Question 6: What Have You Learnt About Technologies From The Process Of Constructing This Product?

Zac Sowter A/S Media Studies

Digital Cameras

Before even our preliminary, I had never properly before used a camcorder. I can now say that I have learnt how to make good handheld shots, and how to use various features of the camera – for instance zooming, knowing when appropriate to zoom, using the camera’s integrated light, and even how to rewind, fast-forward and watch the playback of what is on the tape all on the camera’s screen. The camera which we used was nice and basic to use; nothing too complex, and in partnership with it we used a tripod, which again before I had never used. Thanks to this task I now know how to assemble a tripod and use it accordingly.

Shot Types

Thanks to this project, I can now differentiate distinctly between the significance of different shot types. For example, the shot of the buyer leaving his house (upper left) is a high angle shot. This shows a possible undermining of his power and influence in our film; to indicate that he is not to be on the wrong side of.

Furthermore, the relatively menacing shot of the sniper’s fist indicates tyranny and pending disaster; as it gives all the power and authority to the sniper; as he is the one about to take action.

Editing

In terms of what I’ve learnt about editing films, I would personally say I’ve learnt a lot. The program we used on the computers was Adobe Premiere Elements, which was a very easy to use editing program. Before this task I had never edited before, except for our preliminary task. I have now learnt useful skills such as how to trim parts of a recorded clip, so as to refine the amount of a certain clip that one would want.

Another skill that I have learnt from this project is how to export and upload our finished videos. Once we had finished editing our films, we had to export them to our computers and also an external hard drive, and then upload them to YouTube. I even had to create a YouTube account and upload it myself, so I learnt from this experience on how to function a YouTube account, and how to also export videos.

Narrative Structure

Throughout the editing of our thriller, I tried to keep the capturing of our recorded work fairly chronological. For example, I tried to avoid capturing a sequence from the start of the film, editing it, and then capturing another sequence towards the end of the film, and then editing that. To keep this relatively simple, I would capture our recorded work a slight bit at a time, and editing as much as I could as I went along.

Of course, once it had all been pulled together, it was necessary to edit fragments that weren’t necessarily in order. This saved time in doing so, as I could address one problem, and then move onto another without having to worry about the order of them; as I would rather have known that all the problems relevant had been addressed anyway.

In conclusion, it was important to keep the narrative structure, to increase the reliability of our film running smoothly, and therefore making sense. If, for example, we had the scene of the buyer getting ready, and then cut to the stand off between the dealer and the sniper, then the film would not have made any sense. This is why it was important to keep the narrative structure; for the events to occur in the intended order.