Evaluation Question Six

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

We colour coded our answer to show we all did equal amounts of the work for each question. 

Jack - Light Blue

Ellis - Lilac

Leah - Light Pink

Camera Equipment:

The purpose of the tripod is to keep the professional video camera steady and level whilst filming. This is the traditional way to film shots and makes the footage look professional in general. There is a clip at the bottom of 3 of the legs of the tripod, where it is released to extend the length of the legs to suit the shots we wanted. These clips are then pushed back down to secure the tripod; once this is done the platform at the top of the tripod is used to secure the camera and tighten the security when attached to the tripod. This enabled the camera to not fall off and be damaged. There is also a handle on the tripod which allows us to smoothly and carefully rotate the camera so that we would not have to reposition the camera each time and lose our continuity within the shots. 













Whilst being completely new to setting up and using a camera with minimal knowledge, we learned how to fully operate a professional video camera. We learned how to carefully open the tape compartment and then wait for the camera to make a noise and re-adjust itself in a different position to then afterwards put the tape in. We also learnt how to place the battery in the camera safely without damaging or negatively affecting the equipment. Although we quickly figured out how to record simple shots, we had to develop our knowledge by learning how to zoom in and out and create pull-focus shots. However, we did not apply the zoom to our final Thriller film 'The Sacrificial Lamb'. On the other hand, we did apply our knowledge of the pull focus shot several times in our final film. To zoom in and out, we had to press the two zoom buttons either in or out for the required amount we needed. To create a pull-focus shot, we had to gently turn the circle frame around the body of the camera lens to fit the strong or weak focus for our required shot.

Final Cut Pro:

This software was new to each of us in the group, and getting to grips with the basics such as importing clips and ordering them was pretty simple; some of the other tools such as adding in title slates was a bit more challenging however it was a reasonably simple, fun and good piece of software to use and learn about. We used final cut pro to sequence our product. This software also allowed us to cut/trim clips and allowed us to delete the sound that came with the clips as we added our own sound for our final product using a different software (this was to prevent the background noise and to add in foley). Final Cut also enabled us to add title slates, we were able to change the font style and colour and we were also able to make the slates move. 

Sequencing & Cutting: Once our clips were imported into final cut we could drag them into the bottom box from the first box on the left hand side on the top row. We could then drag them about in the bottom box when they were lined up so they would appear in the right order using the arrow button at the top of the line of tools (shown above). Then we had to trim most of the clips as at there was a long wait at the start or end of the clip or at the start you could hear us saying 'rolling' and 'action', to cut the clips we used the tool that is 6th from the top in the little column of tools (shown above) this then enabled us to click at a point in the clip to cut it and we could then go back to using the arrow button to select a section to remove it from the sequence. Sequencing and cutting was very simple, quick and easy to do and each member of our group learnt how to do this very fast and we were all very confident with using this part of the software.

Title Slates: Adding title slates to our sequence was pretty straight forward. The second box along the top row on final cut (shown in the screen capture) has two drop down boxes int he bottom right corner, one has a small 'A' on it, when clicking on it it gives you the option of adding text. I could then simply type in the title slate, at first I played around with the tools I could use - the same box has several tabs that you can click on which show different tools and options that you can use to edit the text - I could change the opacity of the text, I could choose my own font style and colour and I could make the text move. I downloaded my font for our final product off of the internet as I couldn't find one appropriate for the thriller genre on final cut. I changed the colour of the font for a lot of the title slates so they would blend in with the background/surroundings. I also chose to make some of the title slates move; this was a more challenging tool for me to learn and use however it was effective and showed more skill. I made the slates move if either the camera was moving/panning, so the slate would move along with the camera, or if an object was moving or would block the slate, so that the object/person would look as if they were moving the slate along. To move the slate I had to slowly move the sequence along and as it played I'd gradually move the slate along, however with each frame that it moved I had to pause the sequence and click the little button in the bottom right corner of the third box which shows the video. 

Colour Grading: Colour grading was used to give our final thriller opening sequence a cold and eerie feel, it created the correct atmosphere for typical Thrillers. Colour grading was a simple task, to colour grade on final cut I had to use the 3 way colour corrector. I watched a youtube video that helped me to understand what makes a good colour grade. I then ensured that I incorporated everything i learnt from this video into my colour grading. 

Garage Band:

Garage band is an application used to create music, overlapping of sounds and also podcasts. We used Garage Band to create and enhance the sounds used for our final Thriller film 'The Sacrificial Lamb'. We learnt how to convert soundtracks into our Garage Band library by using different sources to find soundtracks such as www.royaltyfreemusic.com and www.youtube.com by saving, downloading and then dragging the sound effect into the library. We learnt how to crop the sound effects by dragging the bottom right hand corner of the clip towards the left hand side, making the clip smaller. Oppositely, we learnt how to extend the clip by dragging the corner and the icon to the right hand side to lengthen the clip. Adding to this, we learnt how to overlap each individual soundtrack to make a layer of foley sounds and also the original sound effects from the footage. By adjusting the sound clips, we learnt how to change the volume of each clip by selecting the option on the far left hand side within the sound clip library where we could adjust the sound by dragging the sound icon towards the left. Fading of the sound effects was commonly used in our final Thriller film where we made certain sounds decrease and fade in volume and then let another sound effectively fade in to create a dramatic and suspenseful effect. 

Youtube:

We used Youtube a lot during the process of constructing our final product. Youtube was used to upload and publish the videos we created so people can then view them and we can embed them into our blog to give evidence for our work. Our final product was one of many videos which we uploaded and embedded into our blog via youtube.

Once signed into our youtube account, we clicked on the 'upload' button in the right hand corner. Then it gives you the option of selecting what files you want to upload, or alternatively you can drag and drop the files. It also gives you the option of choosing if your videos are public or private, all our videos were selected as public so anyone can view our work.

Once the file had been selected a new page would appear that would have a loading bar, first it would process and then it would publish. On this page we were able to title our video and add a description or any tags if necessary. After the video had finished uploading it would then give us a link which would take us to our successfully uploaded video.

When the video was uploaded there were several tools available which would enable us to edit our video, the only tool we used within this process was annotations. The annotations allowed us to add notes/information over the top of our video; we used this for evaluation question 5.

Blogger:

Blogger was a new technology to all of us when beginning this process, however it is a very simple, easy and fun technology to use. Blogger allows you to create your own blogs, giving  you the freedom of choosing your own layout, and choosing the topics of your posts and how you want to set them out. Blogger allowed us to post frequently to give updates on our work. 

Once signed into our google account we could then type in the blogger website address and we would automatically be signed in. We then clicked on our group production blog 'dynamic productions'. On the left hand signed was a column where we could see things such as stats, edit the layout of our blog our view our posts; viewing our posts also meant we could edit or delete existing posts. In the top left hand corner of the page is a pencil icon, clicking on this enabled us to create new blog posts.

The new blog post is simple and easy to use, you can type information and change the font style, size, colour and you can embed videos or pictures. We embedded many videos and pictures into our blog posts during the course of this process, there are two ways blogger allows you to embed videos; you can either click on the movie clapperboard icon and select your video from youtube or your desktop or you can copy the 'embed' link from the video if it is uploaded to youtube. On the video it gives the option of sharing and if you click 'embed' and copy that onto the HTML section of the blog post, it will then appear on the blog post once you click on compose section again. Then when our blog posts are complete we click publish which means it will now be available to view, by anyone, on our blog.