Depict Research

"Nati" by Daniel Chisholm 

http://www.depict.org/2014/nati/?category_request=2014

In this video a 91 year old Italian man - Nati, cuts an old olive tree to then make a new plant. The audience becomes familiar with his background and his views on life as he reflects back on his life in 90 seconds. This video contains match on action shots, wide angle shots as well as close up shots. Through the use of match on action shots and wide angle shots we become familiar with the location and the surroundings. This video also includes diegetic and non-diegetic sounds  such as voice over and the dialogue. The voice over is spoken in a different language therefore, the video includes English subtitles at the bottom. Even though the man was aware that he was being filmed, none of his actions looked staged or scripted.
I really liked this video as it gave me some topics to think about.

"The Peace of Wild Things" by Adam DJ Laity

http://www.depict.org/2014/the-peace-of-wild-things/

Autobiographical 90 seconds video that follows a man's journey into nature. This video is in black-and-white,however, it doesn't stop me from seeing the beauty in every shot. Absolutely stunning cinematography that makes you appreciate your surroundings and everyday of your life. The poem that we hear as a voice over is beautifully composed and read by Wendell Berry. The close up shot of the man's face towards the end of the video allows the audience to see his emotions. The time lapse at the end of the video that captured shadows created by clouds on mountains was very effective as it allowed the audience to reflect back on the words spoken in the poem.

"A2042" by David Castro Gonzalez
http://www.depict.org/2015/a2042/?doing_wp_cron=1476805581.1244480609893798828125

Incredibly overwhelming video of a middle aged man having a panic attack in the streets overnight. The sound effects of breathing and heart beating intensifies the image seen on the screen. The first thing we see is a close up shot of a man's face which highlights and allows us to see his emotions. As the video progresses the camera slowly zooms out which reveals the man's identity and locations - he is a police man sat on the floor leaning against the wall. As the camera continues to zoom out, we are exposed to what is happening around the corner - broken glass on the floor, a knocked over rubbish bin, blue and red lights which are clearly coming from the police cars because we are now also introduced to a new sound which is a siren, we also see people running around which connotes that this is a crime scene. 

This video opens the audiences eyes to the fact that regardless of what our training was or is, the fear of death is always going to be a major mystery.

The Blair With Project (1999) Low Budget Filmmaking

  

There are several elements of low budget filmmaking evident in "The Blair Witch Project".

These include; 

1. Main characters were played by non famous actors.
2. Footage was filmed by the actors from their point of view.
3. No professional equipment used - the cameras were hand held.
4. The footage was filmed in a documentary style.
5. The set was very simple - available locations were used - nothing was built specially for the film.
6. There are a lot of unnecessary shots included - ground, walls.
7. Simple editing - blunt cuts and no special effects.
8. Dialogue doesn't seem to be scripted - actors had a rough idea of what they had to say, however not all of it was scripted.
9. There are no sounds effects nor any presents of diegetic or non diegetic music.
10. Costumes are regular everyday clothes such as jumpers, jeans and boots - possibly actors own clothes. 
11. There were no signs of light or sound crew.

After doing my research on this film, I found out that the script was only a 35-page outline as the writers wanted the actors to improvise their dialogue in order to make the story more realistic and believable.

Due to no written dialogue the actors had to use a 'code' word for when they wanted to speak out of character - the code was "taco."

The actors filmed nineteen hours of footage in total which had to be then cut and edited down to ninety minutes.

Only one of the actors continued working in the industry as a full time actor. 

Induction Task - Change of Hands (Evaluation)

Even though my group had some difficulties working as a team whilst filming, I think that our final piece isn't that bad. 

Coming up with the story line and ideas created tension within the group. Sebastian and Lauren were absent in the first lesson, leaving Caitlin, Leah and I to draft ideas for the story line. Leah wasn't as focused and helpful in this session and was concentrating on other things during this lesson which left Caitlin and I to come up with the ideas. 

Caitlin and I came up with the idea of gay relationships and how people get treated because of their sexuality. 

In our 2nd lesson, Caitlin was absent, however everyone else was here. Sebastian, Lauren and Leah decided to change the idea because they thought that it would be difficult to portray the characters.
Sebastian wanted to create a comedy sketch that involved superheros and villains. As we didn't have an actual plan for this idea, we struggled to film.

Leah and I were absent on 3rd lessons, therefore I wasn't able to contribute in this lesson. I asked my group what they were up to that lesson and they explained to me what they did.

4th lesson Sebastian was absent and he had all of the footage that been shot in the 3rd lesson leaving us with nothing to do. We then decided to go back to the original idea - gay relationships, and preceded to film. We managed to film everything that we needed in that one lesson.

In our 5th lesson we started editing. We cut the videos to how we wanted them and put them in chronological order. In the 6th lesson we finished editing and uploaded the video onto YouTube.

Continuity flowed quite well throughout our final piece. However, the bits that didn't work so well were the 2 shots where the 'gang' walks through the door - they took a while to start walking. Another section that didn't work was where Caitlin and I were walking down the corridor and James was pointing at us.

Lastly, I believe considering all the stress that our group went through, we ended up with a decent final piece.