Preliminary Task - Miss Miller

The purpose of this task was we could familiarise ourself with the group we would be working in. My group consists of just three of us; Nojus, Harry and myself. This task helped us all to become aware of the equipment we will be using for filming our own opening sequence, this let us understand how the camera and tripod worked.We created a short sequence in which we were able to experiment using different camera shots. Our task was to film someone walking into a room and sitting down with someone else to have a conversation. They then had to get up and leave. Within this we had to use the following shots; close up, mid shot, long shot, panning and an over the shoulder shot. This short sequence has to be roughly 30 seconds - 2 minutes long.


Within our sequence we had to use a variation of different camera techniques, this included a panning shot, a long shot, close up, an over the shoulder shot and a shot reverse shot of a conversation. The equipment we used was a tripod to hold the camera so that it was still shooting, we used a digital camera to film the clip on.
When filming our short sequence I believe that my group did multiple things well. This includes quickly trying to put together a narrative for our sequence, in our narrative we included all of these camera techniques. The positioning of the camera and trip pod changed throughout in order to achieve the perfect shot. The shots we used did not break the 180 degree rule. My favourite shot was the over the shoulder shot we did which showed the setting over Harrys shoulder, all our camera techniques were added together and at the end they ran smoothly.
As a group there was only three of us which made the narrative hard from the beginning as it was hard to think of a scene where only two of us could be in it at a given time. If I was to re-enact the whole sequence there is a number of things I would have done differently I would have made he narrative follow a story line. As our narrative didn't have a strong beginning middle or end. I did enjoy the task as a whole was interesting as I enjoyed filming the high angle shot as I found the camera easy to move around, i was also taught how to refocus the camera by putting a piece of paper infront of it. If we were to re film I would say that I would repeat the filming of each shot 2 or 3 times, as if there is poor acting skills or the camera would look better from a different angle then we could have justified the situation. By doing so it would have allowed us to become more professional around the camera and let us gain more confidence and we could have gained a better end product. Through my experience I think the whole task helped my group to prepare for filming our opening sequence we used the most conventional shots that wee will incorporate into our own opening sequence we are now aware of how to film these different elements that we can add to our own clip.

For the close-up we had to lower the camera and the tripod in order to get the camera closer to the object we were filming. I think we used the camera really well when we had to do the close up of the books as it remained steady and showed the object clearly so the audience could see by having it in line with Olivia's shoulder as she examined the books, keeping them central to the frame and catching the audience's attention.

Overall I believe this task has helped me and my group prepare for our filming the opening sequence as it has allowed us to see how we all work within the group and help us become more familiar with each others working pattern, who prefers acting and who prefers filming. This helped as playing around with the camera and trip pod was hard to manage at first it has taught us our strengths and weakness as a group and individuals. From this task have learnt that camera skills do not come naturally and knowing where my character should be positioned. To ensure the same errors are not made I will re enact the same scene and watch it before we move onto the next part of the scene. This has also helped me understand the filming aspect my group have recognised what we need to do to engage our audience and make the scene look more realistic.