Tag: film

Absentia

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I admit it’s been quite some time from my previous blog post. The hectic lifestyle of juggling Media 4, Media 6, an internship and personal matters have taken a toll on the reflection of my work. Excuses aside, here’s an update on the progress of the Melbourne anthology series, now titled “Absentia”.

Each team member has been allocated an episode (for each character). We have written the opening and climactic scenes of each episode, catering to each character’s individual plights. As our final presentation is in the form of a pre-production pitch, we have no plans of doing formal casting and filming with actors. Instead, we will be drafting a “dream cast” of individuals we see fit the roles in our character episodes.

A point that was raised by Paul in one of our group meetings was the idea of script interpretation. He was curious to see how others would comprehend what he has written and how we would convey them on the screen. Casting each other, we’ve shot some of these to provide ourselves and the audience a visual indication of what is written on paper. Fellow Media student Julian and I have edited some of these scenes and will be uploaded on this blog soon. In the mean time, here are some Adobe Premiere keyboard shortcuts that proved helpful to me during the edits:

CMD+G  – group

CMD+SHIFT+G – ungroup

These are helpful in grouping clips, allowing the user to move multiple clips to a particular direction.

SHIFT+I – go to IN

SHIFT+O – go to OUT

This pair is a shortcut for the user to go directly to marked sections of a preview clip.

CMD+D – apply video transition

CMD+SHIFT+D – apply audio transition

Having selected a transition effect for the sequence, these shortcuts allow immediate edit to selected clip/s.

~ key toggles the full screen of the window that is selected.

Ctrl + ~ keys toggle the full screen of the video playback

HOME key brings progress line to start, END key to last clip (never came across these as I don’t have these keys on my personal computer)

the M key marks key points of an imported clip, making it easier for the editor to sort through the footage. These marked areas can then be labelled separately to the actual clip title.

Presenting the Melbourne anthology

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Last Thursday, PB & J Productions presented the anthology concept to the rest of Writing for Filming, Filming for Writing. The group members had the opportunity to share their characters and episodic plot lines. Here are some of the visuals that inspire Thanassis’ environment in the western suburbs of Melbourne;

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Thanassis’ character is inspired by Manolis from Christos Tsiolkas’ The Slap.

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Key visuals from inner-west Melbourne’s Yarraville

Short documentary The West inspiring the melancholic simplicity of Thanassis’ dramatic episode

IntJobs Week #5

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11882284_729698580468347_8757313360589793632_oIt’s Week 5 and the group’s progress is on par. The multitalented Aki has completed a campaign design, which means that the social media crew can begin pushing out content for students to discover. As seen on the image above, the group has also begun filming the promo video directed by Angus. More information on that soon.

On my end, I’ve spoken with my contact Josh McNicol about potentially speaking for us and he seems keen about the idea. Although he doesn’t have a conventional “international job” I sold the idea to him of working with foreign clientele and assimilating with varied cultures rather than finding jobs abroad. He said he can also recommend someone to me who’s currently working in the Australian Ballet, but has had experience working in China and I think Europe (?)

I’ve also contacted Adam Smith, who is based in Miami as the Executive Director of Social Responsibility and Public Affairs at the Laureate Universities. He’s also a connection of mine, but I was initially apprehensive to approach him as 4 PM Skype/FaceTime session in Melbourne will be 2 AM in Miami for him. But the great thing about him is his story. He didn’t have a traditional education in communications and forged his career by networking and hard work. He’s told me he will check his schedule and get back to me soon, but if he’s unable to do it, he can recommend someone he knows who’s based in Melbourne.

My only concern about these potential speakers, and also something which Vicson has spoken to me about, is their careers’ focus on communications rather than media. According to the Facebook poll we shared on the media pages, there is more interest on media graduates to invest in a career within film and television production, which is nothing to be surprised about given our course. On this case, I must cater for our audience’s interest and continue to look for people with established careers in production overseas.