Process

Process of filming I filmed five times in total for our opening.

1. The first time was me trying out the original script we had which didn’t work out really well. The storyline was too easy and old-fashioned which would of course not get us a high mark. There is also not much I could build on top of the storyline, e.g. insert shots of other things, etc. After shooting the story practically, I was sure it was a story that could not present the complexity of filming. Since it wasn’t an official shooting, I did not worry much about camera angles, shooting methods, and mise-en-scene. But I did changed into my pajamas to make the scene look like a casual, in home, before sleep ritual.

2. The second time is where we had most of our shots done. Choosing the location, props, and costume was the easy part. We based the location at an apartment because compared to a house, the area of movement is smaller which means we could spend less time on shots showing the transition up and downstairs, from one room to another, etc. For props, since we wanted our story more life-based, we only needed things that a girl would use daily. For example, phone and cosmetics. A prop that we planned on needing at the very beginning is a mirror. We needed it for the shot where we built our suspense to. Costume is a part of shooting where we chose very carefully because it’s the most important indicator of a character’s character and personality in a short amount of time. The character that I played wears a random black hoodie to show that she’s just an ordinary person and a cap to hide her face, giving her a mysterious “man in black”feeling. The character Shirley played, a rich girl, dresses up in a totally different way. In the beginning, she wears a gold-laced wool jacket, a short dress, and a beret. The typical outfit choice for a rich, high class girl. Then she changes into the “black swan”dress, one that we had an argument on. Shirley believes that the girl should be wearing a mint-colored dress with diamonds because it looks more elegant. But I believe that this black dress with silver ribbons and black feathers all over it is more suitable for the occasion. Since the dress is black, it is suitable for going to a night party and the feathers on it makes it representative of the black swan, it is like wearing an evil layer of the skin on. Acting and playing around with different camera shots was the hard part. We did not totally follow the script and improvised a lot of the things we were saying. I did all the shooting since Shirley was the main character. The most challenging part I had was a shot at the table where the television was playing. First I have to ensure that the movie “Black Swan” was starting at a certain point where when Shirley Close the door, the state light in the movie comes in. Then I had to rush to start the camera going. After Shirley enters the shot, I have to cross the room in a very fast speed and get ready to enter the shot. This sequence is really tiring and repetitive. There were in total 200+ shots. I went through them and chose 33 shots that we could actually use and sent it to Shirley to edit the rough structure of our film. This is where I faced another challenge, and that is to send the high resolution version to Shirley. Because we weren’t together, we could not use Airdrop. Neither could we use WeChat, Teams, Outlook, etc., because the videos will be compressed. At last, after doing some research, I uploaded it onto Baidu Netdisk and the videos were successfully delivered to Shirley. 3. The third time is where we did our missing shots and shots for an additional narrative at the end of our film opening because the shots we had, after editing, was only around 1 minute and 30 seconds. This time took longer than we thought it would because in our planning, we wanted to have a police. But in reality, we couldn’t find someone to play that character. Also, we don’t have the costume and props available to create the police crime scene atmosphere. After many failing approaches, we finally decided that Shirley would play the character of a private detective and I will be filming again. The reason why the character wouldn’t be confusing is because she had a totally different costume. The detective outfit is a suit with high heals and glasses to make her look professional. Then we had to set up the whole scene at the television exactly the same as last time. The time of shooting is during daytime instead of nighttime for our additional narrative to further hint the audience that this is not happening at the same time. A challenge I had during this shoot was panning the camera at a worm’s eye view angle to capture the walking of the detective. Also, since we don’t have a storyboard for this shooting, we had to try many things again and again before it works out like we wanted it to.

4.

This time, we filmed in the parking lot. We decided to change the narrative of the story so we needed more shots and we don’t want the whole narrative to be in the apartment. The parking lot is a good location that links with our previous shots because every apartment has one. This time we first looked at which specific parts of the parking lot we want to film in and what props we could use. We decided to use a pathway near the garbage recycling corner because not a lot of cars pass there. Also, there was a cart and a garbage bag not in use which we could utilize as a bag that contains body corps. First we filmed Shirley walking, she has a psychopath character in this setting so she walks as if she was drunk. This shot was conveyed well with the pillars, cars, and colors of the parking lot. We gave a close up shot her boots to see how she’s slow and dragging. Then we continued to film the narrative, the only restriction we had was that the echoing was very loud so whenever someone else or a car passes by, the noise is loud and remains for a very long time. An accidental surprise we had was that when we was shooting our closing footage, a car came in from the back, giving us a perfect and impactful backlighting….

5.

This was our last shooting. It happened at my learning club. We want it as the setting of an interrogation room so we moved everything unnecessary out of the room. For example, books, paintings, lights, etc., the only thing we left in the room was a pair of white chair and table. The lighting of the room was very suitable for our setting because there was only a lighting from the top. The walls were also like an interrogation room as two were white and two were glass. After all these preparation work, we started to film. We used a tripod so we could all get into the scene. We also filmed the same sequence from different positions so the audience won‘t get tired of seeing from one angle. One of the things I did that was memorable was that I had to go under the table and lay down on the floor to film a worm’s eye view shot.

Initial Reflections: · What have I learned from the task? I learned that it is very important to have a tripod to shoot shots that are long and not suppose to be handheld, because hands will definitely shake which create a different meaning/feeling to the shot to what we’ve planned (handheld shots are usually used when there’s an emergency or when it’s a first person view)

I also learned that storyboarding is very important because it will help ensure that our story development is on track and it highly decreases the time we need to shoot and reshoot since we won’t make any major mistakes or decide to change our narrative halfway through. Although, it is still impossible that we only take each shot one time…

Another thing I learned is lighting is very important. During night time, the dim light just automatically create a sense of oppressiveness and horror. One which day light will never achieve. But since the light is so dim during night time, we have to use a lot of fill light to emphasize the main object we’re filming. However, during daytime, there is also a need of using fill light but we hold the light further away to make it look like it’s natural lighting. · What equipment have I used? We used a camera, a tripod, a holder, a LED · What skills did I utilize and develop? -changing the camera parameters （ISO, aperture) -the eye-line shot, where when I film a first person’s vision, I film from the height of where their eyes should be at so it makes sense and looks natural to the audience. -the change in focus to create blurs to the object I’m filming in -to correctly use handheld shots. For first person perspective, for example when we walk, the handheld shot shakes in the pace we walk which makes the audience feel like they’re in the eyes of the character. The instability of the shot also is a good element to the thriller genre. -to use a tripod to correctly, changing it’s height, making sure the camera’s stabilized, etc. -Dutch angle shot, do create a sense of chaos -Ground level shot to that focused on the feet/shoes. This helps me portray the personality of the character by revealing a detail of her. -panning, so I could follow the character’s as she moves from one place to another in one shot. -long take (continuous shot) used when the character Tiffany enters her apartment and Tess followed her -closeups, there were many closeups of important objects -over the shoulder shot, used to combine the background setting and the character during daytime back into nighttime I also used some of my experience from all those movies and television shows I watched. Coincidentally, I really like to watch thrillers so when we have a narrative, I knew exactly what I wanted the outcome to be like. I’ve had some filming theory classes outside of school before so the spacing and composition of the shots were all designed to make the shot look discord/harmonious. -lighting, since it was really dark outside,and the streetlights were not bright enough, the face of the character couldn’t be seen easily. So we had some lighting that were from the direction of the streetlight to make them look natural. -record background noise so when we edit the soundtrack of the film, and add synchronized sound, it won’t sound fake and stick out.

-worm’s eye view shot, helps me convey a sense queerness and uncomfortableness to the audience. · What did I learn about continuity editing? Continuity editing is very important, the shots have to be relative so the narrative would be smooth. A technique I used for the continuity of editing is the cut on-action technique. So the character would be taking an action in the first shot and still doing the action in the other shot. This will link them together naturally.

When we want our footage to have continuity editing, we should film the shots repeating the same actions, this would make the editing easier and more fluent. Another technique is when we take a shot of a particular object/setup, we should be seeing the object/setup somewhere in shots before this shot. The shot before would act as an establishing shot for the object/setup we’re filming. · What difficulties did I encounter? Overall I think things went smoothly. But like above mentioned, we had difficulties in having enough actors as what we’ve planned; costumes were not so professional; there were shots where I had to film and act, etc. There were three other major difficulties that we encountered. The first one was that we forgot to record all the background noise while filming so we had to record it later on. The other one was the short living battery and the limited amount of time we had to film because people that live in this apartment needs to rest and it’s not very appropriate to bother them once in a while. The way we overcame them is to plan ahead every time. We make calls on WeChat to communicate on the details of shooting to ensure that we could use every precious minute we had. Next Steps: · What needs to be done now? After the second shooting, we need to do our editing and make sure that the shots could link together naturally. We also need to see if there are anymore missing shots, or that our narrative is too short and needs to add more bits and pieces to it. For editing, we need to choose the filters, the soundtracks, etc.

After the third shooting, we wanted to add some conceptual shots about the dark personality of Tiffany and add it to the part where Tess was standing at the television. We also may want to shoot our added narrative again so we need to plan for a fourth shooting.

After the forth shooting, we decided that we need someone to tell the narrative So it could connect. Therefore, we planned the fifth shoouting.

After our final shooting, we need to rearrange the footages. We have to make the whole narrative link together so there is a lot of editing to do. · What problems have I noticed in our footage? The color of the footage was yellowish because the light in the room was warm light. This made it look less “thriller” so we need to use filter later on to add the sense of horror. There were also footage where the focus did not follow up with the moving character; link with the narrative on the shot before; act to the best standard. We also noticed that there are sometimes unplanned background noises where we could not eliminate, this would have to be solved when editing. Another flaw that our footages have is that they were not that smooth when we try to use continuity editing, the movements are not that matching from the different footages…