What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

 

While making my media product I have learnt how to do many things using technologies that are new to me. I have also learnt how to use things I have used before properly. I have used a camera before but never to record my own media product. I learnt how to zoom the camera to the desired distance to show certain objects in a shot and leave out other details. The camera itself was very easy to use and the quality of the footage was good considering weather conditions. I also found the tripod very easy to use and did not find it difficult to get the camera at the precise height that I wanted. I did have to hold the tripod when filming outdoors as it did wobble a lot.  

 

I also learnt how to frame and compose shots effectively. My preferred method for composing shots was the rule of thirds. The rule of thirds uses a 3 x 3 grid and the middle square is where the focal point of the shot usually is.  This meant that I had to put what I wanted to be the focal point of the shot in roughly the middle of the screen.

The golden mean

I did also use the golden mean to compose some of my shots. The golden mean is a way of composing shots so the focal points are on an imaginary diagonal line across the screen. I often used this technique when filming the shots of the car.

 

The most important piece of technology that I used was the Apple Mac. This was very important as it is where I would edit and add sound to my film. The software that I used is called iMovie. To begin with it was hard to get my head round what to do and how to edit but it didn’t take long before it became easy to edit and I felt comfortable with what I was doing. I found out how to add effects to my footage. For the slow tracking shots from the front of the car I slowed the clip right down to build tension. I then added an ‘old world’ filter. This made the shots black and white but also very dark. This made the shots of the countryside very bleak and desolate. The trees that are in these shots also became very dark in their colour, thus making the shots look like the setting to a horror film.

 

For the external shots of the car going past I added the ‘day into night’ feature. This made the shots look like they were shot at dusk. This meant I didn’t have to risk shooting at dusk and having very limited time. Much like the ‘old world’ filter the dusk shots gave a sense of bleakness being shattered by the speeding car.

 

On iMovie there is also a useful feature that allowed me to speed up and slow down my clips. I found this very useful and used it on all the shots of the car and the tracking shots. I used it to speed up the external shots of the car; this meant that I could show the car moving at considerable speed without having to break the law in the process. Best of all when I sped up the shots the footage still looked realistic and that the car was actually moving at that speed. The tracking shots were slowed right down but had to be stabilised as the camera was shaking due to the vibrations of the car.    

 

On the second day that I attempted to film I did suffer a problem with some of the external shots of the car. The sun was reflecting off the car so when I watched the shots back the car could not be seen clearly. To avoid this problem on most of the shots I filmed some shots and made sure that the sun was obscured behind the trees. These shots were much more effective as the trees also enhance the atmosphere of bleakness.  

 

I also encountered problems with lighting when filming the shots outside the house at night time. This time it was too dark. This meant that some of the close up shots we tried didn’t work as there was too much shadow being cast by the only outside light. To fix this problem we held up a torch opposite the outside light. This meant that the close up shots of the hand and the hammer were not spoilt by the shadow. I also used the shadows to my advantage as we could use the passage to show the attacker seemingly appearing out of the darkness caused by the shadows.

 

After the completion of my editing I then had to burn my project onto a DVD. This is a relatively simple process. To burn the project onto the DVD I had to insert the disc into the side of the Mac and then export my project onto it. I encountered a serious problem the first time I attempted to burn the DVD when the Mac crashed just before the burn was completed. This meant I had to wait for the mac to be fixed and try and burn the DVD again.

 

Another piece of technology I have used for the first time is Prezi. Prezi is a website that allows users to create presentations without being restricted by the creative limitations of Microsoft PowerPoint. I used Prezi to present the organisation of my thriller. This included props, costumes and locations. The information would have been the same if I had used PowerPoint but aesthetically Prezi is a lot better.