Project 1_Alexa

PROJECT 1: "Not So Still Life"

31 August: Filming Practice (in-class)

Today in class, we were given time to practice the film examples we were shown in class. I was able to get lots of footage using a few drink bottles that a few classmates and I had on hand. I practiced filming good shots and bad shots using my phone, one of each of which is below. 

Example 1: Bad Shot

In this shot, the three water bottles are not fully in frame, and are all located in a line at the same level from the viewer. It makes the focus of the shot unclear and confusing, and is also shaky. 

Example 2: Good Shot

In this shot, the filming is much steadier and has a steady slight pan of the environment to provide movement. The bottles are located at different areas in the shot but can all be clearly seen, providing depth and clarity for the viewer. 

After today's class and filming, I am thinking I might want to make something along the lines of a horror or murder mystery type film, because I think it would be an interesting way to utilize and practice the variety of shots we learned about in class!

2 September: Storyboarding

 For project , I've decided to make something with a bit of a scary/ horror theme, since Halloween is coming up. When discussing the film techniques and watching examples in class, I instantly thought of how I could incorporate the camera skills we'd learned about into a short horror film. My idea is based around a girl running from her haunted doll, and I want to film in a wooded area with lots of trees and not a lot of light. As of now I am thinking of making it all in black and white to accentuate the contrast of colors in the film. 

4 September: Location Scouting and Practice with a DSLR Camera

Since it is a long weekend, I decided to go back to my hometown and do some scouting to find a place to film. I went to a few of the parks in my area and found some great spots, and also got practice with two new cameras that I had at home. I was able to play around with the cameras and figure out how to use them while I looked for the perfect spot to film, and got some super cool footage!

Above is one of the practice shots I got with my the camera while scouting for locations!

5 September: Filming Day

After finding a good location to shoot yesterday, the weather was cloudy and overcast today so I decided to go back to the park I had found and film everything I needed! My friend Lauren helped out by being my main character, and I spent a few hours filming her and the haunted doll, as well as some environment shots to set the scene. I made sure to take multiples of almost everything I filmed just in case, because I am filming in a location that is far from campus and would be difficult to go back to for a re-shoot. This was very dependent on weather, my friend's availability, access to my parents' camera, and the fact that I was able to travel home for this shoot; so I wanted to make sure I had more than enough footage to work with. 

(photos taken by my mom, who went with me to film. Going into the woods can be dangerous to do alone, so I always bring a buddy if I feel unsafe!)

Above are some images from filming today! It was a lot of fun and only took about 2 hours to get everything I needed. It started raining near the end, but luckily I was able to get everything before the weather got bad! In total I ended up with around 4-5 minutes of footage, so I think I should be set with everything I'll need to edit for the next few weeks! 

9 September: Uploading to Premiere and Video Editing

After I gathered all of my footage together, it took a while to figure out how to get it from my iPad to computer. Once I did, I was able to upload it to the Premiere software and start working! I decided that before I went in and did detail work, I would add ALL of the clips I have from filming and put them in order on the timeline. This took quite a long time because I had 58 short videos to work from. After I added them all, my video was about 4 minutes long. This is most likely because I took duplicates of almost every shot, and added them both in so that I could trim them and then compare them. Next, I began trimming all of the excess footage off of each clip, which brought my video's time down even more. 

Above is a screenshot from Premiere. At this point in time I was still in the process of adding all of my clips to the timeline in the correct order. Over the weekend, I will likely finish trimming the clips and narrow down the duplicate footage. 

15 September: Video Editing

This week I have spent class time and out of class time editing, narrowing down footage, and stitching everything together. At this point in time I have realized that some transitions don't make sense or would have been clearer with more footage, but I don't have the capability for a re-shoot so I'm trying my best to work with what I have. 

After stitching everything together, I still have some narrowing down and lots of transitions to do but I'm starting to get an idea of what my final film is going to look like. I'm contemplating changing the story/ idea around a bit to make the footage make more sense since I can't do a re-shoot, but I am still not sure if I will do that or not. 

Over this weekend I plan on finishing up the stitching and working on transitions, as well as possibly incorporating some audio!

19 and 21 September: Audio and Finishing Touches

Over the weekend I was able to get all of my video stitching and transitions done, and also found all of my audios. I am using clips that I found from Youtube for audios, and am putting a bunch of them together  on top of each other to get the exact sound I want. 

The most difficult part of the audio was syncing it to my video. For example, I wanted to include the footsteps and breathing sounds that you would hear if you were really there, but since I didn't record with audio initially I had to add it in after the fact. It took a lot of time adjusting audio clips to perfectly sync each footstep and some of them are still a little off, but I think the overall effect it gives in the end made it worth it. 

This week I have been working on balancing and adjusting audio levels, and doing some minor finishing tweaks and adjustments. After these are all done, my project will be finished!