Filming Complete!

 

The filming went quite well. We were lucky that it didn’t rain while we were there. The main issue we had was that it got dark very quickly. I had to keep on adjusting my aperture/F-stop and then my ISO.

Method of Working:

I used my shot list as a guide, but predominantly I improvised camera movements. I positioned the character where I wanted her and blocked out her movements. After this, I manipulated the camera around her shifting angles, camera tilts & pans, changed lenses. I ignored the 180 degree rule of crossing the line and organically shot as much coverage as I could in the time frame that I had.

I adjusted the White Balance a couple of times (as seen above). I over saturated the image and then brought more cooler tones and hues into the image. I experimented with depth of field. Filming on a Canon 5D is always going to be difficult to keep the moving image in focus. I spent a lot of time focusing and refocusing to ensure the picture was crisp. I tried not to attempt a focus pull or follow focus. The character moved through space and at times this was not an issue but sometimes she would fall out of focus and I would ‘cut’. Follow focus is too time consuming and difficult on a DSLR without the appropriate equipment. I maintained shot types to stills, pans and tilts.

I was lucky with the expression of natural light. I had prepared a small LED light and reflector, but I didn’t use any of this equipment. Not only would it have been a time consuming to match the light (shot continuity) as she moved through the space, but the natural light complimented the image without having to add artificial light. The lighting was soft and as the sun went down, it became quite expressive, which complimented the tone of the scene (my intention was to create different tones to allow for different cuts of the same scene).

The acting was minimalistic. I didn’t want to get caught up in teaching a non actor to act. I let her feel the space and wander curiously through it. Focusing on genre forces you to focus on acting and the portrayal/representation of that genre. Once I began filming I realised that I didn’t want to get caught up in the logistics of the ‘genre’ and the acting. The exercise for me, was to focus on camera coverage and the manipulation of the camera to reveal new meaning. This will be evident within the multiple edits that I conduct. There is room for more than two edits of this scene. I will work on multiple edits, focusing on the cutting of the shots and then choose the edited scene which is most effective. I will then fine tune my chosen edited scene by adding in diegetic sound (that was also recorded on set) and non diegetic sound. This final edited scene will be used for the RMIT Media exhibition/presentation.

I will compare and contrast all of the edits reflecting on the process of filming, how I can improve, how the scene tells a different story and how the camera is manipulated.

This week has been challenging, but I have thoroughly enjoyed the filming process. It was simplistic, yet the results surprised me.