G324 - Filming Day 4

On the fourth day of filming we met at our first location, bringing our equipment and any costumes needed for the actors (Christmas Jumpers). 

We began setting up all of our equipment and planning the shots that we wanted to film for our music video. The only problem we cam across during this section of the evening was making the room light enough for our cameras to pick up what was in front of them, but also dark enough that the christmas lights looked as good as possible.

We also prepared props for this evening. We wrapped up a variety of boxes and objects to look like different christmas gifts that the couple could give to each other.

The second half of the evening was creating the Camp Fire scene. This was filmed at the back of Abby's garden. We had an adult nearby who both built up/started the fire and kept it under control if it got too big or made it bigger/look better if the fire went down and looked too small.

We were worried that having too many people around the fire could be dangerous and it presented health and safety issues. To resolve this, any props or equipment not being used was kept out of the way and two of our group members would pass these objects over when needed.

 Posted by Katie Pridige

G324 - Filming Day 3

On our third day of filming we had two different scenes that we wanted to have filmed by the end of the day, because these scenes are based outside we had to make the best use of the daylight we would have (as it starts getting dark at around 4pm now). We made the decision to first film at the beach as we knew we wanted these shots to be the sunniest/brightest, and we would then film the second lot of shots at the park later in the day as this could look more like an afternoon/evening trip.

We went to Mersea beach and Admirals Park (bringing with us the individual shot list we wrote up for each scene).

We used Mersea beach as it had features that we thought would create the look that we were aiming to get (E.g. a small cliff, Large Rocks on the beach).

We also had to ensure that we got to Mersea beach after a certain time and left before a certain time depending on whether the tide would be in or out. This is because to get to Mersea a bridge needs to be crossed, when the tide is high, this bridge is covered by water. By looking at the time of high and low tide on this day we did not run the risk of either being stuck on Mersea island or of being unable to getting onto it.

Filming on the beach gave us opportunity to fully use all of our equipment as the surface (sand and stones) was uneven. Setting up each shot took a lot longer in comparison to when we filmed indoors as we had to go through a lot more to make the shot even and straight. We also wanted to take advantage of the sun and nice scenery by using a variety of heights from the lowest our tripod would go, to the highest it would reach.

When using a focus pull shot we didn't us a tripod at all as we wanted to focus on the shells on the ground, up to the actors sitting on the beach in the distance.

One of our sots involved the actors jumping across the large rocks on the beach. To avoid anybody injuring themselves and to check that our idea was actually plausible myself and Hayley demonstrated what we wanted the cast to do, this told us that the rocks were stable and dry (so the actors would not slip). This was also a good way to demonstrate to the actors what they were to do throughout this shot and because we found this technique effective, we continued to use it when describing shots which required slightly more complicated movement from the cast.

Hayley and I demonstrating

The actors copying the movements

Once we had returned home the cast quickly got changed into their next outfits for the park scene, The dog was picked up by other crew members and we all met together again at the park we agreed to use. The sun had started going down and it was almost pitch black when we had finished, so we had to work quickly. Working through the shot list we brought with us made the whole process a lot quicker. When arriving at the park we decided to include the orange sunset - which was luckily still in view - in the background of most of the shots as we found that this tied in well with our overarching theme.

We included a dog within these shots to give the characters more purpose to their walking around the park. We made sure, before deciding on using the dog, that our cast members were comfortable to work with an animal (E.g. they weren't scared of dogs or allergic). The dog belonged to Hayley (a member of our group) and she had dog treats as a way of getting the dog to sit where we wanted her to. This could've been quite difficult, but the dog was very well behaved and did not cause any problems.

Hayley is holding a dog treat in the direction we wanted the dog to look

Overall, filming on this day went well. It may have been nicer to have brighter light during the park footage, but we are still happy with the results of the day.

Posted by Katie Pridige