Evaluation activity 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

After completing our opening scene, it is quite impressive how far we have come when looking back at our preliminary task we made at the start of the year. It is obvious that we have built upon our film making skills and it is quite interesting to look back and compare the two, allowing us to realise what progress we have made and how we have learnt from our mistakes.
The differences between our preliminary task and opening scene are things such as the location, types of shots and different scenes; however this was mainly due to the very limited preparation we were given. The main difference between the two is the filming location. As we were given the instructions for our preliminary task under short notice, we chose our location more for practicality rather than anything else. This meant that the use of different shots we could use were also reduced, which shows significantly as the preliminary task is much more static and unrealistic. As you can see, this meant our preliminary was filmed in school whereas we purposely chose to use a quiet, secluded forest for the opening scene. Similarly, we had to create our own plot and our own script under short notice, apart from the need to include “What are you doing here?” into the scene. Although the line that we needed to incorporate helped the structure of the task, it made it slightly more difficult to come up with an idea for the scene as it limited our choices and ideas. Even though we were under pressure for time, it wasn't important to have a strong plot as the task was more focused on the use of camera work and so this is what we chose to focus on.

The acting and plot line of the preliminary task fell in comparison with our opening two minutes. As the preliminary task was created in less than an hour, we lacked structure and dialogue. Although our main focus was the camera work, if given more time to prepare, we could've come up with a stronger preliminary task and would have had the chance to incorporate different camera angles in order to introduce more themes and emotions. From our preliminary task, we learnt that we had to be more convincing to create a polished screenplay. With the opening two minutes, the quality of our camera work was at a much higher standard due to the more advanced technology we used, as well as the knowledge we gained throughout the course, which produced a more realistic film. 

When trying to use the continuity and editing techniques we had been taught, we ended up using trial and error which showed us really how inexperienced we were. despite this the preliminary task turned out better than expected considering this was one of our first times filming, however when we came to editing it we were certainly aware of the mistakes we had made. One of the main things we had learnt was when editing, doing a shot reverse shot, rather than film directly in front of the face, we should take it slightly behind the characters shoulders to make the film look more realistic rather than very sharp shots. We also took the fact that filming before you were ready would help the editing process, even though we took this on we may have taken it on too much as when editing we realised there was a slight pause between the characters speech which made the task look staged rather than smooth. 

We used the conventional camera techniques in our preliminary task, such as match-on-action and shot reverse shot as the main purpose of the task was to practice and get used to using the techniques as they are so vital in successful films. We did try to employ the use of these techniques in our opening two minutes, i think match on action was our most successful camera shot as when editing we cut down each shot to make them look clean and smooth. We found that our preliminary task incorporated more of the typical camera techniques due to the heavy focus on camera work, whereas we found it more difficult to use of all the technical areas in our film as we had so much to concentrate on. Due to the genres and the pace of the film we found we paid more attention to the 180 degree rule in our preliminary rather than in our opening two minutes. This may have been because we were slightly more experienced and so were not forcing ourselves to use it as it came more naturally. Despite this, we did not use this technique that much and although we could have adapted the plot to fit it in like the other techniques, we did not feel that it was necessary. 

Overall, we felt our preliminary task had boosted our confidence and motivation to make an even better opening two minutes. This is because the mistakes we made spurred us on to improve our knowledge and therefore produce a higher quality piece of work. A lot of the camera work we used in our preliminary scene was used and even improved in our opening scene. Despite this a lot of the camerawork and techniques is dependent on the genre and pace of the film. Without filming such a thing beforehand, we would not have acquired the skills and understanding that would allow our opening to succeed on various levels, and I think we are all pleased with the outcome, despite further improvements which could be made.