Went to see the second film in the Twilight Saga on monday night called 'New Moon'. I really enjoyed it and thought it was such an improvement on the first one. I later found out that 'New Moon' had a different director than the one from the previous film. There seemed to be such a huge difference between the two films, not just because of the content but because of the editing techniques, etc.
This film was a lot more fast-paced in terms of editing than the first one which made the film more enjoyable (this could be put down to the fact that more action occurs in the second book than the first one, not because of the change in director) For example, when showing the character's flashbacks or if a character has just realised something, a few very short shots of things would flash up on the screen in quick succession in order to show the audience that character's thought path (fast-paced editing).
I also particular liked the shot of Jacob's character jumping over the camera as he turns into a wolf. The effects they used in order to create the visuals of these wolves are probably the same/similar to those used in the film '300 (see my last post). It can be seen in this advert at about 1:33;
I loved the film but I still prefer the books, even if they are badly written, I love the story line (apart from the very end which is awfully written) and I'm looking forward to seeing how the producers/directors manage to get the next book from paper to screen.
In wednesday's lesson we continued to play around on iMovie with our films to see what did/did not look good. I found the different video effects we could put onto our footage and one of them was Day To Night which we thought might solve our problem about the footage being to light in the outdoors scenes but it made everything look blue so we'll have to keep changing around the colour settings etc. to see if we can make it work.
There was also a setting which put a blurry black, circular frame around the shot so we added this to the section where the stalker is following a victim because it emphasized the fact that it was a point of view shot and made it stand out as different from the rest of our footage.
In the film '300' there is a famous scene with a quite realistic looking wolf in it and I wanted to know how they managed to create such an impressive representation of a real wolf and I found this article on the website www.popularmechanics.com.
(To see the clip of the wolf scene in '300', click here)
The New Normal
A WOLF IN DIGITAL CLOTHING
In today's movie making, the creative work that takes place on a computer can be as important as what goes on in front of the camera. In the big-screen adaptation of Frank Miller's historical graphic novel 300 (above), the future Spartan King Leonidas fends off a wolf. On set, visual-effects supervisor Chris Watts tried using a robotic wolf (top) for the scene, but it was eventually covered up by a computer-generated version of the animal (shown midrender, below).
Digital effects such as 300's virtual wolf are remarkable not because they are groundbreaking — the use of computer-generated imagery (CGI) in cinema dates back to the 2D pixel-vision of a robotic Yul Brynner in 1973's Westworld — but because this technology is now a standard part of the moviemaking toolkit. The impact of digital technology on Hollywood has been gradual but all-encompassing. Today, a movie can be shot, edited and distributed — from camera to theater and beyond — without involving a single frame of film. The transformation is at least as sweeping as the introduction of sound or color in the early 20th century, and it is changing both the business and the art form of cinema. Cinematographers, long resistant to digital image recording, are starting to embrace the use of digital cameras, shooting clean-looking footage that's easier to manipulate than film. Commonly available software allows small special effects shops such as Hybride to render entire virtual worlds and blend them seamlessly with live-action shots. Scenes that would have required elaborate sets 25 years ago can now be shot against a blue or green screen, and the setting can be filled in later — and then tweaked until the director is satisfied.
On sunday I was watching the film '300' again, and I loved the way they had mixed real footage with incredibly impressive special effects. I'm not sure how they did it but I really like the effect it had on the entire feel of the film. Everything is made to look very dark and moody, and it makes you feel very disconnected from the film but in a good way, because it makes you want to understand more about what is going on in the film. It intrigued me and I would love to know more about how the producers created that effect. An editing technique that I noticed throughout the film was the use of slow motion in order to build up tension when something momentous is going to happen. For example, in this clipthe main character is seen going towards his opponents at normal speed and just as he goes to kill them, the clip is slowed right down so that the audience is eagerly anticipating the kill. This is exaggerated even more for his final killing of the clip and the sound (both diegetic and non-diegetic) builds on the tension even more. The use of high/low angle shots also came into the film a lot in order to establish the status of the characters. For example, inthis second clip, the shots of the character Xerxes are all taken from slightly below him (character of Leonidas is seen to be looking up at him) in order to suggest his superiority.
Today we watched our footage again and then began to edit it. As the footage we filmed outside is very light, we tried to make it much darker/more dull by changing the contrast, brightness, saturation and balance on the clips. This worked because it meant the clouds and blue sky were no longer visible, although everything that was white in the footage became much brighter but I liked the effect this had, it made it seem abnormal which reflects the story of the film - something out of the ordinary. We also played around with these settings in the dark room scenes and tinted them so they were more red which made it look much more scary than the original piece of footage. We then began to select the clips of film that we definately wanted to use and then started to slice them up and mix them around to see what they looked like in different orders, etc. We muted most of our footage too, to get rid of the sound of wind and our directions to each other, but we edited some parts so that we kept some of the noise - such as the sound of the door closing when Charlotte walks out of her front door and the creak of the door as Sarah's dad walks into the dark room. After doing a small piece of editing we all went away feeling slightly happier about what we had and how we could develop it into something much more impressive.
Now we have to take the pictures of his victims again so that we can film the pan of the dark room/credits again with more visible pictures of us. After that we are finished filming and it will all be editing from then on.
Yesterday we uploaded our filming so far onto the computer and watching all of our footage to see if we had enough to work with when we begin to edit. We were a bit disappointed with some of the footage, mainly because of the lighting. We are going to try and edit it by changing the contrast/adding a red tint to see if that will improve the quality of our footage, if not we will be filming parts of it again. The problem we had with the footage we got on the first day of filming was that it was sunny at the start and dark towards the end of the day. We will try to edit this too but if it doesn't work out we will have to redo that part of our filming.
In yesterday's lesson we watched the film 'Se7en'. Directed by David Fincher, starring Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey this thriller definitely gave us the shock of our lives!!
I loved the storyline and thought it was incredibly effective, but only due to the effects the producers used with the camera shots, sound and general mise-en-scene of the film.
(I have already written one post about the opening credits of the film and how much of an impact they have on the audience)
For example, when the first murder is discovered and the two detectives (Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman) go to investigate the death, the non-diegetic sound adds so much dramatic tension to the scene that without it, the audience would not have been very scared at all.
The lighting in this scene also builds on the dramatic tension as it is very dark in the room and the only light they have is the light from their torches. The way they keep flashing the torches around means that the audience only really gets to see tiny parts of the scene for a very short amounts of time which makes the audience want to see the whole thing, they are waiting in anticipation to see the full horrific image of what has really happened.
Right at the end of this scene one of the detectives lifts up the victim's head to reveal a close up of his face and his white eyes wide open with the torch light shining in his face.
The fact that the audience has not yet been shown the whole picture up until that moment means that it shocks them to be shown such a horrifying image at a moment when they least expect it.
Clever methods such as this are used throughout the film in order to scare the audience and another example of this is when the murderer kills his third victim; sloth. The audience is led to believe that the victim has been dead for a whole year and whilst the viewer is still reeling from the close up shot of a years worth of pictures of the victim on the bed, another close up shot appears of the supposedly dead man's face and he suddenly gasps for air and dust pours out of his mouth.
Our entire class jumped about 10 feet into the air and were still recovering ten minutes later! I couldn't believe how much it made me jump because in thriller/horror films, it is generally quite easy to tell when something out of the ordinary is going to happen because of the build up of scary music but in this scene I had absolutely no idea that was going to happen! This was probably because there was no music behind it, just the detectives talking over what seemed to be a corpse. This proved to be another clever way of catching the audience when they least expect it.
I think the film is very clever and the story line seems quite unique, but I wasn't completely persuaded by the ending. I thought it was very predictable that he would have killed Brad Pitt's wife and it seemed to be a bit of a tame way to end the film when you compare the ending to the graphic images shown nearer the beginning.
On the other hand, I can see how the ending could be more terrifying in some ways, because the audience doesn't get shown any horrific images, it's all implied so your imagination is left to run wild.
In those last few minutes of the film where the two detectives are driving John Doe to the location, I found myself getting really angry with the killers character for the obvious reasons but also because of what he says about why he kills these people. His character completely contradicts himself with his values/morals.
He thinks he's doing the world a favour by killing these people and that he has been called by God to carry out this awful killing spree but by doing so isn't he breaking one of the ten commandments himself?! The smug grin on his face really got to me as well and I felt myself empathize with Brad Pitt's character as he clearly wants to make him realise what a hypocrite he is.
Another interesting point about this car scene is the metal grid that seperates the killer from the detectives. When there is a shot of Brad Pitt or the killer, the grid covers their face. When there is a shot of Morgan Freeman there is no grid over his face. This is to represent the part the two characters play in the seven deadly sins murders and also to show Morgan Freeman's innocence in it all.
When the time came for Brad Pitt to find out his wife had been killed, as an audience member I responded to what was going on by hating the killer even more because he told Brad Pitt about his unborn baby and then went on to enjoy the fact that he had no idea that his wife had been pregnant.
The complete anguish on Brad Pitt's face leaves the audience feeling quite unsatisfied with the fact that he shot the killer, although they know that it had to be done. (Pitt's thoughts are confirmed by the extremely short flash of a picture of his wife just before he shoots).
I loved the effect that Morgan Freeman's voice over right at the end had on the audience too.
The techniques the producers/directors used were clearly very effective if they left me feeling so angry that the murderer only got killed, it didn't seem like justice to me and this is probably the desired effect on the audience that the producers were looking for.
Another significant part of the scene for our group in particular was when the detectives go into the murderer's flat and find his darkroom. We will be refering back to this scene for inspiration for our film opening.
Such a clever film with a great storyline, but I don't think I'll be rushing to watch it again any time soon...I'll wait till the nightmares subside hahaa!!
I am a year 13 student at Enfield County School and I am currently studying for Media, English Literature, Photography and Textiles. I decided to study media because it involves the analysis of film, tv and text, etc. and I am very interested in that, as well as the filming aspect of the course. After studying for two years in sixth form for my AS and A2 levels, I plan to go to university to do further studies.
