6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

The use of both hardware and software was essential in creating our opening sequence. We needed to act professionally with the equipment and use it to the best of its ability to ensure our shooting and editing went to plan.

 

Animatic

In preparation for our shoot, we created an animatic with still shots. This allowed us to check that all of our shot types worked well before going out and using the real equipment.

Production

For all of our shooting we used a Legria HV30 Camera, with a tripod and microphone. We had previously worked with this equipment for our Prelim task and for GCSE Media, so it was all quite familiar.

After realising on our first shoot that the majority of the shots were grainy and dark, we decided to use Arri 650W lights on our next. Although they created beautifully lit shots, there were difficulties that came with the lights which we had to overcome. Firstly, they were extremely heavy, so carrying them on public transport required a lot of teamwork. Secondly, they became hot very quickly, and so we had to ensure we wore gloves when handling them. Along with these lights, we were able to use a large reflective disc to direct our light with further precision.

We were able to rotate all the roles so we all got to work with the camera. It was extremely easy to use, and the tripod gave us smooth pans which were ideal. However, our equipment was limited, and we ended up having to get creative and use a skateboard for the tracking shot of Scarlett's feet. We also shot a pan of Lauren's feet walking, although it was not used in the final product, and for this we opted with a swivel plate on the floor to ensure the pan was smooth.

Post-production

We used Adobe Premiere Pro for editing. We were able to cut and shape our clips, followed by grading them using the ProCamp tool, which allowed us to ensure the shots had lighting and colour matches. After using the ProCamp tool, we used a Three-Way Colour Corrector to enhance the pink tones in all of our shots.

I created some voice-over videos of how we used the programme:

As shown in the video above, we used split-screens to contrast the two characters and create a sense of interaction between them both. Although none of us had use this split-screen technique before, we found it simple to understand, even though it was quite time consuming to match.

Before we scrapped the idea, we intended to use Adobe Audition to voice-over our opening sequence. Instead we decided to stick solely to the music. Full of Mesh, which we found on www.freeplaymusic.com
This was a perfect website as it gave us many styles of music without copyright. We decided on Full of Mesh because it was upbeat and fun, which suits the mood of our sequence.

We used LiveType to create our titles. We debated between a girly hand-written font or one that was bold and capitalised. We tested both and found that the hand-written versions were rather illegible, so we used the other in a light pink shade to enhance our genre. By adding animations to our titles and making them part of the shot, it was a nice addition to the fun, uplifting feel to our opening sequence. For example, the hairdryer blowing away the title or the title swirling down the sink.

In hindsight...
- One shot which was difficult to edit was the 'skirts' split screen. Originally, we wanted the framing to be identical. However, we had filmed Lauren's skirt a lot more zoomed in than Scarlett's and it was impossible to zoom out once it had been filmed.
- I feel there were a lot more creative possibilities we could've grasped if we had had more planning and shooting time. For example, better incorporating more of the titles into shots.
- I would advise people that lights always help in interior settings, no matter how bright you might think the room is.