Update Post

Christmas Update - final lesson 

Though I was not in most of our final lesson before the christmas holidays, many problems and issues have arrose since our last edit. A Certain clip within our edited movie had somehow over night been corrupted - this issue was simply resolved by gathering our raw footage and placing our selected clip back into final cut express and editing it all over again. Though most of our final editing has been completed and we seem happy with most of our opening sequence, some problems still seem to be facing us - with our final scene - a close up of our much beloved catalyst 'the pocket watch' on the ground - going missing. With the closing scene going missing and with no work done on titles we still are not able to surrender up our opening sequence just yet. All feedback given to us from our draft piece was followed, with slow motion effects being reduced by a substantial amount and the removal of a clip that broke the 180 degree rule. Many sound problems have also come up. Thanks to the windy weather that was taking place during filming - the diegetic sound of wind picked up by the camera is overwhelming. With these suden bursts of wind making it hard to get a flawless transition between cuts we are still left with a problem when it comes to the diegetic sound in our film. Solutions have been discussed, such as the removal of all diegetic sound from our final sequence. All though this may work, there is a distinct lack of diegetic sound within our film already - with it only being used within our chase scene which is only to be covered up with our "home made" incidental music. We as a group have been playing with the sound levels to try and dampen down the extreme amount of wind in the background of our final scene. This has not worked, preventing us from turning over the edited opening sequence to Ben for soundtrack incorporation. 

Problems with our soundtrack have also arrose. As of yet we have not been able to release our pilot films to gather audience feedback on our two soundtrack options. One soundtrack being orignal - made by group members - and one of which is pre-made and was used within out draft edit. As soon as our pilots have been made they will be made public and will be released for audience feedback so that we can choose which one suits best. Solutions to the pocket watch scene have also been discussed between the group with the options of re-filming the clip or leaving it out. Even though re-filming sounds like a good idea, as a group re-filming things has always been the case. With me making the suggestion that we leave the clip out - which brought group members to point out that their would be a rather big whole left within the narrative if we did so. All though I do take narrative into consideration when I made this statement I do believe for an opening sequence such as ours it's all about asking questions. With the appearance of the pocket watch typically answering audiences questions. When reviewing the clip in which we see the murderer looking at something within his hand I find it much more affective that we do not see what he is holding. It could be argued that the clip be left out for conventions sake. Rather than seeing the pocket watch we can just see the character looking at something that lies within his hand, making the audience raise questions such as "What is he holding", "Why is he holding it" and "What does it do?". For the convention of the unknown and mystery the clip is not longer a big part of the narrative, even though it is the catalyst for our film - it does not play a vital role within the opening sequence.

Problems with our narrative have been with us since the start, with our narrative being confusing and unclear to the audience. Due to this fact I have decided to write a full treatment behind our story in the hope it would make thing more clear to our audience where narrative is concerned. I do realise that this issue should of been resolved long ago to avoid problem during filming but things have been left this way due to certain group members not taking things very seriously at the beginning of the project.

Other problems will be delivered in later posts, by for now I wish everyone a merry christmas and a happy new year.