Megan Plant - A2 Media Studies

  This post includes some of my music video and edited extracts in which I explain some of the choices I made and why I did them:         1st Extract - This is the beginning of my music video excluding the title screen. It features many darkly lit shots that have an almost yellow/orange tinge to it in which I added to make the shots set the mood, hence feel solemn, until the shot with the feet which is contrast to this, as I wanted to mimic the good times. Although initially I wanted a shot with my actor's feet in the bed, but I was unable to achieve this, therefore I compromised. 2nd Extract - The second extract is of the beach scene that I shot, and I used a few close ups of my actors to make it very personal as this fitted with the rest of the video about mental health and romance. The shots I tried to line up with the music, when the lyrics pronounce "you" and "I", and coordinating this with my characters, in which this helps the aud...

Today I did some editing for my music video with some of the latest clips I have collected from latest shoots: For these shots I colour graded by using the creative drop down menu, and experimented with the intensity, to make them have a cleaner look. Finally, I did some colour grading to this shot to make it less orange as the lighting was a big problem during the shoot, and I added blue tones to contrast with the orange ones.

Today I filmed my timelapse of the snow falling for my ending of my music video. As shown by the picture, it was a thrifty set up as I used an umbrella to shade the camera so it wouldn't get wet, but I had to tape it to the tripod to keep it stable.

Today I did some filming in college, in which I did some shots with my models smiling at each other and their feet together as I wasn't able to get a shot of them in bed at my friend's house due to her bed being a different angle in her room. I also shot some steam that was coming out of one of the buildings, as replication of some breath, as the weather didn't allow a subject to create a breath of air, so I improvised. I will continue to edit my music video, after I have got the rest of my shots, as I don't have many to shoot now, and I want to edit them all together as I do my colour grading, but I will do some progress updates for separate techniques that I used in the editing process.

Today I did some filming for a shot that I planned as a handstand, performed by my actor: Kathryn. As shown by these clips, Kathryn was not able to execute this action like she had done before in the past, but I decided that some cartwheels would suffice. We tried several ways to try allow her to get her balance but it didn't work, which I didn't mind as a cartwheel still allowed the same premise as the handstand - due to me trying to symbolise my character having the strength to perform the action.

Today I planned on doing a reshoot for some of the shots that was set on the beach, but due to unfortunate circumstances and the weather being substantially different to my other shots as it was raining, I decided to cancel my filming and I will plan to film in the very near future when the weather gets a bit better. In the meantime, I will try to film shots that are inside and do not include my models, and will continue to edit the shots that I currently have to create a rough edit.

I am now in the process of editing my recent shots that I filmed on the 3rd. I have decided that there's a few where I need to re shoot due to my actors laughing or smiling in them in which I don't have enough footage without them doing so. But with the footage I am able to use, I tried to nest the footage and warp stabilise it to stop the footage looking so shaky, however I preferred the handheld effect as I think it represents how shaky and unstable the relationship is. Re filming will not be a problem, as I needed to get extra footage that I was unable to film on that day anyway. I plan to do this next week.   For colour grading, I decided to use SL BIG HDR as it gave my shots a yellow sombre tone, and helped with the high exposure that was very bright on my shots. I specifically like how the top screenshot turned out, as it balanced the exposure and made the shot duller but still kept the brightness.

Today I filmed with my two actors near the beach, close to Tuned In, in Redcar. This goal for this shoot was to film my scene which showed the distance between the two characters, and give some narrative to my audience about how cold the relationship is. I worked with an orchestration of shots, including close ups, medium close ups, and long shots. I struggled with this shoot as I was not able to get an available tripod at my college, so I had to shoot handheld shots rather than have that stability. This made some of my footage quite shaky, and I will try to correct this in the editing process using warp stabilisers. Furthermore, there was a blur on my camera lens that I could not get rid of no matter how much I cleaned it - though I still filmed and from feedback from fellow peers, they kind of like the effect it creates due to it only smoothing out aspects of the image, and they didn't even realise it was there till I pointed it out.  Although the sun gave some l...