How did
you use digital technology to help with your production tasks?
Digital
technology played a key role in the making of my production tasks. From the
firm foundation of my blog, which acted as a core for the tasks themselves,
storing all of my information and progress, to the vast expanse of the
internet, providing a huge source of knowledge for me to use in my research
stages.
My blog is where the process of creating
my production tasks began. On this blog I could lay out my planning in an
organised fashion and add all of my findings to it before consolidating it into
a firm backbone to work from and place all of my step-by-step pieces of
progress into. From the basic beginnings of posting up my thoughts for themes
and genres, to the finished script, storyboard, and shot list, my blog was
there as a central hub for every thought and piece of progress and research to
be recorded on. By doing this the other stages of my production tasks were made
far more simple and organised.
After creating my blog, the next step was
to try and decide what my production tasks would be about and how I would go
about making them a reality. To do this I first had to begin researching from
the broad areas of genre and begin to narrow down my ideas until I had a firm
story. I began with the television, watching the opening sequences of films which
I liked and writing down what exactly I liked about them. After doing this for
numerous films I posted the findings on my blog, commenting on what I did and did
not like about each. Websites such as
Youtube were also immensely helpful, as they allowed me to watch the work of
previous Media students and observe in a more realistic light what somebody in
my position of making a film was capable of. There were many inspiring finds,
what I liked, I posted to my blog for future reference and inspiration.
The internet continued to be a huge help
for me as I continued to research and gather components such as music for my
production tasks. I was able to find a large website full of Royalty free music
which I was able to use in my work to prevent copyright issues. One of the
things I spent longest searching for was my music, and in my search I also
looked up independent amateur composers and musicians on Youtube. After getting
in contact with a few I received permission to use their uncopyrighted work if
I so wished.
Social Networking sites such as Twitter
and Facebook allowed me to research the audience expectations and see what was
expected for a film like mine. I was able to witness how many people might be
interested in viewing a film of that genre and receive personal feedback from
people in the expected age range of my audience. Another website which was
hugely useful to me whilst carrying out my production tasks was the Internet
Movie Database. I was able to research the success and genres of a wide variety
of films old and new that were under the 'Drama' genre such as 'The Godfather'
and 'Public Enemies'.
I used other kinds of technology briefly
in the production of my tasks, such as a digital camera to take photos of
proposed screenshots, locations, props and actors and a scanner to upload my
storyboarding to my blog. A mobile phone proved very useful for organisation
purposes and arranging for actors to all be in the same place at the same time.
The use of a video camera was fundamental in my piece, but not just in the
production itself, but pre-production also. I did many practice takes of
various shots which I wanted to use in my film. By practicing before the real
shoot I hoped to get a better grasp on the techniques for filming. These
practices were also uploaded to my blog.
The use of the computer and apple Mac were
also hugely important in my production tasks. Whilst using them at the
beginning of my production tasks to watch film openings, taking screenshots of
sequences and record the common conventions shared in films of this genre, to
finally editing and uploading my finished piece of work. The editing process
relied wholly on the use of Final Cut. I learned the ropes of this program to
do basic tasks such as linking shots, adding music and simple transitions, to
special effects, colour correction, speed alteration and cutting shots in the
correct places. This was extremely time-consuming, however the process was of
the upmost importance for finishing the task I had worked so hard to create and
film.
The final touches were added with the
program LiveType. This allowed me to add in credits and create an original
company logo to put at the beginning of my video. After learning how to use
this program too and adding all of my finished clips together into Final Cut
once more I was able to render my finished product and upload it to my blog,
showing the full circle of my progress from my very first step.
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