Evaluation - Question 6

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

A list of the equipmeant we used during the production process:

Hardware:

-Sony Camera and mini DV tape (with tripod)

-Microphone and Headphones

-Dell computer

-Mac computer

Software:

-Adobe Premiere Pro cs3

-Adobe Sound Booth cs3

-Live Titles

Me Filming

Throughout the project I have developed my skills in editing and filming a huge amount. With the camera I have learnt the in and outs of the different manual settings, and have become better at deciding the best way to shoot a shot. This was particularly relevant, as we didn’t realise how easy it was to accidentally change the colour grading settings on the camera.  On one of our shoots we did just that, making half of our footage a strange washed out colour, rendering it useless.

I have become a lot more confident with using various softwares on the computer to edit our film. We used adobe premiere pro to do most of the editting of our film, and throughout the project I have progressively become better at editting accurately and quickly. I also learnt some tricks and techniques needed to create a certain feel within a shot. For example we brought up the contrast and darkened most of our shots to create a gloomy atmosphere within the forest.

Changing the contrast on Adobe Premiere Pro

We used Live Titles on the mac to create our titles and animate them. We only wanted a simple animation on our titles, as they weren't meant to be very distracting or noticeable, (apart from the last one which needed impact.) However looking through all the fonts and animations on the mac was interesting as this was a new programme for me, and will be usefull for future preferance.

Creating titles on Live Titles

Probably the most important thing I learnt from the process is the importance of lighting. Lighting can completely change the way a shot feels, and changes the way an audience reads into the story. For example, when we filmed our footage it was in broad daylight and sometimes quite sunny, this gave an optimistic feel which we didn’t want. This was fixable by changing the colour grading in editing, however it’s easier and quicker to get it right then first time. If I were to advise someone else who was doing the same project, I would say to avoid an outdoor night shoot at all costs. As we learnt very early on, it is a nightmare to light, and most professionals would shoot it in a heavily lit studio.

As you can see in this shot, we have beams of light coming through the trees. Obviouslty this made the shot alot brighter than the other shots, so we had to change the contrast and brightness more so in order to keep the sequence continuous.