EVALUATION QUESTION 6

WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNT ABOUT TECHNOLOGIES FROM THE PROCESS OF CONSTRUCTING THIS PRODUCT?

INTRODUCTION

• While producing my film, I have become aware of many new types of technology, including mainly websites and downloadable programmes.

ENIA MEDIA PLAYER• When researching other films and creating

my practice films, I found I needed some form of a website or programme that would enable me to crop clips. Therefore, I turned to my trusted friend Google, and discovered Enia!

• This programme was very straightforward to use, requiring only that I import my film, use the ‘begin’ and ‘end episode’ buttons to crop my clip and then export the files to save them. This was very useful and effective, although nothing to prepare me for what was to come when using Adobe Premiere Pro on my real film!

CAMERA: CANON XL H1A• When filming our thriller, Nicole and I were equipped by

our school with a professional video camera and all other equipment we would require to film our thriller. This consisted of; a red head light, dolly, tripod, tape, reflectors (only shoot 1) and an outdoor lighting kit (only shoot 2). Despite our experience with this technology that was gained in the process of creating our preliminary task, which did come into use when filming, we still had many areas to learn and improve on. This meant that individual shots took longer to film and some required many takes, but the longer we spent familiarising ourselves with the camera, the easier the entire task became.

FILMING – DAY 1

• On the first day of filming, Nicole and I split the filming equally.

• One of my favourite shots from this day was the backwards tracking shot of the Brownie Leader walking towards the campsite. This was a long shot that in its final seconds became a close up.

FILMING – DAY 1• I also loved capturing the two scenes of the girls running towards their tent

and then the silhouette shot from the other side and the same of the Leader entering the tent later. These match on action shots required a significant amount of patience, an awareness of even the smallest details, and an ability to self-critique. These enabled me to ensure that the tracking shot taken from behind the girls flowed sinuously into the silhouette shot and that the handheld shot from behind the Leader, starting at a close up and becoming a long shot, fitted perfectly alongside the following shot. This was slightly more difficult to engineer as clear hand actions were being used and therefore more attention to detail was required. The second frame in this scene was of a medium shot, which again required a meticulous amount of patience when using match on action to create fluidity from one shot to the next.

FILMING – DAY 2• On the second night of filming, I was significantly

more active than Nicole in this area. • My favourite scene to film overall was that of the

girls sleeping. The panning shot that introduces the audience to a new setting and complication in my film. This high angled medium shot required a steady hand, as this was fundamental to the atmosphere of the scene, to indicate vulnerability and innocence in conjunction with the music.

FILMING – DAY 2• I captured this shot from both a steady perspective

and with purposeful jitters, meant to heighten the tension and increase the eeriness within the film, as fitting with the music. Initially I had planned to use only one of the two shots; however, they both had a place in our film, the steady shot coming first, and then the shaky shot to raise tensions.

• I then filmed high angled close ups of the Brownies’ faces as each was taken by the chloroform. I used really tight frames as the Leader’s hand came down each time, focusing on the significance of her actions.

FILMING: SUMMARY• Filming together and in approximately equal amounts

allowed Nicole and I to share ideas continually and to combine our abilities to produce the best possible results. We also benefitted from learning how to use the camera in a master class we attended before we even started shooting; small and yet significant details, including the importance and effect of white balancing, changing exposures and apertures and others, such as manipulating the focus, may not have been taken into consideration when filming if not for this lesson.

• Post filming, we captured our film onto a USB stick, then imported the footage onto the editing programme we would be using, Adobe Premiere Pro.

ADOBE PREMIERE PRO• When editing the footage of my final thriller, the majority of

the work was shared between Nicole and me. However, I found myself editing alone for a significant amount of time. I spent a long time on my own sorting out the pace and timing of the various pieces of music in addition to cutting down the footage in the final stages of production. This was because, despite the fact that our film was ‘complete’, it was too long. Therefore, I had to cut down the length of individual shots and rearrange the music to match. As Nicole was not in school in the last couple of weeks before the due date, I did this by myself.

ADOBE PREMIERE PRO• I found that pacing the music effectively helped the

audience recognise the negative impact of the Leader’s actions on the children and the possible conclusion of this act.

• Sharing the role of editor equally meant Nicole and I were communicating regularly and combining our skills to produce the best effects. We worked really well as a team, completing our tasks long in advance of all our deadlines.

SOCIAL NETWORKS• I have learned and refined my knowledge on communicating

through social networks over the course of the process of creating my film.

• Be it promoting my film screening on Twitter, or communicating with those who’d volunteered to help prepare for filming, via posting on a Facebook group of my making or a Skype conference call; technology was key in my communication. My usual means of communication would be through emails, phone calls and texting, and these were practical too, but I did enjoy experiencing these social networks I’d never used until now.

MARKET RESEARCH• In order to discover and adhere to my audience’s requirements, I

created polls and surveys on both the websites Kwiksurveys and Surveymonkey.

• On Kwiksurveys, I created polls. This was a really simple, self-explanatory, free-to-use website and it provided me a link that I could copy onto facebook and other such social networks to send to family and friends of the age of my target audience to receive as many responses as possible.

• Surveymonkey provided a very similar service, and I used this website to create a pre-production survey. Again, I copied the given URL onto various social media in order to generate as many responses as possible.

MARKET RESEARCH• All the research I have taken has been left open to the internet’s public

on websites in order that the decisions I make are based on valid research taken not only from friends and family in my close community, but from a wide range of responses, also in other places, worldwide.

• Both websites taught me the importance of wording a question clearly so that they cannot be misguiding. The open, closed and probe questions lead to the audience giving different kinds of answers and so I spent a long time wording each question appropriately to garner the best results.

• These research websites helped me learn the importance of indentifying a target audience long in advance in order that the results are relevant to my film intentions and so in the final production, I can adhere to and satisfy the expectations and demands of them.

LOGO CREATOR: AURORA• When creating my company’s animated logo, I found

software called “Aurora” online. After installing this programme, I found I was able to create an easily customised 3D animation. I was able to edit my logo with a range of tools including changing the pace, timings of different elements, font, sizes and even the format of the animation. I could edit even the tiniest details, including where the shape appeared in the frame, and the texture of it.

• After exploring this programme, I sent a link of it to Nicole. Then, at her house, we constructed two final copies of our logo. We attempted to download them, but came across an issue whereby a large watermark appeared across the screen on every format we downloaded it onto.

LOGO CREATOR: AURORA• Therefore, despite my arguing that this was

unethical and that we should just split the cost of the software, Nicole recorded the screen while we played the animations on Quicktime, we then imported these onto iMovie and cropped the screen so only the logos were visible.

• Despite my concerns over this approach, we benefitted from this hugely as the experience in the programmes Aurora, Quicktime and iMovie was invaluable and free!

REELCLEVER• When searching for a website or programme

that would enable me to create and present my post production storyboard, I found several potential devices, including ‘Storybird’ and ‘Storyboard that’. I considered the many options available to me and after, experimenting with a couple, I settled on ‘Reelclever’. This user friendly software provided a free way to present all the information, including photos, as well as minor details such as shot type and number. I also had space to add notes, which was a bonus that not all software provided.

PRESENTATIONAL DEVICES: AN INTRODUCTION

• The number of representational devices I became increasingly familiar with over the course of this experience is vast, and I used as many as I could to present my work on my blog. These included websites such as ‘Slideshare’, ‘Scribd’, ‘Kizoa’, ‘Prezi’, ‘Docstoc’, ‘Spicynodes’, and programmes including ‘Windows Movie Maker’ and others.

SLIDESHARE & SCRIBD.• These websites enabled me to upload PowerPoint

presentations to the internet. The websites provided an individual HTML code for each presentation, which could be used to remotely embed the slideshow onto my blog.

• These websites were very simple to learn to use, and were not only very user-friendly, but trustworthy sites that fulfilled my requirements quickly and were extremely compatible with Blogger, my blog host, and straightforwardly linked with my pre-existing Facebook and Email accounts, which was much easier than creating individual accounts.

DOCSTOC• In order to upload documents and

PDF files to my blog, I created an account with this website. Docstoc enabled me to share my files on the internet, and with HTML codes, copy them onto my blog. This was not as easy a website to familiarise myself with in comparison with Slideshare, but after taking the time to learn the terminology of the website, I found it much easier to use.

KIZOA

• Kizoa provided me with a way to create and present my work online, in an uncomplicated innovative system. This creative outlet enabled me to chose any photo as a background, write a certain amount of text to each slide; editing the colour, highlighting, font and position on screen, add transitions, music and other effects to present my work in the most exciting technique possible.

PREZI• Unlike other presentational devices I had used until discovering Prezi,

here my work did not present in a slideshow format. Instead I was provided with a blank virtual canvas, with the option of a template, to which I could add different textboxes, pictures, etc. and then present these in any order I chose. This was my favourite presentational device as it allowed me to fully experiment with my creativity and develop my presentational skills.

SPICYNODES• This website enabled me to create a

spider diagram online; it provided very little choice creatively, but imparted the information I wanted to communicate clearly and directly. However, I only found I could use this website for a specific purpose and therefore did not use it more than once, considering how I didn’t really have the need to create many spider diagrams later on down the line.

WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER• Before trying Adobe Premiere Pro, I experimented

heavily with this software, as fulfilled a similar function to the editing programme, but on a smaller scale. I learned how to create, organise and edit a film in this basic programme; using the range of the tools available, without being overwhelmed by the vast number of steps a film has to go through before it is ready to be presented. My trials with this programme taught me to pay attention to detail, as I found that after I posted my film online, I had left in a typing mistake. Practice with this programme also helped me understand the importance of saving a file under the correct format, which benefitted me later when I had to capture my footage and import music files into Adobe Premiere Pro.

MUSIC• I had the opportunity to manipulate the music I had recorded,

adding different effects to produce different results on my school equipment, e.g. adding echoes to create another dimension of the music. Of course this was much more difficult a software to use, the tools and subject of editing, utterly unfamiliar to me. Moreover, this experience gave me the basic lesson on how to manipulate sound in a studio, using the many different functions to edit the sound as it was being produced. Although, I could not have done this is if not for the fact that I was aided by an experienced musician.

BLOGGER• Of all the presentational devices, websites, and

programmes that I have experienced, Blogger is by far the most important, as without a firm understanding of this website, I would not have been able to present any of these. In order to keep my blog up to date regarding the process of producing my film, I was required to upload and embed many different presentations, pictures, etc. In order to upload all the research and planning I had created in preparation for my final product, I had to learn my way around this website in great detail.

BLOGGER• Having never created a blog on Blogger previously, as

a quick learner, I have now become fully versed and confident in this modern website. I downloaded the Blogger application to my mobile phone in order that I could access my work when away from my computer; this was more complicated to learn to use, but I rose to the challenge nonetheless. I haven’t experienced any issues with this website for the duration of the time that I have uploaded various documents, clips and files on it as well as the time I have spent writing posts directly into the Blogger text box and posting text directly.

CONCLUSION• All in all, I found that producing my film has led me to gain

experience in many different technologies that I otherwise would know nothing about. Not only have I improved my technological terminology and abilities, but these programmes and websites allowed me to let my creative juices flow. My ability to create exciting and appealing presentations has progressed over this time period, ranging from the way I presented my research clearly, to the way I presented the continual development of my presentation of ideas, to the high level of film I managed to create as a final product.

THANKS FOR READING!

BY RACHEL GIBSON