Reflective Blog's
(overturefilm, 2009)
(Icon films Austrailia and New Zeland , 2012)
(Luc Senal, 2010)
week 1
On the first week back to college we started to discuss all the options there will be for us after college to do so we all created our own UCAS accounts and began researching the different pathways possible relevant to our course and then different ways of completing those courses. This helped me to understand all the different courses there are and the options available that would suit me best, whether that be a sandwich course studying one year abroad, a part time or full time course. Aside from university we also discussed apprenticeships or going into full time work as well as a gap year, from all of this discussion and research i felt comfortable creating my own mind map of all the different options available to me, when doing so I made not of three universities I was interested in and managed to improve my mindmap skills keeping them simple and easy to understand.
week 2
This week we began our first script writing lesson to do so we discussed the ''ingredients'' to a story challenging each others ideas of what is the most to least important ''ingredient'' from this I learnt that the most important is characters as without them there is no story especially when it comes to scripts. This lead onto the making of our own characters, by answer questions I was able to create a character with likes, dislikes their job, hobbies and more in just a couple of minutes. I did however discover I need develop my pitching skills of my character by keeping it short whilst still giving all the relevant information. This week we also began documentary research to do this we watched a couple of documentary trailers and broke them down to give examples of where the typical conventions of a documentary were shown, from this I learnt what most documentaries typically included that being first hand witness interviews, hand held cameras all to support that its not scripted. This then led onto the comparison of two documentaries this time we watched 30 minutes of each film to take notes on the similarities and differences, when completing this task I realized I needed to develop my analysing skills I was thinking too small on the comparisons I needed to think more like a movie maker on the structure, the type of lighting etc. However, from both tasks this week I learnt the basic structure/''ingredients'' to a documentary and story which will help me to progress with my work on these subjects.
(SmokyHillsPBS , 2019)
week 3
This week we looked further into documentary specifically the 6 modes of documentary to understand the 6 different modes we firstly defined a definition for each mode; to do this we watched videos of documentary of the different modes noting key factors and were then able to discuss as a class before getting the definition form our tutor. From this task I was able to gather examples other people saw for each mode and ask questions. This then meant I felt compfortable watching parts of given documentaries to define a mode for each of them, supporting my reasoning with examples from the film to come to final conclusion as to what mode of documentary it is. Overall, this week I was able to further develop my knowledge of documentaries, and my analysing skills with the support of examples/evidence to back up the points I make. To note I was also Ill this week so was only in one day.
week 4
This week we were introduced to a vox-pop style of documentary, to understand this style we watched examples of vox-pop interviews and discussed the key factors to making a vox-pop interview documentary. From this I was able to gain an understanding of what a vox-pop interview is, meaning I was happy to move on and in a group make my own. To do this we came up with some questions basing ours on film, the location(s) of filming and finally gathered the equipment and set out to film. From this practical task I did improve my confidence skills speaking to strangers and having the confidence to film in a public setting. When editing I was also able to improve my skills further discovering a quicker way to line up audio to the footage. However, when editing I noticed when we were filming the interviews, we forgot to get an even amount of people on both the right and left side of the screen to then when editing have one interview on the right and the next footage the interviewee be on the left etc, ensuring to be more organised and wary next time.
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(W Magazine, 2018)
week 7
This week I finished off my piece to camera edit to do so I screen recorded the footage I wanted to incorporate with the footage I had filmed of myself discussing the documentary, further developing my editing skills and also noting that next time I need to better plan to ensure I will be able to get the footage for the points I will be making. We then in script writing further discussed ideas for a short story to do so we watched some more examples of short films and then discussed them as a class which helped to understand the key points that make up a short film. Moving onto defining our own ideas to then write a script for starting my synopsis. At the end of the week, we moved on from Vox-pox interviews to Tv interviews, to do this we analysed a TV interview of our choosing breaking down the camera movements/angles, type of questions asked (open/close ended), the tone, target audience etc. From this task I was able to better my analysing skills and correct terminology when discussing shot types etc.
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week 5/6
This week we moved onto a new practical task that being a piece to camera exercise, in a similar style to vox pop you must talk off to the side of the camera however instead of strangers this is you yourself discussing a documentary that you find interesting. To understand how to do this I watched an example of Louis Theroux in a bbc interview talking about documentaries he has watched; from this I was then able to plan what documentary I was going to discuss and write pointers to talk about, planning ahead what footage I would then edit in. I was then finally able to record this, it did take a couple of tries trying to get the right focus as well as what to say not being used to being in front of the camera developing my camera skills and learning how to feel comfortable when being filmed. The following day/week I worked on editing which was a bit of trouble also as I had not worked out how to get all the footage I needed from the documentary and therefor had to use images instead, this being poor planning; but overall I was able to develop my editing/problem solving skills and build on a new one thinking on the spot.
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week 8
This week we moved onto another practical task capturing three different shots with one camera for an interview, to understand how to do this we watched a video explaining/showing us how to complete this, from this as a group we were able to give each other roles and begin coming up with questions for the interview. We then felt confident enough to begin filming in the radio room, taking quite a few tries we were able to get all the footage and audio we needed, I also felt I had become more confident in speaking louder during the interview to ensure the audio was of the best quality, learning how to also speak at a sensible pace and to reenact a reaction to a question when being filmed. The following day I began editing the footage together ensuring to line up the audio accurately, from this task I was able to develop my editing skills but also develop new skills with a different software as I edited from home using CAP-CUT. Overall I was able to learn a new filming technique when given limited resources filming making one camera look like three and also new editing skills with different software.
week 9
This week we began looking into news channels, to do this we looked at three seperate news industry segments and analysed them and compared them all at the end, from this task I was able to progress my analysing skills. This then lead to the green screen practical task, where as a group we set up a green screen recording draft footage to then edit before then creating our own news channel and story. When filming the practical task after planning as a group I was able to learn a new skill in using a different type of audio recorder and clip microphone this being useful in any future projects. During post-production I was able to learn how to make a crawling title to look even more like a news channel further developing my editing skills. Overall this week I was able to learn new transferable skills that can be improved in all future projects.
week 10
This week we started our documentary project, to do this I had to come up with three ideas creating a mindmap to then S.W.A.T analysis each of them outlining problems that be faced with each one. From this task I was then able to move onto creating a questionnaire, this time I created one digitally and sent it out to people in my class to answer, this was a development as last time I used paper questionnaires which were more time consuming. With my results I displayed them onto my Wix page summing up the number to then be analysed to finalise an idea to create my documentary project on. From this weeks start to the project I was able to develop my primary research skills by creating a questionnaire online, and from this was able to finalise an idea for my documentary project.
week 11
This week I continued my research and started to move onto my project plan outlining the areas/tables I will be writing in, as for the research I was following my research plan looking into a POV shot and how to structure a documentary. I was able to do this by looking at websites and YouTube tutorials, from this task I was able to further improve my research and analysis skills which would be useful in all future projects. I also finalised My personal statement and was able to apply to my universities of choice after attending the open days to gain an insight to the University life, I believe that my creative writing skills and vocabulary was improved from the many drafts I have created.
week 12
This week I began filming of my project after finishing my project plan, filming took three days. On day one I interviewed the volunteer manager, on day two I was able to interview the manager of the Bredhurst centre and capture footage of the cats and around the centre. On the final day of filming I finished the last interview with the volunteer and was able to film some kittens. In between each of the days I edited what footage I had on hand before finishing the edit at the end of the week and exporting it to my website. From this task I was able to become more confident in using the camera and zoom recorder ensuring I had the right settings, I also further improved my editing skills with the app Cap-cut. Overall my planning skills proved to be accurate as everything went according to plan resulting in my final piece; and was a great task to expand my editing skills.
week 13
This week I evaluated my documentary project to outline areas of improvement and skills I have gained, this task progressed my analysing and comparing skills as I went into thorough detail. I decided to discuss my task with my peers and tutor to get feedback on what I did well and what was missing/could of been improved. Overall, this week I was able to complete my evaluation of the documentary and up to date my research page/website as a whole to ensure nothing is missing; improving my organisational and creative writing abilities.