Preliminary task

 For our AS Preliminary task, I was provided with a simple storyboard to shoot:

In a group of four, equipped with the Sony HXR-NX5, we made our way to an empty classroom which we used as our set. We started of by distributing the jobs, Poppy and Angelina became our actors and Roberto and I where responsible for shooting and directing. Looking back on it, I think to help us save time and work more efficiently, we must be more specific on who takes the role of the director and who the role of the Cameraman/women.

We decided to start of by shooting all the required shots (an establishing shot, two over the shoulder shots and two close ups), beginning with the establishing shot and moving on to extra film material later.

We set up the tripod on an average eyesight height, bubbled the camera, focused the lens  (by adjusting the focusing wheal at maximum zoom) and adjusted the white balance.

Next, we took two straps of paper and placed them on the spots where our characters stand in the sequence, to ensure that we are able to keep the continuity at a decent level.

I started directing by requesting, “stand by”, “camera role” and “action”. Followed by Roberto replying “standing by” and “camera rolling”. We agreed to repeat the shot a few times until we were satisfied with it. I ended the shots by saying, “cut”.

We repeated the same process on all the other shots, however decided to have both of the over the shoulder shots from a rather high angle to provide some dynamics and special awareness to the sequence. Also we shot the close up of Angelina from a very high angle, to convey her weakness and helplessness to the audience, since she played the victim in the sequence. On the close up shot of poppy however we changed it into a low to high angle to enhance her power, she has through pressuring Angelina.

After we completed all the required shots, we where running low on time but still decided to get a close up of their feet, through out the shot. We brought the tripod down to the floor level and incorporated a panning shot following poppy exiting the shot. Since the close up is extra material, we will see how or if it fits in to the sequence when we start to edit it, but it was a lot of fun experimenting with the different levels of the proxemics.