evaluation

Evaluation –Zero hour chapter 2

I, along with 3 other students decided to create a film together for Unit 54: film and video editing techniques.
we created a film averaging at around 2 minutes a piece.

We did it together because we wanted to create something more intense than the rest of the class were by giving it a story and action.

In turn we got what we wanted. The four of us each produced an enjoyable experience for the viewer.

We came up with the idea to do the zombie aspect over Skype conversations, we all knew what the unit wanted us to do, ‘produce a video sequence’ so we decided to do it all as a group, this conceived the idea of four survivors in the zombie apocalypse meeting up at the end.

We made our video over the course of about 4-5 weeks. For the first one to two weeks we focused on preparation, such as finding locations for scenes, accomplished via google maps and actually going to scout the area, because of this we were able to find areas that are relatively unused and boast an urban apocalyptic feel.

Once the location scouting was over we had a pretty good idea where we were going to film so we could move onto working on the story and the storyboards.
we spent quite a few days then working on the storyboards, mine took me over 10 hours to complete.

once the prep work was over we went to film, the four of us went out together to film each others parts together.

With the help of a few recruited extras we knew we had our zombie force.

They had makeup applied and we went out to film the scenes.

Though we divulged from some of the scenes we had set out in our storyboards we did keep true to our original intentions of the production where all scenes were shot, but cuts were added to either break up longer cuts or just make action seem more intense.

I myself had to film several scenes seperatelly from my group members as they were flashbacks, one during night time, though that did cause me a lot of issues.

Once the filming was over all we had left to do was get the editing over and done with.

Each of us donned the computers with final cut pro and we stringed together each individual part and scene into the story that we had set out.

Then we each had our own take on music,

Most of us created our own music, I personally got a good friend of mine to create a flowing track that worked with each scene, because I knew he had a lot of talent when it came to music, so I felt leaving it in his hands would give me the best outcome I could ask for, and I was right.

Though it seemed that we got our work done with relative ease, there was a lot of issues that we faced during the filming that we had to overcome, for example:

-on the first day of filming when I had to do a scene where me and mike were ambushed at a campsight.

My original idea was to have some speaking before the fire was lit and then once lit the zombie came and attacked.

Due to lighting difficulties, e.g. night time, we had to shuffle around the shots so we had light. So we had the fire lighting come first then the light from the campfire illuminated the dialogue and characters.

I don’t really like that I had to do this, however, I do like the warm effect that we got from filming it in such a way, it made the tension mount a little, so it wasn’t ideal but it was good enough for my liking.

- another issue was caused my our own doing, we decided that early morning light would be best so we often got up at 6am to go film.

Because of this many people we asked to be extras were put off or reluctant to take part. This left us a few times without extras.

The only solutions around this were to either film later and have more pedestrians ruin shots, or just reshoot another day.

We did either or, closer to the deadline we had to be more accepting of issues and we just went with some pedestrians.

Our overall video came out spectacularly and I think we were all satisfied wit the results.

Though for mine, I think a lot of it was rushed, and although I had music to cover up most of the scenes they did feel a little empty without background noise (footsteps, attack sounds, ect.). there was also the fact that a lot of the scenes were changed in such a way that disappointed me a little, though this wasn’t too much of an issue, it was generally a location change.

To fix this I would have liked to be more focused on my video instead of helping the others do theirs.

I did like how it all came together and that the music worked perfectly with the scenes and moments that happened. (for example the scene where I am chased down an alley to a set of bars. The cuts there were really action like and I think it’s my favourite scene.

In conclusion, I did achieve what I set out to accomplish, though I had to make a lot of compromises to do it.

I also learned that having multiple directors, though it might seem fun, it can also be a large hindrance on the work.

Though at the end of the day we all came to the idea that we would create a linked story of a zombie apocalypse and we reached that goal.

In closing, thank you for watching our films and thanks for reading this evaluation,