THE END

Last night saw the ending to our Planning and Making a Film module... and it went with a bang.

All our films were showcased at The Little Theatre in Bath and it was an absolutely amazing night. It was so interesting seeing everyones films on a big screen, and although I had already watched all the other films, it was just excellent to see them in that kind of environment. It was great to see all the changes that people had made since their rough cuts, and personally I thought that The Cure [Dir. Liz Scott] really turned their film around with the narrative. It made the story line much smoother and added a depth to the main character.

I also really enjoyed what Lydia Beardmore did with my script "R.S.V.P". After seeing the rough cut I really hoped that they pick up the pace of the film a bit more... which they did. They added some excellent music and overall the film was a success. In comparison with my script it was definitely more 'censored' it could have been a lot messier... but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It was a really interesting experience writing a script but to then have absolutely no involvement in producing it.

I said in my previous post "Editing and Final Cut the second time around" - I felt quite disappointed with how our film turned out, so I was really nervous about other people viewing it and how it would be received. But the audience's reaction was overwhelming.

As soon as the opening titles came up, my heart was in my mouth, and I don't think I have ever felt my chest beat that hard before. "Katy this would be the worst possible time to have a heart attack" was literally all that was going through my head. This was the first time any film I had made, had been publicly shown. It was exhilarating. The audience laughed at all the right moments, and even at unintended moments too, which was wonderful. So I found myself sat there actually enjoying our film properly for the first time. But the applause was absolutely amazing. I'm not gonna lie.... I LOVED IT! That has to be the best feeling in the world.

The Interview [Dir. Gus Newby] won the audiences' vote, and we also won a bottle of champagne coming 2nd - Which we drank with much appreciation. The majority of groups then strolled over to the Westgate for more celebratory drinks.

The whole night meant so much to me. I'm so glad we had this opportunity, because I think this is something I would really like to do in the future.

I really want to thank all the cast and crew for putting so much effort into making Dans L'Esprit: The Vision. Also thanks to Mike Johnston for all his help, and for organizing the event at The Little Theatre.

THE END

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Editing & Final Cut, second time around.

The editing process went really well. Annabel our main editor was beyond fantastic. She is a total perfectionist which is brilliant because it meant that every scene is cut beautifully.

The images that I have inserted are just to support what I'm going to reflect, they are not the actual editing images unfortunately, but screen shots that I have taken from Final Cut Express.

We were using Final Cut Pro software again, which I think we're all starting to get the hang of. But this was the first time I had ever really learnt about colour correction. We were fortunate enough to be given the help of Jamie Worsfold going over our colour grading so that they look just right for the showing at the Little Theatre tomorrow.

Below are some examples of how colour correction changes the image. The first image is slightly under exposed, there's a lot of black due to the fact that it's not very well lit.

By adjusting the mid-tones and the saturation we can lift the image to bring out more of the whites.

The editing process was much longer with this film than the one we made before Christmas. This is partly down to the documentary style of the film, but also I think due to the fact that we were only using the Broadcast Lab macs rather than the convenience of a laptop. However this was perfectly fine as we had our rough cut and final cut ready in plenty of time.

I did begin to feel that towards the end of the edit, there were a lot of shots we probably should have re-taken as it left the impression on me that it really looked like a typical student film... and I had hoped to make something exceptional. I also felt as though maybe the story line could have done with a little bit more just to explain why Owen went so crazy. But as we had 15mins of film which we had to cut down to 8mins, there wasn't much we could do to save the pace of the film.

Dans L'Esprit: The Vision (Production) 19/20/21st March 2010

If I had to sum up our production weekend in three words, they would be:

• Intense
• Exciting
• Improvised

These probably shouldn't be the first words that come to mind, and combined they might sound disorganized but, this was the impression the production weekend left on me. I loved every second of it (Despite the tears, perhaps!).

Because we had so much to shoot and a busy cast, as director, I felt as though we should make the best use of our time by starting as soon as possible. We collected our kit on the Friday and went straight to location to shoot five of our scenes. However, we soon discovered that due to a faulty XLR lead, our sound input was terrible. We toyed with the idea of using the internal mic, hoping that this might add to style of the film, and emphasize the 'behind the scenes' vision. But after much deliberation it was decided that someone should head back to campus and collect a new lead (Rosie Harris wins 'Hero of the Day 2010' for that). Although this took nearly 3 hours (mainly due to rush hour traffic), I don't regret this decision at all. We had allowed plenty of time over the entirety of the weekend for any unforeseen circumstances.

Our shoot that was meant to start at 3pm didn't begin until 6:00pm.

The filming itself on the first day went very well, despite the weather. And due to the late start we didn't have enough daylight hours either, so had to make a few compromises concerning exterior scenes. But after swapping some of the scenes around we still managed to film as much as we intended on the first day. Everybody gave 100% effort.

The second day began slowly. I don't feel as though our time management was executed particularly well. We attempted to apply a tracking shot to our opening film noir scene, without actually using tracks. Mistake! Inevitably we spent too long trying to get that scene just right, I believe we had approx. 12 takes. For a scene that we had originally allowed 1 hour to shoot in total (inc. all 14 shots) took nearly 2 hours to capture. As a result, some of the cast were upset about being made to wait so long for their scenes, and most of the crew were feeling the pressure to get scene 1 in the bag. This was understandable, but they were all easily bribed with fish and chips and the mood was eventually raised.

The rest of the filming on Saturday went without a glitch. The weather was still terrible, so we continued with most of our interior scenes. There were a couple of scenes which we huddled under umbrellas, but thankfully on the final shooting day we got some brilliant sunshine, so were able to shoot our important exterior scene for Steve's speech.

One of the last scenes that we shot on the Saturday was the film's final scene - in which Owen the scriptwriter destroys the set and attacks Hubert Hall. Originally we had intended to shoot this scene outside with a club/bat and lots of blood. However, due to the unfavourable weather at the time we had to hold an emergency meeting to rewrite the scene. There was no way that we could have shot this scene as an interior with all the blood. Although short films can work unrealistically we decided it would be less believable for Owen to attack the cast and crew wielding a bat, and there not be any blood. So instead we re-wrote the scene with a gun.

We improvised again whilst filming this scene when Josh (Cameraman) managed to end up in front of Owen as he tried to exit, resulting in a chase. It was agreed that it was more entertaining as a story-line to see Hugh being threatened and then involve the character of the Cameraman more. I felt as though this worked on the level that the film we made was a

moc-k-umentary and so the involvement of the Cameraman as a character was essential. It just so happened that the ending of the film came about through unrehearsed choreography. It was also unnerving how naturally Rolf Pratt (Owen) conveyed the role of psychotic killer, "Does anybody want to be a hero?... Where you going CameraBoy?... I'm gonna put a bullet between your eyes!" -all Rolf's own work. Brilliant.

Sunday went incredibly smoothly, mainly due to the fact we had beautiful weather. We rapped at about 6pm and must have cleared out from our location around 7pm ish after grabbing a few establishing shots. And, so as not to break tradition, we then enjoyed an excellent rap party.

I really felt as though everybody involved put their all into making this film and I really hope that it shows.

I really enjoyed my role as director. The responsibility was huge, but as this was a group film, we made most of our decisions collectively. I think this was very important in order to maintain a group mentality.

Future Shorts

I just thought this was pretty damned good,
so wanted to share it...

I love the use of camera angles, the music is perfect,

and I really love the way it's cut together sharply.

You may not agree with me,

but I felt as though it was a condensed version of:

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

(2004) [Dir. Michel Gondry]

...Only, just a little bit happier.

And of course, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) [Dir. Michel Gondry]