Development: Week of filming for final 4 : Hannah McClure centre theatre

For our last shoot I contacted the Hannah McClure centre and got permission to use their theatre space which suited some conversations we had about how the art of cinema can help Marks depression. It turned out to be a great space for this and we had a lot of creative control for a few hours.

We were very pleased with the space but had to figure out how to do the lighting ourselves with a switch board as some of it wasn't working. It was a little tricky but we managed to figure it out enough to get some of the effects we wanted. We even brought our own reflectors just incase which ended up being sliver cooking trays since none were available from the university.

We also tried out different seating arrangements for the puppets for angels and to also hide oursevles it was also what best lighting worked out effectively.

Some lighting tests and also brought the puppets some 3D glasses.

We also had to make some readjustments to the puppets and also the seats with tape so the seats were held down by enough weight.

Mark ended up having to hide behind a curtrain to the side and had to control his puppet through bars while I hid under the seats with my arm inbetween them for mine. We also gave them some popcorn as extra props and to make the conversations more like a realistic situation at a cinema and in the context of the audio and environment. We also could hide the laptop in this way in reach of being able to mime the audio.

For some assitance since we had to stay in the same place ready to puppeteer Aimee Stewart was on hand for some help with direction, recording and lighting.

That's us shot all our conversations for assessment now it's over to Mark to edit it all together in Premier and handing over my sound files for him to place over the top of the footage. We also have plans for DVD as well as a poster and our set up for assessment displaying our work. But this plus finishing off the blog is what we will be working on in the next two weeks up to assessment.

Development: Week of filming for final day 2/3 : Sound studio

We did do our second day in the green screen room just for some extra shots in case our locations didn't work our well and for lighting. Mark said their was some quality issues with how the puppets looked on the high tek cameras with the green screen but eventually we found out this could be due to white balance from Malcolm. But we collected some more footage from their anyway and Mark said he would try to make it look better in the editing stages using premier. We went ahead the next day continuing filming again in the sound studio to do more conversations and because we knew how to get the lighting better with the Panasonic PMW EX1 from out tests.

We also found it easier to keep the puppets in position without help from an extra person working the camera or direction by placing the puppets on some spare lighting stands. This helped us keep the shot better while we could alter the camera settings and place the lighting differently and communicate with each other on how it looked. Also if we were in shot and hiding successfully and giving our arms a break.

We also used the laptop for our audio again and used the schedule I made to know what conversations to try out this time from the previous sessions. This also gave us the idea of how to possibly display the puppets for assessment by using some type of stand.

The session went quite well since we managed to get the sound studio booked for a full day and we had got some of the shots as successful as the test one. We now were going to shoot our next location the following day at the Hannah Maclure centre of the university of Abbertay.

Here's a sneak peak from the day of the improved original conversation from the first test.

Development: Week of filming for final day 1 : Tennis court and someone's flat

After editing and tidying up all the audio for a final shooting we were ready to go for it and film all our ideas for each conversation. I also created different sound files with different acoustics based on if the conversation sounded like a bigger room with a slight echo or if they were outside and the right format for Mark to take into the filming.

To help with the timings of our conversations I also created a small script with timings so Mark and me knew better when to speak and not for each audio piece. It helped a lot just as another visual aid of when to make the puppets speak in time.

We also got permission and equipment back in time for different locations and to do a full week of filming. To make sure what we were doing everyday and to keep us on target I created a little timetable so we knew that's what we were supposed to be doing and what equipment was needed everyday.

For the first shoot we did one based outside at the Tennis courts and made sure they were free so we had the whole area for angles and to be able to hide ourselves better. We did a certain conversation about sports days at school and thought this location would suite that.
We got Louise Mccusker to help us out again by helping us keep out of shot and to press record.

We tried out different angles and ways to make it not as direct as possible through the fence, bars and the tennis net. The lighting worked really well for us as well and was fine for how the puppets looked on film.

Somehow laying down to hide made performing easier on our arms.

It worked out really well performing outside when the weather is good and the assistance was a big help. We also went ahead and filmed some clips inside of Marks flat for a more domestic setting and the lighting still worked out from the windows. We arranged Mark's living room to to fit into the scene better and to hide us more easily.

Louise helped us out more by helping arrange our puppets and the blankets since we couldn't move away from each scene without disturbing the set up more.

We got a good few conversations filmed this way in one day which was great progress and worked out really well. On to the day two of shooting.

Development : new locations

Since we were trying out different angles for the puppets and had different variations of audio ready. We then had a look around DJCAD for new locations. As much as we liked the sound studio space which would be used the angles could be limited to keep visual interest for as many audio conversations as we had. We also were looking at spaces that mostly had glass/see through/windows so it created another dimension for the viewer.

We did some experiments with the puppet in shot by taking pictures to see how it looked and if we could have the space for equipment as well as new location ideas. We did also try some filming and shoots in one of the lecture theatres since it has a glass window. It was also just trying to get places around the school that we thought we would both most likely be and places we would be talking about personal and serious subject matter that our shorts are about. This was also so we had a variety of different shots and locations for our ideas and to have a enough to work with in the editing stage even if their was some we couldn't use.

We do have plans to shoot outside based on some of the conversation's contexts as well as many other places. Just waiting on permission for some of the places outside of the art school to be available and to be able to get some equipment.