These are recce shots, they are filmed in a local park, there are shots of a gate. a swing and the pathway in which the main action is going to occur. The gate and swing are used mainly for the mysterious sounds they make, it creates a tension which we feel would be a good addition to that particular scene.
Halloween
Halloween’s opening sequence is mainly made up of a long POV shot, the establishing shot is of a detatched house which instantly looks mysterious and creepy, the character then approaches the house still with a POV shot which is moving up and down as the character walks, the character then moves around to the side of the house and looks through a window to see a girl and a boy on a sofa, they then move upstairs, the male then exits the house and the character enters into the house and moves to the kitchen still all in a POV shot, he then takes a knife from the drawer, at this stage you get a view of how tall you would expect the character to be as he looks like he towers over the drawer which you would expect to be a fully grown male, the character then moves up the stairs with his knife, as he enters the room the girl turns around and sees the character who is about to knife her. The character then knifes the girl vigourously and then leaves the house, still all in a POV shot, as the character goes outside you see his father say ‘michael’ and it is revealed that the character is around an 7 year old boy. Throughout this whole sequence there is a soundtrack playing, this soundtrack fits the genre well as it is very mysterious and makes you think something is going to happen.
Casino Royale title sequence
It opens in the traditional bond way, with bond appearing in the middle of the circle then turning and firing the gun, at this point a blood effect runs down the screen and from that the opening credits begin with ‘Albert R Broccoli’s EON Productions LTD presents’ then after that there is many visual effects going on and ‘Daniel Craig’ appears on the screen. The song You know my name by Chris Cornell has been playing since Bond fired the gun shot at the start, it is quite a fast paced song which fits the speed of which the sequence is running at. After the title of the film is introduced the focus is diluted on the credits as there is alot of action going on in the background as they are rolling, it then continues for another couple of minutes of visually pleasing Bond actions with the credits rolling, as it reaches the end Daniel Craigs face is shown which then turns to a silhouette and then it breaks up and covers the screen in black and this is the end of the sequence, at this point the song also finishes.
RockNRolla
This sequence opens up with a pan across some large room which appears to be a warehouse, after it has panned it stops and the warner bros. logo appears like it has been spray painted onto a wall, after this there is more camera movement and it appears at another wall which then Dark Castle Entertainment appears at this stage, after another couple of seconds movement it stops and Warner Bros. Pictures Presents appears then again the same for Dark Castle Entertainment, it then moves on to say ‘A Guy Ritchie Film’ the screen then turns black then gradually fades back in and the camera starts zooming into a character which has appeared and shows him doing drugs which sets the tone for the rest of the film fitting the genre, after this there is a very fast paced section showing alcohol sex and violence again setting the tone of the film.
Pulp Fiction
Pulp Fiction is a very strange opening to a film, it opens straight into two characters being shown in a two shot engaged in dialogue, it shows who you would first expect to be the main characters having breakfast in a diner, the whole scene revolves around the two characters conversation of talking about robbing banks and other places which leads you on to believing they may be the criminals of the film. As the scene continues you see camera shots which could be either a POV or over the shoulder shot its then a continuation of these and shot reverse shots. The action then begins briefly then you are directed away to the opening credits, which is joined by a fast tempo song to match the action which was just starting, the credits open with ‘miramax films present’ and then the directors name ‘Quentin Tarantino’ is introduced, after this the name of the film comes onto the screen in very large writing and then starts reducing in size whilst the actors names are written over the top, the title of the film remains visable throughout the whole sequence.
The Godfather
The Godfather opens with a fully black screen to start with and music playing in the background the music is mysterious which sets the tone for the film, the film title then shows up on the screen in white writing with the name of the producer above it. After this it opens with a close up of a characters face who is talking to somebody, however you cannot see who he is talking to at this point, as it continues the camera gradually moves backwards and another character appears but you are unable to make out any of his features as he is shown in the shadows. The dialogue continues and then the character in the shadows speaks out. As the first character shown moves around the desk at this point it becomes apparent there is more than 2 characters in this room, the camera then moves to another position to give a larger view of the room and you can see there is infact 4 characters in the room. All of this scene revolves around the two characters having a conversation and the film credits do not appear in this very opening part of the film.
This is the preliminary exercise for my foundation portfolio. This exercise is set to a brief which included a character walking through a door, approaching another character, exchanging an item and a few lines of dialogue.
The main difficluties we faced while doing this project were firstly the sound. In ours it is poor because we didnt not adjust the music manually or use the headset, we atempted to change the sound level while editing but it really work very well. Another problem we encoutered was that when we came to editing we realised that we didnt have as much footage as we first realised, this therefore made the exercise a bit shorter than anticipated. The final problem was we had to refilm some of it again as costumes changed, as we filmed it over a space of a few days.
On the other hand there were lots of good points about it. There was a variety of shot types, most notably a shot reverse shot which we were told would be very appropiate for this preliminary exercise, another good point of the piece is the close up on the hand pulling the chair back , this shows a high level of camera work and helps the piece flow from one mini sequence to another. We also included a fade at the end, this made the ending a lot smoother and easier on the eye.
The toolbox contains common tools for editing clips in the timeline. The default tool is the selection tool. When you select a tool the mouse pointer will usually change to a new icon to represent the tool when held over the timeline panel.
Here is a list of the tools -
Selection key - Select clips in the timeline
Track select tool - Selects all clips on a track from a given point, or select multiple tasks
Ripple edit tool - Adjust an edit point which affects the timeline
Rolling edit tool - Adjust an edit point between two clips without effecting the timeline
Rate stretch tool - Change the duration of a clip
Razor Tool - Cut a clip
Slip Tool - Moves a clip in and out points by the same amount
Slide Tool - Move a clip
Pen Tool - Creat control points
Hand tool - Drag the timeline left and right
Zoom tool - Magnify a view
The workspace can be customized in lots of different ways, you can rearrange the panels and use special panels for different tasks.
The workspace is divided into 5 panels :
Project Panel - It is where you store all of the elements needed to create the finished video. It can contain individual video clips, audio clips, titles, photos and graphical images
Monitor Panel - Where video clips can be viewed. The left screen is the source monitor which allows you to preview clips and make adjustments if necessary. On the other hand the right screen is the program monitor, this shows you the timeline
Information Panel - Shows information about a chosen item
Timeline Panel - Where you arrange the edits from the project panel into a sequence. This is where your video’s begin to take shape. By dragging items from the project panel you can then put them in order, you can then create a sequence of clips and events
Tools Panel - Where you can choose which tool you wish to use
Other parts of adobe premiere -
Current time indicator (CTI) - it is a blue triangular indicator which shows you where you are on the timeline
History Panel - Displays a list of recently performed actions. Allows you to move back through multiple undo levels to previous versions.
Audio Mixer - Gives you the control over the audio levels for individual tracks.
Effects Panel - Drag video and audio effects and transitions from this panel to the timeline
Effect Control - Controls parameters for each effect which has been applied to a clip
Reference Monitor - A handy technical monitor for advanced users, gives you precise information about video clips
Adobe premiere is a video editing software package. It can be purchased, and works well with adobe photoshop. Premiere is a powerful editing tool, it can even produce top quality high definition video’s. Also adobe premiere has a very easy to use interface, and can be used by amateurs and professionals
It works by importing video’s from sources, for example a video tape onto a hard drive, you can then add effects and basically edit the tape to exactly how you want it. It can then exported back onto the disk or tape.
Premiere can do a variety of different things. It can -
- add effects
- edit or manipulate video’s
- can put the tape in order
- import video’s
- export tapes in a variety of forms e.g. disc
On the other hand, the things that adobe premiere isnt so good at -
- the title maker isnt particularly advanced
- serious sound editing is not ideal for premiere, need a more high tech device
Premiere is a mid range application. Their is certainly cheaper products in the market, but for value for money there is no better product in the market, adobe premiere is well worth the money.
Video editing is the process of manipulating and rearranging video shots to create a new work. Editing is a part of the post production process.
The goals of editing - Their are lots of reasons to edit a video. Before you begin work you must set goals and targets which you wish to achieve.
Remove unwanted footage - This is the simplest part of editing, many video’s can be improved by getting ri of unwanted parts.
Choose the best footage - This is choosing the correct parts of footage to put in the film.
Create a flow - This is trying to get the film to flow
Adding effects - This is the most interesting. You can improve most video’s by adding extra elements, eg graphics and music
Give the movie a particular ‘angle’ - Video can be tailored to support a viewpoint
Linear sequence - This is a sequence where the editing is in time order
Non linear sequence - This is a sequence which isnt in order, it sometimes can cut back from previous action
Montage - It is a filmmaking technique whch uses quick editing, special effects and music to present the narrative information
