3. How did your production skills develop throughout this project?
Initially when I took Media Studies as a subject I only had faint idea on how to operate a camera. Throughout my journey of AS, the first thing I learned was to understand a camera. How to operate a camera’s ISO, shutter speed, aperture and various lenses. Since I did not team up with anyone and I was working on my project alone, I had to learn editing, filming and the entire film making by myself. After the initial step, I learned about different camera techniques, types of camera shots, how to use framing to convey a message, and various different techniques which I never really tried to understand. Similarly I learned about the use of sound and the use of props in a film what meaning it constructs. The major part, which I lacked the most was editing and filming. The first experience I had with filming a film opening was while doing my preliminary task. I tried rather a practical approach to the making, so rather than studying the theory, I made the film on set while just knowing the story. This really showed me how I could’ve done the angle and framing better. The real difficulty I had while completing my preliminary task was editing my product. Since I was new to the use of Premier Pro CC, and all of the options were overwhelming, I used the help of various YouTube videos and somehow created an end product. After this experience, I researched through various products which were already made and saw how the there was such a diversity in camera framing and angles. I also learned about colour grading and how it really changes the whole mood and the vibe of a media. The use of Premier Pro CC was one of the most hardest and time-consuming, not because it was difficult to use, after the initial confusion the uses came naturally, but because it had so many attributions and features, most of the time was used in re-touching and re-arranging the final product. I learned through a series of trial and error how to convey my idea through a camera lens and editing. The most major element I learned was how I can deliver a message without any words. The elements which were included in the film opening which I was also concerned about was the titles, from my preliminary task to my final product, the one element that really bugged me was how I was not able to edit and add the titles like I wanted to. Throughout my research, my main goal remained to learn more about the editing of the titles and the one thing I am really proud of is the development of my titles from my first ever video to my last video. When it came to planning and production, I had the general idea about storyboards, mood boards and scripts but my skill in making them was polished thoroughly, by looking at references and practicing often, I was able to come with an outcome that I was satisfied with. For storyboard, I tried channeling my artistic self, and thought about how my film would look on paper, what it did was it gave me ability to think past the present and think about the final outcome, this was really eye-opening to realize that film makers have to go through this process frame by frame. This gave me patience and my respect increased even more for the film makers. For mood board, I searched through Pinterest for pictures which really channel my film opening in a picture, and to end the planning and production, I looked at different scripts of famous films and used the website Celtx to write the script and was able to conquer this task too by an ample amount of research. Music also plays a significant part in a film, and I used my research to fill in the gap by the lyrics which was made by the lack of dialogue, hence polishing my skill to convey a message without the help of narration or dialogue. Another element worth mentioning is the audience questionnaires, by researching about my audience and what kind of audiences usually consumes media, I was able to create a media which suited my audience. Different theories about audiences helped me learn more about how every individual consumes media, which in the end helped me understand the individuals around me also, while also helping me make a suitable media. A lot of my skills were polished and enhanced because of the advice I took from my teacher and my peers, which yet again helped me look at my product through a different aspect. The whole journey of my AS Media Studies thought and polished me, from constructing a meaning from a camera angle to using sound and music as a way of communicating, to understanding my audience to editing my film in way to convey a message without any dialogue, this journey somehow found a new sense in me, to look at everything from a different angle and constructing a meaning of everything. My skills developed from an amateur to a novice, yet the improvement gave me a sense of contentment which I know comes from the patience level which also increased in this whole process.
Eesha Saeed's AS Media Blog 