Evaluation Question Seven

Looking back at your preliminary task, What do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to your full production?

Before we commenced filming our opening sequence, we conducted a preliminary task which aloud us to experiment with the equipment and editing software we would be using for our opening sequence and iron out any problems we had with the cameras, software and Apple iMac computers. It also gave us an opportunity to learn camera angles that are effective when filming an opening sequence as they help to add realism. We focused on four different camera angles; Match on action, Shot/reverse shot, 180-degree rule, and the panning shot. 

Match on action

Match on action

Over the shoulder shot

We were given the task of creating a short scene that involved a small amount of dialogue and involved conflict of some sort. We decided to make ours comical, displaying a pointless argument between husband and wife about leaving the milk out. Since completing this task at the very begging of our project, we have learnt so much and are now much more confident with the equipment, the editing software and the shots we should use to make our film as professional, realistic and effective as possible.

Over the completion of our project we have learnt that mise en scene plays an integral role in making a film realistic and maintaining continuity. For our preliminary task we were restricted with the props we could use and where we could film as we had to stay in school and only had two hours to come up with what we were going to do resulting in us not being prepared with props or costume. We used a school corridor as it was the only place available to us and seeming that our film was about a typical household argument, this setting made the film look false and extremely unrealistic. We also only had one prop available to us, a mug, which did add some amount of realism to the action but the action still seemed out of place.

The importance of mise en scene with the pen and paper.

In contrast, for our opening sequence, we had a long time to plan exactly what we were going to do and where we were going to film. We were also able to plan costumes and props. As our opening sequence was based around a modern day family home scenario, we filmed in an average sized family home using everyday household props such as a teddy bear and plastic cup. We also dressed our actors in modern, every day clothes. We set up the house and made sure nothing changed during filming to maintain continuity throughout. We learnt that mise en scene is very important in adding realism to a film with the location, props and costumes.

Over the project we learnt that camera angles are essential to telling the story and making it believable to the viewer. The match on action shot we used in our preliminary task was not actually needed to tell the story and we only used it because we had to include that type of shot. This made it less effective. In our opening sequence, we used a match on action shot to add to the scariness and thriller theme of the film. This shot was used when we see Jessie opening the door from the back and the camera angle shifts to the front of the door and we see her face and her frightened facial expressions. We have learnt that camera angles are essential to conveying to the audience a characters emotions and personality. For example, a person with power would be shown by a high angle shot while someone with less power will be shown by a low angle shot to visualy display to the viewer that they are smaller and less important.

High angle

Low angle

During the course of constructing the preliminary task we picked up some basic editing skills, learning how to make cuts in our footage and upload videos from Final Cut Pro X to youtube. Over weeks of playing around with the software we learnt how to add and take away audio from our clips, add subtitles and titles over our footage and how to add effects to ensure that the lighting was the same in all our clips, making sure that continuity was maintained. 

From our preliminary task to our final piece, our opening sequence, we have learnt a lot. We have found that mise en scene, camera angles and editing are the most important parts of making a film realistic and believable.