Generally, I would say that my postproduction was the smoothest part of the project. Once I had got everything that I needed together, the editing process was mostly uneventful, which was a relief after all the challenges that Location Scouting has caused in actually being able to get the footage that I required. So, although I had had concerns that I wasn't going to get all the footage, once I got it there weren't really that many problems with postproduction.

 

A few problems that I did need to resolve in postproduction were:

 

Grainy footage

There was some grainy footage due to me not having set up the Manual settings of the camera properly for when my mum was literally just pressing the start and stop button on the camera when filming me. I didn't see what came up as settings during filming each shot that day, since I was the one being filmed. I set the camera up for each shot, and I set up each shot including positioning in frame and lighting using my mum as a stand in for me, since my mum has no experience of DSLR cameras, much less when using Manual settings. So she didn’t realise anything was wrong with what was coming up on the screen. And to be honest, it wasn't really apparent until I watched on a bigger screen for editing. I found a way to reduce grain, using the grain reduction tool, which I hadn't used before, in After Effects. However, I noticed that although it reduced the graininess, it also softened the focus, which I didn’t like.

 

I did 2 test edits of the shots affected, one with the graininess "fixed" and one without, which I put on my website under Postproduction, Test Editing, and I asked my tutor Tom for feedback about which version was best. He preferred the original version, without the "correction" since he wasn't keen on the softening of the focus that the correction caused. I was pleased, since this agreed with my own preference, and it is good to get confirmation from my tutor. To learn from this, I made sure to have all the Manual settings correct for the nest day's filming, and filmed a little bit myself each time before each shot, to be sure, so that I wouldn't have a re-run of this issue. It reinforced for me that, although, with amazing editing software like Premiere Pro and After Effects that exist now, it really is better to get it as good as you can in actual filming so that you limit the number of corrections you have to make in postproduction, since it seems that often correcting one thing comes at the expense of something else. So, it was a useful learning experience.

 

Audio

I explained in my run through of what I did for Postproduction, under the menu item Postproduction, about the issue with the sound of me walking on the leaves being too loud when I am not speaking. I resolved this using the pen tool and it has prompted me to investigate equalisation methods when I can get them working on my set up. However, it has taught me that thinking about and paying close attention to the audio when filming can save having to fix it later. I am used to doing this for visuals, but not so much for audio, which I need to start doing more...

 

 

There are many things that I am particularly pleased that I did in postproduction, that I believe worked well.

 

Title

For example, I described in the Postproduction section how I made the title at the start of my video. I am very pleased with how it looks, it fits very well with the subject of camera movement, as does the actual camera movement in that clip. I feel it grabs the audience's attention from the start, increasing the chances that they will keep watching.

 

Split Screen

I feel that using the split screen technique works well, particularly the way I matched up the people jumping in the Rocketman (2019) dance sequence. I feel that attention to details like this are a strength of mine, plus being prepared to take the time to get it right.

 

As I describe in my postproduction run though, I haven’t used a 3 way split screen before, but I feel making the decision in postproduction to incorporate this enhances the video and makes it easier for the audience to follow, which is a key objective.

 

Cut choices

I thought hard about all the places I chose to made cuts throughout my video, and I am particularly pleased with the cuts and editing together of the combination of Kingsman (2014, 2017) fight scenes. These are a complex combination of shots, which I worked hard on, to be sure that what is on the screen at any time is representing well what I am talking about. And it is deliberate that the point where Gazelle kicks Eggsy occurs when I say the word "punch".  Again, I think this shows my attention to detail, which I try to apply to all my work, and which is particularly useful when editing.

 

But a contrast from the complexity of editing the combination of the Kingsman (1914, 1917) fight scenes is the simplicity of editing the 1917 (2019) sequence. Basically, I didn’t. I was going to edit together a sequence of clips from 1917 (2019) but when I saw the sequence from the trailer it was so well put together (obviously, professionally), and it worked well with what I was saying, that I felt it would be more effective to use it as it was, rather than muck around with it.

 

Reflecting upon this decision, both at the time and in writing this, I think that contrasting the complex editing of the Kingsman (2014, 2017) fight scenes with the choice to use that particular clip of 1917 (2019) as it is, shows the importance of not just doing something "because you can". It would have been easy for me to decide to edit some 1917 (2019) clips together just to show that I could. But that would not have been to the benefit of my video and audience, because I don’t think it would have been better in this particular case than the professional version I had found. I think it is a truth for the whole process, including postproduction, that you need to keep reflecting upon and evaluating your motive for doing certain things, Are you editing a certain piece just to show that you can, or is it the best creative choice for the film? Are you including a certain piece of footage that you filmed that you like, or also in this case certain clips that you like, just because you like them? Or can you justify it creatively. If you can't justify doing it creatively then you shouldn’t do it, like I believe it was the right thing to use that particular sequence from the 1917 (2019) trailer rather that editing my own combination, which I would have been doing for the wrong reasons.

 

Relationship between Voice-over and Clips/Stills

As I describe in my Postproduction details, I had put a lot of effort into adjusting the flow of my recorded voice-over with the video clips and stills. I was really pleased when one of the friends who I had asked to watch my film actually commented as feedback on how "slick" the voice-over is in relation to the clips, she said "they flowed really well together, the visuals and the voice-over sentences matched really well and so were very easy and hence enjoyable to listen to". Which is what I was aiming for.

 

In summary, I have learnt more editing techniques from this particular postproduction process, both to fix problems and to enhance my video. I am also very pleased with how the edit went overall, since I feel it has enabled me to make the best use of all my creative decisions and thus to produce a video that I am proud of.