At this point our film is completed apart from a few small things which we have to change. Last time we got feedback from our classmates, we had not yet added the voice over so it was hard for them to understand the storyline. We looked at the previous feedback and edited our film accordingly. Even though it is not completely finished, we decided to export our film anyway as a media player file and show our classmates again and see what they thought of the end result. We've asked them to place comments on this post so we can consider their opinions.
( James & Gabi )
27.1.10
Main Task: Voice Over
Today we decided to record the voice over for the section of our film beginning where the characters are speaking on the phone to eachother. When other people from the class watched our film, many of them said that they could not understand the storyline or what was happening in our film. This however, was because when the characters speak to eachother on the phone, they explain what the story is to be about.
Tomorrow we're going to edit the sound over the top of our film beginning to make sure the sound has improved and the plot of the film is easier to understand. With two weeks left until we have to hand in our coursework, we're all confident and happy with the product so far. The next two weeks will be spent editing the sound and fixing up any other errors we can find.
( Gabi )
Main Task: Editing (6)
In the last lessons we had big success in editing our movie and we finished the rough cut now completely. We finished the middle part now as well. We embedded the voice over, the music and the middle part shots. Now our story makes more sense and is understandable.
We could possibly finish our movie after this step, all the titles are there, everything makes sense. But we want to finalize some things. We did the voice over in a room, but two of the actors are outside when they speak. Therefore we want to do the voice over again, but outside. We hope that the voice sounds more realistic after that. We also have to work on some of the volume settings. For example on of the ring tones is much too loud, the viewer nearly gets frightened by it. It should be a nice and quiet sound. And sometimes the music is louder than the voice over. That is not good, we want to have the music loud at the beginning and in the end, but when there is the voice over we want the music to be quieter, so that the viewer sees that the most important thing in that bit is not the music and not the feeling the music gives to the viewer, it is more the message which the actors tell the viewer.
So there is still something to do, but we have done most of the work.
(Simon)
We could possibly finish our movie after this step, all the titles are there, everything makes sense. But we want to finalize some things. We did the voice over in a room, but two of the actors are outside when they speak. Therefore we want to do the voice over again, but outside. We hope that the voice sounds more realistic after that. We also have to work on some of the volume settings. For example on of the ring tones is much too loud, the viewer nearly gets frightened by it. It should be a nice and quiet sound. And sometimes the music is louder than the voice over. That is not good, we want to have the music loud at the beginning and in the end, but when there is the voice over we want the music to be quieter, so that the viewer sees that the most important thing in that bit is not the music and not the feeling the music gives to the viewer, it is more the message which the actors tell the viewer.
So there is still something to do, but we have done most of the work.
(Simon)
Main Task: Dialouge
This is the dialouge for our film opening. We were not entirely happy with the storyline we had so far as it was not very easy to understand once we had edited all our footage and so we decided to use a voice over, so that we could write out a new storyline. We now need to make sure all the sound feels authentic and we need to get the pitch perfect so it can be combined into our film.
(James)
26.1.10
Main Task: Editing (5)
Today we edited the middle part of our footage for our film opening. This is the most important part as it is the part with most of the dialouge. We wanted to add in all the different shots we used to show our knowlege of camera angles and also to make the film look overall more interesting and of a higher quality. When Simon answers his phone we show a panning shot to capture his side of the conversation and there is a long distance shot to give it an edgy feel as if he might be being watched. This feeling is emphazied when you see the barmaid looking over her shoulder trying to catch the conversation. How the characters keep looking over their shoulders is also emphasising this and continuasly gives the viewer a feeling of the genre that we based our opening on.
Today we added an extra sound effect as well. We used a phone and recorded a modern sounding ringtone to use when Vidur is walking down from Duffus and answering his phone.
(James)
Main Task: Feedback (2)
Today we asked other members of our class to watch our main task film so far and give feedback in comments on our blog so that we can work out what needs to be changed.
( Gabi )
( Gabi )
20.1.10
Main Task: Titles (4)
Today I finished the Tites of the movie. At the beginning of the lesson we came together for a brain storming which should be the title of our movie, and we decided that "A Diamond's Glimmer" sounds best. In the opening two minutes the three characters talk about the operation and their plans to flight down to Dubai. This operation is about Diamond's, which is now easier to understand with the title.
At the end of the movie the image will freeze and the opacity will go down to 50%, and then the title will come up which is in the same lay out as the others.
(Simon)
19.1.10
Main Task: Editing (4)
In the today's lesson we didn't do the voice over, what we first had planned to do, because everyone was in the class and we decided that we need more silence for it so we will do it one afternoon. That is why I carried on with editing today. For our aim, to finish the rough cut til the end of january, will we have to work concentrated and hard, because there is quite a bit to do. But it is of course possible, there are just about 35 seconds missing - and the voice over, which we need to cut the sequences into the right order.
That is why I started editing the end of our movie now. I realised that the music is quite good, the viewer gets more into the feeling now. But I hope that the voice over makes the story line easier to understand because that is quite a problem at the moment.
Anyways, at the end the three main characters meet at the front of the bar, stop talking on the phone and walk towards the camera. The image then freezes so that the title can come up. In the screenshot above this picture is shown. The title is not finished, so we can just imagine what that will look like. It will be in the same font and layout as the subtitles with the names before as well.
Before the characters walk towards the camera, the two, who were walking, will be seen in a split screen long shot towards the camera. Before that we will have to introduce the building with an establishing shot to the viewer, because this is not clear enough. The split screen is shown in a screenshot above as well.
(Simon)
That is why I started editing the end of our movie now. I realised that the music is quite good, the viewer gets more into the feeling now. But I hope that the voice over makes the story line easier to understand because that is quite a problem at the moment.
Anyways, at the end the three main characters meet at the front of the bar, stop talking on the phone and walk towards the camera. The image then freezes so that the title can come up. In the screenshot above this picture is shown. The title is not finished, so we can just imagine what that will look like. It will be in the same font and layout as the subtitles with the names before as well.
Before the characters walk towards the camera, the two, who were walking, will be seen in a split screen long shot towards the camera. Before that we will have to introduce the building with an establishing shot to the viewer, because this is not clear enough. The split screen is shown in a screenshot above as well.(Simon)
14.1.10
Main Task: Music (2)
We think the sound has an essential role in a movie. If there is not much talking, the music has to introduce immediately to the viewer. If the sound is not synchronized or if the sound effects doesn't make sense, the whole movie gets unrealistic with one sequence of sound.
For our music we chose a song/playback from which we think it fits in our genre and represents mood, situation and feelings of the actors. It is called "Three Hits". It is very difficult to find something which represents exactly this as free music, so we decided to work a bit on it. At the beginning we tried to make it a bit better with Apple's Garage Band, but we didn't really got there so we had the idea to ask a friend in school who is more confident and experienced in this topic, Nikolai von Tempel. The today's version probably won't be the final version, after finishing the rough cut, when we have an exact idea what will be when, we will give the music again to him to not just make it louder or quieter when there are people talking, we are also try to build this into the music as well. As an example: How many instruments are there, how high is the pattern they are playing, etc.
I added two sound effects to our movie as well. For the company logos in the beginning we need some sound to make them more attractive for the viewer. For the title of the "United Movies Publishing" we took a quiet synthesizer sound, for the "Art Productions", our company, we intend to use an small explosion. This is not gonna fit with the dissolve we use to introduce the viewer to it, but also shows that that logo is "more important".
We didn't found a good ring for the phones yet. It is really difficult to find the right ringing, because we don't want to have an old fashioned ring, but it shouldn't be too spaced up as well, the viewer has to be able to identify it immediately as a phone.
All in all the sounds work quite well, but we really have to try to finish the rough cut til the end of January, which is two weeks to go. We will also try to do the voice over next lesson, so we can work better with the sequences.
(Simon)
For our music we chose a song/playback from which we think it fits in our genre and represents mood, situation and feelings of the actors. It is called "Three Hits". It is very difficult to find something which represents exactly this as free music, so we decided to work a bit on it. At the beginning we tried to make it a bit better with Apple's Garage Band, but we didn't really got there so we had the idea to ask a friend in school who is more confident and experienced in this topic, Nikolai von Tempel. The today's version probably won't be the final version, after finishing the rough cut, when we have an exact idea what will be when, we will give the music again to him to not just make it louder or quieter when there are people talking, we are also try to build this into the music as well. As an example: How many instruments are there, how high is the pattern they are playing, etc.
I added two sound effects to our movie as well. For the company logos in the beginning we need some sound to make them more attractive for the viewer. For the title of the "United Movies Publishing" we took a quiet synthesizer sound, for the "Art Productions", our company, we intend to use an small explosion. This is not gonna fit with the dissolve we use to introduce the viewer to it, but also shows that that logo is "more important".
We didn't found a good ring for the phones yet. It is really difficult to find the right ringing, because we don't want to have an old fashioned ring, but it shouldn't be too spaced up as well, the viewer has to be able to identify it immediately as a phone.
All in all the sounds work quite well, but we really have to try to finish the rough cut til the end of January, which is two weeks to go. We will also try to do the voice over next lesson, so we can work better with the sequences.
(Simon)
Main Task: Feedback Classmates (1)
Today we showed our film to the other people in our class to get feedback on what we have done so far so we can improve our film to make it as good as possible.
Everyone thought that the opening title went on for too long so we need to shorten it and fade it into the next title.
We have just added sound and they said that this worked well with the genre of our film and made it obvious what it was about. Our teacher listened to it and immediately associated the music with the television show 'Hustle' which is of the same genre as we intend our film to be.
They also thought that the camera work was good with a wide range of different shots.
(James)
Everyone thought that the opening title went on for too long so we need to shorten it and fade it into the next title.
We have just added sound and they said that this worked well with the genre of our film and made it obvious what it was about. Our teacher listened to it and immediately associated the music with the television show 'Hustle' which is of the same genre as we intend our film to be.
They also thought that the camera work was good with a wide range of different shots.
(James)
Main Task: Feedback Teacher (1)
Today our teacher, Mrs Downes watched what we had achieved last term on our main task and gave us feedback. She said that the company logos and the graphics we used were nice as well as the opening of our film. She also said it was quite hard to understand the story at the moment because we haven't included the sounds, narrative voiceover or captions to explain the story. She also pointed out:
- 00:29:03 - there is a very "hissy" sound
- 00:44:02 - "drags" a bit
She also asked:
- Who is good?
- Who is bad?
- How do I know?
- Why should I care?
We intend to address all of these things over the next few weeks during the production of our film beginning.
( Gabi )
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