Tag Archives: Real2Reel

For this part of the assignment, I have chosen to compare a rough and finished version of the Billie Buttons sequence.

The reason I chose this segment of Georgie Currie, was because it features chopped up and rearranged audio. The aim of each piece is the same, to elaborate on the importance of flowers (specifically billie buttons) throughout the album artwork, and also on the thematic element of flowers through the whole EP (titled flowers for you worst days).

The original clip felt somewhat disjointed, Georgie stammered a lot throughout the explanation, and we felt this would cause the audience to lose attention somewhat. Eliminating some of those pauses and stammers cleaned up the sequence quite well, but it still wasn’t quite working for us. Taking it to Rohan, he suggested rearranging the order of what she says and moving the B-roll around a bit to cover the new audio cuts. Moving the word “Billie Buttons” and the image of the flowers in the vase to the very front of the sequence completed changed the feel. Instead of feeling a bit slow and dry, the audience immediately knew exactly what the flower was, and what it looked like at the top of this small segment.

We also moved the location of this part of the interview to right before the florist footage. I think this formed a very clear throughline from the first half of the interview into the interlude. Having Georgie talk about the flower, and why flowers were important to her lead into the visuals of her playing in a florist in front of a wall of flowers really well, and the thematic coherence added a lot to the piece.

Finally, this rearranging is somewhat reminiscent, in a more broad sense, of the entire piece. The original ordering and focus of the first cut just didn’t work. It didn’t have that sense of coherent, concise flow that is required to make a successful film. Chopping the irrelevant small details, putting the important lines/shots right at the front and giving it a proper sense of order really brought both this sequence, and the entire film together.

What was your goal in week 1? Did you achieve it?

The goal that I outlined in week 1 of this course was; to come out the other side of the semester with a piece of media that I was happy to put in my portfolio and share with the world as a reflection of my film-making ability.
I think, insofar as achieving that, this studio has been a resounding success. I am incredibly happy with the end product of Georgie Currie. It is a piece that I am both proud to have made, and will be proud to share.

What Challenges did you face in this course?

I think the biggest challenge I face in Real to Reel was that of delving into a type of media/content creation that I wasn’t familiar with. I’d never done anything corporate or advertisement related, and I’d never produced anything that had a purpose other than itself being a work of art (in this case, showcasing the talents of Georgie and introducing her as a person to the world).
However, this course happened to coincide with a 3 month internship I acquired at a marketing firm in the film department, mainly editing commercials for the internet and television. These two experiences occurring alongside each other really helped my editing skills on this kind of media.

What did you learn along the way?

I think most importantly to my own personal future career, I learned a lot about collaborative film-making. This was the first film, short or otherwise, that I had produced/edited/filmed etc with someone else. It was a great experience in juggling my own personal vision for something that was, in some ways, my own passion project, with the ideas and creative visions of another person. I think it was beneficial not just to the work, but also to myself as a filmmaker, because it’s just not feasible to be successful in this industry, and not be a strong collaborator.

What was your intention with this work? Did you achieve it?

The original intention of this short film was to create a spotlight piece on young, Melbourne based, singer/songwriter Georgie Currie, and to promote the release of her new solo Extended Play (EP). The stakes of the piece were to outline that Georgie was going to return to university if, after a few years of full time music production, her career hadn’t picked up. Through the pre-production phase this held pretty much the same, however after the first rough cut of our footage, we felt that the stakes did the opposite of what was intended. Rather than draw the reader in, they took the audience out and made her career seem somewhat trivial. We also found that a part of the interview where she expanded on the struggles and experiences of being a young female musician, came to the forefront as something we needed to make central to the piece.

So the film kept its original intention as a spotlight on Georgie and her album for the first first half of the interview (which is all about her album and musical style), the second half of the piece focused on navigating the musical industry as a young woman. All in all, I think it achieved what we were aiming for when setting out to create this media, especially in terms of functionality for Georgie, as she used some of the footage on her social media platforms to promote her tour and her EP launch show in Melbourne.

What aspect are you proud of? What can you improve upon?

I think the centre point of the piece is what I’m most proud of. The images of Georgie with flowers in her hair, playing in front of a wall of more beautiful yet fleeting flowers inside a florist, while her interview audio over the top describes her fears that age is incredibly important for female artists, and that every year she gets older that she fears people will care less and less about what she has to say (something that is particularly true of women artists) creates a poignancy that I found really striking.

In terms of what I could improve on, audio engineering is definitely up there. I’m just not well versed in creating a sound space around the interviewer. I took some recordings of sounds to layer the piece with, but I think a much more planned and deliberate approach would have been better. A nuanced yet more diverse sound sphere around Georgie would have really elevated the piece in my opinion.

Did you have any issues in the making of your work? If so, how did you overcome them?

The only issue I can think of occurred in the editing phase. It would have been beneficial if I made myself more available to meet up and edit the piece as a pair, rather than doing a lot of editing solo at home and bringing it to class/to our occasional meetups. Obviously, it’s impossible to do everything together in class and so there will always be some measure of balancing what you do as a group physically and how you can edit by yourself. Perhaps we could have skype called while editing to include Jana a bit more in what I was editing at home. However we were constantly communicating on facebook, so that made things easier.

One way we overcame the difficulty of not being in the same room when editing as much as we would have liked to, was outlining what we need for the next week/session. Whenever we met up, we left with very clear, specific goals of what each of us wanted to get done before our next meet up, which in my opinion made for a very efficient editing process.

What makes a good collaborator?
I think being open to new ideas is an incredibly important facet of collaboration. It’s very well to have your goal and a picture of the piece of media you want to create, however very rarely can you bring that exact idea to life to-the-letter from the pre-production phase. There are always things that come up or interesting new ideas to incorporate and one should always be open to hearing how they can change/adapt the piece to improve it.

Another important element is gratitude. If your aim is a successful collaboration (and thereby creating a successful film) it is incredibly important to make sure your collaborator(s) feel like their input is both important, and received well. If you continue to disregard someone’s input, they will stop giving it. Fostering that open floor in a group is always essential to getting the most out of the collaboration.

Georgie Currie’s breakup with her boyfriend may have caused many tears and sleepless nights, but it was not without some avail. Inspired by this difficult emotional experience, the release of Daytime T.V. in 2018 (Currie’s first and very personal, emotional single) came at a pivotal time of her career. Now in 2019, with the launch of her new solo E.P flowers for your worst days, Currie is fully committing to her music. The next couple of years will be a trial by fire as she attempts to break into the music industry, while battling the many challenges she must face and overcome as a female artist. GEORGIE CURRIE is a 6 minute spotlight on an emerging singer and songwriter pursuing her musical dream.

Production Roles
Jana Politis – Camera Operating, Directing, Editing
Jack Fahey – Editing, Directing, Interviewing