Descriptive & Analytical Writing

Posted on April 16, 2021 by jenna

Descriptive & Analytical Writing

Movie Clip:

This scene is from a musical romantic comedy-drama film “La La Land”, written and directed by Damien Chazelle and released in the United States on December 9, 2016. It tells a love story of Mia and Seb who meet and fall in love while they pursuing their dreams in Los Angeles. I chose this film is because I really enjoy watching it. Apart from the storyline, the visuals are the stunning point of the film, lots of camera ‘coverage’ are designed elaborately for visual interests and storytelling. The more as I learn, the more I feel complex of the shots in this film. Thus, I think it’s a film worth to unpack.

The “Someone in the Crowd” scene is start from a one minute master shot, in a medium long shot, with a handheld camera following the actors shuttling around the room, showing a fascinating musical performance of Mia’s friends persuading her to attend the party. As the camera goes around the room, it established the environment of the room. This master shot can be considered as an economic shot because there is only one continuity shot need to be taken, however, it require a significant amounts of rehearsing and advance preparation. The performance, position, actions of actors and the camera coverage are all choreographed designed perfectly match with the music. For example, in 0:31, three girls runs out to the corridor and the camera follows the green dressed girl through two different colors of rooms in a close up shot. As the girl disappear behind the camera, it continues move forward, we see Mia and the red dressed girl appear in the end of the room. Then, the camera follows Mia through the arch and continue moves back with the movement of Mia, other three girls come back on the screen in different timing and performance. Their performance matches perfectly with the lyrics as well. This scene skillfully uses the three-dimensional space of the room, smooth camera movement and wonderful performance of singing and dancing, really mobilizing the mood of the audience, gives the audience more immerse cinematic experience.

In 2:35, in a medium close up shot, with a horizontal pan, we follows Mia to the mirror. As Mia stares at the mirror and starts singing, the red bathroom lamps replaced by spotlights, this design of lighting allows the audiences goes into Mia’s inner world, Mia’s singing lyrics represent her inner thought as well. Further, when Mia looks direct at the mirror, camera zooms to a medium shot, which makes it seems like Mia is talking direct to the audience which break the forth wall and create a further emotional connection.

In 3:33, in a slow motion and a wide angle lenses, camera follows Mia enters the party, the slow motion of visuals and music represent the sad mood of Mia’s inner world. Suddenly, the camera changes its position to shot from Mia’s back, this requires a restart performance of the actors and breaks the 180 degree rule, however, keep the continuity. The color of lighting turning from red to blue, with the snowing falling in the image, it engages the audiences with this visual spectacle. As the music and dance turns quicker and quicker, Mia walks out of the screen and the camera continue moves forward pans up and captures the character jumping into the swimming pool. It is said that the continuity shot of following the character jump into the pool is actually shot by two different camera and the editor cut them together afterwards. Another camera positions under the water and rotate horizontally, in a wide angle lenses, showing the attractive performance of people dancing around the pool. Match with the rhythm of the music, the camera rotate quicker and quicker and the camera moves up shows the blooming fireworks, the atmosphere reaches the peak as the music ends. The amazed part of the scene is that the lighting and camera coverage helps to deliver characters’ feeling to the audience, with match the music perfectly, it also offers a strong audio-visual experience at the same time.

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 6

Posted on April 16, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 6

In this week’s class, I further learned how to transfer the script to a movie. In the group discussion, I discovered that everyone has a different interpretations of scripts and there are lots of things need to consider, like the camera position, the image size, how the characters enters the frame, is tracking shot needed and so on. During the discussion, we put forward different suggestions and finally chose the best expressed way.

For the exercise 3, I did a floor plan before shooting therefore this time I took less time to complete the shooting. As Robin mentioned in the class, the jump cuts appears in the video. That’s a problem I didn’t think of. While shooting, I was just thinking to get another close up shot to show the details and my origin purpose is to shot with another angle. Therefore, l learned that if I want show shot in another angle, it need to be larger than 30 degree.

From the reading of “Big Picture”, I learned that the master shot is a long shot that captures all or most of the action in a scene. It is an economic shot because it can not only save time and money but also eliminates the need of coverage and matching. Furthermore, because the master shot allows the actors to perform in a more natural way, it gives the audience more immerse cinematic experience compare to those “cut together” scene. Another difference is that the master shot only have one way to edit but the “cut together” scene could be edited in different way by the editor which might different with what the director want to express. I think it’s quiet interesting that it seems to be a financial choice but offers more “beauty, elegance and creative freedom.” I think master shot is more of a design for particular purpose rather than a commercial choice. For instance, in the beginning scene of “La La Land”, the master shot of people dancing and singing on the road is been used to immerse the audience into the world in the film, sharing the emotion.

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 5

Posted on April 16, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 5

in this week’s class, I understand different language may course different effect, not only to our understanding but also to the performance of the activity itself. For instance, we use the word “coverage” as the process of filmmaking. In French, this process is called “decoupage”, literally means “to cut up” and the editing process is called montage, literally means “joining or sticking together.” This different meaning results to different approaches for filmmaking process. The difference is decoupage implies a premeditation, or pre-visualisation but the editing is a solution. In France, filmmakers tend to plan everything while shooting and when they go to the editing room, they can just connect every scene together to finish the editing. However, in other countries, filmmakers shooting in different image size and camera angles until they make sure they coverage everything they need and when they come to the editing room, the final film is not sure, they may have different editing version. This different approach is because of the language. In other side, this language difference offers a wider perspective to filmmakers in other countries. In China, the word for editing is “剪辑”, literally means editing and rearrangement and the editing process is called “蒙太奇”, it’s just the translate of word montage. I think these words came from abroad to China, and then filmmakers used them all the time.

From the reading, I learned that continuity is very important in the film. When we shot we need to make sure the eye line and camera direction seems normal when they cut together. Further, a lot of details need to notice while shooting like the hairstyle, the making up, the blood on the shirt, the water marks on the ground, all these details need to handled properly, otherwise, it will break the continuity of scenes. The 180 degree rule is a cinematography guideline that help to create a normal conversation and to avoid unintended confusion amongst the audience. However, rules are design to break. We can break it to challenge conventions, to identify a change in the story and to achieve visual variety. For example, in Paper Moon, filmmaker cut across the line when Ryan reaches across the table, shot the conversation outside of the restaurant. In this way, the filmmaker changes the tone and power relationship. The boy became the one who has power, we can see that from he yelling to the man ” I want my two hundred dollar!” In addition, I’ve seen some mixed cuts recently, editing characters from different movies together in this new clip, but I didn’t feel any discomfort. That’s because the editing follows the 180 degree rule, two actors’ eye line matches perfectly that the audience will assume they are look at each other. In this way, editing can become more creative!

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 4

Posted on March 31, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 4

In this week’s class, we analysis the camera coverage of 6 clips and explore the different ways of making scene interesting. The camera movement design offers interesting to it. In ‘High Low’, the camera coverage is very abundant. There is camera in front and back of the character and detail shots are offered as well. In ‘Night Train’, the use of camera is smart. When girl wipes her eyes, the director let she performance in front of the lens, thus the audience assume she is in front of a mirror, and therefore increase the interest of the scene. Further, the performance of actors are important as well. An attractive performance can really engage the audience and make the scene more interesting.

Furthermore, I also learned that each country has different cultural and aesthetic, therefore different styles of posters are needed to attract the local audience in different countries. For instance, below are the two posters of “Jurassic World” in China and America. The American poster shows the breathtaking size of the park’s newest creature, Mosasaurus and attract the audience with direct visual horror. However, the China poster shows the escaping moment of Chris Pratt, with the most feared dinosaur breaks free and following behind, it’s more storytelling. It might because Chinese cares more about the fascinating plot and sense of substitution and the American cares more about the horror itself.

On Thursday, we discusses the exercise 2. This is my first time to actually film the script and I think I need to improve on the lack of preparation. I just image the camera coverage of the scene in my mind, however, when I’m actually filming, different thoughts just comes to my mind, which makes my work disorder. Thus, to improve, next time I will draw a diagram, floor plan and lists all the scenes I need before shooting. Another problem that Robin mentioned in class, the establishing shot appears twice and the Rachel entry scene appears 4 times. During editing I just put different shot I got together didn’t notice this problem. I like Yuhan Jin’s work very much. I like the old film style, the color and the actors, they are very attractive and real. Although, they are speaking Chinese with english subtitle, there is no big influences. Further, the image proportion, the detail shot and the connection between shots are just perfect! All in all, everyone did a good job!

Thank you very much!

Assignment 1

Posted on March 19, 2021 by jenna

Assignment 1

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 1

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/jenna/2021/03/14/the-scene-in-cinema-2021-reflective-writing-1/

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 2

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/jenna/2021/03/14/a1-the-scene-in-cinema-2021-reflective-writing-2/

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 3

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/jenna/2021/03/19/the-scene-in-cinema-2021-reflective-writing-3/

Descriptive & Analytical Writing

http://www.mediafactory.org.au/jenna/2021/03/19/descriptive-analytical-writing/

Thank you very much!

Descriptive & Analytical Writing

Posted on March 19, 2021 by jenna

In the Mood for Love

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09sYnsT2ENU&t=169s

The scene I choose is from a classical Asian Film called In the Mood for Love, the film tell a story about a women(Mrs Chang) and a man(Mr Chow) whose spouses have an affair together and who slowly develop feelings for each other. I choose this film is because it’s played by very famous actors in China, and I choose this scene because although it is a common restaurant scene, the special camera coverage build the secret atmosphere to the audience.

The director Wong Kar-wai utilize camera movement, the position of the camera and the size of image shows the secret conversation between two protagonists and the inner reflection of Mr Chow. Wong choose to use out focus shot as the beginning and end image of the scene, I think the indistinct image allows the audience to have more space to image and think. There are totally three camera position in the scene, one is at the very back of the restaurant and the other two are facing towards main characters. For the establishing shot, Wong adopts wide angle lens to show the whole environment of restaurant, further, he creates the secret and private atmosphere by positioning the camera behind the chair, with the frame shows almost 1/3 the back of chair and the characters that hiding inside the chairs.

The conversation between two protagonists is showed by cutting two protagonists’ close up shot together, which is a traditional way. At this time, Wong uses a narrow angle lenses showing detail facial expression of two protagonists, which allows the audience to focus on their conversation with no disturb. However, what different is that Wong adopts a lot panning of camera in the scene. The detail shots of the hands, cigarette and gesture of drinking tea gently is done by panning the camera slowly, which not only shows the gestures of character more naturally but also saves time and machine.

When Mrs Chang asking questions to Mr Chow, instead of cutting the frame back to Mr Chow, Wong chose to pan camera quickly, which enhance the pace of communicate and create anxiety atmosphere to the audience. Moreover, when Mrs Chang asking “what are you getting at?”, Wong makes the camera panning quickly from Mr Chow’s back to inside, which further emphasis this big moment in Chow’s head, this is when he confirm the affair of his wife. I think Wong’s choice of panning shots really makes the conversation far more interesting, it enhance the tension atmosphere and indicate important moment. The far away position of camera in establishing shot and the pan movement of detail shots has been used to disrupt the audience’s attention from the conversation, both way indicates the distance and politeness of the conversation in the scene.

In total, I think different camera coverage helps the director to create different atmosphere and effect he wants. Every coverage is done meaningfully.

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 3

Posted on March 19, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 3

In Monday’s class, we saw two video clips and discussed how similar situations can coverage differently by different director. Both clips shows a two people conversation at the bar. However, in the gossip girl, the director simply use 4 shots, medium close up shot, close up shot and their reverse shots, through cutting back and forth to show the conversation to the audience, which consist to very traditional way of showing dialogue. The camera position follows the 180 degree rules. The 180 degree rules in the film is basically position the camera on one side of the audiences, in this way, you will get the characters facing each other consist the dialogue scene, otherwise, the characters will look like talking to same side, which confuse the audience. Compare to the gossip girl, the Fire Within shows the conversation with huge amount of different camera angles and positions. Further, it also breaks the 180 degree rule, there is shot connect directly from shooting the front image of two characters to their back but with no strange feeling as an audience. Thus, the 180 degree is can be broken as long as the scene is make senses to the audience. Directors can create similar situations with create different feeling to the audience by using different camera approaches to covering the scene. For the discuss clip Margaret, it’s a more complex situation. I’m a bit confused, the 180 degree changes with the action of characters. From the beginning of the scene, I’m not expecting the shocking accident until the traffic lights shows up twice. Editing the short series of scene together make the pacing quickly and enhance the tension atmosphere to the audience. In the next week, we need to create videos, this exercise focus on the camera angle and position, how to show story with still camera with different position and angle. I haven’t decided to shot which script.

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 2

Posted on March 14, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 2

In this week’s class, we discussed lens’ angle and focal length of a lens. In Thursday’s class, I understand that short focal length lenses (wide angle lenses) like 10mm will offer a wide field of view, oppositely, long focal length lenses (narrow angle lenses) like 100mm will offer a narrow field of view. Although the narrow angle lenses shows less background image, it allows the audience pay more attention to the details, like the facial expression. Also, the wide angle lenses sometimes will distort the image particularly when you get really close to the object. This can be shown through the clip “I Am Cuba”, the scene start with using wide angle lenses, showing a wide view of the world behind the musicians, also, the image is distorted because the musicians is too close to the lens. In the recommend reading “The Big Picture”, Tom Reilly talks about the constructed of an entire scene and the professional process of film production. From the reading, I understand that there are lots of elements need to consider for director to getting a nice shot, like lighting, acting, camera moves, stage, editing and so on. Further, behind a good scene, the actors have to learn their movement and line timing and the camera operator need to learn the camera moves and the place and every shot detail need to be prepared 3 month ago, which is a huge process. Different approach can be made for getting different effects. For example, in order to get a fast pacing and energy scene, director can achieve it either by performance and shot design or editing. However, the former is extremely important. In my past work, I always focus on the post production part of the video but ignore the early planning and shooting. From now on, I will try to design the shot, consider the camera position, camera angle, the position of characters and their performance to enhance my work. When you are ready in the early stage, you will save a lot of time in the later stage.

Thank you very much!

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 1

Posted on March 14, 2021 by jenna

The Scene In Cinema 2021 | Reflective Writing 1

My first expression of the studio is that it’s a studio talking about filmmaking. I hope to know more technically and theoretical knowledge about filmmaking, especially, the way of achieving esthetic picture through camera position, camera angle, image size, lights and other elements. In this week’s class, I understand the word coverage is mainly means practical concerns that relates with scripts. For instance, before actors go home, director needs to make sure every scenes is covered and there is no more shots need to took. In the class, we also practice to draw floor plan and storyboard depends on the scripts. My group did Exercise D and E, the corresponding video is very similar to what we discussed, except that I missed the word ‘1 single perspective’ and draw lots of different perspective in storyboard. Through the discussion of sharing ideas in groups, I found that although depends on one script, people get different answers. The direction of camera might be different, the way of people moving into the screen might be different, the setting of scene might be different and there is no right or wrong answer. It’s just different ways of showing the story to the audiences through screen and different ways might course different feeling and effects. Further, I realize that it’s also very important to draw a storyboard and floor plan before shooting date because this helps everyone understand what they needs to do and save time on shooting day. In my internship experience, I did lots of video editing job, and my woke mate will always give me a script, includes actors’ lines, camera angles, image size and so on. The script let me quickly understand the kind of video they want to produce and save my times. All in all, I think this class is exactly what I want to learn, the content is very interesting!

Thank you very much!