Major Project - Production | Project Evaluation

When starting this unit, I felt quite excited to start shooting the project and turning it into an actual video. I did have a few worries such as the actors dropping out, or things not turning out the way we would've liked, but I felt confident that everything would turn out well, and even if it didn't we would work through it as a group.
The whole process of production has been stressful, time consuming but I have learnt a lot about working in a group, meeting several deadlines and communicating really well throughout the whole unit, not just during shoot days and such. Our whole project has changed a fair amount right from the very beginning but the end result definitely shows how much the project has developed, and how much work has been put into the project.
There were a few moments that were pressing and stressful, but I have learnt from those moments and they have helped shaped my experience of creating a project from beginning to end.

What worked?

My favourite part about this project was seeing the script come to life, and working with the actors to achieve my vision in the best way possible. Working with the DOP on deciding what shots to use has been fun as we could experiment as much as we wanted, and also we could visualise what the scenes would look like. Then seeing these visualisations coming to life was really fun and rewarding.

• Communicating & Group Work
• When working within a group, communication is one of the most important factors. Without consistent and effective communication, it can affect the outcome of a project and can also affect certain situations such as shoot days. 
• Half of the time during this project, I feel like our communication as a group has been really effective. We have got individual pieces of work done, but we have communicated with the group when it was completed or what else needs to be complete. 
• I feel as if the communication between myself and the DOP has been very effective as we have constantly shared our opinions on certain decisions together. When preparing our shot list & storyboard, and adjusting the blocking, we both worked well together to make this the best it could be. We also discussed our own opinions and come up with a solution if we didn't feel the same way. 
• Throughout production & post production the DOP/Editor and I have had a really good working relationship and strong communication.
• This is good as we were able to discuss problems and work them out together, but also I could suggest something in the edit, or vice versa and we would work together to make the video the best it could be.
• The strong communication is present throughout the video as it is smooth and there isn't any mishaps that might have been caused by any disagreements or confusion we may have had if our communication wasn't as good as it was.
• Not only was the communication good throughout our good on most occasions, it was also good with the actors in the shoot days. I felt as though the actors trusted my directions and felt confident enough to give any ideas for the scenes we were shooting, whilst also being indifferent if I didn't think they would work.
• By having this good communication with the actors, it made the shoot days more enjoyable, relaxing and the bond between the cast and crew was always very positive and fun, which is good when shooting for 4 consecutive days and more.
• Shoot Days
• Even though there were moments on the shoot days where I felt stressed and overwhelmed, I still think they all went really well.
• We shot all of the footage that we had planned to shoot, and we finished every day on time. Having a big crew during the multi-cam set ups was really useful as we didn't have to stress about all cameras being on the right shot and and no camera we ever left on a bad shot.
• We trusted our crew and everyone worked really well together when a problem occurred.
• Trusting your crew is always a good thing to have as you know that if any problem were to occur they would be on top of it, or they would be happy to help solve it. Also it gave me confidence that our shots would look good as our crew knew what they were doing, meaning I didn't have to constantly check and tell them how to get the shot I wanted.
• The actors were very easy and fun to work with, and I didn't have a problem with directing any of them. They were all understanding and understood by vision, which was good as I didn't have to direct them on specific emotions and actions (which is something that isn't good for a director to do). They played the characters really well, and I never felt as if they strayed away from the character during takes.
• This is really good as I could trust them with playing the characters and I could focus solely on the performance that was coming off on screen. This meant that when it came to editing, we didn't have much of a problem with the acting on screen.
• Creativeness
• All of us had jobs to do that challenged our creativity, like making some of the props, and dressing the set appropriately. By putting our creative skill to work, our props were effective in the outcome and most of them don't look hand made, which adds to the realistic tone that is carried throughout the whole video.
• By having these props made, and the set dressed effectively, it means that the story is told in an effective and entertaining way. It also means that the humour in the show is clear and consistent due to use having control over the looks of the props.
• This in turn makes the outcome humorous and entertaining for the audience, which gives it an edge to the video, making it attractive for the audience.
• This skill also helped during the editing process, as Nisserin and I were able to confer creative ideas with one another, and come up with a good outcome that shows our creative skills and makes our video the best it can be.
• Developing the Edit through Constructive Criticism
• Throughout the whole editing process we were given constructive criticism on our edit. We made note of all of the feedback given to us and we tried every change that was suggested. We didn't necessarily go through with all of the changes as we didn't feel as if they were the best thing for the project, but we took the feedback on board nevertheless. 
• By doing this we have clearly demonstrated that we can take on feedback and work on changes that needed to be made. It also shows that we can take on feedback but also have the confidence to stick to our own opinions, take control and decide against a change that may have been suggested.
• This overall shows that we can take orders but also justify why we made the decisions to go against these orders.
• I'm really happy with the pace and the progress we made during the editing process, and I think we timed every step well as it led us to finishing on time. By taking on this constructive criticism we were able to see what would benefit our production but also learn from any mistakes or mishaps that might've happen the first time around (especially on shoot days).
• Organisation & Time Management
• Much like pre-production, organisation and time management were really important during this stage of production as they ultimately determined whether we would be behind schedule, and get everything done in time.
• I believe, my organisation leading up to the shoot days was advanced and very effective. By preparing the shot list and blocking with the DOP it meant we knew exactly what we wanted, and what the set up would be on the shoot days. Also, by having the paperwork on hand, it meant I could be asked any question and I would know the answer to it or I could look at the paperwork and work it out fairly quickly.
• The prep for the shoot was done way before the shoot day, every shoot day ended on time with everything thing shot, and the editing of the visuals and sound were finished before the deadline day, which meant I was on top of all of my work and managed to get everything done on time. 
• This shows that my organisation skill was used a large amount and it was effective, and my time management was skill was needed and it was efficient, making the project the best it could be and finished on time.

What didn't work?

Even though I'm happy with the production part of our project, and the final outcome, there were still some mishaps and challenges that we went through on different occasions.

• Communication
• Some of our communication as a group was really good, but I feel as though it could've been better for certain circumstances. 
• At the beginning of the unit, we arranged to have a script read through. This went well, but prior to it actually happening the communication between the producer, the DOP and I could've been better. The producer didn't send us the plans or info about the script read through before sending it to the actors, which meant that the actors knew what we were doing and what day we were doing it on before the rest of the crew did.
• I thought this was quite unprofessional as myself and the DOP could've wanted to do something different and then the producer would've had to email them back with the correct info, which could've given the actors the impression that we were unprepared.
• The producer also didn't really keep us informed on important information and updates about the progress she had made on the scheduling of the shoot days.
• Developing on from this, the DOP and I went through all of the scenes and shoot days and discussed what scene we should film first based on the lighting hitting the house. When the DOP sent this information to the producer she wasn't very happy that we had done this, as she felt it was part of her role and she had already done this.
• Realistically she should've asked us first what we thought as we would've had more to say on the matter, but she didn't communicate this to us, so we did it ourselves much to her dismay.
• We also didn't get the schedule of any shoot day a week prior to the shoot day/week, and we either got it along with the actors getting it or afterwards. I felt as if this should've been the other way round just in case we needed it to be changed, and we were only sent this because we had asked for it rather than her sending it to us anyway.
• I would've liked to review the schedule before the actors seeing it, as I could've made some changes if I had needed to, and she should've communicated with us about whether we were happy with how her schedule plans were coming along.
• There were also moments of confusion were some crew members might not have looked at the most recent update of some shoot info like the shot list, and asked about a shot that we had decided against.
• This created a sense of unprofessionalism and it makes the group look unprepared even though the information has been available to all group members for a while due to our shared drive.
• Props
• Even though the majority of the props were prepped and worked really well for our sets, there were a few mishaps that could've been avoided.
• In scene 3, we needed a newspaper prop as Annie and Dean come up with the idea of becoming Young & Famous based on the newspaper article. Quite early on in the process Laura created the newspaper article and she did a good job at it. Nisserin then took the article and made it look more like a newspaper would look like on photoshop, and the overall outcome look realistic and perfect for the scene. The producer had found a source to print the newspaper from, so I assumed she was on top of that. However, the morning of the shoot day, she sent a message in our group asking if anyone had printed the newspaper off.
• This wasn't very professional and as the producer she probably should've asked if we had printed it off a few weeks before hand, rather than the morning. The newspaper was eventually printed off that morning and it worked well for the scene, but we might not have been that lucky, and the producer should've prepared for that earlier.
• We could've come together a week before this shoot week and made a big list of things that still needed to be done, but we did mention this prop several times, so it should've been one of the first jobs she looked to get done.
• Also in the reshoot, she didn't buy all of the props that we needed for the baking of the cookies. This was quite frustrating as it could've effected the continuity of that scene, but also we had mentioned that we needed these ingredients several times before the shoot week. The producer could've bought these props along with buying the food for lunch, but she didn't.
• We managed to find an alternative, but this wasted more time than needed and it would've made the shoot a lot easier if we did have the same props as before.
• Shoot Days
• The majority of our shoot days were very successful and the crew worked really well together as a team. But there were a few mishaps that could've been avoided and really showed unprofessionalism.
• There were a few moments were I heard some members of crew saying inappropriate comments that could've waited until after we had wrapped and weren't around the actors.
• When hearing these comments I didn't let it affect my working ability, so I kept myself professional and made sure the actors weren't paying too much attention to these comments. This could give off a really unprofessional vibe to the actors, and it makes us seem really immature.
• I always made sure to stay calm and keep the actors happy and made sure they weren't aware that some crew members were being inappropriate about other crew members as this could've made us look really bad.
• Also there were a few moments where myself and the DOP felt agitated and stressed due to interruptions such as spontaneous warming up breaks and constant reminder of how much time we were running over by.
• These two circumstances could've been a good idea and wouldn't have made us feel stressed if we had known about the warm up breaks and were of the running over times every so often. But because we weren't aware of this plan and kept hearing the times, it made me feel overwhelmed and it affected my direction.
• Thankfully the actors were great to work with and they understood the stress I felt, so they understood quickly what I wanted, and showed that through their performance.
• Time Management
• There were a few moments were time management wasn't very effective throughout the team, including when we had to make some props at the last minute.
• Before the shoot week I wanted a production meeting with everyone to make sure everyone knew what was going to happen during the shoot week, and I had been asking for this for quite some time. However, the producer found that not many people  could make the date, whether this was because they were busy or she left it quite late to organise this.
• This was quite frustrating for me as I thought it would be a really effective meeting for us to have, however I comprised by having the producer send every bit of information the actors needed before the shoot week.
• The reshoot was also organise quite late into the process, and it only started to take shape 3 weeks after we had decided we would do the reshoot.
• This was quite frustrating as we weren't sure if the actors would be able to make the day we had planned, but we wouldn't know until the producer had communicated with them. We had to put all of our trust in the producer for this, and although it worked out in the end, it was still frustrating that it wasn't done a little sooner.

What did I learn?

Within this unit I have learnt:

• Communication throughout the whole project is really important.
• Without communication the project wouldn't have happened and it definitely wouldn't have had the same outcome. Our communication as a group was overall good and it was effective, which you can see through the final outcome. 
• Even though we had a few issues with communication, we still got through it effectively and worked with what we had offered to us. If I were to do this unit again I would make sure that whenever I felt the communication was lacking I would tell the group. That way we could improve this and hopefully some of the mistakes and inappropriate comments wouldn't have been made. 
• Some communication was maintained throughout post between myself and the DOP/editor, and we were all vocal about our own opinions on shots and ideas, but overall our communication as a whole could've been better.
• Saying that, the outcome has turned out really well, and even though we had issues, they haven't come across on screen.
• Prepare for a problem.
• We weren't faced with too many problems throughout this whole project, but the problems we were faced with have taught me to be prepared for them.
• If you go into a project expecting problems, you can easily resolve them and prepare for them, meaning the problem wouldn't be so problematic. This is something I didn't necessarily do for every mishap that happened, but as the director I made sure to think quickly and resolve any problems that occurred. 
• With the newspaper prop mishap, the producer could've been more prepared for that, but also I could've prepared for that making the newspaper even though I thought the producer was dealing with it.
• That way I would've had a back in the situation that we had been faced with.
• Also if we had a plan B for most scenarios we would've gone through shoot days and most editing stages smoothly. However, having the mishaps and the bumps in the road it has taught us to be more aware of problems and to be more efficient when solving problems.
• Don't assume anything.
• Developing on from this, you shouldn't just assume a job has been done. This isn't saying that you should do the job yourself to make sure it is done, but more check on the person who is doing said job and communicate with them to make sure it is or is being done. 
• This will put you at ease, and the rest of the group as well. It could also remind the person that they need to do it, or clear up any confusion if they weren't aware they were doing that job.
• This then covers all bases, and helps expand the communication skill within the group, whilst also making sure everything is organised and getting done.

Overall, I'm really happy with the outcome of our major project. The pre-production element has translated onto screen really well, and the whole journey has been really rewarding. I have definitely had moments of stress, feeling overwhelmed and frustrated throughout the process, but every project will bring emotions such as these. Working in a group isn't an easy thing to do, and I know that through the ups and downs we have gone through this unit. However, even though we've had problems, we have still managed to create a really good project, and we have got everything complete in time. A few things I will take from this project are - the ability to keep calm, and focused on my role in moments of feeling overwhelmed; staying positive even when things are going wrong or work isn't being done efficiently; and compromise with different opinions especially when working in a group, as everyone has their own thoughts but you can't take everything on board. I stayed focus on my job as director throughout, and this helped me stay calm, but also it helped the performance of the actors, the edit and many other things throughout this project.

I'm really happy with the group I worked with for this project, and I'm happy to end university with this project being my last at uni.

All of our hard work has payed off, and I'm excited to see this being shown on the big screen.

Last Few Edits & Jobs Before Deadline | Development

Before the deadline, there are a few things we need to get sorted and finish in order to complete our work. Here is a list of the jobs we had to do before our deadline:

• Testing the photo freeze.
• We added this into the edit but after watching through it, I've decided it doesn't really work with the tone of our show. If we had done this elsewhere in the video it would make sense, but because we haven't it just feels out of place. We also didn't say in the script whether the photo was actually taken or not, so it would work with or without it, and we'll probably not have it in our final edit. 
• We all agreed it doesn't do anything to our video, and there's no point in keeping it as it seems very out of place.
• Group Crit.
• During the big group crit we had, there were a few audio issues I found, like Marie's door slam wasn't very effective, and the volume of certain things needed to be raised, but other than that I was really happy with how the final outcome looked and sounded, and I think the improvements made over time have been very effective in making the video the best it can be.
• Also we got quite a few laughs during this session, and quite a few people that our two characters had really good chemistry, which is really good. The group liked our video, and that's really good to know as we've been watching it for weeks and are used to it by now.
• We had to shoot the iPad scene to go into scene 17, with the instagram notifications. We originally decided to do this after the group crit, but Laura's iPad ran out of battery, so we had to do it the day after. I created the Instagram image, to go onto the iPad, on photoshop and uploaded it onto youtube so it was all prepared. Once we had shot this scene, we added it in and at first we weren't keen on it, but after a while we actually started to like it, which is good.
• Printing off the poster.
• This was one of the last things we needed to do. We had heard from a second year that there was a printers company in chatham that did printing for cheap. Nisserin called the company and asked them the questions we wanted to know the answers to. This should've been done by Laura, but we didn't want to waste time so Nisserin did it. Myself and Nisserin then went into chatham and printed the poster at the company sourced. It came out really well, and the quality is still really good, which I was worried about.
• We made the 2-3 minute extract, did the three action screenshots from the timeline, and chose two bts pictures for our hand in. After all of this was complete, we were ready for our deadline to come.

I'm really happy with the outcome of every piece of work we have done, and I'm happy with have got everything complete in time.

Final Cut Viewing #5 | Development

We now have all of the shots in place, including our reshoot shots, so the feedback we got from this viewing will be the last few things we work on before our deadline.

Here is Simon's feedback:

I'm really happy with the feedback from this viewing, and they are all things that we can change and add in without any problem. We can shoot the iPad insert at any time before the deadline, and we can adjust the cleaner cuts and audio. We're going to experiment with the freeze of the selfie picture, but if we don't like it we won't be keeping it as we want the video to be the best it can be. 

We have decided to get rid of Marie's new shots as they just don't work and we would rather them not be there and have the scene look realistically put together, than have one shot that looks like a completely different.

For the stage we are at with our edit and the process, I am really happy with how this viewing has gone, and I'm excited to see how our final outcome will look.

Adding the New Shots & Finishing the Edit | Development

After the reshoot, Nisserin and I came together and she added the new shots into the sequence. Most of the shots match the scenes and they work really well in the video, but there are two that aren't the best. These are the two shots of Marie walking from the car to the house. In these shots you can tell the weather is awful, and they don't match scene 17 at all. I think the shot works in terms of making the scene better, but I'm not sure it's the best shot ever, so we might be getting rid of it. We're going to see what Simon thinks about it in our final cut viewing, but for now it can stay.

As Nisserin added in the new visuals, I added in the new audio tracks and edited them so they matched the rest of the scene. The only problem I had with the new audio clips was the dialogue of Annie & Jordan is very quiet, especially compared to our original audio clips. I increased the volume of these clips and tried my best to get rid of any hissing or humming noises, but it was quite annoying that the volume was significantly different. This was probably due to the sound operator, who happened to be Laura, being in the wrong spot, or not getting as close as she could've done. I made it work, but it would've been nice for the audio to be a bit better, but there's nothing that can be done about that now.

Now that all of the changes from the last viewing have been made, and the new shots are in place, Simon can now see the cut and give us some final comments of feedback that we can work on coming up to the deadline.
I'm really happy with how the new shots look, and I'm really happy that we decided to get some more shots for scene 11 & 17.

Monday 30th Apr & Tuesday 1st May | Reshoot

Laura's schedule:

What happened on the day?

• First of all, before the reshoot we were sent the reshoot schedule along with the rest of cast, which I was a little bit confused by. It would've made more sense for Nisserin and I to get the schedule before the rest of the cast as we could change it if we needed to. But this wasn't the case, however if anything needed to be changed I didn't hesitate to make a comment about it.
• In the morning, we heard from Laura that David couldn't make today's reshoot, which was quite frustrating but there's nothing we could've done. Laura suggested cancelling the shoot day, but myself and Nisserin said that there wasn't any point in cancelling and we might as well get the shots of the actors that will be coming.
• We arrived at the location and started by setting up the camera and zoom that we needed. Due to us being the only crew, we didn't need as much equipment and it didn't take us too long to set up everything in the right place. However, some of the props that were already at the location weren't prepared beforehand, so we put some of the props I bought in place while Laura was finding the rest of the props.
• Once the actors arrived we decided to start shooting the outside shots of Marie coming from the car. However, the weather was awful and the rain and wind was very hard to work with. Nisserin and I went outside with Liz and started shooting the two shots we wanted, but the weather was awful and the shots were really difficult to get due to that factor.
• We managed to get two shots, but whether we will use them or not is another thing, as the rain was really heavy and it might look like two different days, which is not what we want.
• The weather is quite problematic for scene 11 as well, as we wanted to shoot outside and through the window. We had quite a lot of time to spare, so we decided to take a step back and assess the situation. We discussed as a group how we could film this scene without being outside, being it was too windy and rainy to do that.
• I suggested just reshooting the same shot as before, but I could move Annie so she starts off in the same place as before, but moves the bag and leans her back against the counter behind her, so she is facing towards Dean and you can see her face in the camera.
• This seemed like the only way we could reshoot this, and everyone agreed that this was a good idea, so that is exactly what we did.
• We started by getting the shots of Dean baking and Dean's recipe so we could get that out of the way, and we could experiment with the different shots.
• At the beginning of the shoot day, when we were putting the props in their location, I found that Laura hadn't bought all of the props for making the cookie mixture. This was quite problematic and the continuity of the mixture would be different, but we made do by putting milk and flour in a bowl with the rest of the gross ingredients, we could've put eggs in but there weren't any eggs either.
• Once we shot the MS of this, then another CU of the ingredients entering the bowl, and a CU of the cookie mixture going onto the baking tray, we moved onto the shots of Annie. I blocked the new actions with Christine and she understood what I wanted her to do. We had a few run-throughs and had a few takes of this shot as there were a few line mishaps, but eventually we got the shot we needed, and then we moved onto getting the iPad shots we needed.
• Once these were done we wrapped for the day. After we wrapped we decided that if David could make the day after, we would shoot his shots in the morning. Laura called him and asked, and he said he was free, so we had a second reshoot day the day after.
• SECOND SHOOT DAY
• Once we arrived we set up the camera, zoom and lights, and we also set up the green screen. We wanted to get some shots of David as Jordan Hamsay to add to the advert, as we thought that would help the audience recognise him at the end of the video. We set up the lights how we wanted them so we could get straight into filming once David arrived.
• When David did arrive, we had him stand in front of the green screen and say a few lines for the advert. We also had him sharpen some knives to add a little bit of entertainment in the advert and make it more realistic.
• Then once I was happy with this footage we moved onto getting the two shots for scene 17. I blocked the scene again with David and showed him the footage we have edited already so he remembers everything. It took a few takes to get right, for both the shot inside the house and the iPad shot, as their were line mishaps and continuity mishaps. But we eventually got all of the shots we needed and it was a relaxed way of shooting, which I really enjoyed.
• Then once I was happy with the shots we got, we wrapped for the day again and packed everything away before taking the equipment back.

Notes:

This reshoot was a lot more relaxed than our normal shoot days were, but that was probably because we didn't have as many shots to get, and we weren't rushed for time. We did have a few moments where we had to solve problems, but we worked well as a team and communicated well in order to solve these problems effectively. The only thing that I thought was quite time consuming and problematic was finding the props in the house, when they should've been prepared before hand, and also not having all of the ingredients for scene 11. This could affect the continuity of the scene, but hopefully it won't be too noticeable.

Overall, I think this reshoot went really well, and the new shots will definitely make a big difference, but for the better.