Long Film: Critical Evaluation.

Critical Evaluation:

For our final piece we decided to use long shot film styles to demonstrate the skills we learnt through the course. This style required us to essentially over extend shots that we were taking, for example, If there was a scene with someone riding a horse, instead of it being a quick take to show the passing of time and going from one place to another, it would be a shot that could less a couple of minutes before finally arriving at the destination. This is the style that we chose.

Our topic of choice for the script was something dark as we wanted to delve into the impact of mental health issues on men as I personally believe this isn’t something that comes up in topics as much as it should. Our story followed a young male going back to his flat and not having anyone there for him, he shows clear signs of loneliness and is blatantly ignored by someone he considers his only friend which, on that day sends him over the edge to the point he takes some pills and drink and over doses.

For this we did lots of long extended shots of our main character walking to his room, drinking alcohol and alternatively his friend just ignoring him and enjoying herself watching Netflix and so forth. These shots worked out quite well as we used a canon c100 the shots were in good quality and the angles we chose captured the characters emotions well by getting quite a lot of close-up shots of his face as well as text messages on a mobile phone.

We could have made these shots better though by correcting some of the lighting in the shots as I believe some shots were slightly over exposed or too dark. This was an issue for us as the light boxes that had been ordered hadn’t been the right ones and instead didn’t give off enough light that we ideally had hoped for in the planning process. As we also had to come back and re shoot some scenes, I felt like the continuity was slightly broken by this lighting again as the time of days were slightly different which mean that the amount of light that was let into the room was more than what we had originally.

In preparation for the task we planned out what was going to happen, or what we had hoped was going to happen so that we could ensure it wasn’t going to take longer than expected. The majority of the filming went to plan although we ran into a slight error that the pills, we wanted to use we couldn’t get so we had to improvise with a different bottle by pulling the label off, so it wasn’t an obvious brand within the shot.

Despite the set back of trying to find a new prop everything had gone smoothly for the whole aspect although we had run out of time which meant that we had to plan again to get the rest of the shots done so we had everything we needed to fit within the time frame stated.

As we had to film on 2 different days, when it came to book the equipment for the second session we ran into a big problem. The canon c100 that we had previously used had been fully booked and there were no more available to use which meant we had to use a different camera that wasn’t quite as high a quality which meant in the editing process we had to try and make the scenes looking similar in quality through post edit shots. If we were to do this differently, I would ensure that we had the same camera if we ever had to do multiple shoots again, so we didn’t have to worry about any loss of quality during post production.

Despite the set back we still managed to film in the appropriate style which was a benefit cause despite the loss of film quality, the quality of style was still there.

Another factor that I think could have been improved upon was the use of a shotgun mic for the piece as we ended up using only the cameras inbuilt microphone which I believe didn’t do the film justice, especially with trying to capture the full emotion of the character to try and explore how impactful and scary what our main character was going through. Although we didn’t have a mic attached this wasn’t the end of the world for trying to draw out the emotion of the piece as, in post edit we had the option to add some music over the slower more quieter moments which would be a reflection of the characters thought process and almost help push viewers into the correct direction for really feeling what the character is going through.

I also believe that this style of filming fits the message of the short film well as the long shots almost identify that what he is going through is dragged out and almost over thought which is a reflection in the filming itself. The filming style requires longer than usual shots which I feel can make some pieces almost uncomfortably long which is how I wanted the piece to feel to the viewer, as this is a reflection of the characters thoughts, he’s uncomfortable with what he lives with, everything he does feels longer that it should be which makes it seem like a burden which ultimately makes him not want to be alive anymore.

Overall, the final piece followed the conventions of the style we chose which was a better outcome that what we could have hoped for as we managed to keep it in the time frame requested, had a story that was quite meaningful and was done with lots of long takes. There are several things I would have liked to changed to get a better final edit but we managed to work with what came out at the end which allowed us to explore this type of cinematography giving us a greater knowledge in this style of filming.