Preliminary tasks:

For the first shot, we decided to do a birds-eye view of my partner lying on the ground with a clearly content facial expression. By doing a birds eye an emphasis is placed on his body gesture and the green vibrant grass around him, this builds a connection in the audience’s mind between the stereotypically happy environment and my partner, this combined with the audience being able to see his relaxed full body strongly conveys a sense of content happiness.

For this theme we used an establishing long shot, naturally this prompt more-so relies on the set than it does the camera shot, but in this case we took advantage of the camera to amplify the significance of the ‘architecture.’ Because this is a long shot the audience gets to see an open feeling frame of the overgrown environment around the architecture as well as its odd loneliness, being in a secluded corner. This makes it seem more significant, although I would say the piece of architecture we chose is pretty weak for what we intended.

For this shot we used a two shot and a dutch tilt, the two shot displays the body language between the two actors (me and my partner) with me having a clearly heated position – although our faces do betray this intention because we look a little too happy. The dutch tilt however, saves this otherwise pretty mundane looking shot by creating a sense of chaos which overwhelms the audience reflecting the supposed heat of the conversation.

For this prompt we used a mid-shot with a closed frame. This keeps the audiences focus on the door, while the mid-shot allows the audience to focus on the actor’s (my) body language, as I open the door, particularly my hand moving the door handle. This leads the audience to want to know what’s behind the door.

For this prompt we used a POV shot, this allows the audience to be put into the shoes of the person being surprised, which both the context and hand gesture should push the audience to feel.

For this shot we used a low angle, which makes me look comparatively imposing, as I tower over the camera, which should put me into a position of power over the audience. This is supported by both my height and the fact that I was at the top of stairs. My body language of crossed arms also connotes confidence. All building the effect of ‘power’

Although many of these shots are… not perfect, I believe that it served as a good learning experience for several aspects that will be relevant in the final film opening. This helped us learn the value of location scouting, as the mise-en-scene severely altered the effectiveness of some of these shots, I will keep this in mind when making the final film opening. This was also a good taste of teamwork, as the final film opening will likely be a group project as well.

Together with my group of two other classmates we discussed what genre we thought would fit the prompts the best – ultimately deciding on a thriller, the general plot is that a student is looking for a lost bag in a gym after school hours, however they get suddenly attacked and knocked out by another student, the victims friend is then eating lunch the next day, when the attacker calls the protagonist saying “He’s gone”, to the protagonists confusion and worry. We all planned together to make a brainstorm, mood-board, script, and general list of the shots that would be included. Because we wanted to do tracking shots, I also learnt how to use a gimbal in my own time – which will without a doubt be a useful skill for the final film opening.
The filming itself was certainly a learning process, it was virtually my first time acting – which I think I did to a serviceable extent as I managed to fit the character pretty well, at the very least I could probably act again in the final coursework, in terms of what we did well, I believe that the variety of shots used was quite good, and that we did very well at building enigma as to both why and how the kidnapper managed to do it, but we could certainly improve on teamwork, as we had several misunderstandings and creative clashes, however, my teammates and I did have a good variety of skills, this is an important thing to remember for the final coursework, as I will make sure to choose my group members wisely, ensuring a good spread of skills to maximise how well made the final film opening is.