Prelim Task Evaluation

For this task we had to spend time working in allocated groups to create a short Prelim Film as practice for our final media production. We were allocated into random groups and given a random genre in which we had to create a short film opening, sketch or other form of filmed media.

 

I was in a group with Amara, Leah and Lorna and we chose at random the genre 'Comedy'. At first we felt this was a great genre to be given, however it proved quite difficult in certain areas.

Here is the final edit of our short comedy sketch:

 

 

 

Our short Preliminary Film began with our group brainstorming ideas to use. As comedy was our genre we looked at multiple short sketches and comedy film scenes for inspiration. We then came up with different ideas for our Prelim task by all writing down possible ideas on paper. We decided to do a sketch in the end and ran through multiple different ideas before we came to a decision on what to do. I decided to think up my own idea and write a script for my sketch, I shared this sketch with my group and we all added to it, altering the jokes and adding stage directions and camera placement ideas as well as facial expressions used, we printed out the raw script and then added these ideas in pencil on the paper.

After I had written the script and we had altered it together, we assigned roles to each other. I was an actor and editor. Lorna was an actress and assisted in all departments. Amara was in charge of camerawork and diary work. Leah was an editor and camera operator. We then began filming on day three after creating story boards and a shooting diary. Unfortunately we lost some of our footage and had to reshoot, this taught us to backup recordings as soon as possible. We then compiled all of the footage together after reshooting and uploaded it all into Adobe Premiere. From here I put all three of the different camera angles together in order to make them align with one another, I also deleted the audio on two of the tracks so there was no echoing of sound. After this myself and Leah began to put the clips in line and make the script come to life. We decided after compiling some of the clips together that the project was going to take a long time to edit together into the final, fully completed version, with time that we did not have. As a result we decided that we would cut out a large amount of the footage from the script and settled for a shorter sketch and focus on making these scenes better than they would have otherwise been.

 

Overall our final prelim task was 'short but sweet', we encountered many errors along the way but in the end settled with a short, well edited piece of work. We received a positive reaction from the audience which clearly shows that the final edit was well produced and that it was in fact, somewhat funny. We also received positive feedback on the editing of our prelim task as well and only received a negative comment on one of our shots where the camera was at the wrong angle which made the eye contact between the two characters distorted.