Reflective Journal 15/05/17

This week was the second week of helping Dylan on his production, I spent the first half of the week helping Dylan on set (Monday and Tuesday). I think that working on other people’s films alongside my own has helped me think more about how I can develop my skills as a film maker whilst also helping others on their films. This week on Dylan’s set I was able to develop my sound skills further by being more confident with the Merantz kit, I practiced changing the audio levels to make sure that I was getting the perfect sound and I experimented with how far and how close I could get to the subject whilst still getting crisp audio. After working on set with Dylan, I felt like because he was confident in me and believed in me it made me more confident with what I was doing with sound and so I believe that I was constantly developing my sound skills whilst working on his film. This also made me more self-assured about what my sound is going to turn out like in my interviews.

On Wednesday I spent most of my time creating log sheets, shot lists, call sheets and editing my schedule for the next two days of filming. Doing this made sure that I was set and organised for the next filming days, I was able to be prepared for shooting within plenty of time and I was also able to prepare my crew for this too (Dylan.)

At the end of the week came shooting days, Thursday I shot in the Camerados set up. At first I was unsure if I was going to actually get any interviews because there weren’t many people sat in the ‘living room’. I decided that I should just go and set up equipment and see what I could get shot. After about an hour of being set up I had recorded one interview with Emma (camerados representative/camerado), which I was really happy with, I then decided to get some cut aways of the leaflets and some of the furniture that was set up. After speaking to a few more people who were sat in the living rooms I didn’t find any more people who were willing to be interviewed. Even though I hoped to get more than one interview at the camerados set up and I was really happy with what I got shot.

Friday was Toms interview day. I went into college and set up all the equipment ready to interview Tom, after waiting a while I realised that he wasnt coming and so I went to his office to see if he was there and asked reception where he could be, then I was told he wasnt going to be in college at all. After setting everything up I decided that it would be a waste of time to just pack everything away and so I decided to ask Lee’s class (who I had planned to interview next week) if they were available to be filmed instead on that day. Thankfully they were all able to be filmed earlier than what we had scheduled and so I ended up having 4 interviews shot instead of the one I had planned with Tom.

From this week I have learnt that it is extremely important to stay in contact with your cast, I hadn’t emailed, seen or even spoke to Tom for around 2 weeks after he confirmed he could be interviewed and so the lack of communication was what caused me to lose the interview with Tom. However I was able to solve this problem fairly quickly by getting other interviews shot instead.

Next week I will try to rearrange an interview with Tom for sometime next week and I will organise more shooting days for my opening and closing shots.

 

Reflective Journal 01/05/17

This week I wanted to focus of finding more contributors for my film. I decided that I needed to be more engaged with doing this and so I decided to email my old teacher from Firth Park to see if they had come to a decision about me shooting cutaways, I was hoping that if I kept emailing them they would eventually let me know what was happening and give me more understanding of why they wouldn’t allow me to film.

I also decided to make sure that I emailed Amy at the start of the week as I had previously emailed her asking if she would be able to meet up at the City college Camerados set up. Before doing this I was told that Amy was actually in the same college building that I was in and so I decided to go and talk to her in person as I thought it may be easier to talk about exactly what I wanted to get in the interviews and talk about (in detail) what I wanted in my film. Once I found Amy we spoke about our ideas and what would work for both of us, I then checked out the Camerados living area that had been set up in the canteen and noted down any cutaway shots I could get if I was to film in that living room area. I emailed Amy all the dates that I were available to shoot interviews and asked her to get back to me to let me know when people were available.

I made sure that I told Amy when I want interviews shot and I made sure that I came up with this date that fit her and my availabilities.

I decided that I wanted to get some students in my film to give a different perspective upon the issue that is bullying. I spoke to my tutor about the type of students I wanted and whether or not he knew any students that would be willing to get involved, from this I was forwarded to some of his students that said they would be happy to be filmed for my interviews. I created a Facebook chat to make sure that I could contact the students, this allowed me to see who had read my messages and I knew that all of the students had been given the same information. I believe this was a really effective way of talking to the students all at the same time, I was able to ask all of their availabilities without having to message them individually.  I noted down all of their availabilities and made sure that I wrote them in my schedule, this allowed me to see when I was able to shoot with them and when I had planned to shoot with other groups and other contributors.

My tutor also gave me further help with contributors by giving me a list of people who may be willing to be interviewed (not students). I went and found Tom Wilson; a student engagement officer who works within the college, we spoke about my film and he seemed excited to be involved and straight away gave me his availability for when he can be interviewed. Again, I noted this on my schedule and planned a date around everyone’s availability. I then emailed Tom to confirm times and location of where we were shooting the interview, everything was set and he confirmed the date & that he was able to attend.

Later on in the week I received an email from Firth Park stating that they “don’t have any confirmation yet on whether this would be possible (to shoot) as no one has given a definite yes or no for you on the cutaway shots”. This is when I decided that I wouldn’t keep contacting them regarding my film and that I needed to focus on getting other contributors instead. I believe that making this decision was a positive way of moving forward with my production.

I decided that I should and ask Beck Primary to see if they would allow me to get some cutaways, even if they turned me down I would be able to carry on with production as I was but know that I had tried with other schools to get cutaways too.

This week I believe I have learnt a lot, I think that I am now more independent and doing the research and planning that I have has helped me become more confident within my self and when speaking to people who I haven’t even met before. I have found that set backs help you develop more and force you to become more creative because you have to work with other ideas that you didn’t originally have. Overall I think that I will be able to carry on next week with more confidence as I contact my contributors and arrange more interviews.

 

Reflective Journal 08/05/17

This week was the first week of helping Dylan on his production as sound operator, I was really looking forward to working on a film that was completely different to mine and doing a role that I haven’t had much experience on over the past few projects. On Monday we went to Firth Park School to shoot some scenes for Dylan’s films. I actually really enjoyed being sound operator, I think that because its something that I don’t usually do I found it more enjoyable to learn new things and practice my sound recording skills whilst I was learning. Overall the first day of Dylan’s shoot went well and I was able to develop and practice my sound skills, which will also help me in my film when it comes to recording sound in the interviews, voiceover (if I choose to add this in) and any other voice in my film.

On Tuesday I had planned to help Giz with her documentary production, I was supposed to be helping with camera and sound set up and operating. However Giz cancelled on me at last-minute. I was looking forward to helping on her production as I thought that it would help me develop my skills whilst also learning about what types of techniques she was using in her doc, although this did allow me some more time to do some planning for my own film.

On Wednesday I knew that I had planned to shoot interviews with the Camerados group and with Amy on Thursday and so doing the right preproduction and planning for the shoot was critical for me to make sure that everything ran smoothly. I printed out log sheets, tracking sheets, shot lists, call sheets, location recce etc all for the crew and for me to know exactly what to expect on the day of shooting.

Thursday was supposed to be the day that I was shooting interviews with the Camerados group however, I hadn’t heard from Amy for the past 2 weeks since the first emails and since we spoke in person. I decided that before I went into the college with equipment to shoot, I would be a good idea to call Amy’s office to check that she was in first. I was told that Amy was not in at all and wont be coming in and so I decided to cancel filming. I emailed Amy to let her know that I had cancelled and that I would be rearranging the shooting day. Shortly after I sent my email, I received an email back from Amy saying that she would be able to get people to be interviewed on the 24th and she would be able to do a different date for her personal interview, I then emailed her back asking when she was free to be interviewed.

Even though I had to cancel filming on that day I knew that I had spare days left in my schedule for me to do more shooting days and so I made sure that I communicated this clearly to Amy and let her know exactly when I wanted to film.

At the end of the week I spent a lot of my time sorting out my schedule and making sure that everything was organised so that I would be able to have all of my interviews run smoothly when it came to filming. Next week I will be spending a lot of time on set with Dylan for his film, practising my sound skills and I will be shooting interviews in the camerados set on Thursday and I have Toms interviews planned for Friday next week, so  I will be spending most of my time on set.