I’ve currently set up this online music channel with Tamsin and Taryn to showcase up-and-coming artists, provide news, reviews, mini documentaries, along with interviews with some of the biggest names in the music industry.

The website can be found at http://www.audere.tv and we can be found on facebook, twitter, youtube and vimeo. We’re currently in pre-production with many of the shows being negotiated and filmed within the coming months. So stay tuned and keep an eye out for new content.

Camera: John
Editor : John

GOALS

The group for this coursework involved myself, Craig Fields, John MacDonald, Mike Moody, Chris Lovelock and Chloe Gorsuch.

During the pre-production stage, we decided what our goals will be. We wanted to create a short film, made on DSLR, taking advantage of its cinematic capabilities. It would last around 20/15mins. With these in mind we set upon creating a production company of sorts that would house each of us under it. Chris and myself both already have production companies (White Ice Media ~ Chris, Light Year Productions ~ Craig) but we wanted this to be an online presence that involved all of us.

To be able to keep in contact with the rest of the crew, we created a Facebook Group. This would allow us to suggest names and ideas for the project. Within this group we came up with the name Inside Edge Film.

After mulling over ideas for what the actual production will be about, we settled on two possible productions. John’s idea of the sex trafficking film and Chris’s idea of the father betrayal thriller. I was for Chris’s idea because I felt logistically we could produce this without having to spend lots of money. If we were to do John’s idea then we may run into money issues, UNLESS it was well budgeted.

As Chris and myself both wanted to do his idea, John and Mike wanted to do John’s then the decision rested upon Chloe. She chose John’s idea. Our roles, because of this choice would be settled next.

JOB ROLES

Craig – Camera Op, Sound Engineer and Editing (Data Rangler)
John – DOP, Camera, Editing (Colour Grading & HDR)
Chris – Director/Editing
Mike – Script/Director/Editing
Chloe – Producer

As a very technical person, I knew I wanted to be a camera operator, along with doing any other tech stuff, including editing (data rangle), Sound engineering etc. If we had chosen Chris’s idea, I would of loved to have developed the script with Chris as well as doing the technical roles. John is great with camera and lighting and we both would work well together under these roles. Chris wanted to Direct, Mike wanted to produce the script and Direct along side Chris. I thought this was a fair idea, Mike would know the script inside out after having written it and would therefore know what he would want to see from the actors. Chloe would therefore be producer.

THE Soundtrack

The score was to be written by Kevin Fields, who happens to be my Father, amongst being a musician and sound engineer. Any foley sound was to be collected by myself, after the film was edited to a good standard. Then the score and the rest of the soundtrack, including the on-set/location audio would be mixed and then mastered in our home studio.

Here’s a sample of the opening music to the film.

THE STORY

RED LIGHT is the story of two men who drive various rented vans. Contained within these vans are trafficked women. One of the men is aware of the true nature of the business, the other believes he’s doing a good thing. When things go wrong, and one of the women end up dead, the cleanup rests on our two main characters. It’s only then that they both realise the true nature and severity of this business.

TECHNICAL

As the goals sections suggests, we will be using the DSLR format to create a cinematic look, taking advantage of it’s shallow depth of field and low light capabilities. It’s also a relatively cheap solution to creating the celluloid 35mm style without having to run into the costs of re-shoots and getting the film processed and then transcoded into the relevant editing format of either Apple Pro Res 422 (HQ) or DPX. Our DSLR of choice are the Canon’s. Chris, Mike and myself own the Canon 550D, although they feature a smaller APS- C sensor that crops the images (1.6x) on the EF lenses, and therefore also allows less stops of light into the camera. They still produce a very cinematic look and feel, but compared to it’s 35mm sensor counterpart; the 5DmKII, it’s not quite as good as achieving the a clean image we want in low light situations.

Because we own the 550D camera’s we’re able to change and modify the firmware to a greater extent. If we were to use the University’s camera’s this wouldn’t be possible. The Magic Lantern firmware for the 550D is essential, without it it would be much harder to achieve the 2.35:1 cinescope aspect ratio that we wanted. It will also allow us to manually see what the white balance is and manually change the colour temp in camera. The other very good feature of Magic Lantern are that it also allows for more increments between different ISO values, excellent when trying to expose to tricky environment.

The final year film is a production by a group of us, which go by the name of INSIDE EDGE FILM; Chris Lovelock (Director), Mike Moody (Writer & Director), John MacDonald (DOP/Camera Op) Chloe Gorsuch (Producer) and my good-self (Camera Op/ Sound/ Editor). The film is called RED LIGHT and is about two men who are trafficking women into the country. We’ve spent a fair amount of time on this production, a lot of the time due to the change/dropping out of actors. I’ve learnt a lot, mostly what not to do on a production, a certain amount of professionalism is to be expected and I feel it’s not been attained due to many unlucky events taking place. It’s very important to have a schedule in place, and detailed weeks in advanced, but because of the mishaps, the schedule would be done the night before, causing much confusion. I start going into Post-Production on Monday for this project so I might neglect the blog, however I do want to share my experiences. So I’ll try my best to create tutorials of certain elements of my editing, such as stabilising a shaky shot in Adobe After Effects.

The Second Years I’ve been working with have been most professional, and have created something that I’m very pleased to have worked on. “A Chapter in the life of Elizabeth Keckley”, shot on location in Kent, in a 13th Century House. It was a tough shoot, but shall be very rewarding, I was most pleased with how some of the shots I filmed came out. I felt that this production set the standard for all other productions.

The 24 Hour project was an experiment, but we treated it like any other production. It’s a short film about a man who meets a woman, typical love story etc…  and allowed us to stick to conventional aspects of the RomCom genre but at the same time playing with natural light with the placement of actors and the use of reflectors. I shall be editing it along side the RED LIGHT project. So It’s not really a 24 hour thing, but I only have a certain amount of time to give to everything.

Below is the gallery featuring more pictures from all three productions.

[Show as slideshow]

Last week, The University held a ‘Skills Week’ – a week of perfecting and recognising our skills with others we wouldn’t usually work with. This year was the first time the film students did something outside the CMS (computer, mathematical and science) school. In previous years the Skills Week had very little in the way of a film aspect or were just incredibly boring. This year however, it was The 48hour film challenge. Where we had 48hours to shoot & edit the film. That in itself is a challenge. But we did have Monday to plan and Thursday to finish and then showcase all the productions. In this instance, being a third year, I had to Executive Produce said production along with another third year. Together we led a group of first and second years ranging in skills from a lot to not much. This is what Skills Week is all about, recognising our strengths and weaknesses and using this experience to better ourselves in the area we fall short.

My reasoning behind this post is simple. After watching all productions from the Skills Week challenge, it has come to my attention that many if not, all the productions lacked in having a decent audible experience. What this means is the sound levels on location may not have been set properly or the post production of the audio just didn’t happen. And if it did happen, it was a rushed job. My aim here is not criticise. It is to highlight the problem area and show how it can be corrected by doing a few simple things, both on location and or in post.

As a result of this experience I have learnt the hard way not to trust the universities equipment. Countless times I’ve been handed broken or missing items that result in bad sound. Batteries not charged, settings changed from default on the solid state recorder, broken shotgun microphones, leads bent causing artificial static, the list goes on… So to rectify this, I’ve taken the plunge, so to speak, and purchased my own shotgun mic. A Rode NTG-2. A phantom powered microphone of which is broadcast quality. I currently use the Zoom H4N solid state recorder for various sound applications, but it’s time for an upgrade to the on-board mics of the Zoom.

Here’s how to use this equipment to get decent quality sound every time. It’s the basics that count, so this should work for all solid state and shotgun microphone set-ups.

(Starting at the end of the shoot and then moving on…)
1) Keep your stuff clean, fully charged and packed away neatly after every use. After using the equipment for a prolonged time like on a days shoot, you should always clean it up, be it a quick wipe or a full on clean. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but don’t let it get clogged up with mud or dust or grime. Dust is the biggest killer in electronics, fact!
Replace or recharge those batteries, you don’t want to pick it up the next day and run out of charge before the day has even started, do it the night before or after the shoot!
Pack it away neatly, wrap the cables up nicely without bending the metal cabling inside. They’ll last longer! Plus you wouldn’t want to use something after someone else who just shoved everything back in the case without any regard for the next person and that next person could be you!

2) Check to see if you have everything and the microphone is working before going on the shoot. This applies to people who are getting it out of uni stores or even if it’s your own. You don’t want to turn up with broken or missing stuff.

3) Check to see if the mic you have needs phantom power 48 volts or not. This can be provided from the solid state recorder, or from a battery that gets placed inside the microphone itself. If you’re using the 48v from the solid state recorder, TURN IT ON. If you don’t know how, refer to the manual for that solid state recorder which you can easily find on the web or ask someone, that’s what they’re there for. Sometimes the preamps on the solid state recorder are too weak for these microphones, this is where you’ll need a preamp to power the mic. NOTE, the solid states at the university work fine.

4) Format or transfer the files from the current memory card and set your sample rate. You don’t want to run out of space, format or transfer files. Then set the recording quality. Usually these solid states can record at broadcast quality, I like to record at 96khz 24bits. But if you want to save memory you can record at 44.1khz at 16bits.

5) Set the audio to the right audio channel where the mic is plugged into and check your levels. setting and monitoring the audio can and must only be done by someone using headphones. Ideally you want someone tweaking the levels as you go, if your talent gets louder the levels need reducing. You don’t want to peak, you’ll never recover the peaked audio in post. You want it ideally at -6db.

6)  Listen With Your Ears Not Your Eyes.
Added: 18th March 2012. Submitted by Oliver Cooper

7) Refer back to point number 1!

Other techniques include using a boom pole and wrapping the XLR Cable around the pole for safety and for general tidiness. For capturing dialogue, you ideally need to be 3ft away from the subject, pointing towards the mouth from above.

If I’ve missed anything, please feel free to add your comments below! :)

I am venturing into London today; Solar powered backpack strapped upon my back and a case full photographic goodies carried on one shoulder. Tripod attached to the bottom of my bag. AH MAN this is heavy!

So why am I lugging this stuff around? – It’s the London TimeLapse shoot, which is to go along with my dissertation as the product. I wanted to produce something that was iconic to the audience and also visually stunning- London is that iconic place and the astrological timelapses will provide some stunning attributes. But that’s not the only reason, the title of my dissertation involves the words “experimenting with the different forms of TimeLapse Photography” Which means, there needs to be a variety of different types. The London TimeLapse is one of three types that I shall do. London = City Scape.

I thought I’d do the City Scape TimeLapse first. My thinking was logical, it was to be the easiest and possibly the most fun, however I did learn a few things. Vital things are needed, such as:

A Decent Tripod. I thought my new tripod would stand up to what I wanted to do, but I soon found myself trying to stop it from minor wobbles, which would have a devastating effect. And that is true for the first TimeLapse I shot. it’s a bit of a write off. Reshoot is needed.

A Decent Variable ND filter for ALL your Lenses: Although it might be a costly affair, I found one on Amazon, it’s a Poloriod Varible ND filter which fitted on my widest lens. However, it’s not top notch, purple fringing is seen if zoomed in and if turned to the highest ND setting, ghosting appears, and it’s not the type of ghosting that you could get away with. I’m going to save some cash up for two DECENT variable ND filters. They are a must have, for video and TimeLapses, if I wanted the effect of people or vehicles moving fast I have a 1 second exposure. Without the ND filter it would be overexposed.

A very fast SDHC or Compact Flash card: Depending on your camera of choice. Without it, you can’t capture the timelapses fast enough, IE the writing of the data to the memory card. Also, you should be shooting in RAW format, it’s the highest quality and very easy to manipulate later, however it takes up a lot of room. I recommend Sandisks 32GB class 10 30mb/s SDHC card, works a treat. And although on the pricey side, you won’t regret purchasing.

A battery grip : we’re always in need of extra power and the cheap generic versions of canon battery grips work just as well. I had one on the timelapses in London and I found it worked perfectly, even after 2hours of continuous use!

Have a good idea of what your post production workflow will be. I’ve experimented with a few different ones and have settled with the Lightroom> LR timelapse> Lightroom> and then finish it off in After Effects method.

Here’s a sample of what’s to come.

But I believe now, after working over Ethernet – which is fast – I have to switch over to Wi-Fi. Reason one, the cable goes up the stairs to where the router is, and people keeping tripping over the wire. Reason two, I hate wires. So without further reason, lets begin buying, building using our new Apple Branded Airport Card!

What you’ll need:

There are two things that you will need. The first, the Apple Branded Airport Card. I say an Apple Branded one because it’ll work straightaway, no Kexts nothing. Just plain and simple plug and play.

Which one will I need though? – Good question, there are a few different models from 2006 all the way up to 2010. I bought a 2007 model The Apple BMC94321MC. It was £20 from Ebay, from this seller.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350284532372&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT#ht_1174wt_907

Next you’ll need a Mini PCIe to PCIe adapter card plus antenna. I also got this from ebay, from here.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290546315378&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT#ht_3388wt_907

Total cost: £33

Let’s build it! & Use it!

Hope you got everything you could of possibly wanted.

Have a great day,

Craig! X

I’ve been meaning to get round to using Twixtor for a while now and I remember this bit of test footage John, Chris and myself shot for a project earlier on in the year. So I had a crack at it, but it hasn’t come out great. I’m not overly pleased, lots of artefacts etc… but it’s John’s face that makes it worthy of posting here! If you’ve got any pointers on how to make this better, via tweaking Twixtor, I’d be very happy to hear them! (PLEASE!)