III – Reflective Journal

• Contextual analysis –  Reflective Journal Entry

In the first week we considered the context for our films.

For the first two weeks we touched upon the contextual analysis which was all about demonstrating how we came up with the ideas for our films and exactly how we’re going to translate it from idea to production. We also made an action plan that detailed our week by week plan of what we want to do. I had to make sure I went into enough detail for each week to give the most accurate idea of what I was going to be doing. This detailed all the tasks I would need to complete and when they would be finished whilst also listing the hand in date and end dates for the unit. This action plan will be my guide week by week so I can keep on track with work and hopefully not fall behind. When filling this in I thought back to how I had done previous plans for my work and decided I should give myself more time to catch up with work as at times I can be a slow writer and sometimes get a little behind. With this in mind I continued my action plan and gave myself some time during the Easter holidays and some time after to catch up if I need to or touch up on any comments I may have gotten that needs improving upon. We also made a proposal, which listed my rationale, project concept, evaluation and proposed research, which will help me to detail the type of research I intend to do to help with my work. I talked about the intended primary research I intend to undertake the week after which was to do some lighting experiments to test how light would react  against a subject with VFX then being placed in the shot. This will hopefully help with my final production as I will know what works and what doesn’t when it comes to lighting. 

This contextual analysis really helped me to understand my idea much more and get to grips with how I am going to tackle the idea of my film. Making this and my proposal really helped me to get to grips with the ideas I had created and how I was going to translate them from idea to a full production.

• Research – Reflective Journal Entry

When doing my research there was a lot that I had to look at. It started off with looking at 3 – 5 different topics to research that will help benefit my project. The first one I chose was a lighting topic which I wanted to specifically explore mood lighting in scenes and how lighting affects visual effects in post production, (but I will come back to that.) The mood lighting I wanted to do to show how the characters will be feeling especially in the last scene. I felt I wanted to try to practice what was harsh and not too harsh so that is one of the main reasons I chose to do this as a research topic. For this I took a look at the three point lighting techniques to get the right amount of lighting on my subjects face and the background without one drowning out the other. I also wanted to take a look at how lighting reacts to visual effects if I wanted to use any in my final production. Mainly for something like a portal which I was debating when doing my research. I achieved this effect by using a gel over a light then hiding it in post production by either masking it or hiding it with the portal on top. By doing this I could then in editing play around with the effect itself to get the right colour and blend it well into the shot to look more natural as seen below

Before:                                                             After:

In editing I spent a long time mixing colours and trying to get the right colour to match the gels. If I were to do this again, I would not spend as much time on the colour correcting and general colourising for the portal, instead I would spend more time on constructing the portal itself and making it look a lot better quality. Thankfully though this was only for the research and I am glad to say that I learnt a lot doing these and looking back they only benefited my final production. The last research task I did was a camera lens test to work out what camera lens I will use to film my final production. At this point I had no idea we would be getting new cameras to use (the SONY HXR-NX200 cameras to be precise) until the end of my research. These cameras don’t give you the option to change the lens unlike the DSLR’s we were used to at the time which we thought we would be filming with at that point. Unfortunately that means this section of the research was deemed useless by the end of it. Given the chance to do it again (and knowing that we would have the new cameras to use) I would have used my 3rd research topic based upon them to maybe learn about the new cameras and try out some test shots, which we did later on which I will come back to. 

Overall my initial research went quite well and although having some ups and downs especially with the topics I chose, I am happy to say that the research will impact my film in a positive way.

We did some research on the new cameras when Lee taught us how to use them and go over all the settings which I have made in depth notes on in my Research Portfolio. I was astounded at how many different settings and modes there were on the cameras and how they worked. I enjoyed learning about how to change the shutter speed as well as being amazed to learn how fast and easy it is to white balance the camera compared to the DSLR’s which we had been used to doing manually via the settings. I was also very excited to shoot with the ability of using 4K, although we were advised against doing this by Lee due to the size of the files and how long it will take to render, the fact we had the option to was exciting enough! After spending about an hour going over all the settings and learning where basic functions like zoom, focus and shutter speed were, we were off to take some practice shots and learn how to frame them properly by doing practical experiments. I loved doing this as it gave us a good chance to make any mistakes before we took them out to film our final productions. We had some shots already composed and made by Lee to go out and try and replicate and I think we did this rather well and it gave us a good chance to get up and close with the cameras.

Throughout my production I continued my research, I made a moodboard before I was due to go into filming and continued it afterwards. The moodboard was everything that inspired my film, mainly the things that helped inspire my 80’s settings and designing stuff like costumes and props for Joe’s character Charlie. I took a lot of inspiration from Back to the Future. Especially Michael J. Fox’s character Marty McFly’s aesthetic and costume for the first film for Joe’s character. I think it is the most 80’s costume there could possibly be and I wanted to harken back to the film as much as possible and the storyboard shows that. It also shows some of my favourite 80’s films and TV shows as well as music that has inspired me and given me the ideas to make Out of Time. I think this has helped my research more, especially the fact I have been able to compact everything into one picture and I also listed descriptions for everything on the storyboard in my Research Portfolio to explain how the inspiration fits into my film and how much it means to me. 

I think my research overall has gone really really well and it was fun to learn all that i had throughout this Unit, especially learning all about the new cameras and making thinks like my storyboard which has helped me to learn new things about the 80’s to help make my film more historically accurate and hopefully will help me to leave easter eggs that the audience can pick up on! 

• Planning and Production – Reflective Journal Entry
  • Part I: Scripting Out of Time

Out of Time went through many ideas in its original scripting process, from being set in the 80’s where Benji finds himself in the wrong decade, not Charlie, to being about cops who find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time. (A bit too Life on Mars which is why the idea was scrapped!) Many hurdles got in the way of some of the great ideas. Mainly the COVID-19 pandemic which would heavily restrict our time and resources. Out of Time was going to feature a couple scenes set in the 80’s but with the lack of resources and budget. This was not possible. The script still went through many drafts as I was learning who exactly mine and Joe’s characters were and the more I learnt about them as I was writing the more I wasn’t happy with the script I had done. This went on for a while until I had managed to write a good backstory for each character that I was more than happy with. I was always stuck for a compelling ending. When doing the research we watched a couple short films to get an idea of what we could achieve on our budget and amount of time. One thing I noticed with all of them was that each one of them had a shocking twist ending that no one saw coming. This stuck with me throughout the whole process of writing the script. But what was the twist ending going to be? I was completely stumped. I kept doing some research to work out what had been done before. I looked up the works of one of my favourite writers Russell T. Davies and read his book ‘The Writer’s Tale’ which Russell wrote during his time as Executive Producer and Head Writer for Doctor Who from 2005-10. Here he writes his thoughts of writing the episodes and any issues he had as well as where ideas had come from. At this point I was looking for a bit of inspiration and had hope that something would come to me from reading the book. A couple ideas had come to mind but nothing that was ‘good enough.’ It was at this point I decided to contact a good friend of mine Nicholas Briggs who is the co-executive producer for a company called Big Finish Productions. Big Finish have been producing audio dramas for Doctor Who, Blakes 7, Space 1999, The Avengers, Sherlock Holmes and many more since 1995. I had a good long chat with Nick, (who has written / executive produced a staggering 1785 audios for Big Finish) about writing in general and specifically script writing. Nick told me how if it’s hard to think of an ending that means there isn’t one and the script isn’t working. That opened my eyes. He also told me many tips like how he usually gets an ending before having a full script written. “Sometimes it starts with an idea for an ending and you work backwards from there. All I had for ‘Ravenous’ (A series of 16 full cast Doctor Who audio dramas starring Paul McGann as the Doctor) was that The Eleven would sacrifice all 11 of his incarnations for the Ravenous to overfeed them and that was in episode 16. So, I worked back from that to episode 1.” So, with Nick’s advice and input for Out of Time, I went away and came up with a great ending, one that really fitted in well with a slightly altered story, so I worked back from this ending to the start of the story to get my full idea and i had a path of where my idea was going to head to. This idea was that Charlie (Joe’s character from 1985) was a relative of Benji’s friend Liz, and you don’t find out until right at the very end where Benji discovered Charlie’s denim coat he wears throughout the film at Liz’s house. I presented the finished script to Nick who loved the idea. “I didn’t see that coming! Great way to show off the reveal and it’s nice how it ties the whole film into a little package having the main plot of Benji and Charlie’s issues be tied into the side plot of  Benji having issues with his friend.” After getting this great response, I was more than happy to move forward with the script I had done. I made a few copies and handed them out to Joe and Liz as well as my friend Jayne who will be helping me film Out of Time.

• Planning and Production – Reflective Journal Entry
  • Part II: Casting our Actors.

When it comes to finding our cast for Out of Time, I already had my two main actors cast from filming the opening scene back in November. Joe was set to return as Charlie and I was playing the role of Benji. Joe took a little persuading to come back but after showing him my script and then explaining the plot he liked the idea and wanted to return. I introduced a new character in Out of Time, Liz, who I had written especially for my best friend (Of the same name) Liz. I had promised Liz a role in a few of my college projects but due to scheduling conflicts this never ended up happening. I was sure I was going to make it happen for Out of Time though and although filming the final scene with her 2 weeks after production had wrapped with Joe, it was all worth it in the end to get someone who takes acting at University to be in my film really pays off. I think it will be easy to tell in the finished film which one of the three main cast members studies acting. Liz was really happy with the script and after explaining how the ending works she liked it and suggested some ideas about how it could be done. Which I loved and worked into the script and overall production. I love it when a fresh pair of eyes sees the idea I have because it means I can get some added parts I may not have been able to come up with. Which is why I was so happy to have Liz on board because with her acting experience she knows quite a few things about how a character would react in these situations. It felt very refreshing being able to share ideas from more of a director to actor viewpoint rather than a friend to friend viewpoint as she knows how an actor would react in given situations (but not a director) unlike me who knows how to play the role of director compared to an actor. 

In conclusion, I was very happy to have Joe back in Out of Time and was more than happy to have finally managed to secure Liz in one of my productions. I know both of my actors will bring their all to the production and will help me in any way they can. Knowing that I have the opportunity to work with these two amazing people makes me ever so excited to begin shooting my film.

• Planning and Production – Reflective Journal Entry
  • Part III: Completing the Rest of Pre-Production

After I had my cast ready to go I had but a few pieces of Pre-Production left to complete. After finishing my script I moved onto my shot list which I knew would be one of the longest/hardest pieces to complete (with my storyboard coming in a close second). But with the storyboard needing the shots listed on them it would make more sense to do my shot list first. This didn’t take me long as I had been making notes since doing my script of what would be best for what shot. I had a rough idea for most of them which gave me a great advantage to completing my shot list. Using my script I was able to work out exactly how long a shot would last as well which helped drastically. I knew I would need to keep my film short and not drag out too long, mainly because of the amount of time I had to complete production but I was still able to finish up with 60 shots. Once I had finished the shot list and had realised how many shots I had done I got worried. Would I be able to get them all shot in time? It felt like a lot of work I wasn’t entirely sure I could complete in the short amount of time I had, but it was definitely worth the challenge, and one I was excited to undertake. Looking back at my shot list I do feel I may have used a couple too many shots to get a few different angles but I will shoot all of them and see which ones work best in editing. That way I can determine whilst editing what fits best and what works best in comparison to other shots I want to use.

I then moved onto my Storyboard and although it took quite a while to do the drawings, I was happy with the finished product that finally gave me a clear visual of my film. I was excited to recreate the shots I had sketched out in real life due to how close we were getting to filming and the thought of finishing the big hurdles was quite exciting. I was quite surprised however to find how some shots looked when they were sketched out. I had originally imagined them looking different but once sketched out a few of them took a different turn, looks wise. 

Next up was going out and filling in my Location Recce and my Risk Assessment. I knew that I would have to film at my original location from the opening scene of Out of Time which I shot back in November, so it was very helpful to be able to have a little head start with knowing one of my locations so I went down and took pictures of the woods and I was happy to find that the location was exactly the same as it originally was back in November. I knew this is where I wanted my story to finish off where it started so I was happy to see nothing major had changed (e.g trees being cut down etc…) Another location is my house which was easy to use because I knew I had some free house days during the film schedule so it will be easy and convenient for me to film without anyone getting in the way and we do not feel like we have to rush if my Mum or Dad are coming home from work or any issues happening. The last location is going to be Liz’s house to film the final scene. This scene is going to have to be shot at a different location to my house and I am thankful that Liz only lives a minute away from me making transport to all the filming locations very easy and convenient with the woods being a mere 10 minutes away in my car and only a 3 minute walk away from Joe who can get there ready to film. My Risk Assessment followed that which I found much easier to do once I had finished my Location Recce. This was because the locations I was at made it easy to work out what needed to be assessed. COVID-19 was a big factor in my risk assessment due to the fact that this would be the first outdoor project needing to be filmed and with the ever changing rules and regulations. I made sure that I was going to continue to maintain social distancing whilst filming and disinfect any equipment before and after filming. This wasn’t the only big risk though, there were others such as risk of falling / slipping (especially if filming outside is set to happen). There was even a big risk of cable wires which is always possible so I will make sure that I always have the cables tied up and out of the way when filming. The Risk Assessment can always change throughout filming so I will keep on top of it and make sure that it regularly gets updated if anything is set to change. For example the weather could drastically change and the risk of falling / slipping will be raised and then the equipment could break. Although there is a very low chance of this happening I will always make sure that the Risk Assessment is as up to date as possible. 

Lastly there was my Call Sheet to fill in. This was the easiest part due to already having all the information needed, for example our actors phone numbers, relevant information and much more. The call sheet listed Me, Joe, Liz as our actors and also featured Jayne, Louis and Fraser as camera and sound operators. Due to Jayne not being available to help me film with my filming days clashing with hers so she cannot help me film. Due to this issue I have had to get help from my two friends Louis and Fraser who I will teach how to properly use the camera and the relevant equipment so they can film the production when filming begins. Thankfully they both were available for any days I needed and having the extra body will help drastically. After completing this it meant I was ready to film so I booked out the relevant equipment ready to begin filming shortly. I booked out the SONY HXR-NX200 camera along with a boom mic and boom pole. I was going to book out a marantz kit but remembered that one of the benefits of these new cameras is that the audio can be recorded directly into the cameras and not with separate equipment like the DSLR’s. That night I went home and prepared for filming. I went over all the notes I made in Lee’s lesson when he showed us an in depth demonstration of the SONY HXR-NX200 cameras. I took a few practice shots and got all my settings precise and ready to shoot. I practised over the weekend which developed my skills quite a bit and made me ready for our first filming day which was Monday and then Out of Time was all ready to begin it’s week of shooting and production.

• Planning and Production – Reflective Journal Entry
  • Part IV: Lights, Camera, Action!

Moving onto filming I had my shot list ready and we began the first day of filming. I knew I unfortunately didn’t have my camera and sound operators any other day so my hope/aim was to complete all filming on the one day. The day started with picking Louis and Fraser up at 1. Looking back, if I was to do this again, I would’ve tried harder to get Fraser and Louis to start earlier but they were adamant at starting at 1 and not earlier. This gave me a bit of time to get all the equipment ready to unpack straight away with the camera set on the right settings and with the battery in and ready to go. I picked them up at 1:20 due to some heavy traffic with a closed lane in Crookes. It was absolutely vital that we began filming as soon as possible. We could not risk any more delays. Once I had picked up Fraser and Louis we set off to Stannington to pick up Joe and begin at our first location at Stannington Woods. We bagan shooting at 1:45 and worked all the way through scene 4 which is all set in the woods. Looking back I am very thankful I set all the equipment up before I set off because with our time delay it made it easier to start filming when we did as I only had to show Louis where the start/stop record button is and how to zoom and focus which he understood very easily. Nearing the end of shooting this scene we began to notice some rain was appearing but on the positive side we were nearing the end of the scene anyway. Unfortunately sound was very tricky to do with the impending rain and wind being picked up and Fraser’s lack of knowledge on how the sound equipment works taking its toll on the day. I was determined not to leave the woods until we had shot all the shots we needed to and they were adequate enough to use in my film. After about 2 hours we finished the shots in Stannington in and outside of the woods. Looking back at these shots I wish that I had made sure Louis had the shots in focus as when I went over the shots after filming I wasn’t entirely happy with the framing and focusing of a few of the shots. But on the other hand a lot of them looked really good and I was glad that Louis was filming as he definitely was a fast learner who picked up how to film fast. Although we would need a reshoot day to try and get a couple these shots filmed again, there were a couple I knew I could salvage in editing, ones that could be saved were ones where there were a boom mic seen in shot or the equipment bags are just creeping in the corner of the shots. After we filmed the shots inside Stannington Woods, we proceeded to film the couple shots set inside/outside my car parked outside the woods. Little did we realize that the local school had just kicked out and there were school children everywhere, this is where I came up with the idea to move locations to outside my cousins house on the other side of the village which means it was more quiet and we could easily get a few takes if needed due to the fact we had a space that was ‘ours’ Looking back I am glad that I chose to move this shot to my cousins house because of not being near the woods we had much better sunlight so we were adamant we would take as much advantage of this as possible. Thankfully this paid off in our favour. Whilst filming at my cousins house the shots I needed to get were all of scene 2 which takes place after the opening scene where Benji and Charlie get in Benji’s car and drive back to Benji’s house. There were also about 3 shots I needed to get for the start of Scene 4 to fully complete that one. I am really happy with how I planned to do all these shots because It means I took as much advantage of the time going from one location to the next and filming out of sync. The shots filmed outside my cousins house went really well, Although there was only a couple shots that needed to be reshot,due to positioning of the camera and other little snags like that, The shots did go really well, sadly though the rain did start to come down towards the end of this shoot, but thankfully we were just about done with all the outdoor shots. By this point just about half of Out of Time was shot. I only had scene 3 (set in my house) and scene 5 (which will be filmed at a later date at Liz’s house). I made sure that I had gotten a few takes of each shot to make sure that if any issues were to happen from filming-editing then I had a couple different takes to find the perfect one. I’m sure this will take me a long time to filter through all my shots when it comes to editing, but it will mean I have the perfect film with shots I can whole-heartedly say I like and are good. Once we got back to my house we set straight off filming scene 3. This one was, although not long, had quite a few shots to shoot in it so we cracked straight on. Due to the impending rain we shot the one scene set outside before the wind picked up. This one was the flashback sequence. It went quick and easy and only needed two takes which means we had much more time to film the shots inside. Looking back, I wish I had filmed these shots on a different day where the weather outside was a bit more in our favour. Looking back on these shots I am happy to see that they all turned out very good. I am pleased with all the framing and although one shot on the settee is slightly soft, It works very well. The quality of the sound had improved quite a lot by this point as well, due to Fraser getting used to how and where to hold the boom pole. This thankfully was the last scene to film in the day and we finished at roughly 6pm. We took a break around 3-4 So I am pleased with how fast we managed to get all the shots. The last things we recorded were voice overs for some shots / replacement audio where a shot is quite far away from the subjects which will be placed over in editing. I am happy to have done this because due to the wind in the woods it helps to have that boost with the audio. This wraps up the filming for Out of Time and although I still had scene 5 to do and a few reshoots still upcoming I was happy and pleased with the shots I got today. I am happy I got all the intended ones shot and think everyone did a great job. Joe was very patient with me whilst I tried to direct the camera and Louis and Fraser’s jobs. I am very pleased with his performance, to say we are both not actors and haven’t had any acting experience in our life. I was happy with our performances. I am also glad that Louis took such care with filming and took the time to listen to me as I explained how the camera works and overall, the day was a huge success.

When it came to filming the last scene with Liz at her house it was 6 days since we shot the rest of the shots. We filmed the final scene without much time after we both finished work and immediately went and shot the scene. Liz, due to her history with acting, was amazing in the scene. It took her a while to get into the right ‘groove’ for it but once we began shooting we were on a roll. I was very pleased with the shots I took. Liz even had to have a go at filming with it just being us two but looking back she did a really good job. She knew how to focus, zoom, and everything like that. She gave some great input on how to light the scene and suggested using the warm yellow settings on the lights due to the lighting being very bad in Liz’s house due to her energy saving light bulbs which take ages to power up and are very dull. The idea of using the warm yellow settings worked really well as it helped cement the warm / happy moods the shot is supposed to give off. We took many many takes for this one short scene, somehow something would go wrong with each one, mainly Liz would fluff her line but once we got the right take, it was perfect. I was very confident and happy with how it turned out and was pleased with the camera angles I decided to use, especially the P.O.V shots when Liz answers the door. I believe these actually turned out really well, given the small amount of space I had to record them and the size of the camera and the tripod. I loved how unique they are mixed in with the usual set of shots. Now I had finished this scene I only had a couple reshoots to do from the other day. Once I got home I uploaded all my shots to wordpress and began filtering through them one by one. 

The reshoots were helped massively with the help of Jayne who knows how to use the equipment well and could get the perfect shots needed. The following day from filming scene 5 with Liz was spent with Jayne and Joe getting these reshoots. We were only out for a few hours because I thought it would help all of us if we knew what we were filming before we got there. Thankfully this did help and We did our first reshoot in Stannington outside my cousins house doing the shots inside the car which upon further investigation into the shots taken a few days prior I came to the conclusion that we need to reshoot a couple more than i originally intended. Most of these would have worked perfectly fine in my film, but I made a decision to reshoot them as I was going out anyway to do some reshoots and thought it would be best to help get my film looking as nice as possible. By the end this took about 1-2 hours in Stannington mainly reshooting all of scene 5 which was the first shot we filmed the previous shoot day which came out looking really nice after finishing. Every shot was in focus and it was positioned right and with the new sound we recorded at the end of the other day’s shoot giving that extra boost to the sound. Out of Time was all done shooting and was set to begin editing. I think the filming went really well and I was excited to get all the shots put into editing and take a proper look at what went right and what could’ve gone better. I hope my editing will be easy, but with a few issues I had with my original scene back in November, I fear there may be a few issues. But I am prepared to try and edit the best possible film.

• Editing – Reflective Journal Entry

With all the shots ready on my harddrive I had already hit a snag. The shots would not copy over onto Sony Vegas Pro. From memory this had happened before but I could not remember how I fixed it. I Googled the issues I had and learnt that I needed to install a software called ‘Handbrake’ This enabled me to convert the clips I had into a different format. That format being an ‘.m4v’ file and not ‘.mp4’. I had no idea why this issue would occur but thankfully after converting each and every shot into a brand new folder for each shot it enabled me to upload my shots onto my workbench on Sony Vegas Pro 13. It took me a whale to do this as it took around 5-10 minutes for each and every take I had on my laptop. Once this was done I had over 100 shots to begin editing with. I didn’t want to overload the software so I decided a good tactic would be to edit the film scene by scene and then into one long video. This would backfire on me but I will come back to that. I started with the opening scene I edited in November which acted as scene 1 of 5. I then began with scene 2 shots right after. Although having the delay with the issue of the shots’ format, I Was glad to get started. I wanted my film to look as nice as possible so after getting all the shots I liked I made a rough cut of the scene and then began to tweek that. I worked quite hard to cut out little errors and mask out any boom poles seen in the shots. Thankfully the majority of this was using the reshoots I had filmed the previous day. Upon editing I noticed that a few shots were soft so I tried my best to make them look as nice as possible. I attempted to add in a ‘Sharp’ effect to get the production looking as nice as possible and to un-soft a few shots but to no success. If anything it made the shots worse, The reason they were a bit soft is because of us being too close to the camera. I had no choice but to continue with the shots that were taken. I then edited the shots down to a clearer cut and then rendered it.

I continued this same process with every scene. Rough cut, glamour up with effects, then a cleaner cut, then render. Once I had finished all of this I had the credits left to edit and that meant my film was done! In 6 parts which would then be placed together and was finally rendered. This at the time looked really nice but it was only when we then did the ‘Present’ task and I saw my film on the big screen that I realised there were issues with the cut. A lot of issues that needed to be fixed.

A huge issue was the quality. Due to the film having two render’s, (Each scene and then a final render altogether) The quality had been compressed drastically. I felt whilst watching the film that it needed to be rendered once to stop the film compressing and losing the 1080p quality that I had when recording. 

Due to this I was back to square one. I decided to restart the editing process and do it all in one timeline. After doing this I hit another snag. The more shots I tried to add to the timeline the higher the chances were the timeline would just fail with the shots in. I still had my sound but the shots would turn black. I had no clue why this was happening and could not find a solution that ended with me rendering my film in 1 video. I decided that I would try to copy all the shots in the sony vegas file and paste them into a new timeline. After attempting this a few times, I would still have this issue. Luckily there was a 1 in 6 chance it wouldn’t be so, after trying a few times, I managed to get a timeline in Sony Vegas where everything was working perfectly. I could see every shot perfectly and then I proceeded to add colour correction. I did some research to find what the most common colour correction settings are used in films and I gave each of them a try. After playing around with my settings for quite a while, never truly happy with what I had done, I decided to take a break where I watched some of my favourite shows. I watched Doctor Who, specifically an episode from Series 12 where I noticed the series uses a distinct colour correction, one that makes the shots have a greener tone to them. I then had a google of other shows and films to find this is really common. Below are two examples of the colour correction used in Doctor Who series 12

Before: and After:

As you can see, there is an added ‘dishwasher water green’ colour added to the grading which, although quite strong in this shot, is used in all different strengths in many productions. I wanted to take advantage of this and really wanted to use it to make my film look as professional as possible. I didn’t want to use as strong a colour in my production to take away from the shots themselves to make them be almost unwatchable, but I was determined to echo this as much as possible. Below are a before and after when I use my colour correction. As you can see there is a distinct change in the grading, but nothing that would take away from the screen.

Before:  

After:

As you can see, although not distinctively different, adding that little amount of colour correction can make a film not look as cheap and as ‘student-y’ This was a great decision I think, and one that pays off quite well in my favour. Below are the specific colour correction specifications I used.

Another thing I wanted to do with my film was to ‘Letterbox’ it. This means that the film’s aspect ratio will be cropped to look more cinematic and professional. Usually Letterboxing short/full length films are put into a 1.85:1 or 2.39:1 aspect ratio, this cuts off quite a lot of screen, but due to there being a couple shots where I didn’t want any headroom cut off I needed an aspect ratio that would keep more head room in. This is where I once again Turned to Doctor Who which since 2018’s Series 11, the show has adapted a new 2:1 aspect ratio instead of the traditional 16:9 aspect ratio seen in the majority of tv shows from the mid 1990’s- the present day. I feel this decision benefited me greatly as my film now looks like a professional film compared to what it looked like before. Comparison pictures below

Before:

After:

Overall, I am very happy with my edit and although having the most problems with my edit compared with how filming went, I think the editing has done the film justice that it needs and so with that editing is complete! Looking back, if I was to change anything I probably would have edited in Premiere Pro. This is due to the fact that I had some issues uploading my shots to Sony Vegas’ workbench whereas when asking my classmates, no one else seems to have this issue. I presume this is down to the fact that I was editing in a different software to everyone else but at the end of the day, I am satisfied with the finished product and every shot is as best as possible.

• Presentation – Reflective Journal Entry

On Friday the 28th May we presented our films to everyone in the TV Studio, we got feedback and gave feedback on everyone else’s. Thankfully I didn’t have the final edited version of Out of Time ready for everyone to watch at this point. I did get some great feedback, some including…

‘Good use of different shot types and framing.’

And…

‘A really great variety of shot types, sizes and angles, and these flowed into one another really well. Some of your shots were slightly out of focus, but not drastically. I think you had some really nice moving shots, and this helped create a dynamic feel to your film! I think the shots within the car are really well exposed, and look really good!’

I also got some constructive feedback for example…

‘The audio varies slightly from shot to shot, so just make sure the levels are consistent the way through. I like how you carried the music through different scenes, and I think the music added extra interest to the audio. At 1:43, the audio is only in the left ear, so I would just have a look at that. Some of your lines are slightly muffled, and a bit quick, so it can be a little hard to tell what exactly you’re saying, so if you were to do it again, I would maybe re-record the audio, or the shot again.’

I took this and all my feedback on board and acted upon all of it because I knew all these little issues were there anyway and were the things I wanted to tidy up in my final cut.With this being said, I am glad I got the chance to present my film to my peers as it gives me a non biased look on my film that means I can get opinions my friends may be a bit too kind to say. Safe to say though every comment on my film got acted upon and I am glad to say it did improve my film. There were a few little errors I didn’t notice though, for example the sound coming out of one channel is something I thankfully found out before editing my final cut.

• Evaluation – Reflective Journal Entry

Looking back at my proposal comparing it to the film I have now completed, I set out to create a film for 18-25 year olds. But something that everyone any age could enjoy. I also set out the task of making the film that evoked all my favourite genres and themes for example the 80’s, supernatural, drama and action but to name a few. I believe Out of Time is the film I set out to make and looking back i fulfilled my hopes and dreams as a filmmaker and believe it has improved my skills as a filmmaker. 

I liked being able to express myself through my film. I was happy I was able to unleash my set of skills when it came to my editing. Compared with my original edit, I do think that the final cut is some of my best work where I have been able to shoot shots I wanted to and leave my own stamp on the project. I am happy with the final shots that came out and to get the help of my friends in the film was the best help I could possibly ask for. 

On the other hand, nothing is perfect and Out of Time still has a few issues. I feel like Me and Joe should have done a few more takes with more emotion. Due to our lack of acting experience, I regret that we aren’t entirely capable of giving a dramatic performance. Looking back as well, given more time I wish I thought a few of my shots through more so that they look much better and I could’ve worked around a couple that were not in focus. But, given the short amount of time we had, I can fairly say that I have achieved the film I set out to and I am glad I was able to get Out of Time from script to screen.