Question 6: What Have You Learnt About Technologies From The Process Of Constructing This Product?

Cannon 550D

For our thriller we used a Cannon 550D SLR camera which can capture recording in full HD 1080p meaning all of our shots are of professional quality and also allowing us to change more within the shot when editing such as brightness and colour. Using this when recording our preliminary task we developed our skills a lot and have further developed them to a good level in how to capture a large variety of good quality interesting shots through experience. When using this camera for the credit  shots and the shot of Beth’s hand we discovered that using manual focus works very well when taking shots especially when panning as it allows us to cut into and out of focus at certain points to add mystery to the shot and hide information from the audience that might not be revealed till later on in the film when it starts to make sense.

Manual Focus On Hand

To get effective and clear close up shots of the photo in the protagonists hand, and the shot of the side of Beth’s face by using a macro lens for the camera we were able to take the shots professionally so they have a greater impact within the film. 

Macro Lens On Cannon 550D

To get good shots the focus was very important in order to get a very clear shot with more impact with the higher resolution; along with this getting the lighting right was also very important as we needed to create a dim and mysterious shots but still ensure they are clear. By not using natural daylight we managed to complete this fairly well and the bright lights in the factory could be used to lighten parts of the shots whilst creating mysterious looking shadows in the background.

iMovie

Power Director

When editing we used iMovie to edit together our thriller however due to limitation of tools and ability to adjust clips we edited the shots of the protagonist in the bedroom on Cyberlink Power Director 11 as we could lighten the shots and make them look more mysterious and effective with controlled amounts of distortion and fuzz. We then transferred them back onto iMovie to edit them together with the rest of our thriller. When editing on iMovie we soon found that getting length of certain shots was vital and getting the timing for the cuts to link shots had to be to perfection so there were no jumps and it was not too confusing to the audience but still keeping the element of mystery within. When editing together some of our flashback shots the clip speed adjustment tool came in very handy to easily speed up or slow down certain shots to help flow within the movie. When editing together some of our shots we discovered that some of the shots where slightly too dark so that is when we transferred them over too Power Director which enabled us to lighten them and soften them to reduce the grain within the clip.

Lightening & Re-focusing in Power Director

Before

After

 When we captured and edited together the mirror scene where the protagonists girlfriend suddenly appears in the mirror, timing between the cuts needed to be just right to keep the continuity and the camera position and status of the characters needed to be very similar so it didn't seem like they were totally different shots just stuck together and it gave the intended effect of Beth appearing as some kind of paranormal activity. Getting the right lighting in our bedroom scene was very hard as we wanted to give the impression of a dark atmosphere without cutting picture quality and visibility to the audience too much; this proved to be challenging as we later discovered that the resolution of the cameras much smaller screen displayed the captured shots as much lighter than the bigger screen of the Mac when editing them together. However I feel that our overall result has turned out as well and this is not as apparent or big a problem as we first anticipated.

Blogger

Blogger - Blogger enabled me to compose and display all of my media work digitally which enabled me to keep all of my media work in the same place where I can add any more information or manipulate it easily at any time. It helped my organisation by the dated posts and the images and videos I could embed made it much more appealing and allowed me to create work with fewer words keeping me motivated. It also enabled me to incorporate the use of multimedia such as images, animation, video, prezi, and sound.

iMovie – Used to edit together the shots for our final movie allowing us to manipulate clips and add non-diegetic sound adjusting levels easily. When using iMovie we were able to add sound effects at certain points in the movie to dramatically add tension. We then used it to export the movie ready to be burnt to disk.

Power Director – Used to lighten and soften clips was easy to use and had many more tools and effects than iMovie but was not useful for editing together the final movie as it ran very slow and rendering the movie was an issue so editing together clips smoothly would have been a much harder task.

iDVD

IDVD – Used to produce interactive DVD menu and burn our movie to DVD

When composing our film we stuck to the 180 degree rule which we learned in our preliminary, this was very important in our movie as characters move through settings that are mysterious; navigation throughout the settings through shots that don’t link well could easily confuse the audience. We also used a good quality professional tripod to ensure that the panning was a consistent speed and didn't jump of wobble as this may disillusion the audience. To build tension effectively it was important that all of the elements worked well together to give a good effect overall. For instance at tension building points in the movie we use together: fast cuts, non-diegetic sound, and close up shots to build tension effectively together.