#5: How did my production skills develop throughout this project?

 I. PRE-PRODUCTION

• Research

The very first thing that I did for the project was the analysis of different film openings that belong in this genre. At the moment Media was still completely new for me, as I'd never been exposed to watching films through critic's eyes. 

My first ever film opening analysis was Call Me by Your Name.

I had to look closely and carefully into the symbolic and technical aspects of the film: what the director wanted to tell through the use of camerawork, mise-en-scene, sound design, and editing. Categories like representation and social issues are a bit trickier since I had to pay attention to how the characters' appearances and behaviours tell their stories, as well as how their surroundings and communities affect them. With the movie being of the genre slice-of-life, the role of mise-en-scene and representation are really important in determining the characterisation of different characters, without too much narrative or dialogues needed. 

I've always been in awe of what the director of Call Me by Your Name was able to do within the first 4 minutes: the introduction of the main characters, the first interaction between Elio and Oliver, and the relationships between all of them. This film influenced how I saw certain things and contributed to the birth of City lights, Country nights as well since I tried to mimic and bring into my product some symbolic and technical codes and conventions to give an impression of a slice-of-life film.

Naturally, as I analyse more film openings, I developed a habit of watching films through critic's eyes. I think that this skill is one of the most crucial ones if you want to pursue this career path and work in the media industry. I began to become more sensitive when it comes to hidden meanings underneath different movie scenes, and I also learned to dissect and analyse news and reviews of those film openings as well.

When researching, one fundamental part is to conduct surveys and research papers. I've conducted a survey called Audience Research as primary research to better understand what my target audience is expecting to see in my film opening and try my best to deliver those expectations. I've also conducted secondary genre research and audience research, to further understand what my genre's codes and conventions are, and how interested the target audience is in my chosen genre. 

Throughout this stage, I learned more about how to conduct surveys and ask my friends to take part in the surveys, which I considered a relatively difficult job since I rarely asked them to do anything for me. Furthermore, I developed the skill to analyse and identify the results that were sent back, as well as take into consideration which points I should use for my film opening. Since every person has a different opinion, satisfying every one of them is nearly impossible. Hence, I had to come out with the most appropriate ideas that satisfy most people of my target audience.

• Planning

Writing a screenplay is something completely new for me. Before this course, I'd never done any creative work, hence creating something new and fresh from scratch sounded like a big challenge for me. 

I used Highland, a software that helps users to write screenplays with different formats and functions. In the beginning, what I wrote was very different from what my final product looked like. I was basically pouring out whatever I had in mind without caring too much about how silly it might sound or am I capable of conveying the idea. 

I've always wanted to do slice-of-life so to me, coming up with a plot and a screenplay was relatively easy. However, editing and improving it many, many times was not the easy part of the job. Luckily, thanks to my professor and my peers, I was able to get feedback and advice to improve my screenplay. 

THE HARDEST part of this stage has to be composing a storyboard. Why? Because I can't draw. Honestly, I tried to, but it took me half a day just to finish ONE scene, and I had so many things to do, so I skipped it. I was going to finish the storyboard, and then use it to prove that I've learned a new skill after this, but I didn't. This is one part that I failed to complete what I expected to be completed. However, because I already had in mind what my scenes would look like, the filming session wasn't really hard for me to carry out. 

Footage of me suffering TvT

• Preparation

- Talent scouting:

In the beginning, since my film opening only consists of one character - which is also the protagonist - it was relatively easy for me to cast a talent. One advantage that I had was that I had a medium circle of friends that I could ask for a favour if I needed to. So, I reached out to my friend, Sasha, who is 2 years older than me, to play Irene. I had experience with scouting people before, during the time when I was recruiting new members for my clubs, hence using the appropriate words to convince people to work for me wasn't that hard. Luckily, my only option, Sasha, said yes. I didn't have a plan B for my protagonist because, in my mind, Sasha was the one and only person who was suitable to play Irene. We quickly came to an agreement and I illustrated to her how I wanted Irene to be. Sasha understood things quite quickly and now that I look back, she did a very good job as Irene.

My crew (in my mind) consisted of only a few members. I already cast Sasha, and so I only needed an assistant. I reached out to my good friend, Anna, who was also taking Media Studies. Anna is an excellent and outstanding student in our year, so I thought it would be a good chance to be able to work with her and learn from her. Previously, I agreed to participate in her solo project as the first assistant director as well as the protagonist. So, it was quite easy to get Anna to work with me *evil laugh*. Nevertheless, I'm grateful for having both of them as the only 2 partners to work with during the production of City lights, Country nights as they did their jobs splendidly. 

- Experiments:

Before the actual filming sessions, I did some experiments to work around with the camera first to be familiar with the camera setup, lighting compositions (if needed), and trying out different camera angles that could be used for my film opening. 

Although in the end, I didn't use any artificial lighting for my film opening, it was a great chance to experiment with backlight and direct light for future uses. I hung out with my classmates who also take Media Studies and used the school's lights to take photos and videos with different lighting compositions.

I also experienced with filming at different angles. Here in this picture, I filmed my friend with a medium shot, which I ended up using a lot throughout my film opening. Practicing with a phone beforehand really helped me to navigate the device and getting the hang of it as well.

• Organisation

I DO NOT like organising things. At. All.

Taking time to put things together and making sure all the materials are my least favourite thing to do. However, since I'm the sole leader of the project, as in the director, screenplay writer, producer, scriptwriter, etc... I have to make sure I put everything in place so that I can reach for them whenever I need to. Furthermore, because I feel like each and every material are important, they need to be filled in and put together by myself, so that the cast and crew only need to show up to the set and go home on time. No one wants to do extra jobs without gaining any marks. 

I realised that for future projects, I also have to do the same thing. Organising and preparing are crucial to the pre-production stage, in which they determine the flow of the filming session. Taking care of everything beforehand and predicting what could happen could help me as well as the crew a lot when it comes to the filming day.

II. PRODUCTION

• Working with a camera

This by far was my first time working with a professional filming camera. I borrowed the
school's Nikon D5600 and I'm super grateful that I was able to borrow one and not having to run around asking from friends. I spent the first few days after I got the camera just playing around with it and exploring different settings to find out which is the most suitable for my film opening. I learned about adjusting the white balance, setting ISO, and zooming in/out for extra focus. 

Directing and operating with the camera on set was a fun experience, though it took me quite a while to start getting the hang of it. I had to ask the actress to stay still at the beginning of each scene so that the camera would be focused on the right part that I wanted.

However, due to my lack of experience, I was so confused when the camera suddenly stopped working during the first filming day. I was told by my teacher to be extra mindful about the battery, so the previous night I charged it and I even charged it when we were between breaks. Still, because the camera won't work until the battery is charged to a certain amount, I wasted nearly an hour of the first filming day and had to arrange a second day to finish the shot list. If I were to go back in time, I would divide the
time equally into two days so that the workload is equivalent between the two days and the battery issue won't become such a problem.

• Directing

Directing a film opening is a whole new spectrum of experiences for me, fun experiences, at least. I honestly didn't feel stressed or anxious because I worked with 2 of my close friends, and I expected what I would do step-by-step before stepping foot on the set. Because of that, I was able to interact and communicate with my crew freely without any fear of miscommunication.

However, without the help of a storyboard, it was so much harder to deliver my thoughts so that the crew could understand. With that being said, it wasn't that I had to spend hours explaining things to them, but I feel that if I had the storyboard completed it would've been easier. Sasha and Anna understood my instructions very quick, and they even made suggestions and advice on how to improve what I already had in mind. Luckily, there was no miscommunication during the filming session and we collaborated quite smoothly with one another. 

I consider myself a critical person and a perfectionist, so I was quite strict about getting the best out of the shots, hence I might've asked them to redo a few scenes so many times (there was this one scene in which Sasha had to run towards the door for 16 times because she kept dropping the photos in the wrong place).

III. POST-PRODUCTION

• Using CapCut PC and Adobe Lightroom

My 10-year-old MacBook Air couldn't handle Davinci Resolve or Adobe Premier Pro, so my only solution was to use CapCut PC. To be honest, I didn't have high hopes for this software as I've only used it for daily vlogs and short edits to upload onto TikTok. Even though it is not a professional editing tool, it's hard to say I had a bad experience whilst using it. It provides lots and lots of settings and functions, for example, match-cut and extract audio. In the beginning, I had to search for tutorials on how to maximise the use of this software, and I couldn't have been more thankful because my laptop hadn't crashed once during the editing phase. However, one drawback of this amateur editing tool is that it has limited colour-grading settings. That led me to an extra step: colour-grading using Adobe Lightroom.

Luckily enough, I have an iPad that has Adobe Lightroom and I've been using it to colour-
grade the pictures that I took. However, in order to edit videos, I had to go premium. I had many thoughts about it, but in the end, I decided to sign up for the premium plan, but only until the free trial ended. Because of my prior experiences with it, the process of colour-grading didn't take much of my time and effort. I could also airdrop the colour-graded footage from my iPad to my laptop so it was not that time-consuming to switch between the two software.

If I have the chance to work with other software (obviously if I can get a new laptop or so) I would try out Adobe Premier Pro and other designing and editing tools. I feel like using professional editing tools could benefit me a lot in producing a more high-end and satisfy me more as the director and producer of the product.

• Using available free online resources for sound and graphic designs

Throughout the sound production for the film opening, I used free sound resources from the website https://freesound.org/ to construct the 'natural ambiance' that I was hoping to achieve. I had to match the footstep sound to the character's footsteps and add layers of background noises to mimic the actual surroundings of the set. This was by far the hardest part of post-production because it took so much effort and patience since I had to adjust the length and the position of the sounds hundreds and thousands of times. After each draft cut, I always asked my friends to watch it to see if they thought the sound design was appropriate or not, and it was after their approvals that I started moving on to the next part. 

For the company logo, I decided to use Canva after trying various free logo maker websites because... they were horrendous. I aimed for a vintage, minimalist logo with lowercase font. I've been using Canva for several years so it was fair to say that I was comfortable with doing my creative work on Canva. However, since I'm not specialised in designing, I still struggled for a bit during the making of the company logo. Luckily, since it didn't require any sketching and drawing, I was able to finish it and I was satisfied with the outcome.

IV. THOUGHTS

"Jennie and I have been good friends for a few years now and we both take AS Media Studies so despite having different projects to work on, we always try to support each other as much as we can. Therefore when Jennie asked me to be the director assistant for her, I happily agreed. 

I enjoyed being on set to help with the filming process, whether it was giving opinions on how the footage could be improved or documenting the behind-the-scenes of the process. Jennie also took a lot of care of the crew, as transportation and breakfast were all covered during the filming day, so I felt very motivated to carry out my responsibilities my best. 

Jennie is an easy-going director, she is open to suggestions and changes so I felt very comfortable working with her. That being said, she is also meticulous about her work and has a very clear vision of how she wants the footage to turn out. As a result, the atmosphere on set was very professional and the process was carried out effectively.

Even though there was an unexpected event that happened on production day 1, which caused the filming to be delayed for 1 additional day, it still ended on a good note and I hope that Jennie's (and the crew's) hard work will be paid off."

These are some words from Anna, my 1st AD of the film opening. Anna and I both agreed at the beginning of the school year to do separate projects, but will still support each other with everything we have. It was fun and helpful having Anna on the set because of her quick responses to instructions and constructive criticisms that helped improve the outcome. 

"This is the first time I’ve participated in a short film project. I felt quite hesitant starting out, but Jennie has been very supportive of my acting. I had to grasp the character’s psychology and the surrounding context to portray the role as fully as possible. Jennie is very meticulous; she’s thorough in everything from scriptwriting to creating mood boards and setting up shots. While working together, Jennie has helped me a lot, and she always creates a comfortable working environment."

Sasha and I have been close friends since my very first year at Vinschool. It has been my honour to be working with her because of her determination and professionalism, which could be shown quite clearly through the result. It was fun to have her on the set and I'm looking forward to collaborating with her in future projects.