Evaluation

 

Idea Development

Short Film: Wandering Forward

At the very start of this project, I had two ideas in mind. One was to create a music video and the other was to create a short film. After exploring the theme 'location', I chose short film as I wanted to express a personal story with a strong emotional message. This idea slowly evolved into a character-based silent film, exploring the emotional experience of entering adulthood with the pressure to have everything figured out by 18. By using elements such as visual storytelling, childhood memories and specific locations, I aimed to capture the feeling of being emotionally lost but still managing to move forward whilst feeling a certain way. The main theme being location, I tried to interpret this both physically as a setting and emotionally by showing the characters' mental state. With the knowledge of camera angles and blocking, I wanted to create scenes that can feeling. I wanted to create a short film that wouldn't need too many cast or crew members, so it would be easy to establish. While making this project I was able to develop on knowledge on camera setting, I was able to work with different settings depending on the lighting of the location and atmosphere of the scene. I would say that I have used the time I had to create my film effectively, but I would change some aspects of the pre-production when making another film or something similar. The biggest development I would say is understanding my mistake of the scene lighting not looking good, and making improvements to the scene by retaking it. I would also expand on the structure of the story, when writing the script I thought the film would have a strong narrative but after filming and editing it. I realised that the narrative isn't strong enough to resinate with the audience, as the story isn't dived too much into detail.

The most challenging software I used on this project would be Premiere Pro, but I was able to figure things out by looking up tutorials. I have been able to use templates on Premiere Pro for the title card of the short film. The fading in and out of the title was hard to create, but when using the template, it was much easier. I think after this project I would be able to create another film in a much easier way, as now I know how to organise myself for future projects. I have improved in some soft skills, like time management. I am somewhat happy with the end of my project, but I would add more writing in the film to give credit to the people who helped me and also make sense of the film more sense. If I were to go back I would change the setting for the second scene as I wanted the setting to reflect the characters emotion. I would say that isolation of the environment helps convey the feelings of the character but It isn't something I was originally thinking of creating. So ideally I would make change up the location and make it more clear to the audience that a the character is alone connoting her search of mind peace in her time of confusion.

People that have watched my short film have said that the isn't a clear storyline, but the message is clear and that it would have been better if there was a stronger structure in the film. As to time constraints I wasn't able to fix some minor subtitles mistakes and some people pointed that out.

After finishing this project I have learnt that having a film crew would be easier and that filming a practice take before taking the real take would be better, if I had wanted to change anything that I didn’t like. So because of not taking practice takes I wasn’t able to make sudden changes scenes. For future project I wish to spend more time on perfecting the lighting as this will make the product much more professional and give it a much polish look. As well as lighting, I wish to work on the colour grading during editing the project too.

Scene by Scene Evaluation-

Scene 1- The 18th Birthday 

My intention for this scene was to show the beginning of adulthood, the time in life where everything starts feeling much more serious. I filmed this scene in my living room, using a tripod. The visual interpretation I was trying to reflect from this scene was that the character is being observed or is perhaps stuck. I feel like I successfully filmed the moment I was imagining but I feel that certain props and set design could have been stronger. For example adding more birthday decoration and maybe showing a bit of crowd during the scene would have made it more visually clear that this was a symbolic birthday celebration. So in the film I feel it looks too minimal to carry the meaning I was intending to create.

I also found it technically limiting to film alone. I had to handle acting, framing and mic setup which meant I had to compromise. If I did have help to use the gimbal instead of a tripod, I could have added more dynamic camera movement to add more realism to the scene. This is something I will definitely do differently in future projects. 

Scene 5- The 19th Birthday (attempt 1&2)

This scene was intended to reflect that a whole year has passed, and the character is in the same space physically, but emotionally she’s grown. I wanted to show this birthday as simpler and quieter, but the character as genuinely happy. I filmed the original version on the same day as the first birthday scene, however the lighting was too dark and it was visually flat compared to the first scene. Which defeated the whole message of the scene. It felt incomplete, so I decided not to use this version in the final edit.

For the reshoot I changed the location and with that the lighting did too. I used outdoor lighting and props like a small cake. While this visually works, I realised that the change in location made the scene loos its symbolic meaning that she’s in the same physical place but has developed a new and improved emotional state. This is something I originally wanted, so I hade to rethink how I communicate that idea through other elements like her posture and framing.