Preliminary Task - Report

At last, I will present to you our prelim task. Here is our short - The Quest:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxiqfqQFe9Q&list=HL1380572113

Now for my personal report:

For my preliminary task, I had to create a short film in a group according that followed a set of guidelines laid down for us by the exam board. These guidelines were:
- Establish location
- Introduce character 1
- Character 1 opens door
- Character 1 crosses room
- Character 1 sits down opposite character 2
- Characters exchange at least 4 lines of dialogue.
And it didn't have to be concluded.

We also had to include multiple shot types, follow the 180 degree rule and include these shot techniques:
- Match-on-action: Match-on-action is cutting from one shot to another to create a visual bridge that distracts the viewer from noticing any slight continuity errors between the shots. It is used when a character opens a door then walks through etc.
- Shot reverse shot: Shot reverse shot is showing a conversation from one character's perspective then switching the camera angle to show the other character's perspective before switching back to the first character's perspective. It follows the 180 degree rule.
- Eyeline match - Eyeline match is when a character looks off camera at something the audience cannot see, then the camera cuts to whatever the character was looking at. For example, a character could be walking along a path before glancing to their left, then the camera cuts to a sign on a wall.

The other members in my group are:
Sophie-Louise Courtney
Dominic Edwards
Lester Loat

We aimed to create a piece that would be adventurous and comical while demonstrating all the techniques we've learnt so far. Together, we brainstormed and storyboarded (our storyboards can be found below) our ideas to create the final piece we produced. The general plot is that a boy is peacefully reading a book when he is summoned by a mystical guru (by a gong sound) and then runs thousands of miles to rush to the guru's aid, only to find his guru is simply a little bit peckish. The boy was played by Lester and the guru was played by Dom. We chose this plot as it demonstrated our ability to produce a piece containing two quite different genres and we could use a wide range of shot types.

My main role in the project was director which I thoroughly enjoyed, though at first it seemed like a lot of pressure. I had to ensure we were all in the correct places during filming, suitable locations were chosen and planning the camera shots, lightning etc. It was great fun though a bit a difficult at times because I not only had to make sure I was doing my job right, but making sure everyone else was able to demonstrate their full potential as well. I also got to boss everyone around a bit, which I really like doing. It is definitely a role I would take on again.

I also contributed equally to the editing, which we did in iMovie on an Apple Mac. With Sophie's help, we got the clips in chronological order. We then trimmed them so the piece ran smoothly and removed the diegetic sound on the clips where we only wanted non-diegetic sound to avoid unwanted ambient sounds (footsteps etc.) Next, we added the non-diegetic sound, using sounds from iMovie to avoid copyright infringement. We used a dramatic piece of music to accompany the boy's running to play on the idea of an action/adventure film, to make it more dramatic and to build suspense. This also helped build sympathy for the character and the comical effect because the audience is under the impression it's building to something really exciting before realising the guru is only hungry and the boy has run all that way just to be the guru's manservant. We also used a gong-like sound near the beginning to summon the boy to the guru.

Our film also featured a friend of ours, Sam Harkness, who sadly only made the credits. We decided to use the clip of him doing the Macarena over our credits to make them more amusing (as credits are usually pretty boring). Unfortunately, we couldn't use the actual Macarena music due to copyright issues, but instead found a piece on iMovie we deemed suitably entertaining to accompany Sam.

After a long process, we finally uploaded the finished product to YouTube. I'd say our prelim task was a success and we have a good short film to show for it. I think we all contributed equally to the project and worked very well as a team. I learnt it is important to plan and storyboard well as if you don't, it makes filming a lot more difficult. For us, we had a good storyboard so filming was not too bad. Our script was a little poor, so most of it was improvised during filming. This taught me scripting is just as important as the storyboard. Also, we did not manage our time as effectively as we could have done, meaning our editing was a little rushed as we spent too long on filming. Next time, I know to manage the allocated time more effectively to ensure plenty of time for each stage of the production process.

I have learnt a lot from my preliminary task and I can carry these skills forward to my next project.