As this was the first day, i was pretty apprehensive about how everything would unfold. Thanks to Callum's break down of each day, we had a clear path on what direction things would take and when they needed to be done by. We had all of Danny's room scene scheduled for our first shoot day, and then following on from that the majority of the shoot would be in the dining room. As you can see below some scenes were shot on different days due to time management, and I mean that in a positive sense. We were able to get through some scenes quicker than we anticipated, so with the spare time we thought it would be good to shoot one or two extra scenes to free up a day which had a lot of scenes in it.
(Our shoot schedule for the week)
Scene - 1, 2, 3, & 5. Danny's Bedroom -
EQUIPMENT LIST -
LED Lights x2
Panasonic DVX 200
Tascam & Boom pole/mic
Tripod
Sony A7S
Reflector
Tungsten x1
WHAT
So these first few scenes were all located in one space, Danny's bedroom. I had two LED's set up around the back of the room, facing up towards the ceiling to fill the room as much as possible. This was to act as the natural light beaming in through the window. The tripod was set next to the door, it was a tight squeeze as the fixed lens didn't allow us to go as wide as we had hoped for. The test shoots were fine with the lens as we only had ran through this particular scene with two people, but it wasn't a major issue. Scene's 1 to 3 were shot in about an hour or so, we were very efficient for this first day of shooting, so we motored through out.
LIGHTING/FRAMING/MOVEMENT/SETTING DECISIONS
As explained above in regards to the lighting, it was quite a simplistic backdrop for the lighting, I wanted to make sure that the lights were as natural as possible, making sure it wasn't too overexposed as the characters were sat right next to the window which was a concern at first. I had the lights titled up, being weary of not blasting out the actors faces with artificial light as it would create too much contrast and peaking on the skin. The framing was quite tight within this sequence, I was following my shotlist and Will's storyboard for each of these scene's closely, allowing each recording to flow as smoothly as possible. For these first few scenes I wanted it to be mainly handheld, apart from the master shot on the tripod that would include all 3 of the characters. This creative decision was down to Will wanting it to have a similar tone and aesthetic to The Mighty Boosh, in the sense that it has these long wide shots that show off the mis en scene and characters to their full effect. We shot each of these scenes through the master shot first, capturing all of it from that angle, and then going onto the singles and close ups. This made complete sense, as it made shooting the scenes much easier to follow, shooting each scene from the top from one angle, then moving on to the next. As we'd be doing this, I'd be ticking off the shots on my shotlist, keeping a track on what shots we have completed and may/may not of missed. We had one tracking shot of the feet for this sequence, this was relatively hard to pull off as the room was quite tight, so we manoeuvred around the table and got the actors to sit closer and legs together. I placed the camera on a matt and stuck it on with sellotape, and tried my best to create a smooth tracking shot of the feet. It took about 6-7 attempts, and there was a slight bump in the ground which it kept on knocking, so I got the best one I could then told Aimee to make sure we add some image stabilisation onto it, I also had image stabilisation turned on on the camera as well to try and get that smooth and fluid aesthetic that we needed.
I had already sorted out the cameras recording settings (did it the night before shooting), making sure that it was on the log format recording, with image stabilisation, macro lens, zebra, colour histogram, peaking, black bar ratio, and rule of thirds all on the LCD screen display the camera has. All of these tools dramatically help my approach and with giving us the best possible visual outcome for this piece. The macro lens helps with when you're capturing extreme close ups, to help stay crystal clear and create a immense depth of field, this helped with the coverage shots on this first scene, captured the microphone is the perfect example. The zebra and peaking helped with my exposure dial and what I was focusing on. As sometimes I found it hard to see what the camera was focusing on as the built in LCD screen looked slightly soft but then once plugged into a monitor you could see that it was in focus. So the Zebra just helps with making sure your subject matter is in focus so this is ideal for long shots, used mainly on our master shot within the first few scenes of this sequence. Additionally the rule of thirds & black bar ratio were my main tools that stayed on throughout the entirety of recording. As we were going to add the black bars at the top and bottom of our project for the cinematic look, I needed to give more head space to each scene, taking into consideration this effect that we'd be using. Admittedly some of the shots looked quite strange when recording but then i'd look back on the LCD screen and see the white aspect ratio lines to get a gauge of how it would actually look with the black bars in and it made sense after that. The rule of thirds was another key tool as it helped with my framing and keeping a consistent aesthetic throughout these first few scenes. It allowed me to make sure everything was angled correct and symmetrically, and as this was the first sequence I needed to get the ball rolling on the right path so I had a good foundation for this piece to start off with.
f/3.2
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
f/3.2
ISO - 320
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
f/3.2
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
f/3.2
ISO - 500
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
What want well and what didn't go so well is summarised in this vlog video I captured during the shooting week. I felt by doing these video's it would help me summarise easier what I felt worked and didn't work throughout the day and what could of went better. I've tried to assess my own work and speak about others in the team that I felt worked well/didn't work so well.
(Vlog post-shoot day 1)
Scene - 6, 7, & 8. - Dining room scene, beginning of -
WHAT -
As these were the first scenes of introducing the new location, the shots had to be right as they'd be the starting blocks of our project, meaning they'd all have to be consistent and continuity would have to be bang on. Will and myself blocked out the scenes with the actors firstly, letting them know at which lines they move and stand up. I had set up the lights so that they were next to myself, I stood inbetween the LED lights set up. It was mainly shot from the master shot, apart from the scene where Danny goes to the bathroom, that was all handheld. To get the shot in the bathroom, we stuck an LED light in the doorway of the bathroom, facing upwards, as the actor had his back to the light, it really darkened his face which was not ideal. So we used the light and fixed it up facing the ceiling to brighten up his face. Also as this scene was a psychological self-monologue, we needed to record Danny say the line first, record the time of how long it would take him to say it, then remember the time, lets say 10 seconds, then record him for 10 seconds saying nothing. This would be where we then dub over the inner monologue that Danny says.
LIGHTING/FRAMING/MOVEMENT/SETTING DECISIONS
Following on from Danny's bedroom scene, we began to film the main location scene. So for this specific room, the lighting was a very similar set up to the bedroom, however it was slightly darker due to the lack of natural light leaking into the dinner room, So I had to use 3 LED lights, I placed 2 of the lights in front of the table, on either side of the camera. This made life easier for me if ever I needed to adjust the temperature or brightness of the lights I could manipulate so without moving from the camera. These two lights were the main source of feeding into the natural tone of the piece, these lights would give it the authentic feel that it required. Then with the third LED light, i'd place this at the back of the kitchen, as a back drop light which would give a consistent light look around the room, maintaining the same amount of light around all of the set. The two lights that sat beside me were aimed upwards, as this would cease any major shadows from appearing on the walls from the lights, and it would also fill the room with the light more evenly, making it a more authentic and believable set. I was also instructed by one of my DOP's who I contacted that this is a good technique for filmmakers on a budget to use, so I took on this advice and it helped massively.
For the framing of these sequences I made sure I followed the shotlist that we had on set. The master shot I felt was perfect, it included all the characters and the waste they had got through, showing the character's' surroundings and emphasising their state of mind. I tried to use as much handheld as possible when not recording the master shot, as I felt it was appropriate for the piece. This is the first shoot day where I kind of went off the track of the shotlist, and added in a few more extra shots, the main one being the perspective of the laptop. I thought throughout the shoot day that I should include more point of view shots, as they're commonly used in sitcoms, and after speaking with Will and Callum, we both agreed that once it came to the edit, they'd offer a different look than the more generic shots we had recorded. There hadn't been loads of camera movements deployed throughout this shoot day, as the action didn't warrant it, but we did try to track Danny pacing up and down the kitchen, to add an extra layer to his psychological state. However i'm not sure if this will make the cut.
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
ISO - 400
Shutter Speed - 1/60
White Balance - 5000K
UNGRADED
WHAT I LEARNT & EVALUATION
- As this was our first day shooting with everyone on set, I learnt that patience is a virtue. Waiting for everyone to be ready was extremely tedious and frustrating, it did really test me at times but it's one of those things you have to accept.
- Using the clapper was pretty hard, that also took a while to get used to and appreciating how significant it is as we were using the tascam to record sound separately, so we needed it to match up the visuals and sound.
- The lighting was good all day up until about 12/12:30 as this is when the sun would leak through the back door and lye on the characters. This is an issue highlighted.
- It was good that we became very efficient with digitalising footage, was happy with how that all worked out at lunch time, it was very effective.
- We realised that it was much harder though to match the sound clips that it initially was thought, as I hadn't turned on the internal mic on the camera, so my clips had no audio at all, making it super difficult to match up the clips from the tascam and camera, so for the next shoot day I'll turn on the internal mic, making life easier for Aimee in the edit.
No comments:
Post a Comment