Evaluation Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

The preliminary task has proved extremely useful and beneficial in the way it has taught me the basics to making a small film, from varying the shot angles, to understanding that to fundamentally convey a realistic conversation between two people, you must follow the 180 degree rule.

Planning

The planning element of our mini 'film' took between 10-15 minutes with only thought into narration and the type of shots we were planning on using. From there we sought out a room purely based on whether a class wasn't in it, allowing us to use the space freely, without interruption. We did not get permission for this which is something that was necessary to have in order to film our supernatural opening and shows me already that there were many flaws with the planning the preliminary task. Looking back on the preliminary task i think that if we had planned the film more thoroughly to look at mise en scene and what reading the audience would have had as a result of this, our mini 'movie' would have been much more effective and higher in verisimilitude. For example, in relation to costume, if the group has access to clothing such as formal attire then this would have helped to establish the roles and power of the characters as being high, whilst if we changed it so that i was wearing a suit (icon of power and wealth) and Indya wearing baggy jogging bottoms and a dirty top then the audience would be likely to get a different reading. Furthermore, we used the school as our location with the history classroom as the setting. If we'd have planned further we may have chosen to use the room to show Indya as being a history student, but since we were trying to make it look as if she was going into an interview, the location didn't give the audience the reading we would have wanted them to have, thus it doesn't help to establish the preferred reading. Lighting wasn't an issue for us when we planned the movie and neither was it something we thought about but it should have been a priority for us to give thought to in order to think about creating the right atmosphere for our mini movie. Additionally, the team work made to plan the mini movie wasn't made with the full input of every member of the group and so work was more weighted on the individual which means that in terms of planning, our teamwork wasn't effective.

Production

When producing the mini movie, teamwork was more effective when we shared the roles to use the camera and in giving our opinions on how the shots should look.

Match on action: door knob turns=door opens

In the shots to the right you can see that in doing the preliminary task we used editing techniques such as match on action, providing the audience/viewer with the perception that they are involved in the film because they are closely watching the actions of Indya, walking into the room. Match on action is effective in also creating the mood e.g. more frequent shots following someone's actions such as in our video 'Introducing Jimmy' adds suspense to what's happening in the scene. Furthermore it provides continuity in the film.

Match on action: Indya opens and closes door

Example of shot-reverse-shot & the 180 degree rule

As said before, the preliminary task gave me the knowledge and understanding that in order to create an effective sequence, whereby the actors exchange dialogue, you must use the 180 degree rule and shot-reverse-shot in order to effectively show this and to simply and clearly convey to the audience that different subjects are talking to one another. This video on YouTube is particularly useful in explaining such a rule and how this creates ease and familiarity for the viewer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXZphHOAcFI .

Example of shot-reverse shot & the 180 degree rule

By actually making this video as part of our preliminary task we learnt about the importance of planning and the use of specific camera editing techniques such as with match on action. Furthermore, the process taught me more about teamwork. As a group Sam, Indya, Katy and i worked efficiently to create our mini 'film' with the roles generally equally distributed throughout the group. This allowed the process of making the film to be much more manageable which is one of the deciding factors as to why i chose to work in a group for the filming and production of a supernatural horror opening.


Editing

As a group we decided together what would be better to be used in terms of the typography style for our title and credits as well as how the overall piece should be edited together. Therefore teamwork was generally effective however it wasn't there wasn't a complete equal share of roles within the group making it teamwork less effective. From looking at the mistakes working in a team when editing i made sure to reflect on this before choosing to be in a group to make the supernatural film opening.

Audience

I think i have learnt a great deal more about audience from having done the preliminary task and this helped to build the foundations of my understanding which i then used in order to finally complete the planning, production and editing of the film opening Katy, Indya and i worked on throughout the course of this project. From looking back on the preliminary task i am now aware that simple things such as costume, location and proxemics are important in showing the audience the relationship between the characters in a scene. From this the audience can gain interpret the film and it's plot easily.

Conclusion

Looking back at the preliminary task i am really happy at how we effectively used camera shots to make our 'story' seem plausible and how we could implement the 180-degree rule, match on action and shot-reverse-shot into our work. By doing it i have invaluably learnt the importance of planning as well as the pros and cons of teamwork. Whilst there are several mistakes to conclude from having done the preliminary task, i have been able to evaluate the effectiveness of such actions to avoid the same mistakes in my film opening which is what makes the preliminary task so useful to have completed.