Overall Comments
I am happy and relieved that my Tutor was happy with my assignment ‘Conflict’. I have been criticised in the past of over-complicating my work, on previous courses; so I am now much more mindful to try to keep things simple. My biggest fault is that I tend to over think things which leads to the over-complications in my work later on.
My Tutor is very right and I will take onboard his comment about the power of the pause and I will try to remember this for directing future acting and during film editing. In-fact this is a reminder to me as the power of the pause is is often emphasised in theatre for which I have done some stage acting and also I have studied for theatrical stage directing.
My screenplay format was criticised and as it happens I have just begun to read a book on writing screenplays published by AVA, in the Basics Film-Making series; so hopefully my next attempt will be better and to the correct industry format. I will have a look at the on-line resource called celtx.
Feedback on assignment
Scene one – The phone call – 0.00.00 – 0.01.00
This is where the pauses would have the greatest power. I also take on board my Tutor’s comments on potential plot development that I could have thought about. I must confess my thoughts were more about producing a short-film that met the assignment criteria than trying to make anything too sophisticated. However, I like my Tutor’s ideas and wish that I had thought of them. I found the sound EQ effects for the phone by chance when searching for the dissolves and wipes some weeks before and this was the first time that I had a chance to experimented with it. These are very fun and exciting features to play with.
Scene two – Preparing the Food – 0.01.00 – 0.01.57
Again I take on board my Tutor’s comments with editing the food prep much further and yes perhaps I should have shown a short scene of my protagonist deciding to use another recipe or just leaving out any detailed shots illustrating the recipe, as I didn’t have one for lasagne, again this was a missed opportunity to create a more powerful plot. Yes, it had occurred to me to also shoot Sarah getting ready whilst I was working on some photos of her; but decided that it probably wasn’t necessary to the story; but on reflection I agree that it might have added more power to her disappointment.
Scene three – The Alarm – 01.58 – 0.02.25
I removed the UV filter from my lens that is normally just fitted to protect the lens in case it weakened the visual effect of the smoke and I used additional lighting positioned to bounce light back off the smoke for better visibility. I used smouldering paper to obtain adequate amounts of smoke and the fan assisted oven probably helped push it in to my face. Again, I like my Tutor’s suggestion of an obsessed photographer as an idea for plot development. Interestingly, I have a friend who is currently at Uni studying theatre who is a talented playwright. I was working with him on one of his plays that he was staging for the first time and I commented how clever he was to have implied a criminal past for his villainous Doctor character, to which he replied that he hadn’t even considered it until I pointed it out. The point I’m getting at is that it is good to have another pair of eyes look at a script that can possibly then see things that the author may be blind to, both good and bad.
Scene five – The Meal – 0.2.41 – 0.02 .49.
My skills with my sound equipment is getting better but still requires more experience before I can earn any cigar. Yes, I did in fact use a boom mic; but I think the main problem is to record a reliabley good soundtrack I needed someone to be operating the sound equipment and be listening through the headphones and making any small adjustments or re-positioning the mic as I was filming. Unfortunately, it was just myself and my wife as actress. However, I take onboard my Tutor’s comment and also his comment about the sound jump.
Coursework
I am a little bit behind on my coarse-work and I am working on catching up.
Research
I will try to apply more of what I have learned in to future projects and I am now looking with a critical eye at TV adverts and searching online for more short-films, documentaries and tutorials of film-making. I am fasinated by the technical aspects of film-making and I admit that I need to spend more time and consideration on the conceptual side, the film-language aspect that I have recently been reading about.
Suggested reading / viewing.
I am grateful for the recommendations and will follow these up and blog them.
Pointers for the next assignment / assessment.
- I am currently reading up on script writing.
- I will try to broaden my outlook.
- I’ll do my best.
Setting the Scene 