly useful for me to gain further insight into tracking shots, such as the famous one in Martin Scorsese's  'Goodfellas'. What I took away was to keep stuff happening in the shot all the time, don't shot die, otherwise the audience will wonder why you haven't cut yet.

The next masterclass I attended was on Editing, and featured Lisa Gunning, who recently edited Seven Psychopaths for Martin MacDonagh. She is incredible passionate about what she does and that really came through, which made this a highly enjoyable masterclass. She talked about getting into the business through adverts, moving onto shorts, and then feature films. She talked about the relationship between editor and director, and that she has always had heated disagreements with every director she worked with. Ultimately however, this is because they are both highly passionate about what they do and want to make a good film in the end.

This was an incredibly enjoyable and helpful weekend and I'm so glad that I went. I hope that I will more opportunities to attend events such as this one.

Two Months of Media Production

Hello Media world!

Welcome to my blog. I'm going to be using this as a way to document my progress during my Media Production Foundation Degree at Newcastle College. Hopefully this will prove to be a good outlet for reflection during my time on the course, and maintaining regular updates will keep me focused and always on the look out for the ways to improve. I am confident that documenting my thoughts in this way will be very helpful for me. I hope as well that you will find it interesting and entertaining.

Anyway, today's update will act simply as a bringing you up to date with what is happening currently on the course. As I write this we are starting the second term of the year, and we are beginning production on our first film. The film will take the form of a 5 minute fiction piece, for which we have all had to come up with our own story ideas. Only a handful of ideas have gotten green lighted, and we have gotten broke off into small groups to work on the films. The prospect of actually working on a film in this way is both incredibly exciting and incredibly terrifying. There is so much potential for things to go wrong at this early stage, but then every mistake made will be a lesson learned in the end. The best way to learn how to make films is to just go out there and make a film. This will be an incredibly important and helpful learning experience for me.

The film which I have chosen to work on has the title of 'Tinnitus', and it concerns a man who contracts Tinnitus and his resulting descent into madness. I think that this is fantastic idea for a short film but we have a lot of work to do. We have been set a task for next Tuesday to produce a draft version of the film, that is very rough version of the film but which can be sloppy but has the general idea of the shots, actors and locations in place.

My team and I have agreed that the best course of action to take right now is for us all to go away and produce a storyboard of how we each see the action playing out. Then we are going to meet up on Friday (I am going to the Ashetica Short Film Festival in York on Friday so I am going to send my storyboards over) and review. We will take the best bits from each story board and use those to produce our film.

I am extremely nervous but also keen to get started. I am going to get working on my storyboards and hopefully we will have a good draft of our film to show by next Tuesday.