Directions Unit- Researching a role for a film.

I have recently begun researching for a particular role I have been asked to play in another student's film. In the film, I will be playing a character addicted to Heroin, and as such I have been researching the appearance of most heroin addicts online, as well as the way they act and communicate.
I have found it useful to review the symptoms of heroin addiction on various medical websites, such as the NHS website, as well as watching the 1996 Danny Boyle film; "Trainspotting". In Trainspotting, the main character (portrayed by Ewan Mcgregor) is a heroin addict, who goes through the highs and lows of it's use. I have been reviewing McGregor's character extensively so that when it comes to my own acting, I should be able to create a much more convincing performance.
So what does this have to do with directing?
I have always had good experiences when working with actors, but I have also sometimes found it hard to understand how they think and feel when performing, or why they might be quite apprehensive when performing certain scenes. I feel that by putting myself in their shoes and acting in films alongside directing my own, I will become a much better, understanding director because of it.

Directions Unit- Director's Statement Draft

I have recently been tasked with creating a directors statement for my 4 minute film entitled "A Journey Through Freedom." The first draft is available to view online here.
In the director's statement, I mention the kind of atmosphere I want my film to have, the reasoning behind the choice I casting I will make, as well as how I plan to arrange my camera shots and editing once the filming date arrives.

Directions Unit- Shot Planning.

I have begun the process of developing interesting and creative shots and camera techniques for my 4 minute film "A Journey Through Freedom." One idea that immediately sprang to mind was a result of the film's story-line. In the film, the main character finds himself living in a world where he and other citizens are being continuously watched by the government, under the pretense that it is to "keep them safe."
At the very start of my film, I want to immediately show that this is the kind of world the character lives in by addressing the issue of them being watched- in particular the 2nd scene where this occurs:

The character looking into the mirror is something which immediately gave me an idea involving "2 way mirrors", pieces of glass which seem to be a mirror from one side, but are fully see-through on the other, allowing for some massive invasions of privacy. The uneasiness this idea causes is something I want for my film. I have created several sketches which I hope will better describe my intentions with the shot I want to pull off:

The shot begins by showing the character from the side, looking into the mirror.

As the character stares into the mirror, the camera itself tracks to the left. As it does so, the camera "passes" through the wall. As such, there will be a brief period of blackness, as if the camera is actually in the wall for a moment.

Once the camera emerges on the other side of the wall, a much different scene from the character's bathroom is shown. In this area, a camera on a tri-pod faces towards the 2 way mirror, recording the character.

I plan to pull off this tricky shot by actually filming the shot in two different locations, the first being the set of the character's apartment, and the second being the studio where the camera will be located looking through the glass at the character.

I am hoping that the brief period where the camera passes through the wall and causes the camera to show black will be enough for me to cut the two scenes together seamlessly. It may be worth me experimenting with a camera however so that on the day I am prepared, or so I can make changes if the idea does not work.

Directions Unit- Directions Workshop with Steve Finn.

Recently I have spent a lot of time being taught about being a director by a man called Steve Finn, who has directed over a hundred episodes of the BBC soap Opera; Eastenders. Steve is a man that began his career as a runner, and worked his way up the ranks over the years, until he finally became a director himself.
As part of the course, Steve has been leading several workshops which are designed to help us better understand the work of a director in terms of working with actors and also designing the composition of a shot and set.
I found working with Steve to be an incredibly valuable experience, and I feel much more comfortable in my own approach to directing thanks to the workshop I attended. Below are some images of the kind of work myself and my classmates were involved in:

Directions Unit- Sound Piece Completion.

Below is my semi-completed Sound-Piece for Gregory Crewdson's photograph; "House Fire."
I use the term "Semi-completed" because I am still undecided about whether or not I would like to have the video zoom into certain parts of the photograph as sounds are played.
In the sound-piece, I tell the story of a character trespassing onto the area the house in the photograph is situated, and then smashing the houses window before climbing inside. Once inside, the person begins to walk around on the houses wooden floor before knocking a can of something over.
The sound of the can falling over alerts a dog to the character's presense, and the dog is about to attack the character before being shot by the character. As the dog lays dying and whimpering, the character continues to walk around the house- this time at a faster pace before stopping to unscrew the lid of a can of petrol the character was carrying with them.
The character then proceeds to pour the petrol all over the area before taking out a match striking it. The character then ignites the petrol, and the sound-piece ends with the sound of a fire beginning, with flames and the crackling of burning wood. I am very happy with the way this sound-piece is going so far, and I am especially happy with the small story I have created to go along with the photograph, which explains why the fire in the house started in the first place.
One thing I have noticed however is that I did not use any elements from the right of the photograph, namely the people standing watching the fire from the train tracks. My original idea was the carry on the sound-piece by having the sounds of sirens approaching once the fire had been lit, as well as applying crowd noises and the sounds of fire-hoses dousing the fire, but I chose not to do this as I wanted the main focus of the sound-piece to be why the fire started, as opposed to what happened after the fire had been lit.

Directions Unit- Research into similar films (4 minute Film Research)

Recently I have taken it upon myself to check out some films that have a similar plot to the 4 minute film based on a "Journey Through Freedom" that I will be making soon. One film I came across was the 2005 film; "The Island" directed by Michael Bay.
The film itself takes place in a supposedly post-apocalyptic world where the characters believe they have been saved and are being raised in a sterile environment where the governing bodies mission is to keep the human raise alive. Because of this, the characters are never allowed to leave the place they live, otherwise they will learn the truth about their situation, which is that the world hasn't ended at all, and in fact the characters are simply clones of actual human beings and are being kept and harvested for their organs.
Although alot of the plot is irrelevant to the plot I have created for my own 4 minute film, I did learn a lot about the psychology of characters being kept as pseudo-prisoners, under the false pretense that it is for their own good.

I also learnt a great deal about costume. In the film, everybody within the cloning facility dresses the same, in very clean-cut, sterile looking clothing. The fact they all wear the same clothing is similar to that of the prison uniforms some prisons issue to their prisoners. This also highlights the fact that although the conditions the prisoners in "The Island" are in are very nice to say the least, and they are catered for in every way, they are still prisoners non-theless, and have no freedom when it comes to their choice of clothing.

An example of the uniforms in "The Island"

An example of a prison uniform.

This got me thinking about the possibility of me making the characters in my film wear the same kinds of clothing. That way it would not only make the characters appear as they are (prisoners) but also allow any authority figures or outsiders look different as they are dressed in regular clothes.

Directions Unit- Deciding on a story for Gregory Crewdson's photo.

I have begun my final edit for my sound piece of Gregory Crewdson's photograph "House Fire."

Although I originally had the idea to make a sound piece based on a kind of Zombie Apocalypse due to the people in the photograph looking similar to zombies, during the editing process, I suddenly had an idea about how the fire portrayed in the photograph could have been started.

The storyline I developed in my head before the actual editing process was about a character breaking into the house in the photograph through a window they broke. They would then begin to sneak around the house apparently looking for something before being attacked by a guard-dog. The person sneaking around the house would fire a shot at the dog, wounding it before pouring petrol around the house and starting a fire with a match.

The storyline I chose was something which I could include a massive amount of different sound effects with, from both living and non-living things. I made sure I would be able to use a wide variety of sounds, from many different sources, including dog barks, weapon shots, footsteps on various different materials and also ambient sound effects such as birds, wind and other sounds of nature.

All in all, I think the plot I developed was something that can be easily understood purely through the sound alone. What I am excited about however, is combining the sequence I have created with the photograph, and zooming in on certain areas of the photograph as the events happen. I think the combination of my sequence and Gregory Crewdson's photograph will be fantastic.

Directions Unit- Gregory Crewdson Research

In preparation for beginning the creation of my Sound Piece based on the Photographer Gregory Crewdson's piece of work; "House Fire", I decided to do some research about the man himself, so that I may possibly gain a better understanding about what exactly goes through his head when he takes his photographs.
My hope in doing this was that I would somehow be able to take any kind of vision or idea he had about what story was being told at the time and make it a semi-reality by adding pieces of sound and in effect re-telling the story.
My research mostly consisted of reading articles and interviews online from sites such as The American Reader. Although these articles gave me an idea about how Crewdson operates when deciding to capture an image, and the process of choosing shoot locations and such before actually creating any pieces of work, I couldn't find much in terms of any ideas for a story he had going through his head when doing so. Although I do have an idea as to why this is.
In the linked article I have provided to The American Reader interview, Crewdson uses phrases such as;
"I don't want there to be a conscious awareness of any kind of literal narrative. And that's why I don't really try to pump up motivation or plot or anything like that."
and
"That way, the viewer is more likely to project their own narrative onto the picture."
What I can deduce from statements like this is that Crewdson doesn't really have any desired plots or story-lines when he captures his images, and instead simply creates surreal and strange environments for his subjects to exist in, and leave the actual interpretation of what is going on to the viewer.
In a way, this lack of plot information with his photographs is a good thing for me, as it allows me a lot more creative freedom when making my sound-piece as I am not restricted by any set story-line. 

Relating this back to the photograph I will be working with; "House Fire", I have not actually come up with my own plot or interpretation of what is happening in the photograph, but I am hoping that through the editing process and the sourcing of sound effects to use I will be able to use for this project, more ideas will come to me.

I have also learnt from an online article that there exists a documentary about Crewdson and his work called; Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters. I am hoping to get a copy of this documentary or view it online and see if I can learn anything more about his work that way.

Directions Unit- Practice with DSLR video recording.

Today I attended a workshop where our technician Fergus was teaching us how to effectively use a Canon 7D DSLR camera to record pieces of footage with depths of field and edited focusing. I was personally very interested in learning to use these cameras, as I have had experiences using DSLR cameras before in the past and have found them to be very practical pieces of equipment with many benefits.
The things about these cameras that appeal to me are their small size and the high quality. The downsides are that the DSLRs can only record up to 15 minutes of footage, meaning there would have to be several re-shoots in order for me to collect all the footage I would need to create my 4 minute film. I should be able to accommodate for this problem however with simple preparation, such as purchasing additional SD cards for the camera, and preparing additional batteries so that I can gather as much footage as possible. Should it come to it, I should be able to simply have more shoot-days if I am to begin filming a substantial amount of time before the projects deadline.
All in all, I believe it would be a much better idea for me to simply weight up the pros and cons of using a Canon 7D for my film.

Pros-

• Lightweight and easy to carry around.
• High Quality.
• Easy to use.
• Uses easily affordable media to save to (SD Cards).

Cons-

• Only 15 minutes of record ability.
• Less stability on uneven surfaces or in windy conditions due to it's light-weight.

The pro that stands out to me most is the fact that the Canon is a much smaller device than the Sony cameras I normally use, and so I will easily be able to transport the device from set to set and still have the ability to carry other pieces of equipment too, such as lighting, props and perhaps a jib etc.

I have found todays workshop to be very enlightening, and using a Canon 7D camera to record my 4 minute film is something I shall seriously consider.

Directions Unit- Footage Coverage.

I have recently returned to Rochester to continue my Television Production course after the Christmas Holidays. As soon as I returned, I and my fellow classmates were split up into groups of 3 and required to create 3 short films. One member of the group would direct one of the films, one member would operate the camera in one of the films and one other member would actually appear in one of the films.
The idea behind this exercise was to simply showcase the importance of "Footage Coverage", meaning to learn how important it is to have a variety of different shots and angles of a particular action so that when the editing process begins, there is plenty of material to work with.
I was tasked with creating a short film about a person sat at a desk beginning to write a note, and then screwing the piece of paper up and throwing it into a bin.
Here is the film: