Week 4 reflective post

In this week, we improved our knowledge about sounds & mise-en-scene so that we have a more thorough knowledge for our exam and for future filming references. This was a very helpful week because these sounds can now help me improve my future filming for example since I now know what foley sounds are then I could potentially use them so that I could make my sounds more realistic such as footsteps. Also, knowing more about mise-en-scene such as lighting and actors can add more realism to my filming as I know how I can improve the quality of my work.

Mise-En-Scene evaluation Billy Elliot

Production Design

In Billy Elliot, the production design was made to fit the current time so that a viewer can further understand the current era in which Billy Elliot is set in. For example, nowadays, it would be rare to see in 21st century Britain, boys fighting using boxing gear as football would be the most dominant sport. Therefore, this production design can give a viewer a more detailed insight into when Billy Elliot is set and so add more realism.

Lighting
In some scenes of Billy Elliot, the lighting changes quite drastically to show how Billy is feeling at the time. For example, in the image of Billy at the graveyard, the lighting around the set becomes lighter to show possibly how his mother is in heaven and thus a brighter light is being sent towards Billy which can show the affection that he had with his mother.

Actors
In Billy Elliot, the actors such as Billy's dad seem to have a quite strong accent from the North, which adds more realism as there were a lot of miners strikes happening at the time and so, giving them an accent can make a viewer be even more sure on where the movie is set. Moreover, the dominant race in the movie was clearly white which once again shows where the movie could be set as there was very little different groups of people around.

Color
Much like lighting, color varies in different scenes to show the different moods of Billy. For example, when his ballet teacher was reading him her mother's note, the colors were fairly bright and dark at the same time. This is to show that there is a difference in feelings towards Billy - happiness and sadness.

 

 Era

The era can be very easily figured out due to the riots that occur during the movie. As there were plenty of riots occuring during the 1980s, a viewer can easily guess that this was the time in which the film was set in. Moreover, the use of a gym for a boxing ring and ballet practice shows that there wasn't much money which was a problem back in the 1980s due to the inflation that was occurring because of the current strikes.

Mise-En-Scene Evaluation - KES

Production Design 

In the trailer for the movie Kes, it is denoted throught out the entire of the trailer his dirty clothes which he wears everyday which connotes that the wealth of his family is very low as they are not able to afford ways to wash his clothes, or to even change his clothes on a regular basis.
Moreover, Billy is denoted to being quite dirty which can be even shown by the makeup that he is wearing which is denoted by making him have a face which doesn't look clean which once again illustrates the difficult times that his family could be going through as they are unable to give him a bath or shower to clean off the dirt.

 
This image depicts how his face is which shows the filthyness within his face as it can be seen some areas of his face which do not seem clean. From that picture it can also be seen how his clothes do not seem clean as there are patches on his shirt which make it look unclean.







 Era
In Kes, when it was denoted that Billy and someone else from his school got into a fight together at the school premesis, it was shown that they started to fight in a small mountain of coal which connotes that the era that the movie was set in was during the 1970s-80s as in the modern times it was very rare to find any source of coal inside a school whilst 30-40 years ago, coal production was very neccessary for most people in England and so it had to be stored so that it could be used in future times.

 

Lighting

Also, when Billy is at home the lighting of the set turns dark into a point where it's quite hard to see facial expressions of the people within the set at the time which connotes that Billy may feel depressed when he's at home as if the lighting was brigher, then it could increase the mood of the audience and of the actors, but as the lighting is dark and blunt then it connotes the unhappiness of Billy.
However, when Billy is on the outside in the field with Kes, the lighting appears to be lighter than when he was at home which could be the effect of natural light which connotes that Billy is happier when he is in the presence of natural light and when he is with Kes which shows that Kes is what makes him happier.

Actors 

The teacher in Kes has a strong and powerful voice which is denoted when he is shouting towards Billy which connotes that he wants to show that he has power and has the ability to intimidate which adds realism to the movie has teachers in that era were very strict towards their students and were able to shout towards them with no consequences.

Colour

In the trailer for Kes, the colours are mostly fairly bright as Billy is mostly outside and thus, the director wouldn't put too much emphasis on adding a lot of detail towards colour. However, in some scenes of the trailer such as the end, the colour becomes quite dark, especially when the narrator is saying his quote which adds an emphasis of sadness towards a viewer.

Sounds

There are different sound effects which add various emotions to an audience when they are heard.

For example:

Non-diegetic sounds

Non-diegetic sounds are sounds which are played over sequences which cannot be heard by a character in a scene. Non-diegetic sounds are background music and voice overs.  In the video above, there are the main non-diegetic sounds; the background music and the voice over. At the beginning of the video, the background song is fairly slow-beat which shows the initiation of the rivalry whilst at the end the song gets faster and more up-beat which shows how the rivalry has become more intense.

Diegetic Sound

Diegetic sounds are sounds which can be heard by the characters within that scene. In this clip from Sea of Sand, there are gunshots. Gunshots are an example of diegetic sounds as the characters can hear themselves firing it. With the sound of the gunshots, an audience member can feel the rush as some of them can get pleasure from hearing the gunshots as they could be intrigued by the violence and the death that it causes. 

Sound Effects

In the Mean girls trailer, there are sound effects. Sound effects are often created by a computer as they do or cannot be made in real life. In the trailer, there is a sound effect of a tiger attacking as the girl is leaping. This was done to connote to an audience that she is as strong as a tiger attacking which shows her anger as she has been compared to a tiger.

Foley sounds

In the final scenes of Fast and Furious 1, foley sounds are used. A foley sound are artificial sounds which are created by humans or by objects. In the scene, the train is going at a high speed and there is a sound of the wind rustling which denotes the speed at which the train is going. This is done to tell the audience how fast the train is going which connotes the danger that both of the drivers are in if one of them crashes.

Direct Address

 In this scene from The Office (US), Dwight is using direct address. Direct address is when the character is directly addressing the viewer. Direct address can be done so that the audience is feeling more affected with the characters as they are directly speaking to them.

     Sound Motif 

Arnold Schwarzenegger is mostly known for his catchphrase of "I'll be back" which is known as a sound motif. A sound motif are catchphrases or sounds which are usually always linked with a catchphrase. In this example. Schwarzenegger's gives the audience a sense of danger as he always goes into various battles but before, he says his catchphrase. This connotes that Schwarzenegger is constantly getting himself into danger but knows that he can overcome the problem, hence why he says "I'll be back".

Sound bridge

The trailer for 'Horror of Dracula (1958)' is mostly created around sound bridges. A sound bridge is when the same sound is being played through the edit of 2 cuts. In this trailer, a sound bridge of sinister music is used which connotes that the movie will be constantly sinister with many scares as the music rarely changes. Therefore, the trailer warns the audience that the film will be packed with things that can easily scare someone.

    Synchronous Sound

In the trailer for Rambo 3, the music is very in sync with the action taking place. This is called synchronous sound. Synchronous sound is used to go with the action that is currently taking place. The music needs to be in sync so that it can add more suspense to the scene since the fairly fast beat can turn someone pumped and want to see some violence happening.

Asynchronous Sound

In this clip , there is an asynchronous sound throughout the whole of the clip. An asynchronous sound is when the sound is out of context with the rest of the clip.  Asynchronous sound in this clip was performed to show flashbacks, as the man is on the floor with a car next to him which insinuates that he got ran over. Therefore, the use of the sounds such as an ambulance with the setting of the woods shows that he could be having flashbacks.

  Sound perspective

In this scene, there is an example of a sound perspective. A sound perspective refers to the volume or quality of the sound depending on what is emitting the noise. In this clip, the sound of the example is coming from a phone. If the noise of the other person speaking was clear, then it would remove the realism of the scene as people would expect the sound coming from a telephone to be fairly rusty. Therefore, the director did this so that it could make it more believable.

Incidental Sound

In the Inception trailer, there is incidental sound throughout the whole of it. Incidental sound is when there is background music which depends on the scene just to add more ambiance. In Inception, the use this music will add more intense to the trailer since it shows that there will be suspense throughout. This can make an audience be intrigued on the film since many people enjoy feeling suspense as a pleasure.

Score

Throughout many movies, the theme for Jaws has become popularised to mostly symbolise danger. A score is music composed for a specific film, and in this case Jaws. The use of this song creates a lot of suspense amongst a viewer since the song is constantly changing tempo - from very slow, to quite quick which shows how far/how close the danger is.

Soundtrack

In this scene from Harper's island, a soundtrack is used at 3:30. Soundtracks are songs that have already been made and are now being used. In this scene, the soundtrack was quite soothing which can connote that the deaths of them were quite slow, and upsetting.

Dialogue

In this scene from This is England, the dialogue can tell an audience about the personality of the characters. Dialogue are the words that are spoken between 2 or more characters. Dialogue can be very important as it can show an audience what a character will be like, such as a serious character or a comedian. Also, the things they say can change the audience's opinion since if they say something humorous, it will increase the audience's affection for them.

Mode of Address

Mode of address is the way that words are spoken and an audience's reaction. In this scene from The Office, Michael is screaming and saying "No". This connotes his anger and his informality as he is denying something which he should not. Therefore, it gives the audience an impression that he is a bad manager since he rejects his workers.

Week 3 Reflective Post

For this week, we were given the opportunity to create our own small film which shouldn't exceed the 1 minute mark. The plot of the film is "a character opens a door, sits down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines in dialogue". When I saw this small brief, I was instantly intrigued by the various ideas in which we could expand this upon. In the end, we decided to add in a few more small moves within this brief, for example having an obstacle which could add a bit of humor into our film. The filming in itself though was the biggest challenge as we had to overcome a lot more problems then we expected. One of these problems occured instantly; our camera had no battery which meant that filming became impossible for a good 20 minutes. Also, the constant interruptions made it extremely annoying as we had to stop, and then start again which was frustrating as we had already lost enough time with the battery. When we managed to get the whole filming done, we are now editing it in Final Cut Pro.

Edit workshop Evaluation

In our filming, we used the required techniques to a good standard. Some of these techniques were the 180 degree rule, the rule of thirds and match on action. Using this would allow our piece to look smoother and so please the audience.

180 Degree Rule

We used the 180 degree rule throughout our entire piece so that it does not look strange. An example of us using the 180 degree rule is:

These 2 images display our use of the 180 degree rule. This is shown as in the first frame I am sitting on the right, whilst on the second frame, I am seated on the left. This shows the 180 degree rule because if we did not follow it, I would be sitting on the right for both of  the shots. Therefore, this shows an example of us using the 180 degree rule successfully. Moreover, if we didn't use the 180 degree rule, our piece would look very strange to an audience as it would constantly seem that I was always switching places which shows a lack of continuity.

Rule of Thirds
In our piece, we had to use the rule of thirds so that we had the audience understood what we wanted them to focus on. So that we could do this, we had to be sure that what we wanted for the audience to focus on, it had to be in the middle. An example of this was:

In this image, there is an example of a Rule of Thirds as since Tsel is in the middle,  the audience will have their focus on him instead of all of the space that is around him. As Tsel is the subject of the scene, it is vital for him to be in the centre as if he was in a different position like on the left or the right of the shot, then the audience would not have their focus on Tsel, as he would seem like he is unimportant and thus the audience would ignore him.

Match on Action

These two scenes display match on action as they both display the continuity of our shots since we had to make sure that Tsel was walking in the same place when he was leaving the building and as he was walking away front he doors. We also had to make sure that the doors were in similar places for example we had to make sure that the doors were fairly in the same spot so that as soon as Tsel was leaving the building, we had to look at the positioning of the doors and try our best to match it. If we hadn't done this, then it would look like we had very poor continuity and thus it would look strange for the audience viewing it. 

Challenges

Throughout our entire filming, we had various challenges which we were forced to overcome which induced a lot of problems to us. Firstly, as soon as we recieved our camera to film, the battery pack was already dead and so we had to wait a long time for the battery to charge which cost us a lot of time and so we were forced to rush our filming a lot more consequently making our filming a little worse than what we wanted. Also, we had the constant problem of people being in the background. As we were in a school, there was constant screaming and shouting and people walking past our camera which effected our filming.

Conclusion

To conclude, our film wasn't all too bad as the plot of it was something different than what would be normally seen as we tried to be as creative as we possibly could. I also think that we were able to follow our inital plan well which helped us in thinking on what moves we need to do next. However, if we managed to fill in some of the blank space that there was whilst we was filming, it would be very helpful.

Continuity preparation video