Professional Audience Feedback

Soon in class we are going to have a visit from a professional filmmaker who is going to give us some professional audience feedback which should help us with our film making and help us improve with the constructive feedback he gives us. I shall write up his feedback so that I can prove what he said and what I changed because of it.

Yesterday in class we had a visit from a professional filmmaker Nick Peres who is a Video Producer for Mindmaker Productions. He individually watched our films so far and gave us feedback which would hopefully help us improve our film sequences.

We had feedback sheets so that we knew what questions we could ask him, with the hope of the receiving the best possible feedback. At the time he came to see my film, I had no sound and no narration and so it was a little hard for Nick to understand my film and so I had to enlighten him a little about the plot and the genre.

What part of the film was the sequence and how could you tell?

Nick said that he knew my film was the title sequence/opening because of the photo album and the memories. He said it was a good and classic way of showing the audience it was the beginning of the film.

Could you tell where the film was set in time and place? What made this clear (or confusing)?

He said that he could tell the film was set in modern times but that there was confusion in my opening sequence between the past and the present, with the past being shown as flashbacks he said that I could perhaps de-saturate the colour of the image a little which would define what was a flashback and what was in the present.

Who were the main characters and did you feel you could understand a bit about them? What technical or visual elements were most helpful for this?

He said that the guy was the obvious main character because his emotions were the focus of the sequence and what the audience would be looking at. He said that the fact that he was looking into the photo album and we were seeing his reactions that this also showed he was the main character. He said that we can understand his emotions because they are clear in his reaction to the photos and the letter.

Is the genre clear? How could you tell?

He said that the drama part of the film was clear with the emotion and the non linear narration but he also said that the romantic part of the genre was not clear and that I should perhaps add in some more romance establish that side of the film more.

How intrigued are you by the narrative – what makes you want to see the rest of the film?

He said that the audience would want to see the rest of the film because they would want to the guy’s plight, not only what happens in the end but how he got there in the first place which is created by the non linear narration.

In extra comments that he made, he said that I have too much movement in my shots and that perhaps I should reshoot some of them so that I have less movement which would make it more realistic. He also commented on the titles that I had just started when he arrived and so were not finished but he added that changing the colour of the titles adds character to them and this is something that I should consider doing.

The visit from Nick was very useful and he gave me some very helpful constructive feedback all which I have taken into account and have done what I can at this late hour in my film process to change and adapt as he knows what he is doing and so is most likely to be right. I have learnt from this that it is always good to get feedback from other people as what you see and what they see can be very different.

Audience Feedback

I am going to email people on my social networking site facebook my synopsis so that they can give me feedback on what they think of my film synopsis. Ths will help me understand what sort of people will watch my film and not watch my film and whether my narrative is any good.

As the only people that replied to my emails sent out were teenage girls, and the comments were positive I can safely say from this piece of work that my film synopsis would appeal to my target audience which is primarily female and mostly older teenager, to young adult. Unsucessfully the boys did not reply which didn't help me with the their constructive feedback but at least I got some.

Filming and Editing

The next piece of work I shall do is to write up the process of my filming and editing of my film opening and what I did in what order. This should give a clear order to my work and what I completed when.

I was one of the last people to start filming because I took a lot longer to finish my storyboard as I found it hard to visualise and draw my ideas but I eventually completed it and filming began. The issue that I had with filming was the availability of my two actors and after sorting out a day with my actor Callum, we did our first film session which took around 2 hours. I filmed each shot three times so that I would hopefully have a successful shot which I could use and I managed to get all the shots for what was going to be the first part of my film opening.

I took the pieces that I had filmed back to school and started to edit them straight away which wasn’t too difficult and I managed to edit together some match on actions and completed the editing for this part of my film within in a couple of 1 hour lessons. This was the easiest part of my film to complete.

My next piece to film was the flashback sequence which involved Jez and Callum and after arranging a convenient time for all of us we went of to film the flashbacks. The first part we filmed was them eating chips in the park which I filmed all of and edited it down later into the bits I needed. The other flashback was the walk on the moors one which we went and filmed and that completed what I thought would be all of my film. I took this film to school and started editing again moving the flashbacks around and deciding which ones would work the best. This took a lot longer and I spent many lessons trying to figure out what I needed. There were many shots that I deleted because they didn’t work but I managed to find some that did.

This was when after a discussion with my teacher I decided to add in another shot at the beginning of my film of Olivia writing the letter. I filmed this myself by using my table in my kitchen to film what is meant to be Olivia’s hand but is actually mine to get the beginning shots of my film opening which once I edited it into my film looked a lot smoother and made the narrative clearer to the audience. After this last piece of filming it was all down to the editing stage. Even though the basic editing did not take long at all once I had my basic film opening the most time was spent moving little bits around and changing things in detail so that the film could be improved even more.

After I had edited my film all that was left was for me to add titles, music and narration. The titles took no time at all and I managed to complete them in one lesson, the music was easily put onto my film but the hardest part was finding a piece of music which fitted into my film and sounded right. After a lot of searching I found it. The narration also wasn’t easy, I knew what was being narrated but finding someone who could narrate what I wanted with the right emotion was difficult but I found a friend called Jess Batten who did it wonderfully. Once this was completed all that was left was to adjust minute details in my film, make sure all the music was in the right place at the right volume and make sure the narration fitted with the shots perfectly. Once this was done my film opening was completed.

I did face some difficulty in making my film opening but everything worked out in the end and I managed to find a solution to every problem such as keeping the music under the narration but getting rid of the vocal which I managed to find a way to do.  

 This piece of work shows what took longer, what was easy and what was hard. It gives a clear view as to how my film took shape and in what order. It allows me and the reader to understand how I shaped my film opening and what troubles I had.

Settings, props and costumes

Same as the actors profiles, I also need to present images on my settings, props and costumes which I shall do as a powerpoint uploaded to my blog as images. This will allow me to present why I chose the settings, props and costumes.

This piece of work allows me to present the reasons for my choices in my film, after I have filmed it which alows me to look back and say what was good and not so. The main aim of these images was to present the reasons for all of my choices.

Actors profiles, permissions and filming

I need to create a profile for my actors and also display for evidence for my permissions and a little information about my filming process. I will present this in a powerpoint uploaded onto this blog which should show why I chose these actors and why they are good for the job.

 Click on the slide to see evidence bigger

This piece of work helped me present the reasons why I chose my actors and also what the process of my filming was like. I have also included my permissions for the photographs which is important because it proves that I did ask permission before using them.

Narration script

I don't have a script for my film because there is no dialogue but there is narration involved of the letter that Henry finds, so I have to have a scrip for that and that is what I am writing next. This will not only give me a prop to us in filming but a basis of knowing what is going to be said when we record the narration.

This is the script for the letter that we see in my film opening. The letter is going to be narrated over the top of some of the film, so that the film opening and what the letter says can be understood. The narration is going to be recorded by Jess Batten another close friend and A level Drama student so she will be able to capture the emotion through her voice like is needed for my film.

“I don’t know how much time has passed between me leaving you and you reading this letter but I’m hoping not long as our daughter needs her father.

The reason I wrote this letter is to try and make you not blame our daughter for my death it wasn’t her fault. Giving birth and holding our little girl made me the happiest woman alive and to have risked dying and not feeling that love would have left my life incomplete.

I would love to believe that after my death you changed your mind and took our baby home with you but I know you better than that, you’re stubborn and your looking for someone to blame. Please Henry, our darling baby girl has already lost her mother don’t make her lose her father as well.

Love always

Olivia”

This took me a few copies to write as I felt that I needed to get it right and i was difficult to know what would have been said in an actual situation like this, which obviously I have never been in but now that I have written this narration/letter it feels right and I think this will be the final copy that I use in my film.

Storyboard of my film opening

The next thing for me to complete in this project is a storyboard of my proposed film opening. Even though I have the film synopsis, I need to have visual images of every shot that I am going to film, so that when I go out with a camera I know exactly what I hope to achieve. I don't have to stick with the storyboard that I create and I can make changes, but it is there as a basis.

Storyboard of my film opening from Yasmine Rich on Vimeo.

I chose to present my storyboard on here as a video created using a webcam to create a video uploaded onto Vimeo and embedded onto my blog as it seemed better than scanning in the paper copy of my storyboard.  It took me a long time to create my storyboard for my film opening as each shot needed careful consideration and I changed many shots numerous times before coming up with the final plan. Having a paper copy of a story board will help me greatly because I can take it out filming with me and I will have a firm basis and knowledge of what I am planning on filming even if I do make more changes.