How do I produce a portrait that reflects who I am within a time frame of one minute?

Thankfully, I decided to rely on the fifty words that I used in my Project Brief One, weird quirks.

Since it was only a fifty word description, it was fitting to do a fast paced video that consisted of rapid shots and cuts. Upon editing, I struggled to try and control the promptness of each frame as the viewer may not have the time to process what was just shown on the screen. In order to overcome this obstacle, I decided to extend each frame by an extra second and eliminate unnecessary footage that wouldn’t be considered a “quirk” of sorts.

Particular transitions such as wipes, slides and quick dissolves were used in order to dissect a scene from another. For instance, the purpose of the quick dissolves between the cheese and the ironing sections was to juxtapose how I hate one thing (raw cheese) but love another (ironing). Furthermore, wipes and slides were to keep a consistent pace and light-hearted flow throughout.

I aimed to convey a vibrant aesthetic that fits with the theme of “weird quirks”. The RGB curves tool, was used extensively to distinguish one scene from another as well as complimenting images with the footage. At the beginning where the constant appearance of lips appeared, were all provided with a red undertone colour and high saturation in order to achieve a consistent aesthetic. Moreover, the images of the lips as well as the walking of each person at the end, were to reflect the idea of individuality. Using the map tool on the RGB curves, I was able to change the colour of the gum from clear to pink in order to give a pop of colour onto the footage.

I used the tool of “Motion” to crop and manipulate the footage to give the illusion of symmetry. However, the walking sequence is definitely something I could improve on during production.

Audio gains was used in order to adjust the decibels of the background music from the narration. A few takes had be done in order to achieve clarity in the narration, and re watching it now, it’s something I still need to work on.

I purposely didn’t feature on my self-portrait film as I wanted to present a piece that was purely filmed and edited myself. So all I’ll say is, I hope you enjoy!

So how did I celebrate this 2016 Labour Day public holiday? By playing around and adjusting to the tools on Premiere Pro. Fortunately, I’ve had experience with this software before due to Year twelve media. This time, I focused on intricate details such as colour grading, transitions and audio gains in order to provide a certain aesthetic.

Since I’ve almost completed production on my Project Brief Two, I aim to convey a realistic yet vibrant aesthetic that fits with my theme of “weird quirks”. By utilising the RGB curves tool, I’ll be able to adjust the saturation of the footage and even manipulate the colour balance. Unlike my Haiku exercise, my Project Brief Two will consist of colour so it’s essential to keep a consistently vibrant aesthetic throughout.

From the Haiku exercise I was able to embed text through transitions. This time, I’ll be using transitions in order to move from scene to another and to provide a continuous fast pace. Upon looking through the Video Transition folder, quick dissolves, slides and wipes would be the suitable options.

In order to have a balance between the background music and the narration, I would have to rely on audio gains. The background music shouldn’t be too loud nor too faint while the narration should be the main focus in clarity and volume. Through adjusting the decibels, I’ll be able to control the strength and intensity of the noise.

Fingers crossed my audio and footage meet my expectations. As I’ve learnt the hard way in the past, not everything can be fixed in post-production despite Premiere Pro to be such a user friendly editing program (thus far).