Filming and Editing update

Filming

We plan to film the remaining shots of the school visit tomorrow (Friday 28th November) and if the weather is okay we will also be filming scenes 5 & 6.

Editing

Fortunately I have been given a laptop on loan so that we can continue to edit our production. Yesterday we were able to edit together everything we have so far and came up with a structure. Where the footage is missing due to not having filmed it yet, there will be a blank screen with the scene name written on it. We wanted to do this because it would help us to keep track of what we have got left to film and also because psychologically it now feels like we are closer to a final product.

Final Cut

Last Friday we presented our final cut to the class. We were very pleased with the reaction we got from everyone and the positive feedback we got - although we are still going to refilm certain scenes in order to get them to the best of our potential.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPk7autdK4o#t=33

Filming and Editing update

We did go out and film some of the shots in the town today, however when we reviewed them in editing, we have decided that we are unhappy with them.

Our final cut is on 12th December, so although we don't have much time left, Charlotte and I have agreed that we would rather re-film these shots and produce something of a higher quality than just put up with the less-than-acceptable shots that we filmed today.

We aim to film the whole of the rest of our production next week and plan to edit continuously unit the 12th in order to produce the best possible product.

Filming and Editing Update

Filming

Today we filmed all of the remaining scenes and missing shots and were able to get quite good quality shots. They are not as good as we had hoped due to time restrictions (with it getting dark so early at this time of year), however we are happy with them.

Editing

Today we finished editing our project, but will continue to tweak it up until our Final Cut Presentation tomorrow (Friday 12th December).

Voice Of God Script.

In our final cut we are going to have a "Voice Of God" over our scenes which will make the storyline clearer and make our documentary as a whole more professional looking/sounding.

We have devised a script which will be read out by our school teacher for us to edit into our production:

"Alex Curtis - one of the greats of our generation. Living with his parents and sister in the heart of the friendly town Ware, Alex organises each day in order to achieve maximum productivity. Here we are at Alex's small home in Ware."

"Today, Alex is visiting his old school, Chauncy, to invite his former Head Master, Dennis O'Sullivan, to his big announcement this Tuesday."

"Alex is a very popular person, obviously, and so sometimes, fans can't help but swarm him."

"Alex is preparing for his big announcement. Before every big speech, Alex likes to do a bit of yoga to calm his soul. Being calm is very important to Alex, as it helps him to clear his mind, and focus purely on what he is going to say."

Filming and Editing Update

Filming

Today we filmed the majority of the scenic shots that we intend to include throughout the documentary. Although the weather was not as sunny as we had hoped, we decided that the shots were of a high enough quality anyway.

Editing

We edited these shots into our production and also managed to edit together the title sequence for at the start of our documentary.

Production Schedule Update.

Although we have not been able to stick to the deadlines we set for ourselves due to technical difficulties regarding my laptop, we are now back on track with a loan laptop and are planning on working extra hard and putting in additional time in order to make our documentary the very best it can be.

To do this, we have constructed a production schedule outlining our goals for the next two weeks until our final cut deadline:

Friday 28th November - We will be filming the missing shots from the school visit during this filming session and also plan on filming scenes 5 & 6 if the weather is okay. We will be editing whatever we film during this session on the friday also.

 Monday 1st December - We plan on filming the scene in the town where Alex is swarmed with fans during this session. Also if the weather does not allow for filming scenes 5 & 6 on the friday we will film these during this monday session. We will be editing whatever we film in this session on the monday also.

Thursday 4th December - During this filming session we will be filming anything that we have left to film. This will all be edited on the same day like the other footage.

Friday 5th December - Wednesday 10th December - This is the time we have allocated for re-filming shots that may not work or may not be up to the standard we are aiming for. All editing will take place during this 5 day period and we will continue to tweak our work up until our final cut deadline, Friday 12th December.

Production Update

Unfortunately Charlotte's laptop has had to be sent off again this week to fix some technical problems. Hopefully it will be returned by next Friday in order for us to edit; we are going to continue filming in the meantime and if we cannot get it back in time to edit then we are going to use Adobe Premiere to edit the material that we film.

Target Audience

We have decided that our documentary will be aimed at teenagers/young adults, between the ages of about 16-28. This is because it is quite light hearted and comical, which may not be as enjoyed by an older demographic as they may not understand the type of humour in which we have approached our documentary with.

It is targetted at both genders- we do not feel that anything in our documentary specifies it to either gender. There is nothing particularly feminine nor masculine about documentary, therefore I would class it as "unisex."

The documentary is not targeted at one single social grade, but many. We have decided that our target audience would be between the grades of D (semi/unskilled manual workers) and B (intermediate managerial, administrative or professional people) and this is because the documentary does not have any factual input, and therefore anyone can watch it and understand it, and hopefully enjoy it.

The documentary is not aimed at a particular ethnic group, despite different ethnicities having different sense of humour we like to think it could make almost anyone crack a smile.

Alex's Magazine Feature.

We have designed a magazine cover featuring Alex Curtis to use in our scene where he signs autographs in town.

First Cut Wednesday

Today we showed the class our "First Cut" - although we had to do this by showing the 4 separate scenes as we have not been able to edit and export them all as one clip, due to technical difficulties.
We were delighted with the feedback we received.

Construction Criteria	Comment
Holding Shot Steady	Excellent
Framing of shots	Excellent
Appropriate material for task	Yes! Very clear storyline and good use of documentary conventions
Selecting mise en scene	Nice variety which suits your chosen storyline very well.
Editing for meaning	Good; but not clear what the main event is yet.
Varied shot transitions and post production effects	Great verisimilitude achieved and a sense of professionalism.
Use of sound	Quality of dialogue is excellent, music needed- but only subtle.
Use of titles	Nice titles to introduce your characters. Opening titles and end credits to come.
OVERALL COMMENT:	I predict this will be a very high level 4 when finished girls. You just need to continue to keep up the high standard of footage, and edit it together in the same minimalist and professional manner.

Production Update

Unfortunately, Charlotte has had to send her Laptop off to be repaired. This has left us unable to edit for the past 2 weeks as we have been using it to edit with Final Cut Pro X. However, we are not behind on work too much as we have used this time to film the first scene at Alex's House.

We are happy with the footage we have got, although we may find we need to re-film some parts when we come to editing.

Although we are now slightly behind schedule due to technical difficulties; we are still confident with our work and that we can catch up and continue to produce the high quality work we have been doing so far.
 We are going to use the half term to film more shots needed. 

My Interview and script

My interview as a superfan.

"Yeah he's amazing.. Yeah. I was actually round his house the other day... Yeah, he didn't know I was there but I feel like we really bonded. Well he was asleep. Yeah... There's this big tree outside his house and like, I climb it. And some times the windows open so.. I go in."

Production Schedule

Shot List

Scene 1

- Close up shot of Alex's bedroom door (handheld).

- Close up of Alex's head popping out of the door to tell the cameras he'll be ready in a moment (handheld). - Tracking shot of Alex looking at his tie collection (starting with Alex in the frame, ending with the ties).
Scene 2
We have already filmed scene 2 (see above blog post) and so the shots we used were:
- Medium shot -Medium long shot -Low angle worm's eye view shot

We didn't use many different shot types, as we felt it would not be appropriate and wanted to maintain that professional look.

 Scene 3
-Handheld shots -Over the shoulder shots -Talking head interview with fans; medium shot
Scene 4
-Handheld and tripod shots -Long shot -Establishing shot -Over the shoulder shots -Close up and medium close up shots
Scene 5&6
-Close up shots -Medium shots -Worm's eye view shots
Additional Scene
-Medium shots -Tripod only

In Depth Analysis: Katy Perry Part Of Me

Katy Perry’s Part Of Me
Katy Perry’s “PART OF ME” is a fast paced documentary that follows her as she achieves what we learn to be her childhood dream of becoming a famous pop star. The documentary opens with her “superfans” speaking to the camera about how they idolise Katy Perry and how much she has changed their lives. There is then a cut to Katy when she was 18, (a similar age to her fans) talking about how she wants to be a leader one day. I felt like this was effective as it shows us an audience how long and how much she wanted this dream. This relates to my documentary on Alex, because we also have an interview with a superfan, and a clip of Alex giving a message to his fans where he says “Just keep loving me.” 

There are more archive files of Katy as the documentary goes on, for example short videos of her singing on stage at school with her guitar – this further emphasises to the audience how long audience has been her passion for. She talks about how much she went through in terms of music, for example, only being able to sing Christian music, how this was difficult for her and the conflict between her and her parents over her life choice to follow the path of music. “Katy I’m not gonna watch you if you’ve got half your clothes off” says her religious Mum in an argument. Throughout these archive files there are quick cuts to show Katy on stage on her Part Of Me tour, to remind the audience she has achieved her dream and overcome all these problems.

There are different interviews with friends and family throughout the documentary – including her childhood best friend. This is an important part of the documentary as it related to the kind of thing we were going to go for. We are going to use interviews with characters in our documentary to give the audience more of an idea of what Alex is like now, as well as what he was like growing up. To do this, we are going to interview his Father (Charlottes Father,) and his old school teacher to tell the audience what he was like to work with as a student. 

We have taken inspiration from Katy Perry’s Part Of Me documentary because when I watched it it gave me the idea to use old archive files of Alex like they do with Katy, this will be an effective way of making up the 5 minute total footage we need if we find we are struggling. We plan to take old family photos of Alex and make a montage that will play at the beginning of the documentary to represent Alex’s character and personality.