Before the first week of Ways of Making my camera set up process was a little bit on the lazy side. This was due to the fact I essentially had no idea what I was doing. Damn straight, I had great ideas and intentions but my execution of these ideas consisted of poorly setting up a tripod, focusing and hitting the record button.

Luckily  for me during our first week we had a crash course in learning the right way to set up and capture footage. We learnt the importance of each step when setting up,  from setting up a tripod, (which surprisingly has more to it than expected), to focusing, as well as exposure, and believe it or not up until that day I had gone about almost every step the wrong way.

After familiarising ourselves with the cameras and what each set up process entailed we were ready to go out and capture the first shot of the rest of our lives.

Up until this point in my studies I have been able to master the forming and developing ideas. So when we went out and took a series of shots I decided to focus on executing each shot the ‘right way’.

– setting up the tripod correctly

– making sure my frame was level

– correctly focusing

– correctly exposing the image etc.

My aim for this semester so far has been to improve my skills in creating, so thats what I focused on. With this intention in mind I captured the first shot of the rest of my life.
The shot that should have been perfectly executed with the utmost attention and skill thus far.

–

My end clip was nothing short of downright bad.

It ended up looking like a shot plucked right out of  a current affairs. It was a great establishing shot but terrible at conveying any meaning.

This is where my ‘uha’ moment came.

I had focused so much of my energy on finally ‘doing it the right way’ that I had forgotten the one thing I knew I could do right, which was the development of an idea. I managed to take the shot pretty well but the image was empty of any worthwhile content.

I realised then that I cant waste mine or anyone else’s time on ’empty’ shots.
Each shot taken needs to have a motivation.
This motivation has to be clear.

So in this sense I did take the first shot of the rest of my life.

As the great Paul Ritchard once said…

‘Filmmaking is learning about filmmaking’