Future Opportunities

One of the Future Opportunities that I have coming up is the 2015 Sunderland International Airshow. Myself and the rest of the team from Cram Media will be heading to the event to film live coverage and post it to our Youtube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/user/CramMedia

We filmed this event last year and found it was a success and we will continue to film this event in the years to come. I find this is relevant as this is the kind of production that I wish to continue through out this course and beyond.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwWnZJl7WkXNRCdI83BWEj_Am5byTv64n

Customs House Teenage Cancer Trust

I recently filmed a charity concert at the Customs House in South Shields in aid of the Teenage Cancer Trust. Overall the night was a complete success with lots of money raised and the organiser looking into making it a yearly event. We are very happy with the outcome of the video as it includes a lot of interesting shots from a number of different angles and this made the video more interesting.

We only really encountered one main problem during the production and that was that we had a lot less space in front of the stage than what we were hoping for as we originally planned to use the tracks so that we could get some nice smooth tracking shots and pans, however the day before the shoot we went for a final meeting and found that seats had been put where we thought we would have free roam. we worked around this by having a free roaming camera with an operator and basher.

Lord David Putnam

In march I had the opportunity to attend a talk hosted by Lord David Putnam at college. This was a very informative talk in which he discussed his life both on and off screen. He talked about his role as producer in the Hollywood Blockbuster film Chariots of Fire as well as producing Bugsy Malone and Midnight Express. He was CEO of Columbia Pictures from 1987 to 1988, and after this went back to producing films with Enigma Productions. In 1998 he retired from film production to concentrate more on his work in education and the environment.

I found this talk very informative and interesting as has had an illustrious career in Hollywood and talked about what it was like to work with certain actor in the films and thought he was very inspiring to me and the rest of the people that were present.

Intro to Factual

I have recently finished my Intro to Factual module and found it to be very interesting. I found it interesting as I like filming real people not characters and covering true stories. This is what I am looking to choose on level 5 and beyond as a career.

I was happy with the way that the product turned out as there were a few problems. There are a number of things that I would change if I was to do this production again.
Firstly I would film more cutaways as the ones that we have didn't seem to be very relevant to what Paul was talking about in the video. This would have allowed us to include more relevant footage in the edit and make it a better production.
Secondly I would have shortened some of the Interview as the video does become boring in places as Paul talks for too long and starts to go off topic. Also we had run out of cutaways to use at this point and this meant that we had to leave the interview on screen for long periods of time. If we had changed these point it would have made it a better production as we would have been able to disguise the cuts more in the edit and cut down on the time Paul was onscreen.
Lastly I would have spent more time on the sound. The sound that we had captured was not the best as we did not record any sound externally on the other shoots which meant that we could only include the sound from the interview as well as an ambient track to disguise the cuts in the audio. However we could not have captured sound on the penshaw location as it was far too windy.

The finished Product can be found on my YouTube channel.

Intro to Factual Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H49gc0vPERU

Digital Skills Task 3

I have just completed my final Digital Skills task. This task involved creating a video using the technique of the Parallax Effect. To achieve this effect I first had to take a number of photographs of people/objects and a few that would be good backgrounds. I then took the images of the people into Photoshop and Cut around them. This left me with just the people in a PNG image. I then imported these files into After effects and layered them on top of the background, scaled them to the appropriate size and then added movement.

I found this task very interesting as I had never used After Effects or Photoshop before this task. I have now learned how to use this software and I can now use it in future projects. I feel that this Task has benefited me immensely as I now have more knowledge and understanding of the uses and how to use these two pieces of software.

Task 3 - http://youtu.be/2v5nIq0455I

Practise Enrichment Tasks 2 and 3

I have just finished my Task 2 and 3 for my Practise Enrichment Module. I feel that I did not complete these tasks to the best of my ability as I left Task 3 until quite late and this meant that I ended up rushing the filming and making mistakes. Saying that however, I do feel that I did the best I could in the time I had left.

Task 2 - Interview.

I feel that this was one of the better productions that I had made for my practise enrichment. I asked Victoria to be the interviewee for my interview and the production went well, I got the length that I wanted and on the whole I think the video turned out ok except for there being a bit of grain in the image.

Task 3 - 60 Second Task

In this task I have made a few mistakes as I had left this task until quite close to the deadline and therefore the mistakes that I made I did not have time to fix by reshooting. One of the mistakes I made was where I had positioned the lights. I positioned them in a way where they are reflecting off the kettle and ruining the shot.

One of the things that worked quite well in my opinion was the slow motion mixing of the tea and the milk. I achieved this by filming at 720p and 50FPS and then slowing it down in post. I feel that this was one of the best shots in the video and may have made it look more professional after the errors I made.

Interview - http://youtu.be/jDQf1V6kSnM

60 Second Clip - http://youtu.be/-oghM8_o6Gw

Practise Enrichment Task 1

My first task for my practise enrichment module was to create a sheet of Shot styles that we could then go on to refer to within the rest of our productions. I asked mark to be in my task so that I could exhibit the different shot types such as; Long shot, mid shot, close up and extreme close up etc. I thought that I completed this task quite well and correctly showed the different styles.

Digital Skills Task 2

I have just finished my Digital Skills Task 2. This task involved cutting together a short drama scene set in an office environment. This task for me was less interesting than Task 1 but was still quite engaging. We had to look through the clips and label the best takes and B-roll etc so that we would then know which clips to use in the product. I then started to edit the scene together being careful to make sure that I cut the clips in the correct places as to not have any continuity errors with the actors hands being in the wrong place etc.

I felt that this task was quite interesting as it is not something I normally do and it just refreshed the knowledge and skills that I have acquired before now.

This video is also on my Youtube channel;

https://youtu.be/ZmZUOUerz20

Digital Skills Task 1

I have just completed my first task for my Digital Skills module of the course. This task involved cutting a number of clips that had been given to us and edit them into a video, cutting the clips to the beat of the music track that we had chosen to accompany the visuals.

I found this task very interesting as I have always thought when I cut a video to the beat of the music the whole project flows better as well as looking more interesting and in some places, experimental.
The music that I had chosen for for this task was quite happy and upbeat, so I then tried to select clips that reflected this and then tried to cut them in a way that kept in style with the music.

I have now uploaded this file to my YouTube channel

https://youtu.be/XYybj4VvPV0

Intro to Fiction Module

I recently a module called "Intro to Fiction." This module involved learning about the different types of drama and fiction pieces from serial dramas such as Lost and Breaking Bad to Episodic Serials such as EastEnders and Coronation Street. We were then tasked to come up with an idea for a 3-5 minute short film. After we came up with the ideas we then had to pitch our own ideas individually and the our lecturer would pick out the 4 best and most feasible ideas and then put us into teams to complete the project. we would have to plan, shoot then edit the chosen ideas.

My Idea was chosen to be made. The idea was a man is waiting for a bus, looking quite sorry for himself, and a woman walks into shot and he instantly falls for her. The woman then meets with a friend who hands her a bag before walking off. After a short time another man will enter the scene and mug the woman before making off with her bag. The original man sees this and gives chase, catches the mugger and gets the bag back, he will then discover the woman is a drug user and the bag is filled with drugs, this will be when what looks like a police officer will enter and the film will cut back to the woman before fading to black.

During the Pre-production segment of the project we did run into a few problems with the locations we wanted to film in, and because of this, we were held up a little from when we wanted to start shooting the film. Initially we had wanted to film at Manors Train Station in Newcastle, we had all the correct permissions and had already filmed once, but we decided the idea would be better if we shot at night, however for this we would need lights and Northern Rail denied this after stating that this would distract the drivers of the trains. We then found a bus stop on Great North Road in Newcastle and we made this our shoot location.

During Filming, we ran into a few major issues with the location and equipment, we did not have the correct lights that we wanted to use, this meant we had to shoot at a higher ISO and this made the footage look grainy. After getting back to the edit we then knew we had to reshoot so we rescheduled so we could have better lighting and a wider range of lenses to use. This time the shoot went off without a hitch.

After this we started to edit the film together. The only issue we had here was with some of the colour grade on some of the shots and we then fixed this within Final Cut Pro. We added a few effects to make the film look more profession such as the Wide Screen banner above and below the footage.

And here is the finished product.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVmkQi8vEtA

Work Based Learning

I have recently completed my first Work Based Learning (WBL) task. This task involved editing a number of prerecorded interviews for the Principal of Newcastle College. The interviews focused on a number of students from different courses, and asked them about why they had chosen Newcastle to study at, and what they wanted to do after their courses.

While editing there were a number of tasks that I had to complete to get a worthy product at the end. First of all I synced up audio that had been recorded on an external device when the interview was taking place, this would allow the final video to have cleaner and crisper audio than what it would have had if we had used the camera's on board microphone. Secondly I had to colour correct the footage, this was because when the interview was conducted, it was not lit correctly and therefore would look to dark. So I increased the brightness and contrast within final cut so that the image was clearer, but because of this, there was more grain on the image so I had to balance out the brightness with the grain, to achieve a good look and overall product at the end.

It was worth it when I received this feedback...

Inspiration

I have found inspiration from a few different sources, the most notable of which however, is the online magazine Vice. I have watched a vast number of documentaries on the vice website as well as their Youtube channel and this has led me to pick up on a few codes and conventions that they use whilst filming factual pieces. One of these conventions is that they tend to report on the unreported, the things that the mainstream media won't, or are to scared to report on. I recently watched a documentary of theirs entitled Suicide forest. It is about The Aokigahara Forest, which is one of the biggest suicide hotspots in Japan. This is the kind of story that the mainstream don't report on and one that I am interested in. Whenever I have any spare time I tend to float onto the website to check out any new Documentaries that they have posted as they tend to be very interesting and insightful.

Vice Website - http://www.vice.com/en_uk/

Aesthetica Short Film Festival, York

Last Week I had the opportunity to take a trip to the 2014 Aesthetica Film Festival in York. The yearly event is held in York every year and involves a number of venues around the city with a variety of screenings and master classes in everything from directing actors to editing feature films and Documentaries.

We started off the day by having a group screening in the York Theatre Royal where we attended a talk about Camera Operating. It Involved Listening to a panel of 3 experienced camera ops; Peter Robertson, Phillip Sindall and Peter Taylor. And after watching clips from films they have worked on, including Gravity and Atonement, they answered a few questions from the audience.

After this I went and seen a screening of up and coming documentaries. I found this worthwhile as I have always wanted to be involved with documentaries more than fiction pieces as these are what interest me most. Real stories about Real people. This is what I want to continue to be involved with after my degree.

Finally I attended an Editing Masterclass with BAFTA nominated editor Lisa Gunning, who has been involved with editing some well know feature films such as; Goldfrapp, Seven Psychopaths and Nowhere Boy. During this masterclass Lisa discussed how the editing of a product helps to tell the story of the film. She went through how she prepares herself to edit projects and stressed that to be successful you had to learn to take a break and a step back to see the full picture. Lisa then took questions from the audience. I found this to be the best part of the trip as it gave me a keen insight into the world of editing. After my degree I would like to become an editor as this allows creative control of how the story is told as well as how the final product will look.














Overall I found the trip to Aesthetica a really valuable experience as I found out first hand from experts in the field about the problems they face and the best way to overcome them. I also found out the best way to network with professionals and how to get m work seen, and this is invaluable when it comes to progressing on from University.

Learner Style

I feel that I am a type of learner that learns better when they get hands on. I feel this way because whenever I am learning about any new equipment, I don’t always stay engaged and miss information. Therefore if I get my hands on the camera and practise with it, I will be able to take all of this in and cement in my mind what I have been taught. This means that I am a kinaesthetic learner as I prefer to get hands on with the equipment Im learning about.

I also feel that when I go away to research any of this new kit, I don't tend to read lots and lots of text articles of what different people know about it, I prefer to watch online tutorials with people explaining as they are demonstrating and giving me tips on how to get the most out of the piece of equipment that I am looking at. This means that I am also a Visual learner as I also like people to explain what they are doing while testing out the piece of equipment.

Where I Am Currently...

Hi there,
My name is Jonathan Cliff and I am a first year degree student studying Media Production at Newcastle College. So far I have found the course very enjoyable and have learned a number of new skills and techniques which I plan to further strengthen my grasp of in the coming weeks and months.

I feel that there are a few things that I need to improve on throughout the duration of this course and these are; my organisational skills (needing to improve prioritising of specific deadlines), Target Setting - I need to set myself targets so that I know what I need to improve upon and set myself a mini deadline by when I want to have improved by, and my Essay writing, I have never been good at academic writing and this is one of the main skills I want to improve on this course as at the moment I feel that this is my weakest skill and is the one that I need to improve upon most.