I did lots of Test Filming, as part of my Research, and also as part of Location Scouting in my Preproduction.

 

This is the first project that I have filmed outdoors for, so I did lots of research and pre-planning e.g. Test filming.

 

The filming that I put in my video was filmed on 2 occasions, and it is those occasions that I am going to evaluate and reflect upon here. There was also a reshoot, to get some extra footage that I found that I needed in editing, but that was very brief.

 

I had originally set aside a full week for filming, plus various extra days for reshoots during the following weeks. This was for several reasons.

 

Firstly, I was planning on filming outside, and I was aware that in the UK I could not rely on the weather being good, so I wanted to give myself a spread of time in case we had a rainy spell.

 

Secondly, I was aware that due to the coronavirus pandemic lockdown, when I wrote my time plan, we were only supposed to leave the house for "essential" reasons, or for about an hour's exercise a day. I was hoping to film in the woods that are about a minutes' walk from my house. I figured that, if the rules were the same then I could use several "hour" slots of exercise to film in. If the rules changed significantly then I would need to re-evaluate.

 

Thirdly, I knew I would need to fit around my Dad's availability as crew, since he is very busy with work. In real filming scenarios in the film industry, accommodations often have to be made if key cast are working on other films too, so I felt this reflected real life in the film industry too.

 

It was good that I had allowed plenty of filming days, and also plenty of reshoot days, since the location was probably the most challenging aspect of this video. I discuss this in my Location Scouting section.  But having allowed plenty of time and back up time meant that I was able to do all the filming that I needed.

 

On reflection, I had considered and evaluated the 3 issues that I could see in the current situation when deciding how long to schedule for filming. Because I got all the footage that I want but didn’t have loads of days spare at the end of filming, this makes me conclude that I planned correctly when building in contingency time. In the film industry it is important to get the balance correct between building in enough contingency to get all the footage needed with not allowing so much time that the film would go over budget before it started.

 

 

Comments relevant to both filming days

My preproduction work helped ensure that my 2 main filming days went smoothly. For example, as part of my Risk Assessments I had planned to pack al the equipment in bags to enable us (me, my Mum, my Dad) to carry them safely (for us and the equipment) through the woods. So everything was packed up in bags the night before, which started the day well.

 

Also, the result of my kit list being complete and comprehensive was that on the filming days I didn’t forget any equipment, I had batteries charged and spare batteries and I had a spare SD card (which we did need to use, so it was good that we had it).

 

Also, having done extensive Location Scouting to find the shady glade that I was filming in, and test filming with just my Mum (when my Dad was busy with work), meant that setting up was quick on both days, because I knew exactly where the waterproof picnic mat was going to go, to put all the equipment on when not in use, so as not to be in shot, and I knew all the options that I had for filming on both days within the shady glade. My test filming proved very useful. This also helped me to keep a tidy, efficient filming site, which met what I had planned in my Risk Assessment.

 

Since my slider was in use for all the shots on Day 1 (filming me speaking to camera) and several of the shots on Day 2 ("filming me filming" and me filming my Mum), I had taken the time to practise setting it up quickly and packing it away quickly. This was particularly valuable since it was new. Also, as well as using it myself on the day I was filming my Mum standing with hr back to me, on the other day I needed to be familiar enough with the slider to give my Mum very specific and accurate instructions how to use it for each specific shot.

 

Since I have no clapperboard, I had planned on clapping to enable the audio and video to be synced up, by syncing up the recorder sound with the camera sound. This worked really well, I was pleased with how effective it was.

 

For both days filming I had been checking the weather forecast in the days running up to filming. It was frustrating that it wasn't necessarily a consistent forecast from one day to the next, but that is part of why I had factored in spare days. On the 2 days, rain was forecast for later, and we managed to just finish filming in time before the rain, so I was pleased, and relieved.

 

Comments specific to Day 1

Filming the part where I walked as I talked, the leaves under foot were too crunchy and thus too loud. I got over this by laying down towels (that were being used as ballast for the lighting) on the ground to walk on, this made it quieter but still enough sound that you would expect. From my research for my Neo Noir Interactive film, I had learnt that you can have the sound of things not on screen, e.g. police car siren that suggests a police car is near but not on screen, but you can't have sounds that would be expected NOT being there, e.g. footsteps. There were a couple of other shots where I walk and you can hear the crunch of leaves, so the audience would sub-consciously expect the same crunch of leaves as I walk, but it was just too loud in this particular shot. I was pleased with the effect of putting down a towel to walk on, I feel it was a good solution to a problem and I thought on my feet.

 

Note – when I got into editing I found that, once I had everything loaded into Premiere Pro, the other couple of shots of me walking on leaves were actually a lot louder than they had appeared when I was filming, too loud, despite my Dad wearing the headphones to the microphone. They were not as loud as the crunch of leaves had been before I put the towel down in the particular shot, but they were still too loud. When I reflected on why this might be, I realised that listening to sound when you are outside is going to be problematic even with headphones on. What could I have done? I have reflected on that question, and I think that by setting up the mic, deadcat, boompole, recorder and headphones I did everything that I could have this time, with the equipment that I had. I didn’t personally listen back to everything as much as maybe I could have done, because I was concerned to get all the filming done before the forecast rain started (which I just managed). However, my Dad is pretty good at noticing differences in sound generally, so I'm not convinced that I would have picked it up while we were out there. As part of my reflections on this issue, I thought about how when you are filming in the film industry, you have to rely on other people and trust them to know their jobs. When I filmed my Neo Noir Interactive film with Adam from my course on his sound desk he had headphones on and could let me know if the sound was acceptable or if we needed to reshoot. My Dad was great, and I am very grateful to him, but maybe Adam, having spent nearly a year on this course making his own films too, has gained the experience to determine if sound in headphones is OK. Although I'm not sure that he has used headphones outside for filming yet either. Either way, I was able to sort it in Postproduction, but, having reflected upon it, for future filming, the audio when filming outdoors is certainly an area to discuss with my tutors when we are back at College.

 

ISO – when we got back and I looked at the footage I realise that I hadn't had it set fully to Manual, and the ISO had auto set itself which resulted in a slightly noisy/grainy effect, specifically on my grey waistcoat. I believe this came about for 2 reasons.

 

Firstly, I am still new to filming on Manual. I believe it is definitely the way for me to develop as it gives much greater control to me over my footage. But I am still learning how to do it. I spent a lot of time practising and doing test filming, but this shows that Is still need more practise.

 

Secondly, this highlighted an issue that I had been concerned about, with using my parents as crew and me being on camera. They are great, and I couldn’t have done this without them. But, as I say, all my Mum was doing on the camera was pressing start and stop. She didn't have the experience to recognise that the camera wasn't set up quite right. If I had been looking through the camera at my waistcoat (which I couldn’t because I was wearing it) then I may have spotted that something was wrong.

 

This highlighted that I need more experience with Manual, which I will do for future projects.

 

In postproduction editing in Premiere Pro, I used a grain reduction tool to reduce the grainy effect. I put footage with and without grain reduction under Test Editing on my website, to enable me to get feedback on it from my Tutor Tom. However, when I showed these 2 versions to, he preferred without since with "softened" the focus a bit too much, which is a valid point. His feedback was that, until I had pointed it out, he hadn’t been particularly distracted by the slightly grainy effect, and that he felt it was fine. So that was helpful.

 

Crew – my Dad did the boom mic since he is slightly taller than my mum and most importantly much stronger, and my test filming had shown that my mum's lack of height and strength meant that she struggled to hold up the boom mic long enough out of shot. When I was shadowing the director Damian Power, I had a conversation with the boom operator, who was letting me do the boom mic for some shots. He said it took him 3 months to build up the muscle power to comfortably hold the boom mic up, so this makes sense why my Mum was finding it difficult.

 

I set up each shot and directed my mum how to move the camera for the slider shots. I also set up the lighting for each shot. This was particularly challenging because I was setting up a shot that I was in, but obviously could not be in whilst I was setting it up. So, I had to use either my mum or dad to stand in my place whilst I set up the shot. I hadn’t thought about this beforehand. I tried my dad, since he is slightly taller than my mum, so a little bit closer to my height. But he was dressed all in black which meant that the lighting had very different effect on him to on me. Whereas my mum was wearing a similar grey colour to me. But she is much shorter than me so her head was not in exactly the right place for lighting and focus. We used markers on the floor (large twigs) to try to get us both standing in the same place, which I think was mostly successful. I looked back at the footage, but I am really realising how hard it is to see on such a small screen as a camera. E.g. the grain issue I mentioned previously. If I'd been indoors I could have put it on my laptop immediately (even though it would have taken time, which is a negative, but I couldn’t really take my laptop into the woods for the day, the battery wouldn’t have lasted. For future, I need to investigate those screens that you can get that connect to a camera while you are filming.

 

Regarding the height difference, I tried having my Mum hold her a hand up to pretend to be my head. It was an improvement, and I was pleased that I thought of improvising like that. It was better than nothing but it was still a challenge for focusing and lighting since (as I have detailed in my Preproduction Lighting Plan) I didn’t want full high key lighting, I wanted a bit of soft shadow to add interest and shadow on a hand is different to shadow on a face.

 

However, I'm pleased with the variety of shots that I got. I feel that my creative planning and Test Filming meant that the shots are framed well, with some variety, for example me standing, sitting, walking into frame, or out of frame when I finish speaking etc. The wood works well as a neutral background but with enough variety that it doesn’t look like I am just standing in the same place, which is what was happening when I tried Test Filming in my garden. Also, there were still noisy builders by my garden, so the audio would have been probably impossible. So, I feel the location worked really well, just as I wanted.

 

Despite the ISO grain problem, I think that by using manual (even if not fully correctly) I reduced the white in the background that had been a problem in my some of my Test Filming and which had been why Tom suggested using Manual. I intend to work to improve my knowledge and ability filming using Manual rather than Automatic, since I now prefer it.

 

Lucky it wasn't particularly windy this day – we found out what wind sounds like the following Saturday, luckily then we weren’t filming audio, although I had wanted to film some ambient background noise, mainly birdsong, to edit onto the 3 sequences, and it was too windy to do that. I did try to record some audio birdsong later during the week and found just how noisy it was when wind blows. And at that time I found that when I am not speaking into my mic it seems to amplify the other sounds that don’t seem so loud when I am talking, for instance the crunchy leaves in the shots where I was walking but hadn't started talking like in the opening shot, that I didn’t notice at first. As I say, I was able to edit those crunchy leaves sound to reduce them in postproduction. I was also able to find ambient birdsong online, so I used that instead of recording it.

 

Comments specific to Day 2

This was a shorter filming day, and full filming the previous week (with all 3 of us) allowed me to learn from and hence reduce problems. For example, this time I checked that I was using Manual fully and correctly this time, and thus I didn't have any grain issues this time.

 

As I mentioned above, it was extremely windy and hence very noisy but, luckily, I didn’t need the audio for this day. It made me appreciate the lack of wind the previous week. I had considered rain getting in the way of filming, or it being so windy that it knocked things over, but it hadn’t occurred to me quite what a difference even mild wind could make to the audio. And that is even with the dead cat wind muffler on my mic.

 

The wind kept blowing my mum's hair around, so I was a concerned about continuity, but I don’t think it was a problem in the end, I believe the edit looks fine and the hair movement is not noticeable. However, again, it did raise for me other issues with filming outdoors that I had not previously considered, such as even mild wind could blow set dressings around and affect continuity.

 

I knew that my Mum was going to need to be standing up for the whole shoot. I had done test filming with her sitting or standing in various parts of the shady glade, but it always looked better with her standing up. She was OK with that. In case she needed a break, I made a square on the ground with twigs for here to stand in, so that she could take a rest then go back to exactly the same place.

 

I took "markers" with me to ensure the 3 different types of shots (stationary, hand held, on a slider) had each of the 4 different shots for the sequence shot in the same places. This worked well, it made the shots consistent, and being visible let the audience know they are consistent. They were nice and visible on Camera 2. I was pleased with this idea, and that it worked so well.

 

Summary

I'm happy with all the footage I got. It is much better than the garden footage that I was thinking that I may have to use if my Dad had been unable to be available. If I had had to use footage from my garden I was concerned about having our rundown garage in shot, or all of the stuff my parents have been hacking down but unable to get rid of due to recycling centres in the county being closed due to the coronavirus pandemic. I had put a lot of time and effort into making the creative decisions regarding the location and background, it would have been a real shame to not have been able to follow through, so I am really pleased. I know my Dad worked hard to be available, and I am very grateful.

 

It also allows for another creative decision, which is that in the test footage filmed in the garden (which I was thinking I may have no option but to use), my Mum was sitting on a chair looking at a hedge, which immediately sits wrong with the audience, who sits and looks at a hedge? There really isn’t an effective way to frame a good vista in our garden. But in the woods, she looks as if she has paused and is considering where to go next, so it looks like it could be a scene in a movie. I feel this looks much more professional.

 

I had spent a lot of time considering the implications of filming outdoors, since I have not done that before. I learnt from the issues that I have mentioned that arose, but I think that nothing that wasn't recoverable happened so my planning was effective.

 

I am pleased with how filming went.