Question 7!

We did encounter lots of problems with our film, starting off with timing and organisation. We only had the opportunity to film on one day for a couple of hours, not leaving us enough time to get the job properly done, and left us with only half the amount of shots that we were supposed to be. A lot of the camera shots were shaky and the wrong way around, causing lots of problems in the editing and the continuity of the whole thing, leaving us with a few jump cuts and shorter clips that what was intended, if I were to do this task again I would strongly consider changing some shots so we could use a tripod instead of holding it in our hands, making the shots a lot more steady, and I would also concentrate on allowing more time for us to actually complete the task.

To attempt to make this situation better I added in a lot of transitions and effects, such as the 'peephole' effect and simply fading in and out, making the whole thing run smoother and look more realistic than if I were to simply leave it as shaky jump-cuts. We didn't break the 180 degree rule, though I noticed a continuity error in that it cuts between two different areas in the chase scene, something I would aim to change if I had the opportunity to repeat myself. I think our shot reverse shot was effective in that when Dan aimed his gun at Tom and we got a reaction shot, we didn't break the 180 degree rule and it showed what the characters were feeling.

The match on action shot we included was when Dan cocked his gun. I also added a slow motion effect in to make the shot more obvious, as well as to add tension, which I think worked really well.

I know that if I were to repeat myself, I would add more of a diversity of shots as well as make the editing smoother and a lot more fast paced, as the soundtrack often overtook what was actually going on in the film.

Question 6!

The first piece of technology I used was of course a digital camera, though we had difficulties with the quality, and keeping a steady hand, leaving us with some unusable shots and some that were filmed the complete wrong way round, leaving us to rotate them and leave them in even more poorer quality.

Garage band was used to produce the film's soundtracks, which was a simple and easy thing to do, and I learnt that I would definitely use it again.

The editing software we used was iMovie, which did encounter some problems, such as not being able to rotate clips, and not being able to add effects to them fully, because of the poor film quality and the lack of diversity of effects their actually were. We ended up using another version of iMovie purely just to rotate one clip, which was a hassle to our timing and to our end result, leaving that shot somewhat squashed and not nonprofessional looking.

Evaluation question 2!

The first character representation is the 'hero'. He was always in the center of the shots and had the largest weapon, serving as a massive phallic symbol. He was the main character of our plot and similar to most lead characters in action films, as he was always the center of attention and did all of the 'heroic' acts, in this case rescuing a small child from evil clutches etc.

The second character we represent in regards to 'Propp's Theory' is the 'sidekick'. We always showed him either in the background or to the left of the hero, so he is always in shot, but off camera. His gun was smaller than the main hero's, showing that the 'bigger' man is the more important, and the sidekick sticks to the background.