Television Production

After Effects. For News, we are going to be required to use After Effects much more than we have in our previous projects. Ferg went through a workshop with us to help us understand how to process green screen and how to create 3D graphics (such as a spinning globe). Terminology There are different kinds of 'keys' used to create backgrounds or graphics for TV and film; Alpha key This removes shapes from a clip Luma key This removes light or dark from a clip Chroma key This removes colour from a clip Most notably used for green screen. I found this video by InfiniteSkills.com that really helped me to understand Alpha and Luma keys, as they are what I was not completely aware of how to use, whereas I knew of green screen and roughly knew how it worked. History We watched a video similar to this one about how green-screening came to be. When film was solely used, they would use pieces of glass with black squares painted onto them over the l...

In this workshop, we practiced writing a script to use in our studio shoot workshop. I wrote the script above as an example of how we could script the package to appeal to our younger audience. The intro is still too formal, but I was happier with how I scripted the explanation of copyright. I need to lighten up the tone more so that it's not so heavy for the younger audience to understand but it's not too simple. We then could use this script in our next workshop, however I ended up re-writing a section in order to use something that fit the auto-cue better, and it flowed a lot easier. I preferred the introduction that I rewrote to what is written here, as it was better suited to the younger audience. To begin, we shot a 'studio' sequence in front of a green screen. This helped us understand lighting for green screen, and also to learn how to use an autocue. Using the autocue was a great learning curve, as it was much harder than you might expect. It took a lot...

Sync Workshop. In this lesson we had a workshop on how to begin editing our documentary using transcripts and editing together an interview using a transcript and script. I found this lesson harder than usual as it isn't how I usually edit and because I didn't know the footage it made it harder, but I feel the short interview I edited together was okay considering. Working with a transcript did seem to make it simpler as it meant I could quickly get rid of anything that wasn't needed and being able to go through a transcript before editing the video meant that it was more simple to see what was said and narrow down what was needed and what wasn't. It really helps to organise files into narrowed down subjects to make the shots easier to find. So far this has made editing so much easier and I'm able to find the appropriate shot almost immediately. I have edited using our transcripts and it definitely makes it easier as you're able to quickly remove any f...

The Historic Dockyard. As a class, we took a visit to Chatham's Historic Dockyard to practice shooting actuality and to get a better idea of how to present information in an interesting way. In our group, we shot a short documentary about the Dockyard using the information that we saw on the boards around the museum. We each took the role that we will be representing in the actual production, and it was good to get a feel for the role we are representing and get used to the pace at which we'll need to film. We focused on 3 areas of the dockyard- the lifeboats, HMS Gannet, and the ropery demonstration. We started off in the lifeboat exhibition, and this is where we spent the most of our time, as I was presenting and needed to come up with something to say. It was difficult as there was people still walking around the exhibit which was distracting and I lacked the confidence to continue with my presenting as people watched. We did have some strange encounters, however, su...

Interview Workshop. Today we shot a short interview in the studio to practice how to record an interview for our documentary. In a group of 3, myself, Ebony and Esme each interviewed each other to practice how we were going to use the microphones effectively, in order to get appropriate sound for either a formal interview or vox pops in louder settings. For our interview, we used a shotgun mic attached to the top of the camera and a clip mic on the subject of the interview. This worked well as it meant that in post, I was able to link the sound from the Tascam that was attached to the clip mic with the sound recorded onto the camera through the shotgun. This meant that we had the option of atmospheric sound, but I decided just to use the clip mic, and then shoot the questions with a reverse shot separately. It did work well but was a little time-consuming, so I'm considering that a two shot may be best for our style of documentary, with a shotgun mic being held by the present...

Please listen with headphones. Sound Editing. As mentioned in my previous post, sound is a very important feature when making a film or any kind of production. However sound isn't always straight from the set. Sometimes the sound on set doesn't match what is happening in the scene and a sound editor will have to put in pre recorded sounds to make the scene more believable. Sound editing is also about removing any sounds we don't want. In this workshop we had to edit together a soundscape for a photo by Gregory Crewdson. Crewdson's images are set up like film sets, with incredible attention to detail, which required us to have that same attention when editing in our choice of sounds. I decided to use the following separate clips: A base atmosphere- for this I used wind and turned the volume down to make it more of a base for the other sounds birds- this draws attention to the trees in the back slow jazz music- I imagined that one of the buildings was a bar a...

Recording with the Tascam. In this workshop we got to use the Tascam sound recorder in order to build up experience with it so we knew how to use it before it came to our shoot week.  To display the differences, I recorded a short interview with Ebony, asking her questions about her project. Half way through I changed the sound from the mic built into the camera to the recorded sound from the Tascam, which, as you can see, made a huge difference. In order to edit the sound and footage together, I used the waveform from both devices to match together the peaks.  In the first image here, you can see that the sound clip from the camera (blue) and the sound clip from the Tascam (green) are different lengths. This is the first thing we fix. I cut off the beginning of the sound from the Tascam to make them the same length so they could be matched together. Then, in the second image, I zoomed in and looked for peaks that looked roughly the same. I circled the part tha...

Directing with Steve Finn. For this lesson we were lucky enough to have Eastenders director Steve Finn come and tutor us for a day on how to work as a team with a director. It was very useful to know how a real TV director works with his crew to get the results he wants. I was able to take a lot of notes and we also shot a pre-written scene, working together as actors, a director, a DoP, and a sound.  Collaboration is what creates a project. It's not all down to the director. We learned about the general rules that people in the industry run by. For example, to get 10 minutes of useful footage a day for TV is good, and 5 minutes for film. Now-a-days, production is about speed, and if something can be achieved faster then it will be done. An example of this is a multi-camera setup; as the name suggests, multiple cameras are used and will roll at the same time to get many different angles of the same scene so that there are options and coverage. A multi-camera set up also ...

Perspective. It's important as a director to view a shot from every perspective to get to know the scene. You should also know who is going to be where when you arrive on set; this way you can get started quickly and have time for all the shots you need. It's important to remember you're the director and you make the decisions- plans should be made all the way up to the shoot, but if something is going to be changed on the day of the shoot, that's your call. On Set When you arrive on set, there are a list of actions you must do in order to start production. Recce of the location It's important to recce the location when you first arrive to ensure everything is as it was when you first recce'd. This gives you a chance to understand the area in which you're working. Talk with cast Next, talk with the cast and ensure they're happy with what they're doing that day. Talk with crew Talk with the crew and make sure they're happy...

Lighting. Lighting is an extremely important feature when creating professional productions. Lighting is very technical and personally, I don't feel very confident in it and don't feel that it is my forte, but it meant that I learned a lot in this workshop, since I didn't know it very well. In the workshop, we worked with basic 3-point lighting, which consists of a key light (the main light), a fill light (fills in/softens shadows) and a back light (gives the subject a halo to make them look more 3D and separate from the background).  The important features are: Brightness/ exposure This is important to ensure the colours and brightness look close to what your eyes see. If they are off it's particularly noticeable and can make the subject look unrealistic, dull, or unclear, and can be fixed by increasing or lowering light levels/ number of lights used. Colour The colours are important to get right as this will make it easier in post-production to col...

Directions. In this unit I will be exploring working as a director through the production of a short film. I will need to display my directorial skills and consider the details when working on this project. Workshop We started the unit off with an introduction to the brief and a workshop on directing our own mini-scene. We were given scenarios and in our group we each chose a different one to direct and act out among us. I chose a scenario that involved one character tripping over and dropping things. For this I decided to make it a comedy skit, it was simple and easy to edit, and fairly easy to tell the actors what I wanted.  If I had had more time I would have tried to find a better soundtrack but from past experience I thought it would be better have an okay one rather than none at all. I did find it difficult to explain the shots that I wanted from the person operating camera. I kept feeling like I wanted to take the camera and place it where I wanted but I...

Initial ideas My initial idea for script to screen (as seen in earlier posts) was about a woman who becomes locked in a cupboard on purpose in a house for sale. I liked the idea of having a trusted character become  the antagonist in the 'twist', and so in the end the woman gets shut mysteriously behind the cupboard door, and then we see in a phone call the salesman says "send in the next one," hinting to this being a planned event, that the salesman was in on the whole time. I then realised that this idea was too horror (who closed the door behind her, locking her in? What made her climb inside the cupboard?) and so I thought that she could know the person selling the house, and instead of climbing inside the cupboard, she finds something in there that is important to her... So I gave her a missing daughter. We know her daughter is missing because the first scene shows her dreaming about her daughter. The woman finds her daughter in the cupboard and the p...

Camera, Action, Edit. This week we did workshops on the use of camera and coverage, and Adobe Premier Pro. Camera We went over how to use the cameras for coverage of a scene and had a trial and error practice session with them so we have a chance to get used to using them when it comes to actually filming our projects. Our first session was to make a short production based on 'The Chair', which could be any interpretation we wanted, it just had to be a scene with someone sitting in a chair. This video is what I came up with as it was simple but had a basic plot to it. We had to focus on coverage; getting different angles in order to give us more options when it came to editing so that we could create more of a dynamic story. It keeps the viewers eye moving around the screen and keeps it interesting, however too many movements or cuts can be confusing and hard to keep up with. Positives I was happy with the plot that I came up with for this as it was easy to film and...