Day 1
The day started with the group nominating and voting for four main roles in the productions; director, directors assistant, sound designer and sound designers assistant. I nominated myself for the directors assistant, as I thought this would be a great experience. I didn't put myself up for director because I still haven't got the confidence to, in effect, boss people around. I'm still quite shy. I assisted Katie, who was director, and I feel we did a pretty good job today.
Planning the production began with throwing ideas on to a sheet of paper, in a brainstorming manor. We came up with a number of ideas, e.g. Outta Space, Cowboys & Indians, a ticking clock and the Olympics. We all put our opinions forward to say the pros and cons of each idea. We decided that during previous pixilation projects within the class, there had been a lot of 'fighting' scenes, so we decided to be a little more upbeat, different and happy. We had some heated discussions throughout the process of choosing what theme we would base our production on, and in the end, we decided on the Olympics. This unique idea would give us loads of options in how we could lay the film out in a simple yet effective way.
Katie, the director, suggested we split in to 3 groups of 5. This way, it could be a more sophisticated and calm approach, as opposed to us all shouting ideas out and it all getting messy. In the 3 groups, we would section out the film. Group 1 would be in charge of designing the beginning, group 2 would be in charge of the middle, and group 3 would be in charge of the end. Whilst doing this, me and Katie decided to float around the groups, trying to incorporate everyone's ideas in to a collective agreement. After we had completed the plans, we then had to draw our final idea on to a story board, which we would then pitch to the executive producer, which was Tim.
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| Our plans on the story board |
Day 2
Day 2 was the main day, this was the day to film our production. We were given a strict time slot of 2 hours and we had to film the whole thing. We knew this would be challenging, but we had motivation to do it and we were determined. As a group, we each brought different props in to help the production come alive. Bed sheets, tissue paper, towels, socks and hoodies are just a handful of things we used. These props would be used in different areas throughout the film to create a 3D effect, instead of using paper for everything. When we started filming, we were behind schedule to start with. The beginning scene took half an hour, and we thought this area would take the least amount of time. As a group, we wanted to have as much time for the middle section as possible as we felt this would be the trickiest and most time-consuming part.
It came to filming the middle section and looking back on our story board, we realised that we wouldn't have enough time to complete everything that we had planned. As a group, we decided to slightly change the approach of this section and make it simpler. There was a slight heated discussion over this as not everyone agreed. The decision had been made as a group that we would go ahead with the change, as this would make it less stressful and more realistic in terms of completing the project in time.
We handled the timing really well in the end. We had finished the production with about 30 minutes to spare so we decided to make the ending more exciting and enjoyable than we planned. The confetti was more than planned and we made the ending last a little bit longer. Overall, we as a group felt the production went well and we were really excited to edit the following day.
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| Behind the scenes of filming the production |
Day 3
We had Wednesday morning to edit the production and we chose to do this in smaller groups as opposed to one big group. This way, we could see everyone's interpretation of the production in their own way. The soundtrack that Laurie and Kieran created was placed over the video to create the theme of the movie. Cheering, water rippling and footsteps are just some of the sound effects they created to make the production more life-like and I think they did really well. When we added the sounds to the production it seemed to fit together exceptionally by the time we had finished.
Our final production
I really enjoyed completing this production, and I really liked being assistant director. Although there were a few slip ups during the filming of it, which meant changing our original ideas, I think the production ran smoothly. The whole group worked well as a team and everyone had input in with the filming and editing, including bringing in their own props from home. I loved working in a team and it has taught me a lot for the future; take chances, step out of your comfort zone and throw yourself in to projects.
Cheerio. :o)
- Olivia.
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