God damn. So it’s 3 in the morning as I write this and I’ve just returned home from seeing the midnight screening of Captain America: Civil War. To not be a total turd and spoil the movie I won’t be talking about the movie itself, but rather the experience of it.
I absolutely loved tonight. Everything about it just felt magical. The buzz in the air as people queued to buy their food, the electric anticipation of the audience as they restlessly seated themselves, even the cheers from the crowd as the lights began to dim. There was so much love and care on either sides of this project, from the millions who adored the film, to those who spent countless hours to see their dreams come to life. It helped remind me of why I chose this course (not that I needed a reminder). I want to further become involved in projects the likes of this in hope that one day I can enter a cinema and pass by people dressed as their favorite characters, eyes glued to the screen in awe, and see how something I created could make someone happy. To be able to look back and say “Hell yeah I made that.” Without intent to sound like a fanboy here, but its one of the reasons I love the Marvel films – they do have their flaws, yes, but they’re dedicated to their audience. They have fun with their films and in turn so do we.
It makes you appreciate the power and the effect that cinema has over people. It can appall us, excite us, influence, drive us, educate us or entertain us. This stuff is nifty. All hail film!… and sleep. Which I’ll try to get now…. took too long to write thisobvlnc.;s.v……

Holly Karass
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOd3rxlM5Hkc

I rather enjoyed the found footage musical number at the beginning of your interview, to me it really helped set up the light hearted and happy tone of what was to come.  It was well edited which attributed to the clean flow of the film, having seamless transitions between questions.

Sam Harris 

Sam’s video is humble, neat, and very well composed. I like how you matched the found footage to be relevant to what he was saying, showing images from the given era. The interviewee was well chosen and presented a rich story with a nice moral.

Penelope Amanatidis

To put it simply, this video is inspiring; showing how a change of heart and how taking chances can lead to great things. The care, interest and passion for this video really presented itself, from the connection to the interviewee to the quality of care in this construction of the video itself,  to me, increased its worth and meaning ten fold.

Isobell Roberts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vo3sDyLrLQE&feature=youtu.be

It’s always interesting to be presented with a perspective that is seldom seen, and that is exactly what this video does. Speaking for many (not all) students, it’s easy to get caught up in your own world with little thought to similar and yet starkly different lives of your own teachers, so it was nice for this film to explore that.

https://vimeo.com/163537883

Here it is! It took many an hour to upload but it is finally here! I present to you, my PB3!

This project has presented me with a lot of new challenges. Unlike with previous works of mine, both in and out of schooling, I had had near complete control over what was happening before and behind the camera, whereas with this interview, I had found myself without much power. In fact, it wasn’t until I began editing that I realized what little control I had during production. In other works, you have a script, you set times, you have controlled movements, you can give direction to every minute detail as that you know what is to cone as that it’s been planned. With an interview however, it is the interviewee who holds much of the power, ultimately determining the value of the interview, based on what was said, how they said it, and how long it took to say it. Foolishly, I had preconceived answers to my own questions in my head; expecting the answers to be said in a particular way that I could work with effectively. Even after explaining it, I expected short and concise answers, but that was not what I had ended up with. At the time of the interview Jake’s answers had seemed to flow quite well, like a casual and relaxed conversation, though with plenty of energy. It wasn’t until further review of the footage in my editing stage that I found the answers to be rather long and difficult to work with considering I had to cram over two hours of interview footage into just three minutes. Talk about coverage! To make it worse (although ultimately fun to listen to) Jake tended to fuse the answers to other questions together, creating tangents and going on excited rants. As a result, a lot of cutting and difficult rewording was needed during editing to create an almost seamless flow.
A personal problem I’ve always managed to come to during editing for me is managing to cut footage and adhere to a specifically allocated film length. No matter how hard I try, I always end up choosing too much footage and end up blowing the limit by several minutes. As a result I’m forced to compromise several shots, either cutting them down drastically, or cutting them out all together. Only being 3 minutes long, I was rather concerned for this task; worried that if I cut too much then I would miss out on displaying many answers I feel were key to the interview. However, in the end I believe I managed to cut it down to its core, only omitting what was definitely unnecessary. What could have used more work though was working on my sound levels. I found that whilst the quality was great through my headphones, the speakers I owned struggled. Whether it was my mixing or my speakers that was the problem, I’m not quite sure.
Despite these setbacks, hardships and insane amounts of stress levels I faced in its production, making this video was immensely fun and I would gladly do it again. It got me out and about, experience the atmosphere of live band rehearsal, and added to my filming, photography and editing experience. For whatever mistakes were made during this process, I’ll be sure to take them into account and learn from them as to not repeat them. (I’m looking at you, ND filter I had forgotten was on my camera, forcing me to raise my ISO and make the pictures grain city)

Slight goof up here; whilst going through the checklist for Project Brief 3 I had noticed a lack of recordings posted from week 5. Considering I actually want to pass this course and at the very least meat the requirements for each task (of not to excel in them), I thought that I probably should post the recording so that I may complete PB3 and NOT make an idiot of myself.
Here goes!

This always seems to happen to me when editing, I’ll put large amounts of time, hours even, to making the beginning of a video, only to look back and see I but a meager 15 seconds of footage. So I’ll spend some more time on it, sifting through all the footage I have until I find something of worth to place in the video. I’ll go from have 15 seconds, to 16 seconds, then 16 to 20, then 20 to forty, until what seems but a few moments later I suddenly have 27 minutes of REFINED footage to edit!

Anyways, here’s some inspiration.

One statement today in our lecture struck me harder than anything else that was said for the entire day; “look around you, it’s best to make a good impression now because these are likely the people that you will be working with”*. The more I thought about it, the more excited I was and the more daunting it became. For now it’s very easy to have the typical student mentality going on, focusing on whats happening now, planning for the future, but not actually fully thinking as to what that future holds. I gave a cheeky glance around the room and looked into the faces of everyone that I could see. What were these people like? Could I do well by them? Could they do well by me? Will I work with them, or will I never see them again? Will I come to dislike some of them, or will they become my best friends? It’s impossible to tell right now, we’re only a few months into the course and still have years to come, so I can’t say I know the answers to these questions yet. However, what I can say which I know is certain, is that without a doubt, in some way or another, the next three years of my life will heavily involve you all. We will all have our (hopefully minimal) bad moments, but it’s in this time we will also have our greatest; experiences and memories which will come to shape who are, who we become, how others see us, and the rest of our lives.

What is the ‘controlling idea’ of your portrait?

I guess the main idea that I wanted to push in my interview is the old cliche of ‘practice makes perfect’ and that if you work hard enough you can do well. For years my interviewee had striven to become better, trying, failing and succeeding in various projects until he found what he was happy with.

How is your portrait film being constructed?

I wanted my interview to be a hybrid of a video talk and having narration over secondary footage. for the most part I will be focusing on the video of my interviewee himself, as that I can focus on his facial expressions to bring further depth and emotion to what he’s saying, I will also be having intersecting footage of his band playing, and so on.

What do you want your audience to make of your interview? 

I wouldn’t go as far as saying that I want my audience to be inspired, but more present this as an anecdotal ‘how to’ video; showing how practice can turn into progress and give the steps for other budding performers to take a similar path and achieve their goals.

How is your portrait being narrated?

Although I did record myself asking the questions in the interview, beforehand I ask my interviewee to rephrase the question within his answer, that way when editing I would have a bit more leeway in my presentation, being able to choose if I want myself in the interview or not.

What role will found footage play in your portrait?

To be honest, I haven’t quite fully made up my mind regarding found footage. however, if I were to make a decision of what I would want right now I would want it to reflect what is being said within the interview, or to give an example of what’s being said.

Does your interview have a dramatic turning point?

Although it doesn’t have a ‘dramatic turning point’, it does have (or will have) a point in the interview where it switches from being about the interviewee and more about the audience and what advice they’d give based upon the struggles he and his fellow band members have faced in their progress of becoming an actual band.

When does this turning point occur in in your portrait and why?

To reflect a typical story arch of most characters presented in film, being a journey format audiences are accustom to, I’ve decided to place this turning point about 2/3rds – 3/4th of the way through, so that I may begin to ‘wind down’ the interview follow this.

How does your portrait gather and maintain momentum? 

I plan to maintain (and gain) by not relying on one source of video too much, mixing it up a little and discandying between interviewee footage, found footage, and secondary footage of the band together, using my cuts effectively to create a sense of a quicker pace.

Does the portrait have a climax and/or resolution?

It doesn’t quite have a proper climax, but towards the end it does have the reveal of how the band has managed to reach the point they’re currently at, thanks to a culmination of their hard work.

Whilst not within this class itself, I found my recent blog in Cinema Studies to be highly relevant to our current task of PB3. Regarding editing, I thought it would be advantageous to delve deeper into the study of editing as well as the impact it has on film. So to take into account in the editing for my interview, I thought that I’d keep this post in mind and share it with other in hope that it may do the same for them.

Editing is a highly useful tool in the creation of any film; often being the driving force of the films’ sense of pace and timing via the frequency of cuts,creating tone in how it transitions from cut to cut, and heighten impact of certain shots and actions via the timing of the cut. . Why do we cut? Not only for the aforementioned reasons, but to allow various perspectives to take place within the one scene. Cinematography lets us see WHOSE perspective we’re seeing, whereas editing allows us to experience their feelings as well as gain a a sense of their surroundings via what shots are shown in conjunction to that regarding the character/subject at hand, and further develop relationships, such as when an editor or director decides to hold a shot longer between two characters, whether it be a singular shot of them both, or a shot-reverse-shot structure, insinuating a more intense relationship between the two.
In “Enemy Of The State’, director Tony Scott primarily uses discontinuity editing to hasten the pace of the film to create a higher sense of drama. In the beginning of the film during the movies’ first action/chase scene we are presented with various quick cut shots displaying a myriad of perspectives; that of the chasers, the escaping filmmaker, CCTV street cameras, hidden cameras in numerous locations,  aerial shots and even satellite footage. The quicks cuts between these shots not only quickens the pace of the film, but also makes a displays the numerous ‘eyes’ and points of view that may on be one subject at any given time, making a statement against the NSA’s ever growing want for more control and power in civilian surveillance, being the premise of the film.
In conjunction with the timing of shot cuts, displaying what is in the shot,, what order in comes in,and the the severity of action in the in frame can too develop narrative. In his action scenes Scott predominantly focuses having close ups of the character limbs, showing the most significant movement of the body- showing severity of action, whereas in his more calm scenes, he tends to focus on facial expressions, using close ups and ECU’s to further develop inter-character relationships and create empathy with the audience.