My Last Blog Entry For This Semester!

In my opinion the end of semester two has come round so fast, as have the final deadlines. During this semester I have completed two edits, made a five-minute documentary, completed my BC1004 portfolio (showing my ability to adapt to different writing techniques and styles), completed a group project. I have also written two critical commentaries, as well as experience a couple of days on an actual film set. So we have had a busy semester!

In some aspects I am pleased with the work I have produced in this semester, but there are a few things I am disappointed with like my five-minute documentary 'Training a Guide Dog Puppy'. There were some areas of the assignment I was pleased with for example: the programme's content, especially the interview's content. I felt it was very detailed and provided good information for the viewers.
The areas of the assignment I was disappointed with was my camera work. This is something I would definitely like to try and improve for Year 2.

I thought my BC1004 portfolio was too a good standard and I was satisfied with the work I submitted within it. The only piece of writing I wasn't too happy with was my skydiving news story, in my opinion it wasn't my best news piece, the article I should have included was 'Exams Increase Childline Calls by 50%) This was posted as a previous blog entry.

The Two edits - well I found these gave me a good opportunity to gain more confidence in using 'Final Cut pro' and expand on my editing skills. Throughout these edits I got to learn more about the 'Final Cut Pro' programme, which helped me when it came to editing my individual project.

The project I have enjoyed the most during this semester is the group project. To begin with I was really unsure about everything. However I found I really enjoyed the filming and editing stages of it.

The Critical Commentaries didn't prove to be as difficult as i had imagined. The only problem I really had with them both was writing the introduction because I didn't really know what i wanted to write. However once I began and had the introduction, I was a lot more focused and the writing just flowed.

Overall I think this semester has gone well. I have found it has been a lot more pressure than semester one just because all of the deadlines have been quite close together, but I have managed to meet them all.

Next Year I am going to try and improve my camera work, and be more positive towards editing tasks showing more confidence.

Well thats it now until next year!

GROUP PROJECT EVALUATION

Now we have finished our short film ‘Escape’ and the paper work is finished you may be wondering why, the film’s title has changed from ‘Trail’. Well this is because when we first began the project, the film had a different angle, but as the script and paperwork has developed over the weeks, the group felt the working title ‘Trail’ didn’t quite wok. With many suggestions such as ‘Jealous’ ‘Eliminate’ Elimination’ we finally settled on ‘Escape’ because the film’s story is about a young girl trying to escape from her emotions and things around her.

After we had our final edit, the brief stated we needed bars and tones and a counter clock, which we included by making a counter clock in Flash and using the bars and tones from Final Cut Pro. However when it came to putting the finished film on DV Tape, we realised that all these are done during this stage using the final cut templates. So the ones we made were not needed!

To be honest when we first began the project we didn’t get off to a good start, as the group lacked in communication, and one group member was showing very little interest and effort into making the project a success. Eventually Aleicia and I decided that we needed to make some progress with the project, and this meant continuing without Simon.

When Aleicia and I continued with the project, I felt we worked well together. The group’s communication improved drastically, regularly staying in contact via phone calls, text and e-mails. We both invested an equal amount of time and effort into the project, and I felt we made group decisions together.


There are elements of the finished film I would improve next time, like the sound quality, and possibly include some more dialogue, but this doesn’t bother me too much because our film is musically driven!

Throughout the whole project we have had a few hurdles with actors letting us down, a group member disappearing but we overcome these problems and managed to produce a short film to a good standard and i'm pleased with the finished product.