Friday 25 March 2011

Editing -

During the editing stages of our film, we have been heavily influenced by Guy Ritchie's film 'Rock n Rolla'. We have attempted to emulate this in our edit, using similar music and stylistic cuts and split screens to combat the dullness that originally hampered our film. We have similarly used freeze frames with titles to introduce our main characters. By using split screens and freeze frames we were able to speed up the card game whilst creating a busy atmosphere and progressing our film without it becoming boring.
We also wanted to add to the verisimilitude of our film by creating a realistic Afghanistan scene. To achieve this we used Adobe After-Effects to add an explosion and gun shots to the scene.

Recording Sean's voice-over

We originally ran into complication when recording the voice over for our main character Sean, as the actor who plays him was unavailable to record. However, we decided to record the whole voice over dialogue using one of our own group, so that we could edit the footage accordingly. However, after much feedback from our audiences, we decided that the voice over we had recorded was far too dull, and to correct this we subsequently used a different person for the voice over, and our feedback allowed us to create a much more interesting and versatile recording. We then synced the dialogue with our footage, and due to the lack of any dialogue from the main character in the footage, we were able to incorporate the voice over relatively easily.

Sound work - Creating soundtrack

We have used 'Garaged Band' to create suitable music to use with our footage. We took inspiration from films such as 'Ocean's Eleven', using a fairly similar jazzy rock theme to compliment the split screens and stylistic approach we have opted for. We also used Garage Band to create the more moodier and atmospheric tracks for our film, adding to the tense atmosphere created by a gangster themed film. We have also synchronised our music to match with our footage, changing our split screens in accordance with the bass rhythm of the music, overall creating a much more stylish and dramatic effect.

Afghanistan Scene Filming

Due to our main character's involvement in the Afgan conflict, we decided that it would be beneficial to the story to involve a flashback scene. To do this, we found a suitable sandy location in Verwood, and we aim to edit the lighting in after effects to create the sense of intense sunlight. Obviously noise was a concern whilst filming outdoors, however the rushing of wind and other noises lends to the realism of the scene as it is only a few seconds of our main character running.

Filming Day 2 - Continuity Problems

We encountered difficulties during the second day of filming, as the continuity of both of our filming days proved hard. We had to take great care to continue the Mise en Scene of our footage, making sure that the poker chips, glasses and costumes of our characters matched with the footage that we already had. We also encountered problems with the appearance of some of our characters, as the amount of stubble on our main character differs significantly, however we have been able to successfully mask this through the darkening of our footage using a 'Luma Key'. Also, the black tie that our main character wore in the original footage was misplaced, however we were luckily able to find a very similar one, and the difference is very subtle. The set similarly had to be recreated to the same standard as our original footage, but we luckily managed this. Whilst we unfortunately encoutered continuity problems, the majority of our second filming day was a success, and scheduling and planning before hand allowed us to get all of the shots that we needed to a good standard.

Sean Voice-over Script

Sean- voice over

I’ve never thought of myself as a particularly lucky guy
                             
Poker’s a game where luck can come in pretty handy. Take a look (shows his hand of two Aces). But believe it or not this isn’t the type of place I tend to visit often or at all for that matter. First of all, take a look at my fine co-players
That’s Eddy, he’s the ‘Boss’ around here, nothing happens without his say so...He’s quite the poker Player.
This Guy’s Tommy, he’s the muscle for Eddy’s operation, an expert at making people’s life a misery.
As for the others at the table, they’re relatively small fish, most of them junkies and gamblers in debt to the big man, especially the woman; she’s a piece of work.
 In fact, I’ve never met any of these people in my life before, thankfully. They’re not your average upstanding citizen.

You see, I come from a pretty normal background, at school I wasn’t exactly a genius, but I wasn’t thick either. I wasn’t the coolest kid around but I wasn’t a loser either. I was normal. But there was one thing in life that I loved. The army, it was my life. I was a rifleman in Afghanistan, and served 2 tours of duty. And I was good (Trails off)
But I was wounded in the shoulder during operations in the Helmand province; perhaps you’d like to see it

But I guess all good things come to an end. After that the army gave me a leaving present of a disability payment and an inability to work,