The Planning Begins...

Our big assignment for this class is to produce a short 2-5 minute film implementing all the skills and techniques presented through other movies and workshops. The whole class has been divided into 6 small groups with 4-5 people. Every group has a different genre of film—drama, action, romance, comedy, horror, and experimental. While the genres are different, every group's film must include a clown/mime, the phrases “Why is this happening to me today of all days?” and "It would be better for us not to talk about that,” and guitar, cheese grater, and skull props.

My group's film genre is action. I am very excited.

As camera operator, I missed out on most of the team discussion from last night's workshop. Camera operators were busy with their test footage assignment while the rest of their team members brainstormed ideas. Imran filled me in: we'll definitely have a chase scene. Action film—chase scene, enough said.

I can see many many things being possible for our short film. I'm glad our team has only four people, I think it will be easy to better incorporate everyone's ideas than if we had even one more person. Everyone has a specific role. Imran=director, Bryan=editor, Jordan=sound operator, myself=camera operator. I think Jordan and Imran are going to tackle most of the script with ideas and suggestions from Bryan and myself. I think this is a very strong team. But I suppose I should wait and see how things actually play out before I go tootin' our horn...

After the workshop last class I am doubly excited as well as nervous about this film assignment. Every class opens so many new doors of opportunity as far as creativity and inspiration are concerned; it's amazing and overwhelming at the same time.

My ambition, I'm not sure? Well, I guess something on par with StarWars or the like. A condensed StarWars might actually be pretty cool.

If you've seen one, you've seen them all

The movie, Singin' in the Rain, was a sensation! It was vibrant, energetic, and all around intriguing. I especially loved the character Cosmo, he was extremely entertaining. His slap-stick routine to "make 'em laugh" was hysterical--it really made the film for me. Something that struck me while watching this film was the difference between Norma Desmond (Sunset Boulevard) and Don, Lina, Kathy, and Cosmo (Singin' in the Rain) playing to the camera. All of the characters were essentially entertainers, but Norma's self-indulged ignorance looked a lot different than the others. I actually wanted to see more of the latter characters.

I don't think I've mastered the "take notice of cinematographic elements while watching film" art just yet. Or maybe Singin' in the Rain was just too exciting to not be completely enchanted with. I was only able to write one word down on my Notes page and that was "witty." It was the wit and charisma of the characters that I think really drew me in. I guess it could have been the bright colors (technicolor) or the lighting, but I didn't notice those things like I did the wit.

Maybe I am biased towards the film because I feel like we have a personal relationship. My mother used to sing the "Good Mornin'" song to me and my sister when she'd wake us up in the morning. Now that I'm in college, I still sometimes even sing it to myself when I wake up. I never knew where the song came from, and I don't think my mother did either. Hearing Kathy Seldon break into that song rocked my world. I COULD NOT BELIEVE my ears. The feeling I had was probably synonymous with a person who grew up together with this one particular friend and had to move away in the 7th grade to the other side of the country, and then 20 years later running into that friend at the neighborhood market. It was a beautiful reunion and made the film experience that much more enjoyable.

I can't wait to watch more films for two reasons:

-I may rediscover some memory that will add new meaning to my life

-By that time I might be better at analyzing cinematographic elements and can contribute to post-film disccusions

How to make film, film.

Lighting is one of the most important, and lucky for us one of the easiest, aspects of film. After the workshops, we all have a better understanding of key light, back light, and fill light. This will help to recognize different lighting techniques in films we watch from here on out and hopefully fill our heads with ideas to use for our own short films later in the semester.

Along with lighting, photography aspects such as aperture, shutter speed, and ISO will help us create a one-of-a-kind film that expresses tones and themes the way we imagine it will. For example, if we wanted to focus on a particular person or object in a scene and blur out everything else, we can change our f-stop from something like f/4 to f/28. What this does is make the hole (aperture) bigger which decreases the depth of field. The smaller the depth of field, the less there is is focus. Using shutter speed and ISO we can affect how much light is let in and how sensitive the camera is to that light, respectively. The techniques become very important when trying to create a mood based on lighting.

These photography techniques along with lighting will definitely be in our reach when our small groups get to work on our short films. The photography techniques are easily controlled with the equipment we will be using and lighting is not hard to get. It will be really important that the camera person know how the different aspects of photography fit together so that the effects are filmed with the footage and the editor doesn't have to work extra hard to get the footage to say something that wasn't actually filmed. For example, it wouldn't be very fun for the editor to try and make a few minutes of footage look darker and gloomier than it currently is just because the camera person didn't know how to to it while filming. It will definitely be a lesson in team work and efficiency!

It will be fun to try and imitate some of the dramatic film noir effects that were used in Sunset Boulevard. The stark contrast of black and white with deep shadows and creative lighting really made Sunset Boulevard the uneasy yet melodramatic film that it was.

I can't wait to watch more films and get more ideas about how to make it say what you want it to say!