I feel like this project has been a huge test for me in terms of pushing myself with a different method of working and also problem solving in an experimental and new way within a brief. Compared with previous projects I believe I have shown a lot more organisation in this one, also setting myself small and achievable targets within the time span of the brief has helped me to be more efficient and get things done in the necessary time frame.
I have learnt a huge amount throughout this project most of which I have never even attempted before. This includes; designing and working with 3D spaces, using software such as AutoCAD and AlphaCam as well as working again with Adobe Software. Furthermore, I have managed to go beyond what I had originally planned by hand making the electronics, and building a full set from scratch using sourced materials, in a sense being adaptable and solving problems as I was faced with them. The final out come of the brief was not as I intended it to be at the beginning, but overall I am happy with the result and what I was able to do.
Approaching a brief in this way meant it was expected that things were going to go wrong during the process. Some of the things that did go wrong were mostly related to the construction of the set itself, more specifically, issues with dimensions and measurements. Not unexpectedly on several occasions I used some of the machinery I was working with incorrectly, including the laser cutter not being on the correct settings for example. Despite being minor mistakes, the process was long and hence precious time was lost, as well as materials wasted because of some of my errors.
In contrast to this, there were many positives that I am able to mention that came as a result of this project. Some of my favourite and most successful areas of the project were the furnishing of the set itself, which was a lot of work but came together quite well at the end. Also, working with lighting on such a small scale produced quite good results and by the end of the shooting process, I felt confident about what constitutes good lighting and how to achieve it using the equipment I had. For once I also felt that time management wasn't an issue this project despite it being lacklustre with others. I made a conscious effort to plan my time and it paid off as there were very few moments where time became a big issue, or the idea of not being able to finish in time for the deadline became relevant. Finally, the post-production stage was a well rounded part of the project. I feel like looking back, it is the stage where I really felt all the work I had done came together, and I learnt a lot as well as made successful modifications to the footage I had shot.
As an experience, I feel that I can certainly take what I learnt forward and apply it to other work. Whether it's the use of camera and direction to achieve certain shots, or lighting to maintain a certain mood or atmosphere within the piece. Aside from the production itself, the experience as a whole has definitely encouraged me to be more open to trying new methods and to be more experimental within my work. Making sure I exhaust all of the resources at my disposal, which in this case was workshops and the knowledge and guidance of others instead of just keeping to what I know.
Tuesday 19 May 2015
OUAN406 - Final Crit Feedback
I really enjoyed the final crit of the year. It was interesting to see everyone's piece for the module after having worked on it for so long and only seeing rare glimpses at what people were working on. I enjoyed giving and receiving feedback on my final piece and enjoyed the process of looking at everyone's one after the other.
I got some useful feedback on my final animation, but no one gave me anything that they thought I needed to change before the final hand in on Thursday. I think someone suggested fading out the titles a little bit faster instead of having them on the screen so long which I could potentially change, but I also remember that before they were as long as they were they faded much faster and I thought it looked better after the fade was extended. Perhaps I will go back and compare them before I submit the final version. I also needed to fade out the video at the end to coincide with the audio a faded credit was left on the screen. I have actually done this, I just chose to show the wrong version in the final crit by accident, so I will have to make sure the correct one is submitted. Aside from this, a lot of questions were asked about how I made certain things and how I went about producing the set. I discussed the cost of the production and stated that it would have been much cheaper if I had known what I was doing from the start. Someone else asked how I had made the ceiling fan, so I recalled the process I went through on After Effects to make it. The last comment was a compliment on how the transition between 3D layers, and live action was quite seamless, which I was quite pleased with since I didn't want it to be an obvious change in the sequence. Overall, the crit was very helpful at pointing out some of the flaws in my final piece and things that could be improved on before the final hand in. I will make sure it is as good as it can be before then.
I got some useful feedback on my final animation, but no one gave me anything that they thought I needed to change before the final hand in on Thursday. I think someone suggested fading out the titles a little bit faster instead of having them on the screen so long which I could potentially change, but I also remember that before they were as long as they were they faded much faster and I thought it looked better after the fade was extended. Perhaps I will go back and compare them before I submit the final version. I also needed to fade out the video at the end to coincide with the audio a faded credit was left on the screen. I have actually done this, I just chose to show the wrong version in the final crit by accident, so I will have to make sure the correct one is submitted. Aside from this, a lot of questions were asked about how I made certain things and how I went about producing the set. I discussed the cost of the production and stated that it would have been much cheaper if I had known what I was doing from the start. Someone else asked how I had made the ceiling fan, so I recalled the process I went through on After Effects to make it. The last comment was a compliment on how the transition between 3D layers, and live action was quite seamless, which I was quite pleased with since I didn't want it to be an obvious change in the sequence. Overall, the crit was very helpful at pointing out some of the flaws in my final piece and things that could be improved on before the final hand in. I will make sure it is as good as it can be before then.
Sunday 17 May 2015
OUAN406 - Planning / Time Management
I wanted to make sure I was on top of everything throughout this project because of the length of it. Being a four month project I wanted to make sure I handled my time effectively. I tried to break up my time into how I was going to approach tasks and making sure things were organised, in contrast to previous modules where I had bad time management skills and didn't finish the project like I had intended. An example of this was the Process & Production module where I didn't manage to finish the final animation. This project was also considerably more ambitious than anything I have done before. Furthermore, since I haven't created anything of this nature previously I thought it would be necessary to plan my time using a Gantt chart amongst other methods of planning such as keeping notes about my progress and blogging regularly.
OUAN406 - Audio
When I did the video piece for the COP module, my friend offered some some of the music he had made that was quite experimental and ambient sounding. It worked well last time and there was a good selection of music that I could use, that I like and fitted well. It also meant there would be no issue with copyright or using someone else's work without permission. With this project, I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to collaborate with him again, and get something that really worked. It was easier this time however, because only 30 seconds of sound was needed as oppose to the two and a half minutes of audio that I used last time. However, this was quite restricting as it meant there couldn't really be any long build ups within the audio which I do like as it allows the audience to be immersed in the gradually increasing music rather than noticing it's there from the beginning.
There were two routes I wanted to take with the music that I thought would be best. One was a more classical approach, piano would have gone well with the type of scenes that I shot as it could have been a dramatic and emotive combined with the slow panning shot and the fading transitions. The other route I thought of taking was with more ambient music, setting an eerie and also dramatic tone like with the piano. After the music was produced I synced the two pieces of audio with the footage I had sequenced together and thought that both worked quite well. I turned to my friends and peers in order to choose which overall suited the most, and everyone agreed that the more ambient piece worked better. So that's what I went with. Once the audio was in place I added a few transitions that faded in and out the audio to make the transitions seem more seamless and less sharp. Finally, I cut up smaller sections of the unnecessary audio and removed to make it so the audio perfectly synced up with the footage. At this point the piece was finally coming together with the audio and the video complimenting each other quite well.
Below shows the way the audio was cut to fit in with the onscreen footage, as well as the transitions I used to make the sound feel more natural and less sharp in the transitions between clips and at the beginning and end of the piece.
There were two routes I wanted to take with the music that I thought would be best. One was a more classical approach, piano would have gone well with the type of scenes that I shot as it could have been a dramatic and emotive combined with the slow panning shot and the fading transitions. The other route I thought of taking was with more ambient music, setting an eerie and also dramatic tone like with the piano. After the music was produced I synced the two pieces of audio with the footage I had sequenced together and thought that both worked quite well. I turned to my friends and peers in order to choose which overall suited the most, and everyone agreed that the more ambient piece worked better. So that's what I went with. Once the audio was in place I added a few transitions that faded in and out the audio to make the transitions seem more seamless and less sharp. Finally, I cut up smaller sections of the unnecessary audio and removed to make it so the audio perfectly synced up with the footage. At this point the piece was finally coming together with the audio and the video complimenting each other quite well.
Below shows the way the audio was cut to fit in with the onscreen footage, as well as the transitions I used to make the sound feel more natural and less sharp in the transitions between clips and at the beginning and end of the piece.
OUAN406 - Post Production
Panning Scene
After the footage had been shot, I felt a lot could be added to the clips I had in order to make them as good as they could be when it came to the colouring and changing subtle aspects of them such as the shadows and the lightness. The software I was using for the post production stage of the production was After Effects. I felt fairly comfortable at this point using the program and navigating through the menus as I had used it previously on several other projects. Firstly, I took my favourite clip, one which really showed off the set and the details. I noticed at first that there were some small sections where the camera shaked very slightly, so I used a stabilisation tool that After Effects has to help correct this. Once this was done I trimmed the clip a little to take off any unnecessary footage and then colour corrected it to make it darker and more ambient. This brought the video to a new level and at this point I was starting to feel much more comfortable about the direction it was taking. There was one final detail I added to this scene, which was a shimmer on the bottles as the camera passed and the light hit them. Aside from these things, there was one other thing that I would have really liked to change but didn't manage to. Due to the lighting I used there was a prop on the set that had a really strong white highlight on it that was quite noticeable in the clip. I wanted to add a mask layer to it and change the colouring of it, this proved to be quite difficult however and after attempting it several times I didn't think I could do it convincingly enough where it wasn't detrimental to the scene. So ultimately I decided to leave it as it was.
Above Shot
The next section I edited was the first clip in the sequence you see in the title sequence of the set, which is the above shot. I made this scene a lot darker and turned up the levels of the highlights in the scene to put emphasis on the spotlight that moves across the room. This is the scene I wanted to add the ceiling fan to, I felt that without this kind of movement it would just be a series of still panning shots which would have lacked in depth and realism to me. The way I made the ceiling fan is I made a solid layer the size of the composition and used this to make several mask layers with I used as the components of the ceiling fan, the rotary blades and connectors for example. The different shapes were then linked together as a separate composition and I made the layer into a 3D layer. Using the different axis in the 3D layer I altered the angle on the fan to fit in with the perspective. Once this was done, I set the shape to rotate on the x axis around 24 times per second, and added motion blur and another type of blur to make the motion seem realistic. The final step was to add a shadow on the floor area below the fan, and the scene was complete.
Other Scenes
With the remaining scenes the main modifications I made were associated with lighting and colour correction. Furthermore, there was another stage after all of the clips looking how I wanted where I spent a fair amount of time deciding which clips should be cut short or which sections should be left as they are in order to accommodate and abide by the 30 seconds length that was asked for the brief. After taking some sections out and deleting any unnecessary footage I managed to get the sequence to add up to 30 seconds which was the length I needed.
After the footage had been shot, I felt a lot could be added to the clips I had in order to make them as good as they could be when it came to the colouring and changing subtle aspects of them such as the shadows and the lightness. The software I was using for the post production stage of the production was After Effects. I felt fairly comfortable at this point using the program and navigating through the menus as I had used it previously on several other projects. Firstly, I took my favourite clip, one which really showed off the set and the details. I noticed at first that there were some small sections where the camera shaked very slightly, so I used a stabilisation tool that After Effects has to help correct this. Once this was done I trimmed the clip a little to take off any unnecessary footage and then colour corrected it to make it darker and more ambient. This brought the video to a new level and at this point I was starting to feel much more comfortable about the direction it was taking. There was one final detail I added to this scene, which was a shimmer on the bottles as the camera passed and the light hit them. Aside from these things, there was one other thing that I would have really liked to change but didn't manage to. Due to the lighting I used there was a prop on the set that had a really strong white highlight on it that was quite noticeable in the clip. I wanted to add a mask layer to it and change the colouring of it, this proved to be quite difficult however and after attempting it several times I didn't think I could do it convincingly enough where it wasn't detrimental to the scene. So ultimately I decided to leave it as it was.
Above Shot
The next section I edited was the first clip in the sequence you see in the title sequence of the set, which is the above shot. I made this scene a lot darker and turned up the levels of the highlights in the scene to put emphasis on the spotlight that moves across the room. This is the scene I wanted to add the ceiling fan to, I felt that without this kind of movement it would just be a series of still panning shots which would have lacked in depth and realism to me. The way I made the ceiling fan is I made a solid layer the size of the composition and used this to make several mask layers with I used as the components of the ceiling fan, the rotary blades and connectors for example. The different shapes were then linked together as a separate composition and I made the layer into a 3D layer. Using the different axis in the 3D layer I altered the angle on the fan to fit in with the perspective. Once this was done, I set the shape to rotate on the x axis around 24 times per second, and added motion blur and another type of blur to make the motion seem realistic. The final step was to add a shadow on the floor area below the fan, and the scene was complete.
Other Scenes
With the remaining scenes the main modifications I made were associated with lighting and colour correction. Furthermore, there was another stage after all of the clips looking how I wanted where I spent a fair amount of time deciding which clips should be cut short or which sections should be left as they are in order to accommodate and abide by the 30 seconds length that was asked for the brief. After taking some sections out and deleting any unnecessary footage I managed to get the sequence to add up to 30 seconds which was the length I needed.
OUAN406 - Producing the City Scene
The way I went about creating this scene, where I had planned for the camera to move through a city scape was actually a developing idea, and I wasn't sure until I was making the scene specifically how I was going to do it. Due to the very helpful After Effects induction we were given I was aware of the use of 3D layers and the implementation of a camera which can be passed through or past objects as if the audience is moving through them. I took this and decided to utilise it to create a 3D scene composed of physical objects I had designed and cut using the laser cutter. A long with some post production effects and some editing on Photoshop.
The first step of this particular process was cutting the buildings. They were designed on AutoCAD using the references from my Gothic mood board as well as some other online references where I was able to create some unique designs for Gothic architecture that I thought fitted the style and aesthetic I wanted to achieve. Once the pieces were cut, using a mixture of rastering and engraving I took them and scanned them in to create 2D files that I could then take an use in Photoshop and After Effects. The reason I chose laser cutting is that the effect that the laser creates when it burns into the wood gave the designs some character and texture before I had even begun to work on them digitally. Furthermore, I decided that the use of wood, would coincide with the colour scheme and general aesthetic of the set, which was made in a similar fashion using similar materials. Photoshop was then used to add texture and colour to the designs. In a sense I think it helped bring out some of the details of the wood cuttings using a different colour, this can be seen in the archways on the second segment down from the top on the cathedral design shown below. Then, Gothic patterns were overlayed to add further details the buildings and give them a sense of realism and authenticity before taking them into After Effects. I repeated this process with all of the other buildings I had designed and cut, including; towers, the bridge, and the churches.
Once onto After Effects I imported the Photoshop files and made a new composition where the objects were turned into 3D layers. The most difficult part of this process was scaling them and arranging them appropriately, which required a constant amount of rearrangement until they were at a stage where I thought the layout looked appropriate for the scene. A backdrop was added to the scene, which consisted of a sun set. Some minor colour correction here helped me achieve the mood I wanted with the sky, and to blend in the buildings with the rest of the environment a bit more I also added two light sources. One of the light sources was a very low intensity spot light, allowing me to demonstrate the location of the sun in relation to the buildings and hence cast shadows on each other due to the blocking of light. This again added to the realism of the scene. Finally, an ambient light was added to blend the scene together more.
Next, a camera was added and key frames were placed, setting the pace of the camera as it moved through the entire scene. After some careful adjustment I decided that around 6 seconds was a good length of time for the camera to get through the buildings, meaning the camera movement wasn't too slow, but didn't go too fast. Making sure that the pace of the title sequence consistent with the footage of the laboratory environment. The positioning of buildings and camera was modified several times before I was happy with the final composition, and the scene was complete.
The first step of this particular process was cutting the buildings. They were designed on AutoCAD using the references from my Gothic mood board as well as some other online references where I was able to create some unique designs for Gothic architecture that I thought fitted the style and aesthetic I wanted to achieve. Once the pieces were cut, using a mixture of rastering and engraving I took them and scanned them in to create 2D files that I could then take an use in Photoshop and After Effects. The reason I chose laser cutting is that the effect that the laser creates when it burns into the wood gave the designs some character and texture before I had even begun to work on them digitally. Furthermore, I decided that the use of wood, would coincide with the colour scheme and general aesthetic of the set, which was made in a similar fashion using similar materials. Photoshop was then used to add texture and colour to the designs. In a sense I think it helped bring out some of the details of the wood cuttings using a different colour, this can be seen in the archways on the second segment down from the top on the cathedral design shown below. Then, Gothic patterns were overlayed to add further details the buildings and give them a sense of realism and authenticity before taking them into After Effects. I repeated this process with all of the other buildings I had designed and cut, including; towers, the bridge, and the churches.
Once onto After Effects I imported the Photoshop files and made a new composition where the objects were turned into 3D layers. The most difficult part of this process was scaling them and arranging them appropriately, which required a constant amount of rearrangement until they were at a stage where I thought the layout looked appropriate for the scene. A backdrop was added to the scene, which consisted of a sun set. Some minor colour correction here helped me achieve the mood I wanted with the sky, and to blend in the buildings with the rest of the environment a bit more I also added two light sources. One of the light sources was a very low intensity spot light, allowing me to demonstrate the location of the sun in relation to the buildings and hence cast shadows on each other due to the blocking of light. This again added to the realism of the scene. Finally, an ambient light was added to blend the scene together more.
Next, a camera was added and key frames were placed, setting the pace of the camera as it moved through the entire scene. After some careful adjustment I decided that around 6 seconds was a good length of time for the camera to get through the buildings, meaning the camera movement wasn't too slow, but didn't go too fast. Making sure that the pace of the title sequence consistent with the footage of the laboratory environment. The positioning of buildings and camera was modified several times before I was happy with the final composition, and the scene was complete.
OUAN406 - Storyboards
This was the first storyboard I produced to illustrate my idea and the overall scene by scene layout for the title sequence production. The initial idea was essentially having the camera move through a large city scape, with each scene becoming more focused on the location of the main characters laboratory. Scene (a) being the extreme wide shot of the city scape, followed by a shot of several Gothic buildings in scene (b) and then finally in scene (c) the close up of the building where the next scene takes place. The majority of the action and content of the title sequence then takes place inside the enclosed laboratory setting. The idea of the close up shots of different details around the room stemmed from the title sequence research I did and more specifically how a lot of of them featured sequences of vignettes that demonstrate characteristics or details of the story that in turn really set the tone and pace of the piece that it was introducing. In this particular version of the storyboard, there is close up shots of the book case and other furniture, scientific diagrams and anatomical studies, and bottles and jars filled with different substances and objects on the characters desk. I then wanted to show the character from behind, working in his work space by ultimately although the character was made, I never pursued this idea and decided to bring the character out of the production, leaving only environmental shots in the final title sequence.
There were several reasons that influenced the decision to leave the character out of the production. The first is that I don't think that the quality of the character was up to the standard of the environment, and I decided that perhaps it would bring the overall production quality down. The second was that based on my research, very rarely were character shown in the title sequences for productions of this genre. This was in a sense to build tension and give the audience a sense of the unknown, before the piece had even really begun. Furthermore, I much preferred the idea of developing the character through his belongings and personal items, rather than showing him to the audience from the start. The only other alternative I would have considered here is using silhouettes or other abstract methods to incorporate the character, but I really wanted to stay away from introducing the character straight away. Finally, time affected the production quite a lot, and although the character was made, animating it as well as the footage I needed of the set would have been quite a substantial amount of work that I don't think I would have been able to complete. One of my initial, personal goals that I had set myself at the beginning of the brief, was to try and produce a piece of high quality work without running out of time and having this be detrimental to the quality of the production. I definitely think this had been something that let my work down in the past, and I wanted to not fall into the same trap of being over ambitious. In order to tackle this, I attempted to under promise and over deliver when it came to the building of the set and the post-production work. This, in my opinion, meant scrapping the incorporation of a character in the production and focusing exclusively on environment shots.
There were several reasons that influenced the decision to leave the character out of the production. The first is that I don't think that the quality of the character was up to the standard of the environment, and I decided that perhaps it would bring the overall production quality down. The second was that based on my research, very rarely were character shown in the title sequences for productions of this genre. This was in a sense to build tension and give the audience a sense of the unknown, before the piece had even really begun. Furthermore, I much preferred the idea of developing the character through his belongings and personal items, rather than showing him to the audience from the start. The only other alternative I would have considered here is using silhouettes or other abstract methods to incorporate the character, but I really wanted to stay away from introducing the character straight away. Finally, time affected the production quite a lot, and although the character was made, animating it as well as the footage I needed of the set would have been quite a substantial amount of work that I don't think I would have been able to complete. One of my initial, personal goals that I had set myself at the beginning of the brief, was to try and produce a piece of high quality work without running out of time and having this be detrimental to the quality of the production. I definitely think this had been something that let my work down in the past, and I wanted to not fall into the same trap of being over ambitious. In order to tackle this, I attempted to under promise and over deliver when it came to the building of the set and the post-production work. This, in my opinion, meant scrapping the incorporation of a character in the production and focusing exclusively on environment shots.
Friday 15 May 2015
OUAN406 - Cameras / Lighting
For a production of this nature, I understand that when it comes to the aesthetic and overall composition and set up of the miniature set for filming, lighting is incredibly important. It allows for different moods to be created and different interactions with certain objects based on their shape the material. Ultimately, it brings the whole set to life using light and shadow to create a realistic looking environment, one that I was hoping to make as convincing and authentic as well as attractive to the audience as I possibly could. To do this I wanted two main forms of lighting, interior lighting that would essentially be part of the set such as wall laps or light bulbs that acted as realistic filament bulbs for the set, and exterior lighting that would be adjustable spotlights used to help light the whole environment through windows and from above.
In order to incorporate the miniature filament bulbs into the set I went online to the site of UK based electronic part wholesaler, CPC. The site has an incredible range of components on offer and some of the parts I needed took a little while to find because they were quite abstract. In the end I ordered two sets of two 3mm filament bulbs with a 12V supply voltage ( I ordered four because they only came in sets of two and I needed three). I also ordered an adjustable 12V power supply which allowed me to alter the voltage at regular intervals from 3V all the way up to 12V. Which coincided with the bulbs voltage and thus allowed me to change the brightness or intensity of the them from a bright white to a dim orange glow. I thought this would be an easy way to be able to change the mood based on the interior lighting all by switching between different voltages. Finally I ordered some terminal strips, meaning I could connect the bulbs to the power supply using wires and ultimately create my own circuit depending on how I laid them around the set. After they arrived I went to Maplin in Leeds, another supplier of electronics and got 3 meters of wire cut (1 meter per bulb) so I could accommodate for the distance between each bulb around the set.
Once everything was wired up I did a small test to see if it would work. For the first time this project everything worked as I wanted it to with the first attempt and I was quite pleased with the ambient glow created with each bulb. Furthermore the distance between the three bulbs was enough so that the enclosed environment of the set was lit in all the necessary places, so I was quite pleased with the choice of positioning.
In some of the photographs below I have demonstrated what the lights looked like through a macro lens. The macro lens I used was a fixed 50mm lens and as you can see in the photographs when the lights were out of focus they had an extremely realistic glowing quality to them. In reality because of the size of the bulbs, being only 3mm long the light was quite directional and linear. However with some playing around the the focus and depth of field this was easily tackled and overall created a very nice effect that I was happy to move forward with.
I played around continuously with the lighting I had at my disposal. It was quite overwhelming in a sense due to the huge range of lighting effects and different moods and temperatures that could be created even with such a simple lighting set up. Furthermore I was given the opportunity to use an adjustable spotlight as an exterior light in combination with the lighting I already had. This made it much easier to create clear shots and create shadows at different angles, which looked great in some of the test footage I did because they were much bigger in the final shots compared with when you're looking into the set. When it came to arranging the lighting and planning some of the more complex shots that I wanted to try and incorporate in to the title sequence, I looked at trying to use the set and its design to its full potential. For example, shining a directed light through the window created a nice effect shown below, highlighting some of the edges of the windows design. Equally, the warmth of the light also gave off a different mood. For example, a very white almost fluorescent light would give the effect of moonlight passing through the window, whereas a warmer glow would look as if the sun is setting. I also tried to move the light around as the shot was being filmed, as if an object was moving past the window and blocking some of the light. These are all things that I attempted in order to try interesting ways to use the set. Sometimes I found that they worked quite well, however sometimes, simpler more realistic lighting was more attractive and worked best at producing the kind of mood and feel that I wanted for the footage.
Also shown below is a photographs I took of a camera mounted on a tripod. I borrows the tripod from the photography department as it was a lot more versatile than the one I owned. It allowed me to alter the direction of the camera on both the x and y axis that it was mounted on. Meaning I had full control of the kind of shots I wanted to set the camera up to record. I knew I wanted to place the camera above the set so I could film a still scene from above, and by extending the tripod and tilting the camera downwards in the y axis I was able to position the camera effectively. Furthermore, some of the most important shots I wanted to produce involved the tracking shot technique. Again, I borrows a camera slider from the AV department and was given a quick 10 minute induction into how to use it. There were two types of camera sliders available, an 80 cm long slider and a 120 cm long slider. The gap I was shooting through wasn't that wide, so I decided to go for the more compact 80 cm version. This was more than a long enough length for me to produce the tracking shots I wanted. The slider itself and the mount proved to be quite versatile, and I could rotate the cameras position forward or backward on a fixed point to shoot at a downward or upwards angle if I felt I didn't want the cameras direction to be directly horizontal. Whilst using the slider to test some footage and how smooth the movement was, I discovered that the looser the camera mount on the camera slider the easier it was to create smooth movement when moving the a long the length of the slider, it was also important to use a constant amount of force on the camera when pushing it so that the movement remained the same speed, or as near to the same speed as possible. I wanted smooth, even shots so several attempts were made until I got it right. Finally, I tried to utilise the two lenses I had by changing the distances and types of shots to test. This meant I had to regularly change the lenses but it wasn't too much of a problem. The longer distance shots were taken with an 18 - 55mm lens, whereas the close up shots detailing certain areas of the set were predominately taken with a 50mm macro lens.
Producing the lighting for the set was one of my favourite aspects to the project as it allowed me to experiment with something I've never really had the opportunity to before. Furthermore, it was quite a successful attempt and came out quite well in some of the test and final shots I produced. From this I definitely feel more comfortable about lighting sets and environments in general.
In order to incorporate the miniature filament bulbs into the set I went online to the site of UK based electronic part wholesaler, CPC. The site has an incredible range of components on offer and some of the parts I needed took a little while to find because they were quite abstract. In the end I ordered two sets of two 3mm filament bulbs with a 12V supply voltage ( I ordered four because they only came in sets of two and I needed three). I also ordered an adjustable 12V power supply which allowed me to alter the voltage at regular intervals from 3V all the way up to 12V. Which coincided with the bulbs voltage and thus allowed me to change the brightness or intensity of the them from a bright white to a dim orange glow. I thought this would be an easy way to be able to change the mood based on the interior lighting all by switching between different voltages. Finally I ordered some terminal strips, meaning I could connect the bulbs to the power supply using wires and ultimately create my own circuit depending on how I laid them around the set. After they arrived I went to Maplin in Leeds, another supplier of electronics and got 3 meters of wire cut (1 meter per bulb) so I could accommodate for the distance between each bulb around the set.
Once everything was wired up I did a small test to see if it would work. For the first time this project everything worked as I wanted it to with the first attempt and I was quite pleased with the ambient glow created with each bulb. Furthermore the distance between the three bulbs was enough so that the enclosed environment of the set was lit in all the necessary places, so I was quite pleased with the choice of positioning.
In some of the photographs below I have demonstrated what the lights looked like through a macro lens. The macro lens I used was a fixed 50mm lens and as you can see in the photographs when the lights were out of focus they had an extremely realistic glowing quality to them. In reality because of the size of the bulbs, being only 3mm long the light was quite directional and linear. However with some playing around the the focus and depth of field this was easily tackled and overall created a very nice effect that I was happy to move forward with.
I played around continuously with the lighting I had at my disposal. It was quite overwhelming in a sense due to the huge range of lighting effects and different moods and temperatures that could be created even with such a simple lighting set up. Furthermore I was given the opportunity to use an adjustable spotlight as an exterior light in combination with the lighting I already had. This made it much easier to create clear shots and create shadows at different angles, which looked great in some of the test footage I did because they were much bigger in the final shots compared with when you're looking into the set. When it came to arranging the lighting and planning some of the more complex shots that I wanted to try and incorporate in to the title sequence, I looked at trying to use the set and its design to its full potential. For example, shining a directed light through the window created a nice effect shown below, highlighting some of the edges of the windows design. Equally, the warmth of the light also gave off a different mood. For example, a very white almost fluorescent light would give the effect of moonlight passing through the window, whereas a warmer glow would look as if the sun is setting. I also tried to move the light around as the shot was being filmed, as if an object was moving past the window and blocking some of the light. These are all things that I attempted in order to try interesting ways to use the set. Sometimes I found that they worked quite well, however sometimes, simpler more realistic lighting was more attractive and worked best at producing the kind of mood and feel that I wanted for the footage.
Also shown below is a photographs I took of a camera mounted on a tripod. I borrows the tripod from the photography department as it was a lot more versatile than the one I owned. It allowed me to alter the direction of the camera on both the x and y axis that it was mounted on. Meaning I had full control of the kind of shots I wanted to set the camera up to record. I knew I wanted to place the camera above the set so I could film a still scene from above, and by extending the tripod and tilting the camera downwards in the y axis I was able to position the camera effectively. Furthermore, some of the most important shots I wanted to produce involved the tracking shot technique. Again, I borrows a camera slider from the AV department and was given a quick 10 minute induction into how to use it. There were two types of camera sliders available, an 80 cm long slider and a 120 cm long slider. The gap I was shooting through wasn't that wide, so I decided to go for the more compact 80 cm version. This was more than a long enough length for me to produce the tracking shots I wanted. The slider itself and the mount proved to be quite versatile, and I could rotate the cameras position forward or backward on a fixed point to shoot at a downward or upwards angle if I felt I didn't want the cameras direction to be directly horizontal. Whilst using the slider to test some footage and how smooth the movement was, I discovered that the looser the camera mount on the camera slider the easier it was to create smooth movement when moving the a long the length of the slider, it was also important to use a constant amount of force on the camera when pushing it so that the movement remained the same speed, or as near to the same speed as possible. I wanted smooth, even shots so several attempts were made until I got it right. Finally, I tried to utilise the two lenses I had by changing the distances and types of shots to test. This meant I had to regularly change the lenses but it wasn't too much of a problem. The longer distance shots were taken with an 18 - 55mm lens, whereas the close up shots detailing certain areas of the set were predominately taken with a 50mm macro lens.
Producing the lighting for the set was one of my favourite aspects to the project as it allowed me to experiment with something I've never really had the opportunity to before. Furthermore, it was quite a successful attempt and came out quite well in some of the test and final shots I produced. From this I definitely feel more comfortable about lighting sets and environments in general.
Thursday 14 May 2015
OUAN406 - Decorating / Furnishing the Set
Decorating and furnishing the interior of the set was a really enjoyable stage in the project because it took me away from the design stage and allowed me experiment with things I'm not familiar with such as layout, shape, colour and even lighting. This was an exciting time in the project because in a sense the unknown part of the task was out of the way and I knew that the whole idea wasn't too ambitious. Before this, I had my doubts that I had intended to over deliver with the project and because of this, would fall short of my own expectations. Based roughly of the ideas I had already had for the furnishing combined with the original artwork I had produced to generate ideas for the project I began to finish the set before the shooting could take place.
The first process that I decided to undertake was producing books and papers that I could scatter across the main character's lab from the story. I imagined there to be books stacked quite high where they had been placed for later on, and complex anatomic diagrams of insects to be lying around on the floor and on his desk. To make the books I went to the book binding workshop and took some of the 'throwaway' samples, or essentially cut off pieces that people had discarded at the end of their projects. This gave me around four different samples of book coverings I could use to create a fairly diverse range of covers for the books, so it didn't look too similar in colour. I think the use of different covers was important so they looked like they belonged in the set and hadn't just been mass produced for the purpose of the production. I then took some fairly thin corrugated card and measured it out to be the correct scale within the set, and in relation to other pieces of furniture, especially the book case which some of them were going to sit on. This was around 12mm in length.
After the books had been created, I really wanted to paint the book case for the books to sit on. I wanted to make it a dark wood like mahogany so that when the light hit it, it absorbed the majority of it and kept the level of light within the room to an eerie and atmospheric glow. I got some acrylic paint with a dark umber tone and painted the book case with it, occasionally mixing in some copper acrylic for some slight variation and giving it a subtle shine when the light hit it. When the two colours were mixed with around three parts dark umber and one part copper, it became a very nice slightly reddy brown that gave the furniture the mahogany tint I wanted it to have. Once I had discovered the way the paint looked on the wood, I decided to paint the rest of the walls and some of the furniture with the same mix of paint. Occasionally I experimented a little to give the walls a little more texture and variation. This is most evident in the back wall of the set, where I used a lot more white and copper paint to allow highlights when the light hit it, rather than there being almost no light coming off the wall. After some colour had been added to the overall set some smaller details were added such as the cork topped miniature glass bottles of two different sizes, brown bottles, some charms in the form of wings and a paper aeroplane, (representing the scientist studying flight, like in the story) and finally some plant and leaf samples to go into the bottles as if they were part of the scientists research. These were places on the tables and book cases so they were easily in view when the filming is done.
The first process that I decided to undertake was producing books and papers that I could scatter across the main character's lab from the story. I imagined there to be books stacked quite high where they had been placed for later on, and complex anatomic diagrams of insects to be lying around on the floor and on his desk. To make the books I went to the book binding workshop and took some of the 'throwaway' samples, or essentially cut off pieces that people had discarded at the end of their projects. This gave me around four different samples of book coverings I could use to create a fairly diverse range of covers for the books, so it didn't look too similar in colour. I think the use of different covers was important so they looked like they belonged in the set and hadn't just been mass produced for the purpose of the production. I then took some fairly thin corrugated card and measured it out to be the correct scale within the set, and in relation to other pieces of furniture, especially the book case which some of them were going to sit on. This was around 12mm in length.
After the books had been created, I really wanted to paint the book case for the books to sit on. I wanted to make it a dark wood like mahogany so that when the light hit it, it absorbed the majority of it and kept the level of light within the room to an eerie and atmospheric glow. I got some acrylic paint with a dark umber tone and painted the book case with it, occasionally mixing in some copper acrylic for some slight variation and giving it a subtle shine when the light hit it. When the two colours were mixed with around three parts dark umber and one part copper, it became a very nice slightly reddy brown that gave the furniture the mahogany tint I wanted it to have. Once I had discovered the way the paint looked on the wood, I decided to paint the rest of the walls and some of the furniture with the same mix of paint. Occasionally I experimented a little to give the walls a little more texture and variation. This is most evident in the back wall of the set, where I used a lot more white and copper paint to allow highlights when the light hit it, rather than there being almost no light coming off the wall. After some colour had been added to the overall set some smaller details were added such as the cork topped miniature glass bottles of two different sizes, brown bottles, some charms in the form of wings and a paper aeroplane, (representing the scientist studying flight, like in the story) and finally some plant and leaf samples to go into the bottles as if they were part of the scientists research. These were places on the tables and book cases so they were easily in view when the filming is done.
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