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Yaw
I found myself being someone who’s learning style is quite adaptable to particular situations and tasks. I could even go as far as saying, my learning style changes with my mood and is very connected to my emotion, Though a majority of my learning is best suitable when physical and visual aspects are involved. As someone who works with pace, to avoid being overloaded, I tend to do a lot of things on the fly. Planning isn’t my strong suit. However, this isn’t always a negative thing. I feel this allows me to experiment and not overthink execution. Though, I do realise that filmmaking entails a lot of pre-planning as part of development. Due to this, I am looking to become a better pre-planner. I have found, especially when it comes to editing, I rush through footage and make quick cuts without considering many variations and possibilities. For me, this was very evident in the 1st Lenny exercise. However, as the weeks have progressed, I have approached the activities with more and more consideration for the process.
So far, I have found this studio very suitable for my learning style, as it is very visual and hands on. I look to get as much as possible out of this studio as the weeks progress. I anticipate that my knowledge will increase as we navigate through the course content. I look forward to becoming a more competent filmmaker, with lots of consideration for the practise within different elements of the field. While being online we are definitely tested by the constraints of online learning, however, this allows new ways of working to be experimented with. As future practitioners, we must remember that adaptability is one of the most important qualities in the field today, and what better way than to learn about adaptability in the midst of a pandemic
I’ve always found the concept of eye-lines and the 180 degree rule an interesting point of discussion when dissecting film edits. As film is considered an art form, I guess there are technically minimal rules you must follow as a filmmaker. However, with that being said, many of the decisions made by a filmmaker will ultimately play a very big role in how work is understood or perceived. So when bringing forth the idea of audience and perception, there are many rules to be considered and followed if making a piece of work designed for audience understanding or the portrayal of stories and images. From a personal perspective, eye-lines are an element of filmmaking that I find an integral part of shot execution and even assembly. Though, going back to the earlier point I made about filmmaking’s ability to be a very much subjective art form, where rules do not necessarily need to be followed, I would strongly argue that something as important as eye-lines are something that can lower the quality of work, if incorrectly executed. Unless a clear creative decision is made eye-line matching, for me, is a very important aspect of making quality work.
In this link above, it is explained why eye-line matching is important and how its relation to concepts such as ‘the line of action’ and ‘the 180 degree rule’. It also explained how the establishment of character eye-lines can allow the line of action to be broken. It also explains that matching eye-lines can be important when actors are in the same scene but are not on set at the same time. While it works best to have actors in a scene with heavy dialogue on location together, in a lot of cases it isn’t the end of the world if that isn’t the case. As long as a matching of actor eye lines are considered, the scene can still work. This is also an important aspect of creating work via online formats. For example, for a class exercise we recreated the 3rd scene from the Lenny script on Zoom. My group and I made an attempt to match eye lines as best as possible, while being in completely different locations. Unfortunately due to a perspective issue, footage was flipped which made the eye line completely off, however I was able to edit it together by flipping one of the takes. This helped a lot and allowed a closer match. Below is the finished product attached.
I was watching this video about the 180 degree rule and examples of it being broken in some well known films. I really enjoy seeing this rule broken if it’s done with intent, it can really bring an audience closer into the world which is displayed on screen. At times this can be very disorientating, however that can be great when a point of a film needs to be emphasised and like I said before, elements of stories are often aided if this rule breakage is performed with strong intention.
2. Efficiency is something that I’m slowly gaining. With the music and edit exercise, I learnt that I could duplicate sequences and edit the same bits of footage differently WITHOUT HAVING TO DUPLICATE THE WHOLE PROJECT! I was extremely happy. From now on I will be utalising bins and sequences when compiling edits. Though this is only basic knowledge I should have had long ago, I am grateful that I now know. Embedded is my rough-cut version 3. Reflecting on this, I realise that I made a few strange decisions in this rough cut which I’ll be sure to avoid next time.
As someone with a strong interest in filmmaking and surrounding topics, the Deliberate Film studio seems a very suitable fit myself. As I have progressed, since starting this degree, I have seen an increase in my knowledge and critical thinking qualities in various areas of this degree. My desire to learn and to build my technical competencies, has seen me move towards the creation of content and visual work. Gravitating towards more hands on learning and visual creation, I have really enjoyed previous studio’s and classes that placed heavy emphasis on the art of filmmaking. Starting in Making Media, then making my way to Reel to Reel, I have managed to develop many of the basic editing skills required to navigate programs such as premiere pro. Following the completion of these classes, I have been reassured that filmmaking is something I have a strong interest in. As someone who is not the most tech-savvy, I find myself being an inefficient worker when creating with editing software. Though many of my previously completed works have been at an adequate level, the ways in which I navigated these projects were inefficient and could have been executed with much wiser approaches. So with this in mind, I chose to be a part of Deliberate Film to gain more knowledge and experience, by learning from class curriculum and fellow students. Surrounding myself with relevant sources allows me to absorb the creative tools and knowledge to become a better filmmaker and visual creator. This studio will assist me in being a better critique of my own work and the work of others. It will also teach me how to assess film through specific lenses, that allow me to unpack and dissect minor details. With basic and more advanced activities, I’ll find that my increased editing efficiency will reflect in later works and assignments. This studio provides motive which in turn provides an opportunity for filmmaking and it’s basic techniques to become second nature.