This week I completed my first exercise towards my project for the rest of the semester, that is, a practical study of reframing in coverage. I used a script from one of the earlier scenes we had shot for an interesting reason. I remember the group who first shot the scene actually used some movement which I found quite interesting. I can’t remember the specifics but I know they played around with which characters were in the frame at any point in time. Once I remembered this I thought I’d like to have my own go at shooting that scene. This exercise was in reframing without moving the actual camera, only using pans and tilts.

It’s a pretty vague script, (presumably why Robin gave it to us in the first place) and there’s very few movement instructions clearly given in it. This meant I was able to work the movement into the script that I felt was appropriate. We frequently discuss approaches to blocking in class, and the two options are usually: 1) Director has autonomy and conceives the blocking himself after the coverage and 2) Director and crew run through script with the actors and conceive a coverage to accommodate their blocking. My method was, as they probably tend to be, a combination of the two. We blocked it step by step, and some frames or movements were determined by my camera following the actors’ movement and some vice versa. When Matt walks away briefly and is left on the edge of the frame is an example of the blocking being created to fit a frame I wanted to shoot – I wanted to isolate him in the frame so to satisfy that I had him walk away.

The blocking was the part of the process I was most happy with. I used camera tape to mark the actors’ cues and it was extremely helpful, especially considering I was shooting from a tripod and unable to simply work around missed marks. I was happy with my concepts for frames, but my camerawork was a little bit sloppy. Next time I’ll get someone else to operate camera, I think, and see if that makes a discernible difference.

I think moving on, my next experiment will be shooting one scene static and then shooting the same scene with a moving camera, to see what difference it can make.