Research - Film Openings: Institutional analysis (Elliot)

Forrest Gump (1994)

The opening of Forrest Gump begins with the image of a floating white feather in air. The camera follows this feather until it reaches the end of its journey onto Forrest's shoe. From this the feather acts as a synergetic image for the movie and presents the theme of the movie; destiny and its theological ideas. Throughout the title sequence credits enter onto the screen. Music fades into the sequence from the start and then fades out towards the end. 

"Life is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you're gonna get" - Forrest Gump

Actor Tom Hanks:

Our destiny is only defined by how we deal with the chance elements to our life. That is the embodiment of the feather; here is this thing that can land anywhere, and it lands at your feet.

Actor Sally Field:

Part of the picture is about fate. The feather blows in the wind and touches down here or there. Was it planned or was it per chance? 

Preliminary Task & Evaluation (Evan)

In our preliminary task featuring myself (Evan de Roeper), Janith Perera and James Parkhouse, we used a wide range of camera angles and shots. In the task, I took the role of an undercover cop while Janith became a drug dealer.

Evaluation:
    For our preliminary task, we decided to use the theme of a drug bust. I assumed the role of the undercover agent, Janith became the drug dealer and James was an officer. Following this we all took turns using the camera so that we could have a firm grasp of using it. This also allowed all three of us to be in the preliminary task and have a few lines to say. The use of the 180 degree rule became very useful for this. This is a basic guideline regarding the onscreen spatial relationship between a character and another character within the scene. 

   I find the opening scene to be very effective as we shot the scene from different angles and used different types of shots for example the low and high angle shots. As Janith starts to open the door, the camera moves to the other side, as he is about to walk through. At this moment we then decided to go for a close up of Janith’s feet as he walked in. Personally, this is my favourite shot as there was very good continuity from where we last saw Janith’s face on the other side of the door. 

Unfortunately a major problem that we discovered while editing was that we didn’t have a shot – reverse – shot conversation between two of the characters.This is where one character is shown looking at another character  often off - screen and then the other character is shown looking back at the first character.

Therefore we decided to record this as soon as we found that out yet we used this problem for a positive strength as we decided that we’d use this chance to incorporate a small time-skip of a few weeks where I would be interrogating Janith as to who supplied him the drugs. This was also useful as we moved location and our suits were changed since the last recording therefore with the time skip it implied that clothing and items naturally changed.

Technical: Rule Of Thirds (Group)

Rule of Thirds -

The rule of thirds is applied by aligning a subject with the guide lines and their intersection points, placing the horizon on the top or bottom lines, or allowing linear features in the image to flow from section to section.

Landscape shot-  

This shot is successful because the whole tree is positioned with the right vertical line. Furthermore the horizon of the grassland is situated along the bottom horizontal line. This shot is more effective due to the mountain on the left staying within the left centre third. Due to the positioning of the tree, it remains dominant and captures the main focus.

Unsuccessful Landscape shot- 

This shot is unsuccessful because the man in the image is not positioned on any of the four cross-marks. Additionally, the horizontal lines are not aligned with the top of the horizon. Thus, this shot is not very ineffective. For this shot to be successful, the man should be positioned along one of the vertical lines as to capture the focus of the picture.

Close Up-

For this close up of a ladybird to be successful, the head of the lady bird is aligned along the left vertical line thus drawing our attention towards that ladybird. This shot also encompasses the body of the ladybird as well as the bud of the plant close to the left vertical line.

Unsuccessful Close Up -

This portrait of a girl is unsuccessful because, no part of her face is aligned with the bottom left corner of the left third. Instead, the corner is aligned with her hair. For this shot to be successful, her face should be aligned with the corner to the left along with her hand being aligned with the left vertical line or the centre third as we can get distracted by the corner wall of photo instead of the girl herself. 

Preliminary Task and Evaluation (Elliot)

For our preliminary task my group was presented with the idea of creating a digital text whereby a person can be seen walking towards a door, open the door, sit down opposite another person and then exchange several lines of dialogue in order to demonstrate our knowledge and understanding of production and the skills that are involved in order to create an effective text.

In order to achieve this we were reminded to consider the theories of production, including the 180-degree rule, continuity and the rule of thirds, when producing this text. Additionally, I had to consider and adjust the white balance and aperture in order to increase the light exposure to the lense to create an overall effective text. 


Preliminary Task by Tony Egan (5069), Elliot Stahlmann (5214) and Michael Currie (5053)

From an evaluative perspective I would contend that the overall text was highly successful at meeting the criteria of the brief. Although, I would agree that the piece could have been filmed and edited to a greater quality that would have ultimately improved the success of the piece. In terms of pre-production I would say that the planning process was largely productive in terms of the context of the text however I would also say that in terms of location my group and I could have perhaps selected a more appropriate location with greater lighting.

On a similar note, it could be contended that our match-on-action and continuity were rather successful although could still be improved. In my opinion I feel that our match-on-action was accurate on a technical level yet felt quite jarring to watch. Thus in the future I would use more than one camera to film the text from different angles but also i would remember to take several shots as with this task we were significantly limited with time and only one camera was available to us. In addition, I will focus on planning as this is an area of pre-production that warrants time to plan around any issues that could be foreseen, such as location issues regarding space availability and lighting.

Alternatively, my group and I used a wide variety of diverse camera angles and shots, and regarded the rule of thirds, in order to effectively create the text and to highlight specific areas of the piece; for example to accentuate and draw attention to faces and the mysterious bags. In so doing, we aimed to entice the viewer and draw in on their curiosity as an audience. Likewise, the 180-degree-rule also played a key role regarding the conversation and as a group this is something we had to consider, especially when planning for a location as we had to evaluate whether the space available was sufficient or not.

If I were to reproduce this text then I would remember to be somewhat more prolific regarding the planning of location because, as can be seen in the text, the lighting of the piece was very poor, or more so, the fact that we selected a significantly dark filter meant that the piece would appear dark either way, hence we should have considered this and maybe counteracted this by exposing the setting to more light and later select a suitable filter so that we could still achieve a gloomy and dull atmosphere but maintain the quality of the digital clip.

Generally I would say that our piece was highly successful considering it was one of our first practices of filming. Additionally, there is much to be desired with the piece but on the whole the digital text we created was effective at meeting the brief and at creating a mysterious and erie toned atmosphere.

Production Skills (Elliot)

This week in class we were given opportunity to create a short clip to practice using the DSLR cameras and understand  how to establish a variety of different shots and angles to create a more effective piece. For simplicity we filmed a "meeting", where a hitman meets with a business man to discuss and instigate an assassination. Before filming we had to set up the white balance on our DSLR cameras and set up tripods to keep our cameras steady and stable whilst filming. 

In this clip we used a variety of different camera angles and shots. The first shot is an establishing shot, looking over Hounslow highstreet (where we filmed). In so doing, this establishes our location to the audience from the outset. Next we have an over-the-shoulder shot where we see a business man (Tony) inaudibly talking to a mysterious character. They both walk away. Then we have mid-long shot of our victim (Shannon) as she pears over the edge of a balcony. At about 00:21 we have a close up of our mysterious man (Michael) who, in the next seen, assassinates the victim. The business man and assassin then walk over to the body and make an exchange of some kind. This is a group shot.

From filming I learned that before starting any filming you need to set up white balance, which is crucial to good picture quality. Also, it is significantly helpful to film each scene at least 3 times from a variety of different angles as this allows you to choose from a wide variety of clips which could help make a film more effective and aesthetically pleasing for the audience. By having a variety of clips you give yourself option to what works best in different scenes. Finally, it is vital to include a variety of camera angles and shots in your filming as this can often make a piece have greater impact. Although, it is something that can be easily over done and in some cases less is more.

Welcome! (Group)

Hello and welcome to our AS Media Blog with:

Evan de Roeper 4273:

Elliot Stahlmann 5214: