Film Reports - Day 3

Today we went out to film the plain walls look with the idea being it being a mental home. it turns out it is almost impossible to find a straight jacket without paying a silly amount for one so we settled on some slow shots in the plain white walls setting to show isolation of the singer. also going out to a woods down the road where we could get our opening shot from.

The day was simple we only needed 2 people on set with 1 camera and the back up incase we needed it. it was quite relaxed in the way that we had a large amount of time to film it and no real rush with timings of having to leave so we took our time. myself and jack set about taking everything out the room that was in shot and kept anything that was immovable or was not detrimental to the shots that we were taking that day. we then set the tripod up for the front on shots which were inspired by kings of leon 'loose somebody'. This went through 4 takes as the first two were far too dark on the camera we were using so we switched to the back up which managed to give us more light than the other. this enhanced our images quality. we also tried to light it with a small torch but it made the image look awful so we scrapped it for the 3rd and 4th takes. we then did a range of establishing shots that set the scene of the room including a few close ups and high angle shots to make the character look even smaller and weaker than we have already portrayed him as. this effect will hopefully put in stone the fact that he has nowhere to go and has an instability caused by the relationship.

We finished up and put the scene back to normal and then went off in jacks car to the woods which were a 5 minute journey from my house. Here we shot the opening shots and a few tree pieces. this was bit harder as there was no song to play over the top to get jacks miming perfect we believe i worked as we played the recording back with the music on a phone and it looked to match up. yet we found this difficult as we had no cues and the miming was a struggle because of this. in all we filmed it quite successfully on the limited crew we had but we would change the miming issue that we had. i thought we adapted well by being critical of our work and thus found an issues which we corrected quickly and easily with a simple change.

This concluded our filming process. Our editing could result in some refilling of some shots but it may not. in all i believe that we were able to get a strong focus with our footage and used a variety of locations and technology through our filming which allowed us to get good quality shots which stuck and challenged the codes and conventions in different areas. we used all the varieties of shots which we could possibly use to enhance the impact including, two shots, close up, mid and long shots. we used a variety of establishing shots and angles to display power and represent a power balance which may or may not be present but depends on the viewers interpretation. along with this we tried to incorporate the general shots which are used in the genre and the performance based video which we aimed to get in a style that is effective yet punched in a way that appeals to the nature of the audience.

In all i thought our filming process went well but there are some things i would change. i would want to invest in a rolling track to fix the camera on. this would enable us to go around the focus point and move smoothly rather than jerky difficult movements that are caused by the movement of the cameraman and him being the only ballast for the camera. i would also like to be able to control the lights better that we used in the performance as this was difficult to get right and wanted more of a flash and movement. yet we used it well in the fact it gave it an amateur look that played upon the ironic path our superstars take. i would also want to give myself an easier role by not being a part of the band and being only the director of photography. i would also like to rethink the general concept of the video and go for a more montage effect that would resemble the singers thoughts but that was not my decision. i believe this look would of achieved better results as we could of used a lot of establishing shots to set a mystical scene which we would explore with our character. i would also reshoot the part with the girl and go into more depth about what was going on. we hope the song lyrics will manage this in the video. overall i am satisfied with what we did but limited ourselves a bit and if given another chance could achieve much greater results. yet we still have put together some quality shots and provided  adequate footage for the editor.

by Josh Graham

Report - Day 2 Filming

Todays schedule

Todays filming involves shooting the shots at the apartment scene which is in a village of marsh gibbon which provided a great room for fitting in a bands equipment in the corner whilst not disrupting the layout of a homely atmosphere. we were then going to pack up here and move to the location of the live performance in the Drama Hall.

• 8:30: Josh and Oli meet at Josh's house to gather equipment

• 8:45 Josh and oli leave to go to Marsh gibbon

      + Chloe picks up Jack and Alfie from their houses to take them to the filming location.

• 9:15: arrive on set and begin setting up living room shots. this should be done with the pperformance shot first as the shot list suggests.

• 9:35: begin filming whole band performance and subsequent parts of this.

• 10:10: move onto singular shots of band members and shots of the singer singing and carrying on with life but with band in corner.

• 10:35: single shots of Jack on seat and then shots of chloe with jack and leaving aswell.

• 11:00: move to the upstairs bedroom shots of jack looking upset by the dress.

• 11:35: Pack up gear into cars and leave for buckingham Drama Hall

• 12:20: arrive at Buckingham. 45 minutes for lunch break.when of which producer will set up equipment to be ready.

• 13:05: shooting of performance. any Parts that require redoing in the performance. this includes the close up shots which were too dark for use in the previous day of filming here. this shooting must be finished.

• 4:30 clean up and pack all equipment away. return drums back to Josh's house.

Overall this day of filming went well. doing 2 performances is something we did not want to do yet we had no choice as we were limited on the amount of days off school we could get. Yet we did what we must. the shooting in the morning was only a small section. had about 20 shots we wanted to get from the morning. It started well. we were slightly behind schedule getting to the first location for filming but we made up time with setting up as their was less equipment for this scene.

as we continued we had increased problem with lighting. the big windows at the back caused such issues for lighting and had little we could put in the way to reduce it. we worked around it and used a variety of shots to minimise the effect it had. with careful choice of shots we managed to limit the effect it had on the camera. we also had struggles with the shots we could perform. the room was slightly too compact for us to position the singer in a good angle and still get the band in the background and look neat. if we can effectively blur out the background in editing it may solve the issue we had of focussing in on the singer.

The use of 2 cars made transporting the equipment to the next location of great ease. we then managed to set up quickly upon arrival while the rest of the crew went to lunch. there was some issues with the lighting. 2 of the lights were permanently on. this gave us some issues with the light on the drums but we checked this over on the laptop and discovered that the light was only present on the camera but was okay on the clips when put onto the laptop. from here we were to manipulate the lighting to make the shots of good quality still. the shots went well and we managed to get a lot of film down to hand over to the editor. only one more filming pieces still needs to be performed.

Things we learnt was that we need to always carry something with us to control light. a sheet or something that can reduce light and then relight. this equipment is expensive if professional yet we could still create pieces of equipment that are a compromise. This could of improved our filming quality.

we also went over the pieces where the miming was not believable. we aimed to over exaggerate the miming so it was more believable. as there is a lot of points in our video where the focus is on the singer and their miming is crucial to getting it right. we re did it with a lyrical video playing behind the camera so that jack had a chance to pre read what he needed and would be certain of the words. we filmed this and looked a lot better than our previous efforts. we re-shot a new finish which was a bit more dramatic and hoped that with it we can build a feeling of mystery around the song and the band that was playing.

in all the day went smoothly and to time. well worth the time we spent on the extra filming. extra work we did was beneficial to the overall production of the video. hopefully in the next few days the final shots will be finished and then move onto editing.

by Josh Graham 

Report - Day 1 hall performance

So this is our first day of shooting and of course there were going to be some minor issues with it all. Yet, everything went well, firstly we got transport for the drum kit and all the other equipment we needed for the shot for the day. we then arrived on time and the actors also arriving on time.

we logged all of our set up on film and will include this in our evaluation. it went well, managed to get the kit in and set up in 15 minutes. we then began with the full scale performances as planned. this went well. we kept the camera rolling throughout the performance. we had issues with the fact that we could not here the song from what we originally were playing it off over the noise off the drums being hit slightly. so we quickly after the first take went and got a speaker and attached the laptop to it which made it a lot louder so all band members could hear it whilst the drums were being hit at a toned down volume.

The Lighting went so well. it gave us a professional look that we would of not got from the barn. in many ways it was beneficial to do the shoot in the hall as the lights were perfect for shooting a bands performance. i will also post on how we did the lighting and the troubles we had with it and what we found went well.

We continued to go through the shots and even looked at some other shots we could involve into our video and shot them. as we progressed we allowed the actors some time for a break whilst we set up the lighting or shot pictures of other actors with shots that were only of them. it went well. we used a steadicam and a bridge camera but used it hand held and on the tripod. this gave us a mixture of the still and moving shots which we can mix together and choose when editing.

overall in the day everything went smoothly, we returned any borrowed equipment and took all the other parts back to joshs house. In all there was a lot filmed and with some evaluation of the shots next week we can look at what we want to change so if we have to film again we will know what to do, and are able to film again due to the simplicity of the whole days worth of filming. hopefully we will film again just to touch up any shots which went wrong or didnt look great, doing this should give us a more adapted to what we were looking for shots and then add in anything we want to add in. Overall the day was very good and well ran. we got what we wanted and worked very well as a team. hopefully when we do the other parts it goes just as well and we are able to combine it soon to perfect our project.

by Josh Graham