Evalution question 7

7. Looking back at your preliminary task (the continuity editing task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

At the start of course, myself and a couple of others made a preliminary task which was a small film using match on action shot, reverse shot and the 180 degree rule.

This task was the first practice on filming of that year, and during the course of making my opening I have learnt a lot about the elements needed for filmmaking. The first thing that I learnt was the filming process, generally as at the start of the year I was worried about how I would use the camera to get the shots. During the process I learnt how to hold the camera and use the tripod to not have a shaky picture, as well as learning how to change the camera position to get the shots in needed. I developed my skills in filming by filming different types of shots, such as close up and very wide shots. I learnt how to create them using my camera, and learnt different skills needed to film my opening 

I also learnt more about casting; I needed to chose the right people that would fit the genre and would be good actors/actress for my opening. From the preliminary task I learnt that just choosing people from having a lot of time to film and didn't know how to act was a bad idea as they may not have been right for what I wanted and made the film look amateur.
 I also learnt the problems of casting, and that sometimes casting friends could result in arguments. Also availability was sometimes being an issue of actors of my age, considering the amount of work that had to be put in for Sixth Form, and people of my age not having much time, this limited how much time I had to edit.  

I also learnt about the use of Mis-en-Scene to create atmosphere and a believable setting for my opening. I developed skills in choosing costume that would suit the character at the situation, such as using black and red to have a contention of horror. While in my preliminary task I did not have the knowledge of what would suit the characters in the situation they were in and I just had to use whatever was there.  I have also learnt the power of setting and locations, I discovered while in the process of making my product that settings had to look realistic and fit the realms of the film. For example I learnt that using my bed room for a male character to sleep in didn't not fit his character because of the differences in gender.

Over the past few months, I have learnt a lot about filming, technical wise with the practice with my camera and planning wise with the casting, location-finding etc. I have gained knowledge about how to develop my film-maker skills to create a opening which would fit the 2 minutes. I have also learnt the problems that can arise from poor planning. All in all I have learnt how to film a creative piece of media using different techniques which I learnt from practicing and expanding my knowledge on filming.