In this week, we learned three new elements of filmmaking – staging, blocking and camera coverage. We have watched some movies to help us to understand what the terms meaning is. Staging is the process of selecting, designing or modifying the performance space for a play or a film. In the movies, blocking means that the directors usually determines during rehearsal, tell actors where they should move for the proper dramatic effect, ensure the sight lines for the audience and work with the lighting design of the scene. The camera coverage is the amount of footage shoot and different angles used to capture a scene. Coverage is important not only to keep things dynamic and exciting within the scene, but also to decrease the editing process of the movie. I remember there was a clip we watched in class. It was a scene that a couple dialogue in the building. The camera set up in the central of the cross way, focusing on the protagonist’s face. When the young lady go right way to talk with his boyfriend, the camera turn to right way to shoot. It was impressive clip for me that how to do with a long shoot. I found this very interesting because we have done the film work with different angles, and we did the editing process after shooting. So it inspires me to try to consider how to do a long shoot with no editing, and it also looks so smoothly with more information from the screen. But I am always curious how the cinematographers chose where to set the camera because the cinematographer could not make a bit mistake. I guess it need much more shooting experience and a strong ability to camera control.

The first exercise was Robbin given us a script and let us to set the camera. The purpose of this exercise is to experience the dynamic range and to notice the light source from outside and inside. For instance, the first shoot, which is two actors walk from the lift to exit door. We perceive the lighting inside is too dark, so we borrowed artificial light to enhance the lighting inside so that we could match the outside lighting. However, we made a mistake, the 32K artificial lighting is too blue that couldn’t simulate the sunlight. We made some change in both clips for color temperature that could match each other, but it did not change too much. In the second part, we think we did a good work. We find if we use short focal length to shoot this, the outside area would be overexposure, so we choose long focal length. When the two actors walk through the sliding door, we turn up a bit the aperture to decrease the exposure.
Through this process, I recognize that we should use the correct artificial source in different weather. For the second part, I think it is a good challenge to achieve long shot, and we make a properly setting up on camera tp avoid the overexposure.