PRELIM: Evaluation

I think our prelim went very well. We though about the angles and shots and the variety we could have to ensure it was effective and everything ran smoothly.

We were given a brief on which we had to follow, it included some shots we had to take. The brief was quite broad, which allowed us to experiment, but as we only had a short period of time to film it we stuck to an easy place to film, giving us enough time to also re-film if we had made any mistakes, and to edit.

We chose our location to be in a small dark room in our college, which gave a mysterious look. We chose this because we thought it would run with our theme of a psychologic thriller which is what we tried to convey on camera.

We used match cuts, close ups and long shots to show our understand of how these shots worked and why they were convenient to use. For example, we used a close up on the subject opening the door handle, and a long shot to show the subject walking to the room. We used a panning shot while shooting the other main character, we panned from the bottom to the top of her body, which also added tension as the viewer would question what would happen next.

We also used artificial lighting in the dark room as the room was very enclosed and didn't let enough light in. We used a DIDO light to create a yellow spotlight, then we dimmed it so it wasn't so bright. This proved effective as we could create a sense of mystery.

We muted the sound as it wasn't very well recorded and added non diegetic sound from Soundtrack Pro to add tension to the scene. We used music from the category 'dissonant' and 'dark' as they fit well with what was happening in the scene. We also noticed that the prelim worked well without diegetic sound.

Overall I think the brief given is what we made sure of following. We used the types of shots they asked us to use and also used more to show evidence of understanding. As we also had time to film and edit and some spare time left over we ensured everything was exactly the way we wanted it to be.

From making this prelim we familiarised ourselves properly with the equipment we would be using to film our actual thriller opening, and also experimenting with Soundtrack Pro, Final Cut and the shots and angles we used allowed us to plan ahead and look into depth of each shot we would be using for our thriller opening. We also know that sometimes a shot can be planned but can be changed if we see something more suitable for the scene. Next time we film will be for our thriller, so we have to ensure that we can get as many different shots into the opening as possible without making it look over done.