Filming Day 2

Saturday, April 08, 2017

So yesterday I filmed for the second time around... This time ONLY at Lowes and not using a green screen somewhere else. It went really well and I was able have a conttinuous color palette all throughout!! I adjusted the coloration by changing the white balance settings on my camera, here's some examples of the pink-ish tint my shots had:




My film 'crew' (consisting of two friends and my main actor) and I stayed there for about 2-3 hours, but we got a lot of amazing footage. However, we did run into a couple problems here and there... NOT with the actual production but with some of the people who were shopping at the hardware store.


Since my film opening is about a robbery, there are two scenes that emphasize the main idea by portraying my main actor with a ski mask. The two scenes only took about 15-30 seconds to film each, but wearing a ski mask in a public place can be a tad nerve wrecking. To be safe, I confirmed with the store manager that I was allowed to film at their store. I then warned the employees that we were filming someone with a ski mask, just so none of them would freak out. We tried filming when there wasn't a lot of people around, but honestly, the shot we were taking didn't even look REMOTELY threatening and actually rather humorous.



As we were about to start filming, Cesar (my actor), put on the mask and a large white man approached him and our crew. He came up to me and said something along these lines: "I know you got permission to do this, but I carry around a concealed handgun and there are many other people who do too". Honestly, I didn't even know what to respond because he was right next to me inside the store when I told the employees that I was filming this for a class and it clearly for educational purposes. After the whole thing my friends are I felt kind of intimidated, but we continued to film either way. I guess it's hard to film in public places without people having different reactions, but the situation was really weird in general. 



A little bump in the road but the footage is still fantastic ;-) I'll post about the editing process later since I'm still working! 


xx Maria

Re-filming

Saturday, April 08, 2017

(I accidentally drafted this post instead of posting it yesterday)

 These past two weeks have been beyond hectic. I'm basically caught in between this project and my AP art final series; a match made in hell. Since I really dislike the footage I got last week for my production, I'm planning on refilming again tomorrow. I originally filmed my entire production with a green screen and then filmed the background normally at Lowes. The footage itself was filmed nicely, but the editing process was way too complicated. The whole purpose of the green screen was to be able to adjust the coloration of my actor with a warmer tint and the background with cooler tint (the program I'm using, iMovie, doesn't allow to only adjust color on specific areas of the clip). With the use of the green screen, I'd be able to edit both clips individually so I could adjust the coloration to my preference. However, it was harder than I expected. The filming itself didn't come out so bad, but I was limited to a very short space from side to side and up and down (due to my decently small green screen). I also was unhappy with the the coloration adjustments, it looks too much like a filter rather than the actual lighting of the setting. The video overall looks way too choppy and the green screen didn't even work for some shots; when I tried removing the background my subject became transparent in some parts of his body. Here's a small portion of the video,  but I don't think I'll use it at all:

...On a brighter note, tomorrow is filming day #2! I'm still using my original storyboard, but I've adapted a new solution to my coloration problem. A friend in my class is also slightly adjusting his coloration throughout his production, and explained to me his approach: 

 Instead of editing the color of the clip on a software, film the clips already with a coloration setting on the camera. I have a Nikon D3500, which is able to adjust the white balance before capturing pictures/videos. In order to do so, I took a picture of a light blue paper to set it as my custom white balance. This cancels out all of the cooler hues in my shots, making them have a beautiful warm tint that looks more natural. 

 Just to make sure, I'm going to film each scene twice; once with the tint and once without it. That way if something goes wrong with the coloration, i can just use the normal clips and figure out a different solution. I'm hoping it doesn't come to that though!!!!!

 So tomorrow I'll post again regarding my filming experience. I need to pull an ultimate all-nighter tomorrow in order to upload all the clips and edit them. I don't exactly want to RUSH to finish but I know I can get a lot of editing done if I sit there for a couple hours with a cup of coffee and strong determination ;) 

 Maria xx

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