Digital Film Year 2 Part 2 - Evaluation

I am very disapointed with the final outcome of my individual project film and believe I have not acheived the results I have hoped for a vary of different reasons and problem which I had occured during the project which were out of my control. I believe I had a good idea and style which I wasnted to head in the direction with and used a good selection of reasearch in which to gain my influences. However during this project I had learned alot from the negative experiences such as in future to plan ahead in more time and to include backup plans incase of happening which are out of your control and to definatly be more organised. However I believe I improved my knowledge of shooting films for example about camera settings and how to get the best out of the equipment, I learned alot more about lighting and where to place to reduce the amount of shadows. Whilst I realise that this area is not my strongest nor aspect im that interested in there is certain areas I did enjoy and believe im in a better position now for any future project involving the filming and lighting side. I also got more used with using software such as after effects and final cut which I find to be more around my area and the aspect I enjoy most especially after effects as I love the effect side of the project and is an area I would like to learn more about, and unfortunally the effects I had planned for my film I couldnt acheive for a vary of reasons.

What I did like about my film was the original concept and we did get some nice shots by got using the First person shot,and I did like some of the stuttery effect and it did look good certain aspects in black and white adding to the kind of dream like effect. I really liked the shot which is not in first person of the sin city three colour effect we got, which looked very effective and stood out well and I can take forward on and evelop on for future projects or for when I decide on refilming which is something I plan on doing as I kept the same shots I would have done however I didnt include the shots I could'nt do due to varid reasons.

Unfortunatly I had to cut out some of the shots and effects I wanted to include in the film for a variety of reasons. Firstly the amount of snow and ice which we had made my project morealess impossible to film for around 1 and half week as the area I was hoping to film had become very dangerous, and even if it was potentially possible to film in this location there was no way I was going to risk damaging a camera, so this left me with about a week left to finish my film where I hoped to be in the later stages of editing by this time, so it was obvious from this point there was going to be alot of shots and effects I was going to leave out or it wouldnt be completed in time. Secondly One of my concepts in the film was going to include a woman in which he kept on seeing when he was dreaming, however the actress I had planned on using was only really available for the week in which we had the heavy snow, as she had other stuff planned after. I also found it hard to get someone else at last minuite obviuosly with it been the time of year were deadlines are fast aproaching.Finally during filming there were shots I wanted to include such as around the broadcasting tower as I had planned on using the building as a silhouette during the film, however this was just not doable for the amount of people that were around the area and would look to contrasting compared to the other shots. Ilearned that the best time for filming this shot would have been possibly a sunday however could imagine would still be a challenge, or very earling summer morning however for obvious reasons that was not aproachable. However I do plan to refilm and include all the shots and effects I had orinally planned and these are shall keep in mind those two times and day for future filming.

If I was doing this project again there are many things I would aproach in a different way, Firstly I made the mistake of not experimenting by recording test footage which I should have done as It would have given me a better idea of how to to shoot and could have given me a potentially better way of filming the shots. And I could have got some footage for experimenting with on after effects which would have left me in a much better position. I also learned that as soon as you ready to shoot then get it done as soon as possible, which I left a week to concentrate on a crit for another project which turned out to be a bad mistake due to the terrible weather, so better management of time and been able to manage 2 ongoing projects at the same time. I would have taken lights out with me, especially for the shots inide as the lighting is terrible and that would have improved vastly. And inside the subway as I was hoping to create a sin city effect here similar to the follow shot, however was near impossible as the the t-shirt came out in near black during the footage and would have been time consuming and time is what I didnt have. I would have included more footage as some of the edits are terrible and the jumping from location to location as we didnt have enougth for a continuous walk cycle. I should have taken more people out on location with me for example someone for when the path was clear or to potentially warn the public that we are filming would have been ideal as that was the biggest problem trying to find free spaces with no one around especially at around 11 am at a busy area of leeds which turned out to be the most frustrating aspect of filming, It would have been easier if I had more time as there wouldnt of been such a rush.

For this project I worked mainly with Dan however others offered input and gave valid feedback in which I took on board, they offered feedback such as videos to look at for example the doom video which I would never of thought off, and gave my effects advise for example how to overcome a problem and gave me help with masking which I was very grateful for even though I didn't use any on the video it was nice to learn how to perform this if the outcome came. Danny was great help with the filming and came up with his own ideas and was his idea to do a few shots that were not in first person which is where i got the idea for the sin city effect shot which worked well and got some good shots. He also helped a little with the editing but I had to complete most of it due to him having to complete another project which I was fine with though could have used a helping hand cause editing is not my strongest point though I do enjoy it though can be frustrating getting everything to match up with the music which hopefully mine is successful too as that is a main criteria of the brief.

I worked on a few other projects which was part of the brief to work on at least 3. Firstly I helped out with Chris a little, nothing major at all but just did a few little jobs around for example help out with the green screen as they were too many shadows occurring so just had to held it in place. Also held on to some equipment while others were busy and just helped about. From what I saw Chris had a great team that were very organised and all stuck to their rolls well and got his filming done very efficiently and from the footage I saw it looked very good and from looking at the final version its really good. Secondly I worked on John and Matts project, I was really impressed by what they was doing and its something I would never have thought of, and could tell they went into great technical detail, what I did on this project was help out driving the kinect up and down while Matt took the photos and then we swapped jobs and I took some of the photos. Finally I helped with Robbie project do a little behind the scenes footage and helped out by been tested on filming and did a little with the lighting and helped a little with filming.

Overall im not sure really how to conclude this topic, Im not happy with my final video though some of it was me to blame and some of it was out of my reach though I can learn from my mistakes. I really enjoyed coming up with the ideas and playing around on After effects, which is something I can gain from the project as a possible direction into developing my understanding and skills in this field. However I do look forward to re filming when ever I plan on doing so whether be summer or after christmas and hopefully the film will be improved and something I can be proud of for my showreel.