Second Semester Evaluation

This is my final blog entry for this semester.
We have been asked to evaluate and analyze our own work and the course in general so far.

The second semester certainly seemed a lot busier than the first.
Or was that just my imagination?







Writing

I love writing, so I was looking forward to learning how to write in the many different styles the course required.
I think I managed quite well, although we will have to see what my grades are like. I would have liked a little more practice, some more time spent working through each writing style and some break down of each method of writing. I think it would have helped to read some pieces in class and compare the styles of say a brief and a treatment. Perhaps we could have been given several different briefs to write treatments for and then gone over our own results. I am pretty sure that I was not the only one confused by this part of the course. The same goes for the press release and the newspaper blog, which are similar. Again, I think my pieces are adequate, but I know it would have helped me to have had more practice, and more feed back in class. I think that time was an issue for Kim, we had a lot of work to get into this semester and with a couple of half terms and the trip to London taking up precious time, I know there was a great deal of pressure on her to fit everything in.

Editing

Sacha Atkinson was brought in to help us with editing and was great, but very late in the semester.
I am still very confused about Final Cut. I don't know the software, and although I am a little familiar with it now, not having any workshops at all, and then being expected to edit something we are actually being graded on for our degree seemed very unfair to me.
I think we should have been taught Final Cut from the very beginning of the year. Starting from the very basics, setting up new sessions, preferences, how to save to the correct place. To the editing techniques and terms and tools.
I really don't understand why a degree course in Broadcast Media, with such a heavy emphasis on Final Cut editing has no actual teaching of the software?
Especially as it is such an expensive item to buy. We have had some guidance, but only after we have already started our edits and only for a few weeks. I have just spent the weekend working on a short film, and was amazed how important the paperwork is during filming for the editor to reference after he has the footage. If we are to be expected to write, film and then edit our own films, surely these skills are essential?
I chose to take this course specifically because I want to learn how to do just that. How to frame a shot, how to work the camera properly, not just point, zoom and shoot. I want to be taught how to breakdown a scene I have written into shot lists and storyboards. While we have been told these things exist, we haven't been shown how to actually do them, and how to work on developing these skills. I have been practicing editing on my own, but feel lost without having a firm grasp of the basics.
Kim told us about a one day course being run in Bath Spa, which relates somewhat to what I have just said, and while that would have been interesting and possibly helpful, I was appalled to hear that not only were we expected to pay for the day, but it was £125!!!!!
Haven't we already payed our course fees?
And surely any extra studies offered should have been covered by the studio fee we have payed, for which I have seen nothing in return so far.
I feel as if we are spending the days in uni simply focusing on the work we need to hand in and not learning the skills we need to accomplish this on our own, or prepare ourselves for working in the industry or making our own films.
Kim is really nice, and very approachable and helpful, and I mean no disrespect to her at all, but I find it very frustrating to find myself at the end of my first year on this course with very few additional skills. I would certainly not feel even remotely ready to work in a professional environment, and this weekend filming has absolutely confirmed that to me.
We should be learning about lighting and camera technique, we have only spent one day in the TV studio and that was to work on our radio scripts. It was very useful however, and a lot of fun too, and we all wrote our radio scripts during the process.

So, to summarise. I have enjoyed being in uni and think Weston campus is a great place to study. My classmates are wonderful and we have all worked really well together, and Kim is lovely. I feel frustrated with the lack of real training in camera, scriptwriting and particularly in editing. I would like to be able to say with confidence that I can write, shoot and edit by the end of this course, but after editing three pieces on my own and one with the group, I feel no closer to that than I did at the beginning of the year.

Editing 'Beach Body'

I can really feel my lack of training and experience while editing this group project. Tom has done most of the editing, with input from myself and Adam. But I wish I could have been more 'hands on'. I am finding it very frustrating. Tom has done a great job, although I am sure he will disagree with me, but he has very little experience and training himself. He also composed a track for the film, which is very good, using sound track pro. I contributed a track too, something I had recorded earlier which I felt really suited the film, 'The Game'. We also decided to use a track from a friend of mine, Hazel Mills, 'Freestanders'. Hazel was kind enough to allow us, thanks Hazel! We produced releases for all three tracks, and completed all the necessary paperwork, there is so much!
Now I can understand why film studios are run by lawyers and accountants.
After researching we found some pictures to use during the last few shots of the film to establish the link between the family and their 'normal' day and the bodies around them. These pictures were found using the Associated Press images website, which I joined. This gave us access to hundreds of thousands of historical pictures and also allows for the use of these pictures, as long as they are acknowledged as belonging to the associated press and are not used for commercial reasons.
Even though the film is only a little over 7 minitues long, it took all of us more than two days to capture and edit. I would have liked a lot longer to be honest, and this is not just because of our inexperience and lack of ability and training.


I have been studying editors, by watching and re-watching film, Walter Murch has become a favourite of mine. (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4994411)
Murch has won three Oscars. He has been nominated in sound and or editing categories eight times. His films include Apocalypse Now, all three Godfather films, The English Patient, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Ghost and The Talented Mr. Ripley. I discovered that editing can and should in many ways take a lot longer than the actual filming process. In fact the editing really does make the film.
I intend to continue editing the film myself, to both improve on my editing skills and improve on the finished film. It will be interesting to see how different it will become.

Walter Murch Said "Actually, when you stop to think about it, it is amazing that film editing works at all. One moment we're at the top of Mauna Kea and -- cut! -- the next we're at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The instantaneous transition of the cut is nothing like what we experience as normal life, which seems to be one continuous shot from the moment we wake until we close our eyes at night. It wouldn't have been surprising if film editing had been tried and then abandoned when it was found to induce a kind of seasickness. But it doesn't: we happily endure, in fact even enjoy, these sudden transitions for which nothing in our evolutionary history seems to have prepared us."