7) Looking Back At Your Preliminary Task, What Do You Feel You Have Learnt In The Progression From It To The Full Product?

The preliminary task was a really useful way of understanding what our strengths and weaknesses were in terms of planning, shooting and editing a film sequence. Although my prelim sequence was entirely different to my opening film sequence, the skills I learnt were transferable though and I then applied the knowledge and techniques that I gained from the preliminary task to my film opening.

This is the video of my preliminary  task sequence. 

PRE-PRODUCTION - Planning:

Working on the preliminary task made me realise how important pre-production planning really is when it comes to filming a film sequence. In planning the film opening we were much more careful and looked at each aspect of the film opening in detail, taking into account different issues that we might have faced when filming. During the process of making the prelim, we realised how important it was to get continuity precise, otherwise the mistake would be very obvious in the shot. To avoid this issue in filming the opening, we took more time when making our shoot board.

In order to ensure that we had thought of absolutely every aspect of the film opening when planning, we had to give a pitch about many different aspects of our film ideas and plans. This meant that we had to create a script to make our pitch flow nicely and rehearse it to sound more confident and convincing. We also made pitch handouts to give to the class. 

The two pictures to above are sides of the first double-sided pitch handout we made; and the two pictures below are sides of the second double-sided pitch handout we created.

We also used a large A1 sized piece of sugar paper to make a detailed shot board of each individual shot that we wanted to use in the film opening, we drew an image of how we wanted each shot to look onto a post-it note and stuck them to the sheet, making the easy to move about and adjust to how we wanted it to look.

In pre-production we also had to choose our all important location for the shoot. As a group we decided that we wanted to use an outdoor location as it suited the needs of our scene better than an indoor location would. We wanted a large outdoor space that we could use for a chase scene with little disturbances from members of the public and outside noise from traffic. Although we managed to find a location that fitted our needs perfectly - Epping Forest - we also came across lots of inconveniences, such as the very thick, and almost treacherous mud we had to get through to get to our prime location on the top of a (very large) hill; due to awful weather conditions on our practice, and first shoot.

PRODUCTION:

In the production phase of the preliminary task I learnt how to create a continuity sequence which was vital to learn for when it came to filming match-on-action shots in the film opening.

The gif below is an example of match-on action in the preliminary task.

The gif below highlights how I used the skills I had practiced in the preliminary task on filming match-on-action in the film opening of Quantum. This shot was particularly difficult to shoot in one shot as we wanted to include different angles and distances, to do this we had to use different shots and put them together, making sure that the positions of the actors remained the same for each shot.



Below, are too gifs both showing examples of match-on-action. The first is from my preliminary task and the second is taken from the final edit of our film opening of Quantum.

It was important to get the match-on-action in this scene correct otherwise it could have ruined the shot, and the Henchman's step back in reaction the punch was vital to making the punch look as realistic as possible.

Another important thing we learnt from the test shoot was to take shots from more than one angle and distance; we decided to do this as it becomes useful when editing, as it gives us a larger choice of shots - if we think that that one angle didn't look how we wanted it to, we could always change it and choose another to be used.This was particularly helpful when it came to filming the chase scenes, as it made the pace of the scene much quicker, making the characters appear that they were running faster than they actually were at the time. This adds to the thrill of the opening sequence.

We also chose to explore different angles to use when filming to make the scene even more interesting and engaging to watch. We were able to do this because the camera was relatively small and lightweight, making it easily portable, as well as being extremely careful with the camera of course.

POST-PRODUCTION

Prepare to compromise with shots - once we had arrived at our shooting location, we realised that some of the shots we had planned wouldn't work out in the way that we had wanted them to. So we had to cut some of the shots that we planned to film in order to get a completed final product.This applied in editing as well as filming, sometimes we had to delete shots that we liked because they didn't fit in with the scene.

We also had to learn the hard way that sometimes computers crash, and if the work isn't saved then that work will be lost. Although the crash wasn't our fault, we ended up losing a shot that we had spent countless of hours on, taking an entire week to edit together. This shot didn't make it into the final film as we didn't have enough time to go through the editing process once more.

In our group we delegated tasks and roles for each person to do every week throughout the entire process, from planning to post-production. It was integral that we each did our individual work to help make the task work. It was important that the work load was spread evenly amongst the group and we all worked hard, putting in many hours over the week, at home, during lunches, and most of our free periods working on the film. We worked well as a group, using social media, and time in school to communicate and work on a product that in the end we were all happy with and proud of.

IN HINDSIGHT

In hindsight, I would have perhaps chosen a genre like romantic-comedy, as it would allow us to shoot in an indoor location so we could control the climate, weather and the lighting on our shoot. Shooting outdoors caused many problems for us as a group but I am glad that we shot outdoors as the film looked great, and I think that it was worth all of the trouble.

I would have tried to have been more careful when we were filming to ensure that the actors didn't move and that the camera didn't move either, we needed framing to be precise for certain shots; in post-production our jobs were made increasingly difficult in editing some of the shots, which we spent hours labouring over, some of which didn't make it into the final cut.

Overall,I think my personal learning curve on this project was huge as I have learnt and discovered so much as a film maker; from planning to production to editing the final cut. I enjoyed making this film and I can honestly say that I have taken so much away from this whole process. All of the hard work had definitely paid off in the end and I'm honestly proud of the work that we produced as a group, and my own personal contributions.