practice film 2

Today (20-1-09) myself and Lisa came to workshop to finish uploading the footage and start on the editing. Laila did not attend as she had to go to the dentist. After uploading all the footage from the camera we started to edit the footage. We first started by cutting down the length of first shot, which is of Lisa looking up at the clock, we then had to put the shot of the clock. When we watched the first clip we had realised that we should split the first shot so when she is looking up at the clock we show the clock and then cut back to her looking back down from the clock as the continuity was much better. We then added the rest of the footage. One of the difficult parts was when we were doing the match cuts of the shots this is done when I go to the door and go through it. It was difficult because we had to get the transition from one shot to the other exactly right. When the editing of the footage was complete we added music to it. We first cut out some parts of the original sound except for the part of the dialogue. The first sound effect we added was the ticking noise of the clock, we had to make sure it was only three ticks as it was only three times the clocks hand had moved. A piece of guitar music was added to the footage. After saving the footage we opened it up on to final cut pro so we could decrease the volume gradually in some of the parts so that the dialogue could be heard. During the first and second film I have learnt to keep extra footage at the beginning of each shot. From the first practise to the second film I enjoyed this more because it was our own groups work unlike the other video we had to join other groups, and also me neither Lisa had done any acting before and was very amusing because we kept on laughing as we started to film. I also learnt from this film that every detail needs to be looked at because after we had edited the footage we saw that in the shot when I was coming through the door you could see the sofa where we sat on but you could not see Lisa who was shown already there (shot 4). Another point was that as I came in and sat down I was in one position and then when we had the over the shoulder shot of me looking at Lisa (shot 7 and 8). Also at the end of the shot where Lisa is asking me to come with her to the clinic her hand is place in between her legs then to the next shot it’s on her thigh, next time we do this kind of shot we will make sure the character is in the same position. Finally the college tag disappears suddenly from shot 7 and 8.
I think we did follow the rules which we were told and followed the brief and added some of our own ideas like the close up of the trainers and the clock. I think we followed the conventions of a film which would relate to our small film of a girl being pregnant and used the correct lighting as it is bright. I think also the mise-en-scene of the yellow paper which was meant to be the leaflet on an abortion clinic I think by having that it shows that the girl has knows where she wants to go. However I think we did follow convention relating to settings because as it is set in the college where students are most of the week days and would talk there. I think we did follow convention of a film related to the narrative because our footage keeps the audience attracted because they don’t know what the characters are talking about until Lisa says “can you come to the clinic with me?” I think this keeps audience in suspense because they don’t know if the other character will go with her.