New Wave film +evaluation

How my New Wave film, I used both a DSLR camera and a phone camera to not only give the film a realistic feel but also make the audience aware that they are watching a film, which was the main idea   and concept for the directors of the New wave movement. At the start I was planning on using a simple narrative with no emphaisis on it and rather focus on the editing however as I started filming I didn't find the idea of placing the camera on a busy street challenging enough nor interesting. However I still liked the idea of filming old buildings, but rather than filming on one location, I decided while I was in Bulgaria, to go in the capital without a map, get lost on purpose and find old buildings and interesting places to film while turning my film into a short story- from catching the plane and going away to building a montage-like story of the travel. I also didn't stick to my idea to use  voiceover throughout, and chose to tell the story through the videos so the viewer would stay active and engaged in the story and wouldn't rely on the narrations.

My aim was to use as many of the editing techniques used in the French new wave cinema as possible, while adapting it to the surroundings I was in while in Bulgaria, mixing the two. I think I achieved that right from the start of my short film using a long shot in a car while there is a casual dialogue in Bulgarian taking place. Rather than using an establishing shot, the camera is seen as being the observer which is similar to the documentary style of Godard, and the dialogue in Bulgarian almost puts a distance between the viewer and the people in the shot. To distance them even further I choose not to show their faces but rather use their conversation as a background.

To further show the influence of the French new wave on my film I used the song Les Champs-Élysées by Joe Dassin, upbeat and popular French song, which people would of connected to France straight away, however I also used colours, to show elements of the style of editing of Goddard like in his film Contempt- for a short sequence the colours change from from red to blue and then back to normal, in tact with the beat of the song.

I wanted to use subtitles when speaking in Bulgarian, however I only used them in parts where I found important, and that the viewer would engage with what they see on the screen. I also included an example of breaking the forth wall, when on one of the clips, a girl turns around and points to a building as the camera pans from her to the building, breaking the conventions of mainstream cinema.

What I would of changed is, next time I'm filming, id make a clear plan ahead of time, research and map the places I need to go to to save time and find different locations, which would support my narrative.

Different Lighting setups

Rembrandt

Rembrandt lighting is a lighting technique that is used in studio portrait photography. It can be achieved using one light and a reflector, or two lights, and is popular because it is capable of producing images which appear both natural and compelling with a minimum of equipment. Rembrandt lighting is characterized by an illuminated triangle under the eye of the subject on the less illuminated side of the face. It is named for the Dutch painter Rembrandt, who often used this type of lighting. like the use of split lighting it can be used to create a softer chiaroscuro effect making the subject look mysterious.

Split 

Split lighting involves “splitting” the face into two proportional halves, with one side being in the shadow and the other side being in the light. It can be done with a single light source, which makes it easy and inexpensive to execute even for beginners.

Split lighting can be used for  a variety of purposes as: 

-Achieving a dramatic effect in portraits

-Fashion photography
-Commercial photography
-Adding variety to a set of themed portrait photos
-Making a broad face look slimmer

Butterfly

Butterfly lighting is a portrait lighting pattern where the key light is placed above and directly centered with a subject's face. This creates a shadow under the nose that resembles a butterfly. It's also known as 'Paramount lighting,' named for classic Hollywood glamour photography. It is most often used for glamour style shots and to create shadows under the cheeks and chin. It is also flattering for older subjects as it emphasizes wrinkles less than side lighting.

High Key Lighting

High key lighting is a method often used in beauty and makeup commercials and in comedies. A high key look gives you fewer shadows and makes your talent look flawless and elegant. It produces an even amount of light that spreads across an entire scene. It’s also useful for producing food or product imagery when you need the light to be even across the entire scene.

A high key lighting style often involves a soft key light directly above the camera — and not too close to the talent. Positioning the light directly in front of the talent creates less shadow, making the skin look softer and smoother. Usually, these lights will be large — at least a 6×6 butterfly. High key lighting also produces a beautiful catch light in the talent’s eyes.

Low Key Lighting

As opposed to high key lighting, low key lighting is much more dramatic. Low key lighting typically involves lots of contrast and creates an entirely different mood than high key lighting. Low key’s transition from highlight to shadow is much quicker and more dramatic — and harsh. Usually low key lighting is very close to a subject, and the light source is typically dimmer to accommodate this. In fact, in some cases, you can light someone on a white backdrop, but it will appear black because of how close the light is to a subject.

By placing the light closer to the subject, the transition from highlight to shadow occurs much faster, creating a much more dramatic scene.

Bibliography

https://expertphotography.com/rembrandt-lighting-photography/

https://www.adorama.com/alc/faq-what-is-split-lighting

https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/high-key-vs-low-key-lighting/

Health and safety on set

Responsibilities 

Under most health and safety legislation (check the specifics of your country though), the ultimate responsibility for health and safety rests with the production company and those in control of relevant premises (studios & locations) and facilities (equipment, vehicles etc.).

It is initially up to the production company to establish appropriate procedures to control risk and place H&S alongside editorial and/or dramatic considerations. There should also be good planning, communication, co-operation and co-ordination by and between all parties involved in a production. Especially communication.

Reasonably Practicable:
This means that you should:

• determine what kinds of risks are caused by your work,
• consider how likely those risks are,
• take appropriate action that is proportionate to the injury or illness that could occur,
• implement well-known and effective industry practices,
• involve your staff in identifying and controlling risks.

You don’t need to:

• do everything humanly possible to prevent accidents,
• buy the most expensive equipment on the market,
• spend the bulk of your week on H&S training, compliance and documentation.

Risk assessment
The way to stay safe is to look at each shooting set up or location individually and think of what exactly could go wrong. 

It's a three step process

• Identify all the hazards
• Evaluate the risks
• Identify measures to control the risks

Then put in place safeguards to eliminate or minimise risk. You should make a record of any risk assessment to ensure everyone are clear on how to stay safe. This can save time during your shoot.

'Hazard' refers to the potential for harm. while 'Risk' is the chance of that harm actually happening. Though some hazards might seem very obvious, people might still need to have them pointed out.

Weather
Extremes of weather are one commonly overlooked hazard. If you are filming outside all day, it is essential to make sure the crew are dressed appropriately. A lot of the time you may be standing around and people will get cold very quickly even in what seems quite mild weather. Layers of clothes are best, and get everyone to bring a waterproof and a woolly hat - they keep out wind as well as rain and are invaluable.

Sunburn and heatstroke are other outdoor hazards. Always have high protection sunscreen on hand. Try to wear some kind of sun hat or stay in the shade when possible and make sure lots of water is available to drink. The other reason for sunscreen is to stop the actors' appearance changing drastically and messing up the continuity of the film!


Time pressure
Rushing to finish in time is when hazards get missed, or people start taking risks. If this starts to happen, take a moment to calm everyone down and remind them: this is only a film. If you feel really pressured try to think of how to lighten the work-load: can you cut out some shots or set ups to give you the time to get the most essential stuff for the film without a panic? Or can you come back tomorrow to finish?

Tripping hazards
Move or gaffa tape down cables and objects that could be tripped over.

Lifting hazards
Go carefully when moving or lifting heavy or dangerous things, ask someone to help you.

Camera risks
When a camera operator or cast member is walking during a shot, make sure they are comfortable with their route and there is nothing that could cause problems (a camera operator who needs to walk backwards for a shot should have an assistant to guide them and/or check their route).

Bibliography

https://movingimageeducation.org/create-films/production/the-production-department/health-and-safety

https://www.filmsourcing.com/filmmaking-health-safety-keeping-your-cast-and-crew-safe/

music video with found footage

• for this project we had to find footage online and edit a music video to the beats of a chosen song.
• when looking for footage i was searching for a specific style/mood that would of worked with the beats of the song, more dull colours and a mix of fast and slow pace clips. I wanted the video to look like its following a story/narrative while also being experimental, not following the conventional narrative.
• I found that looking for free videos in good quality and resolution were challenging to find, however once I found the couple of websites i could use I managed to build my initial idea.

Wii short film/ stop motion

• In our stop motion film challenge we used the Wii game soundtrack and decided to adjust the footage to the sound of the beets of the song. 
• To improve, next time I would aim to make the video longer, with more and diverse scenes and have a better suited ending, rather than having the room empty, the same way it started. I would also make sure the song isn't 'cut' harshly and would rather 'fade away'
• As the song is made of many and very close by beats i found it challenging to cut the short clips, I had to go back and forth a few times, however as I got used to the beat i managed to finish and complete the task.

new wave film brief

 I plan on doing a new wave film, with a focus on montage, while the narrative would be filled by every day life events, influenced from the French New wave . I will film both on a DSLR camera and on a Samsung S9 to create different visual effects.
The narrative would follow the journey of a girl, jumping back from her memories to the present and back. The point being not to follow chronological events but to show the mundane part of life, in a slow pace and what goes on in her head as she travels.

 To achieve that I will also incorporate new wave features such as jump cuts and mixing the sequence in different order; I will also use split screen, and changing colour lenses as used in Jean Luc Godard's Contempt and voice over in Bulgarian with subtitles. I want my work to reflect the new wave style in editing and ideology, using influence from the films that I have analysed.
I would aim to use a range of camera angles to give a feeling of distorition and unease. i would also use aim to film in natural lighting so it would be easier to edit later on and to give the natural and authentic feeling as possible when watching, so the audience is aware they are watching a film.

notes and ideas

• starting of with a voice over and subtitles on the screen as the characters has a short dialogue, as used in the start of 'Jules Et Jim'
• the camera is on the floor, filming crowds of people walking fast
• cut to a sound of tapping shoes on floor, black screen
• screen 'opens' like a curtain to reveal just the feat and the heals of a woman walking slow
• the montage jumps from people walking fast on a busy street, to the woman walking slow on the pavement
• a worms-eye view of buildings after every montage (with colour panels changing each time)
• I will also include short clips filmed on a a phone from a POV 
• In my short film I will focus on the editing and the new wave elements of it rather than narrative, however I will use a voice over to give a quick exposition and an inside into the character's thought, another trait used in New wave films. 

Camera practise- Shutter Speed task

• After shooting and watching the 3 examples of how Shutter speed affects movement in the video, I realised that wasn't the best way to show how SS affects it, as the water source isn't big enough to see the difference in the Shutter Speed
• What i would change next time when i need to show a difference in the Shutter speed is firstly to use a tripod, to stabilise the video and also to give the same perspective, so the difference in the SS would be more easily noticeable. I would also use a bigger and a constant moving subject, as the videos of the water dispenser were too short and the water stream was to small to notice a big difference between the three.
• I later found out that my camera didnt have good recording quality and its settings weren’t good enough for recording. To improve that next time i will need to use a different camera to record footage to reflect the camera settings.

Camera practise- ISO task

• When shooting outside the lighting was very high key natural, and that's why the ISO of 125 was essential for the settings, by doing so I lowered the sensitivity of the camera to the light, meaning that the shot wont be overpowered by it or washed out. In this case i also had to bring the aperture up to f11 to minimise the bright light even more.

• Initially i thought i wold find it challenging to film with ISO of 1600 indoors, as the quality of the video would decrease, and you'll be able to see the noise, however due to the low natural lighting and there was no visible graininess, meaning that if I'm facing another situation in which i need to shoot in low key lighting, ill know ill be able to use higher ISO of 1600 without worrying about the picture quality. I also had to bring the aperture down to f5 to allow as much light in as possible.

Camera practise -pull focus

Experimenting with Pull Focus 

Pull focus can be used to create a certain mood/ ideas in the audience, as the director can choose which subject to focus on and change the focus on to.

Examples of Pull focus indoors

Filming inside was more challenging due to the lack of natural lighting. To improve that i tried to get as much natural lighting, by choosing settings as close to the windows as possible, without having to put my ISO higher than 200, however the lighting on the first short clip can be seen as too harsh and too bright. To improve next time I would think about weather I'm filming indoors or outdoors and will consider bringing a light source with me to compensate for the dull low lighting 

Examples on Pull focus outdoors
When filming outdoors i had no trouble with the lighting, I also positioned the camera at a lower angle so i could capture a different perspective and more than 2 subjects in my frame. The camera goes through 2 subjects before focusing on the last 3rd one.

Camera settings

Shutter Speed
simply refers to the amount of time that the camera's shutter is open. The longer the shutter is open, the more light that passes through to the camera's sensor. Conversely, the shorter the shutter is open, the less light that's able to pass through.

• measured in seconds 
• to freeze movement in an image you'll need faster speed/ to let the movement blur you'll need a slower Shutter Speed.

ISO

How sensitive a film is to light
A camera setting that will brighten or darken a photo. As you increase your ISO number, your photos will grow progressively brighter. For that reason, ISO can help you capture images in darker environments, or be more flexible about your aperture and shutter speed settings.

However, raising your ISO has consequences. A photo taken at too high of an ISO will show a lot of grain, also known as noise, and might not be usable. So, brightening a photo via ISO is always a trade-off. You should only raise your ISO when you are unable to brighten the photo via shutter speed or aperture instead (for example, if using a longer shutter speed would cause your subject to be blurry).

• the lower the number, the lower the sensitivity and the finer the grain in the shots/ higher numbers mean your sensor becomes more sensitive to light (use in dark)

Aperture
Can be defined as the opening in a lens through which light passes to enter the camera. It is expressed in f-numbers like f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8 and so on to express the size of the lens opening, which can be controlled through the lens or the camera

• the opening in the lens
• the larger the hole the more light gets in- the smaller the hole the less light
• measured in 'f-stops'

Frame rate

• the number of individual frames that comprise/make each second of video (how many frames per second)/ the simple act of measuring how many video frames the surveillance camera captures per second of video. 30 fps means the camera captured 30 frames in a single second of video; the higher the frames, the smoother the video will be. Frame rate also has an impact on the size of your video files. A higher frame rate of 60 fps results in more frames, so the video file will be larger and heavier for the device.

https://www.photographytalk.com/beginner-photography-tips/shutter-speed-explained

https://photographylife.com/what-is-iso-in-photography

https://www.videosurveillance.com/tech/frame-rate.asp

Unit 30- Lighting Enrolment task

A. how and why lighting affects camera techniques for
moving image.

Lighting could be what devides bad films from good ones as it not only finds the balance between underexposing and overexposure but also sets he thone and the mood. The reason why ligh is also so important is because our eyes respond to light differently compared to film and video which see things in much more contrast. Threfore, ironicaly to make a scene look natural, youll need enough artificial light.

This is what te mst common lighting set up would look like. The key light  would be the most promnent light in the frame. Te fill ligh isn he light that literary 'fills in' the shadows so the contrast from he key light wont be as overpowering and it wont be creating deep shadows.
The backlight, usually set behind and higher above the subject is used to add depth.

Hard and Soft film ligting

The hardness or softness of the light depends on how large the light sourse is, and how it affects the shadows in the frame. Soft lighting uses several lighting sorces from different angles to achieve that  more 'soft' and gentle with faded gradient and an aery feeling to it.  

Hard lighting is coming from only one source/point,  making it a lo more dramatic, creating a sharper edge over the subject in the frame as well as shadows.




B. Post a suggested list of lighting equipment and setups that you would use
for the following scenarios

 A small documentary where portability is paramount

• tripod- Would produce sharper and smoother videos.
• portable digital audio recorder+ headphones- would bring the quality of the sound up, and you'll be able to check the recoding quality throughout. It may not feel as authentic for people, may be intimidating.
• Lights/ LED lights- better video quality, would look more professional. More gear to cary+ it may take long to set up.

 ‘Talking Head’ style interviews

• 3 point lighting camera set up+ light reflectors- natural lighting will be key so with this set up, there wont b any shadows and the film lighting will be soft. Hard and time consuming to set up.
• Tripod- steady and more professional content as its for an interview

 A ‘night time’ shoot

• 2 lights with a softbox one behind the subject to get rid of unwanted and unnatural lighting, and one infront to light up the subject
• tripod- allowing longer exposure

Bibliography A.

https://www.lavideofilmmaker.com/filmmaking/film-lighting-tips.html

https://movingimageeducation.org/create-films/production/camera/lighting

https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/film-lighting-techniques/