jen290302

[jen290302]

Mixing Classes

One of my favorite things we have done this semester is the mixing classes with Zoe, it makes me feel a lot more confident in mixing in general and more comfortable behind the mixing desk. I really enjoyed when we all started remixing Cisza, it was fun to work together and made me realise how much easier it is to mix with two people, one behind the computer and one on the desk, its also good to work with someone else and get their opinion on what sounds good. In the past when mixing I found it overwhelming being on my own, having to make tough decisions especially when you have listened to a project so many times it is difficult to tell what works or what doesn't. Last year I also did the sound design and mix for a grad documentary so I am hoping to take what I have learnt from that experience and feed into what I am doing with Natalia. 

#filmresearch

[jen290302]

Sound Walk

In sound class last week we all took some cool kit out to test and get some sounds for our projects. We went along to Craiglockhart and took out stuff like a extreme directional microphone, and some of Herve and Zoe’s kit like hydrophones, parabolic mics and then Zoe’s special earphones which record what the person wearing them can hear in the direction. We went down through the woods and to the duck pond to experiment. I had the really directional microphone but it wasn’t really that great, it looked cool, I felt like a bit of a spy with it in my hand, but overall it wasn’t very effective in picking stuff up clearly, there was a fuzz in the background as well and due to the wind it was difficult to capture sounds. I then tried the hydrophones which are things that you put in water and it captures the water sounds, Zoe said it usually works better in moving water, the duck pond was pretty still but it did create some nice sounds, mainly when we would throw things in the water or drag sticks along it. Another type of microphone we tried out as Herves parabolic one which you stick on metal things and make noise by hitting them and It captures the noise through the vibrations. This was one of the most surprising things as I had never seen something like this before, it was really cool. Me and Rosie played with it for a while. The last thing I tried was the earphones which record what you hear(I cant remember the name but I know they are really special) They are sooo cool, they work best when you are listening to he recording though headphones as you are situated in the space exactly where the recording was taken. These blew my mind, they were kind of freaky and completely threw me off balance if I closed my eyes, it was so disorientating. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make the class on Wednesday where we looked at the funds and started manipulating them, I hope to do some of this next week while setting up my project for the test shoot. 

@alexcaldownapier @rplayford02

#filmresearch

[jen290302]

Test Shoot!!!

 This was probably one of the most successful and chill shoots I have been on, it was just Nat, Eva and myself. It was planned out well, as Nat wrote a treatment which Eva created a shortlist from. We stayed at Natalia’s house in Glasgow and filmed through the evening into the night and stayed over. We filmed some observational stuff, which I lovedddd the look of. We then went outside to film some experimental things, which ended up looking really cool. I got some cool wildtracks which I aim to use as droning in the background and bring it in and out using EQ automation. The sound went really well, there was no issues with it. I used a lav for some of the more observational scenes of Nat so to catch all the minute sounds. The only issues I came across was Natalias dog Toe kept snoring/barking or walking about. During the outdoor filming I went away and filmed some sounds which I thought would be really beneficial. There was no issues on set, we all worked well together collaboratively, it felt very guerrilla style which was refreshing. I am excited to see the edit and start working on the sound design, I am planning to create a project template early this week and Eva aims to get picture lock by Thurs/Friday which will give me plenty of room to experiment. After listening back to some of the files during Evas edit I have realised that the levels in the final scene are quite low, in hindsight I wish i had put a radio mic on her during these shots as well.

#filmresearch

[jen290302]

Pitch Reflection

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to make the practice pitch, I did record a VoiceOver to be played at the pitch, when I watched it back I’m glad it seemed well received. I listened to a lot of the feedback, which seemed more focused on the story, that it wasn’t 100% clear how the film was going to be structured. After this feedback our group all met up before the second pitch and worked on what we were going to say as well as finalising the graphic design of the Pitch Doc and  presentation. We practiced the pitch a few times. When we did the pitch I was really disappointed in myself because I feel like I had a lot more to say but was concerned about our time limit, in our feedback it says there should have been a more developed sound pitch. I feel like I know how I am going to approach this project but I find it really hard to articulate, I can hear and feel the film in my head but need to find a way to articulate this. I do think we managed to combat a lot of the concerns that were discusses after the pitch by the lecturers and we gave them a clearer idea of how the film will look and sound, as well as an ides of the story. 

#filmresearch

[jen290302]

Start of semester and attaching myself to a project

At the beginning of the semester Paul asked us all to choose a clip which represents the type of work which we want to achieve this semester. I wasn’t really sure but I knew I wanted to focus on sound this semester and work on sound for a grad film. I also knew I wanted to do something fun and experimental where I will have plenty of space to try new things and create an interesting soundscape. The clip I showed was from Oscar nominated filmmaker PES. The film I showed was called ‘Western Spaghetti’, his style of film is stop motion cooking substituted by household objects. The films are really fun, especially ‘Fresh Guacamole’, the films use sound design to ground the films in the real world. 

I really enjoyed this class and giving my input for suggestions and recommendations for people to look into films to develop their ideas. It’s interesting now to see some of these projects develop into test shoots. 

When Natalia pitched her idea I was invested straight away as the subject matter it is something that I hold personally since I lost my dad as well. A lot of the feelings she described I have felt myself so I felt a real connection from the project from the get go. Natlia showed a clip from Tarkovskys ‘Mirror’, although I hadn’t seen the film, I enjoyed watching the clip, I love the style and pacing and experimental aspect to it, I think the sound design in the clip Nat picked was specifically really interesting to me and something which I want to study and take on into my work. Some of the aspects that I wish to take into my work are; natural sound such as wind, water, trees and sounds of nature, I aim to chose the placement of these sounds carefully to evoke a specific mood or emotion relating to the internal state of Natalia. I also want to incorporate ambient soundscapes in the mix such as sounds of the house like creaking, pipes, doors moving to create a complex multidimensional experience, of both the real world which Natalia is experiencing but also bring sounds of what is going on in Natalia’s mind. Also present in Mirror is the use of voice-overs, in Mirror they blend in with the ambient sounds, the use of the VoiceOver will help ground the film throughout the experimental elements. Tarkovsky is also known for the deliberate use of silence, absence of sound can be as powerful as its present allowing for moments of reflection and contemplation. This is something I want to take into my work on this documentary and use silence as a tool to let the audience reflect on their own personal experience os loss. 

#filmresearch #Youtube

[jen290302]

STILLS FROM ADULTOLESCENCE

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Post Production - Adultolescence

EDIT

We had so long for post production on this project, but all of us were super busy. Robbie was bus with Dormouse so I set the project up for him and watched through the footage.

I did ask Robbie if he wanted someone else to edit it(im not evil) but he wanted to edit it himself. We spent a lot of time figuring out the edit, it was difficult as a lot of the time we broke the 180 degree line (i still dont fully understand it) so we just decided to choose moments where this would work in regards to the scene.

Incorporating the skating clips into the edit was definitely one of the biggest challenges, I’m glad we found somewhere for them. The time passing in the corner shop was another thing we struggled to figure out, Robbie had an early edit of the clock intercut with sped up inserts of the corner shop in an Edgar Wright type style which I thought was really cool but wouldn’t have matched pace of the rest of the film. I came up with the idea of editing the skate clips in which I think is cool with the build up of sound design. Part of me is a bit worried it comes across as cliche but I really like it with the sound design and the contrast of the colours in the grade.

I think scene 4 by far works the best, where the boys are having an argument and it stays on the one shot until Pip walks away and we go into OTS shots, I think its edited really well. It flows really well.

We flipped the last scene in the bus stop so that Robbie was in the same place in the frame as he was in the previous shot which I think is a jice transition.

Another part I particularly love is when it curs from Jake helping Pip up to the shot at the wall, I think it perfectly encapsulates Pips dismay that Jake is the one to help him up after their argument and cuts to the wall in perfect timing as if he knew it was always gonna end up that way anyway(reading this sentence back I sound like I’m chatting nonsense but I hope you understand what i’m getting at)

I know the shot where they are against the wall is held on for too long, I think a lot of the wides are, especially for a 6 minute film but Robbie and I felt it was important to let the characters be felt in their space where they were comfortable. I think if we were to re-edit I would definitely cut that shot down as it is held on for an uneccessarily long time. Logic behind is that the boys are reflecting on their lives and don’t really know what lore to say as they are finding it hard to communicate.

SOUND

I am a soundie through and through so I felt toms pain with this one, so hard to fix sound from outside but I think he did a really good job with the atmos. Blended seamlessly!!!!! I helped him with the dialouge and I really loved the sounds in the cornershop, especially the hum of the lights and the fridge and the loud ticking as this was something I had been visualising since pre production so was nice to see it come to life. Frequently throughout post I would listen and give Tom a list of notes which he completed. Favourite part of sound post was recording as hoc foley and adr in screen academy using my sound stuff.. and toms genius idea of the line “What the Fu-“

#filmproject

[jen290302]

the shoots day 2&3 - adultolescence

DAY 2&3 - PENICUIK

The morning of our first shoot at the skatepark we had to hold off going, we had planned for the call time to be 6am so we could be set up by 7.30am and have 8 hours of shooting before the schools came out. but we hadn’t heard anything from Lothian council about permission despite Alana pestering them for weeks. In the morning there was a big panic and we were trying to find other locations, calling the council non stop and planning to reshoot. Eventually a man at the council gave us his verbal permission, probably to get us to stop pestering him but he gave us his name and contact number incase anyone asked us. We set off at around 10ish and managed to get going!! Day 1 was the only day we had Lachlan (one of our only extras and PA) so we used this to our advantage and filmed the scenes which we need him for the group. This was scene 4 when Robbie comes in and scene 6 when the water is splashed. Despite the late start I was feeling really positive!!! The way we worked through scenes would be I would work with Cal and decide the best place for the Scene to take place geographically in the skatepark and then figure out how the blocking would work, we then would get John in with the camera and direct the camera movements to check that it would all work out. I then brought the actors on with just myself and them and talked them through the blocking and performances. Prior to this the actors were running lines together to get into the rhythm of it. We then rehearsed with camera and actors and let sound know what the scene blocking would be. Once everyone knew what they were doing we went for takes. We did this for every scene and periodically me and Cal would look at the schedule/shot list to ensure we were getting the right coverage.

We didnt really run into any issues on set, we used the van as a kind of base where we had lunches and kept the kit while we were using it, someone was always in the van ensuring this was safe.

Our biggest issue was the sun and the clouds, caused the shots to look a little uneven as some shots the sun was out and some were overcast, we were lucky to not have any rain on the days we were filming outside.

School kids would pass and we had some wee bams come after school asking us when we were done but after we explained we would only be another 15 mins we tied their shoelaces for them and they were in their way.

Another issues on set was the gain force winds which we encountered, which made me slightly worried for sound, Tom just made sure the lav mics were well places for minimal rustle as he knew that would be a lot of what he was goino to have to use due to the windy boom.

Here are some pics from set and BTS by lovely @rplayford02

#filmproject

[jen290302]

the shoots day 1 - adultolescence

The lead up to the shoot week was probably the most stressful time in my film career thus far...as detailed in my other blog posts my worst fears came true. BUT alas we managed to film something so I am really happy with that.

DAY 1 - ABERDOUR

This is where we shot the corner shop scene the title sequence and the bit at the bus stop. We shot it in the village where I am from as that's where we got the corner shop location. It turned out to be quite a long day but it went really well. We all met at the train station in Aberdour at around 2pm, Tom, Robbie and I were in the van we managed to hire for the kit. Then Alana came in her car. It took a bit longer for Cal and John to get there as a lot of the trains were cancelled.

As soon as they were there we got everything set up and headed out to shoot, the first thing we were gonna shoot was Robbie skating, this was scene 3 in the script from his work to the skatepark, there is a road in the village which I thought would be suitable, It was a difficult scene to shoot we had a few shots planned which we tried out. I don't think they looked very good as the road was not very aesthetically pleasing and the camera was static so we were not really there with the character. We then decided to use the dji OSMO that we had with us (courtesy of Tom Walker) and Tom Spurin skated behind Robbie which got us the title sequence shot which we used in the final film. I think this is a really beautiful shot and was s total stroke of luck that we managed to get it as Tom was actually trying to get one of Robbies feet and skateboard.

This was difficult to do as we had to block the road off (we all had hi vis on)

We then went to the shop to film after this for around 5pm after he shuts the shop, I had made no prior agreement with him for when we had to leave, I had previously asked him how long we could have but he is a man of very few words and didn't really communicate this with me.

The shoots inside went well, I really like the one shot we go of him walking in, we did get a lot fo coverage from inside the shop but didn't use a lot of it in the edit. We originally had plans to light inside but on the monitor the lighting looked good and there were strong overhead lights (it feels like a sin saying this) however, I do think looking back at the footage we could have benefitted from a light on Robbies face as we loose him a bit when he goes behind the counter.

Performance from Robbie was really good, however, I think the line 'Have a nice day' did get a lot a little bit in the rush of going out of the door.

The bus stop scene was such a pain to shoot but after it the crew were all really happy as I think personally its one of the nicest looking shots in the film. Didnt intend for it to be so dark but as we shot it mid march the we lost a lot of the light really early, the traffic noise was something which was concerning as we were struggling to get takes without cars coming through it. We figured out there was a gap in the traffic where lights must have stopped so managed to work around that. To boost light on his face we used a reflector, which I think worked really well, I like the contrast on Robbes face a lot.

After this we were pretty exhausted it was late at night so we went to my mums house for some nice home cooked food:))) We reviewed the footage and tried to make some plans for tomorrow. Going to bed not knowing if we had out location sorted or not.

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Adultolescene BtS

A couple weeks ago I was asked to come help Boom Op for Adultolescence for one day of their shoot - except I didn't really do much boom op-ing because it was sooo windy and my arms are very weak. Was very much boom swinging - not ideal so Tom, being the reigning arm wrestle champ, took control back pretty quick.

I wasn't entirely useless though! Tom and I spent a bit of time figuring out how to work Rowen's mixer since they had three radio mics alongside the boom which obviously the MixPre 3 wouldn't accommodate. And then for the rest of the shoot I was using Jenny's DSLR to take BtS pics. A really fun shoot to be on and my first of the year! Looking forward to seeing the final product! :)

[jen290302]

Casting and Skating - Adultolescence

Casting for this film was such a nightmare, it was one of my biggest concerns going into this was getting actors who could skate or getting skateboarders who could act. We posted on loads of facebook sights and casting agencies, reached out to so many youth theatre groups, college acting courses ect. Alana privately reached out to actors who she thought would be good for the roles but we had very little people interested.

Eventually, I asked a couple of my friends from Fife and one of them agreed. He is a good skater and a decent actor so i thought it would work out really well... but he dropped out a week before we were due to shoot. Safe to say I was raging. We had to put our feelers out yet again looking for someone to play Jake, we had a Pip through a casting agency. The actor was called Micheal, he was really lovely, and had on his skills that he could skate which was a bonus for us.

The day before shoots I wanted to try and organise a last minute rehearsal with actors but we still weren't able to get anyone for Jake, until about 6pm the night before we were shooting.....before they dropped out at 1am. So we had to pull out the big guns aka Robbie Smith. I know Robbie really didn't want to act in this as he was editing it and he doesn't have faith in himself but honestly I think he did a really good job and I really happy with the performance he gave.

I wish that he had the chance to do rehearsals before shooting so i could get more time to workshop with actors as its something that i have never done before as this is my first time directing. But overall I'm just happy that we were able to get a cast in the end at all.

Andrews main feedback in the crit was that he would have liked more skating in the film... me too Andrew. Unfortunately, although Micheal(Pip) had skating under his skillset on starlight when on set he told us he actually didn't have an experience skating and Robbie does not have much skating skills either(although we did teach him a bit)

Luckily Fiontonn from 2nd year came to the rescue as our pro skater, during casting I was suggesting we could have put Fiontonn in one of the main roles, but Alana was weary as he isn't an actor.

Overall, I wanted to find a way to incorporate more skating into the film, we tried on set to have Fiontonn wearing Robbie and Micheal's clothes but in the edit it was pretty obvious that it wasn't them skating. I did want to try and add these clips in somewhere else throughout the film, possibly separating the scenes but I was scared it would make the film feel a bit disjointed, this is possibly something I will try if we re-edit the film.

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Corner Shop Locations - Adultolescence

Wow this location was so tricky to get. Honestly, after trying to get this location my fear of rejection is gone cause I had to face it so many times. Originally Alana reached out to Costcutter and Premiere who said that they were happy for their shops to be used but we would have to ask individual shop owners personally if we wanted to use their shops. She put posts out on Facebook to see if anyone owned shops or knew anyone who owned shops who could ask for favors, we had a couple of responses but none of the shops really fit the bill of what we were after. After pushing our shoot forward 2 weeks to avoid the school holidays I really started to panic as we were shooting in a week and still didn't have a location secured.

I did have a lead on Keir Street News which allows filming quite frequently, and is close to my flat so would have been the perfect place so we could have had a little production base at my flat. However when I went to ask, the lady was lovely but she said their rates were around £150 a night which we just couldn't afford as we were paying a permit for the skatepark. This was just for electricity for the lights/fridges/insurance etc. This disheartened me as it made me think that every shop would be wanting to ask for the same

By this time I had already decided we were shooting in Penicuik for the skatepark so I thought we could try and get a shop around that area so we could possibly film after the skatepark one of the days. I reached out to almost every corner shop in that general area on Facebook Messenger and phoned them all as well with rejection after rejection it wasn't looking so good. After I tried this method Tom and I hit the streets of Edinburgh literally begging to anyone to let us use their shop. Again rejection after rejection until.....we reached the Apothocary which is a shop for smoking goods in Southside. The men who owned the shop seemed weary but gave us their email anyway. We also got a lead on a global foods market with a lovely man who Tom spoke to for ages. However.......we thought the smoke shop would be too much of an enjoyable place for Jake to work given his circumstances and could come of as kind of cringe so we opted for the global foods market until disaster struck.

Yes, the global food market canceled on us two days before our shoot.....

Had a break down to my mum who suggest I go and ask my local corner shop in Fife where I am from. He is a lovely guy and a man of few words but let us use his shop which I am so thankful for. I think it turned out to be the perfect location for our shoot, I would have liked more time in there as we only had 2 hours but definitely happy that we managed to get somewhere.

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Recce #4 Adultolescence

If there's anything this project had it was a lot of Recces.....I think I visited half the skateparks in Edinburgh and the surrounding areas to make sure that we had the one that would be the least busy and also was visually pleasing, quiet and would fit the script. Although I had already gone to Penicuik and was fairly sure it would be best, wanted to make sure I wasnt missing out on any goldmines or somewhere potentially closer to the city.

I will just outright say this day was actually miserable the weather was actually disgusting but that didn't dampen Tom and I's spirits. We also met some strange people this day I don't think I have spoken to the general public that much in a loooong time.

We went to both Drylaw and Bonnyrigg and honestly it was hard to even tell if they would have been good or not due to the fact it was actual torrential rain(no this didn't stop Tom from skating although I advised him STRONGLY not to). From my memory Bonnyirgg was quite far, had a nursery beside it and was really modern which wasn't really the look we were going for, it had a big playpark in the background and was surrounded in astroturf..which we were not impressed by. Pics of Bonnyrigg....

Drylaw was an option if we weren't able to get Penicuik, I thought it would have worked okay for the film, I just was unsure about how we would have gotten out van and all the kit there. It was also closer to town that Penicuik. Pics of Drylaw.....

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Recce #3 Adultolescence

I went to this recce on my own, which is so unlucky as it turned out to be the location that we used. I think the project would have benefitted from the whole crew visiting this location once we had decided that we were going to use it. The reason which stopped us was that we did not have permission to film there yet, which in hindsight should not have mattered, we should have all gone and discussed how we were going to make things work in term of power, toilets, noise, lighting etc. All that being said... it still worked out in our favour, it was really quiet the majority of the time, the traffic was distant and I think that the graffiti was really nice and made the visuals a lot more interesting, The layout of the skatepark was well suited for the script and made the blocking relatively easy to discuss and plan on the day of the shoots. One of the only downsides of the location was that it was out in Penicuik which is quite a far distance from Edinburgh by bus.

On set it was relatively quiet, the only time we had trouble was at lunches when the kids from the nearby highschool would walk past..never in my life have I been so intimidated I dont know what it is about groups of teenagers but I feel I will always fear them. Alana trooped over and location marshaled where we were filming and kept them away.

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Recce #2 Adultolescence

Myself, Tom and Cal went on some more Recces early on in production. After a trip to a studio in Leith we went to Traverlen Park in Portobello. Which we thought could have worked as there were nice housing estates in the background, I thought this could make for a good progression out of the skatepark when Pip and Jake have their serious conversation (this is before the script changed to them just staying in the skatepark) in retrospect I think staying in the skatepark worked out to be a better idea in terms of the brief. However, my issues with them in staying in the skatepark was that it always felt like Pip was trying to get away from Jake and run away because he didn't want o have serious conversations and then they always ended up speaking anyway. In the end, we decided not to film in Traverlen because there was a school almost right beside it (as there was with almost every location we visited) as well as it being very small there wouldn't have been much space available for blocking. Another reason was that the park was busy even while schools were in as there were older people using it and as soon as the kids were released from school is was mayhem. From what I remember I left feeling a bit defeated. Here are some pictures from the Recce.. (didn't get many as there were young kids about)

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Cinematography PDF Adultolescence

I spent a lot of time putting together image references for Cal to look at to get a sense of what I wanted the film to look like. Some are references to framing, colour etc. They are a mix of cinematographers/photographers/skate photographers etc.

#filmproject

[jen290302]

Recce #1 (kinda..not really) - 'Adultolescene'

After the pitch Cal, Tom and myself went down to Saughton Skate Park with the idea to test some stuff out with Alanas gimble and Cals DSLR. When we arrived Cal realised his charged battery must have expanded and wouldn’t fit inside the camera, disaster lol. So me and Tom messed about with the skateboards and our phones while Cal set the gamble up with the intention of using another battery he had with one bar, managed to get like 20 seconds of footage before it died unfortunately but we did get some footage an idea of the space, I think Saughton is good and visually really nice, where the sun is and the graffiti and the layout of the park, but its just so noisy!!! There was like trains, cars, crossings, school bells ect. It was fairly empty until around 4.00 which means we would be okay to film throughout school hours. The issue is our plan was to film on the week fo the 3rd of April so to avoid when everyone else is shooting, today I realised the schools are on Easter holidays from the 3rd of April so we don’t have much choice but to try and shoot the week before of think of something else. We also attempted to teach Cal how to skate lol. Although we didn’t get to fully try out the gimble, was still fruitful and really fun. Hopefully we are going to have a look at the park at Ocean Terminal tomorrow. Here are some pictures we took.