Music Promo- Evaluation of the shoot day

On Wednesday the 9th of November we had the day of our shoot. On the Tuesday before this, there were a couple of things we had to do to prepare so that the next day would run well. I had contacted Guy, the technical director and asked if we could borrow the van to transport from Conrhill to the studio on Wednesday morning. I picked up the keys from him on Tuesday afternoon and gave them to Phil who would be able to take the van directly to Cornhill the next day without having to look for the keys in the morning. After doing this, Alen and I went into the studio once the group prior to us had wrapped. We helped to clean up their set and explained to the set and light designers what we wanted for our first set so that they could set that up the night before. We had visual aids of the set design to help visualise what we see. We asked if we could help, but because they knew how to do it we left to not get in their way. When I got back to house I made a group chat with all of the cast and crew. I did this just to remind everyone of the details of the shoot.

The message sent to the group chat the night before

On the morning of the shoot, I felt really relaxed becuase I knew that we had planned everything really well. Alec and I brought in a bunch of clothes that fit the convection for people to wear incase we felt they needed changing. We also had the list of shots that we had to discussed and I re-wrote out the morning before we started shooting. This gave us a reminder of shots that we wanted to have. It did help us remember what we initially agreed upon. The studio was really set up well for the first sequence thanks to the communication between George and us and the clear idea that was put across.

The empty studio

studio with the lights

On the actual shoot day we divided the roles, quite evenly. At first I was on Playback, Alen was on Camera, Anna and Alen were directing. As the day progressed we decided that it would be best not to have set roles because this would offer us flexilbity and also a full experience. For example, I filmed the dance sequence as well as directed bits and pieces. We also delegate jobs as the came to different people. For example, I helped with the set design whilst Alec and Anna sorted out the extras. I think that for me planning/organising and directing were my main strengths. I helped to shape up the performance that we got out of Franek as well making lots of things happen on shoot day by planning ahead. Although the effort put into this project was really balanced.

directing

on playback

The only problem we ran into was a mistake for the second set which delayed us. Although we had told the crew that we wanted a silhouette prior to shot and on the shoot day, we built the wrong set. This was understandable because everyone is under quite a lot of stress because of the time limit we are put under. So what we did was quickly talked about it and corrected the mistake in about 30 minutes.

putting up flats

This obviously delayed our shoot meaning, extras we quite early. I personally think that we did quite well as a group to manage this. Anna and Alec assigned themselves to take care of the extras whilst I was inside helping with the third set and occasionally popping out. For all of our actors we directed them really well giving them individual feedback that significantly improved their performances and the shots we got.

The part of the day that was the most successful for me was the first sequence, because we had the whole morning to do this sequence we were able to shoot this sequence with more depth than we actually planned, but it turned out to look really good. Although because we went overtime on this we had to cut down the time dedicated to the last sequence which I felt was a really important one. Time management would have been something that I would have tried to be more forceful with.

the dolly shot

Anna on the dolly

I think that one of the highlights of our group was the communication between the cast and the crew. After every take we would talk about what he could improve on and he would often ask us if he was doing something correctly or if we wanted to change something. We also took turns to stand behind the camera and shout/mime directions to him whilst we were doing a take.

The part of the shoot I most enjoyed was the third element which is the group shot. Although it was stressful to organise, it was an interesting experience trying to organise so many people in such a short space of time.

For the edit, the most interesting thing to cut and put together will be all the sequences we decide to put into slow motion. Watching back all the footage in slow motion is something to look forward to as well. Also cutting from normal speed to half speed will be interesting.

As a group we worked really well, we divide up the jobs evenly and so far there hasn't been many conflicts and all positive input which really nice compared to last year's thriller project. In terms of lessons I have learnt, apart from time management, I think these are the only things we could have improved on. During the shoot we learnt more skills about technical use of camera which could be applied to future projects.