Wednesday, June 23, 2010
the end
The documentary is finished! I am really really happy with it especially the end, which I was dreading putting together. We didn't really have any ideas on how to end up until we actually got there, then it just kind of happened. I think the whole film flows really nicely and - the most important part - we developed and presented our ideas in a way that will interest and inform the audience, maybe even change a few minds.
picking up speed
Knowing that our deadline is next week Paloma and I have spent every spare moment in Com 5, trying to finish our editing. We have definitely begun to develop our own styles of editing and lucky for us we usually agree on decisions that have to be made. It's at this point that I am really glad that I chose to work with some I get on well with or this could be a very difficult time.
The film is really taking shape now and I'm really happy with what we have got. I'm very conscious of keeping it interesting and not just having people talking at the camera. We both take turns at handling the mouse but Paloma prefers to have the controls and I like to sit back a little as that helps me to look at the film objectively and develop my ideas more.
We have tried to kind of section the ideas we are putting forward while also keeping a flow throughout the narrative. Another issue we face is not putting too much of Scotty in. He has so many ideas which line up exactly with our own that it is easy to over use him, which would make it a very boring documentary.
The film is really taking shape now and I'm really happy with what we have got. I'm very conscious of keeping it interesting and not just having people talking at the camera. We both take turns at handling the mouse but Paloma prefers to have the controls and I like to sit back a little as that helps me to look at the film objectively and develop my ideas more.
We have tried to kind of section the ideas we are putting forward while also keeping a flow throughout the narrative. Another issue we face is not putting too much of Scotty in. He has so many ideas which line up exactly with our own that it is easy to over use him, which would make it a very boring documentary.
started editing
Editing is going..slowly. Once we got our opening sequence down we were at a bit of a dead end. The opening montage fits almost exactly with what we planned and it to be, and I am relatively happy with it. I know that it can always be changed and at this point we really just need to get stuff down on the track. We also hit on the idea of opening our doco with a dictionary definition, which inspired us with the idea to kind of title each 'section' with a quote of fact. I don't know if we will actually do this but it is going down on our ideas page.
After the opening sequence and definition we are planning to use our interviews to explain what dumpster diving is and from there go into why people so it and the morality behind it (a suggestion from Anya).
After the opening sequence and definition we are planning to use our interviews to explain what dumpster diving is and from there go into why people so it and the morality behind it (a suggestion from Anya).
fake dumpstering
Having given up on interviewing Jo, we decided to concentrate on our action footage this week. We need this for the opening montage and cut-away shots. We have decided to stage a fake dumpster dive because no-one seems very keen for us to film the really doing it, understandably. It was pouring with rain most of the week, making it impossible, but we did some indoor filming. We took all the food out of my pantry that people in our interviews had mentioned and made a stop motion of the food piling up on my kitchen bench. We hadn't planned this shot, is was spontaneous but I think it will work perfectly in our film, providing some interesting viewing in between all the 'talking heads'. I filmed this standing on my kitchen table with the tripod so we could get some height. We also did some quick shots of me and my sister packing food into cardboard boxes, showing only our hands and feet, and taking the box back into our house. This, along with the fake dumpster dive footage we are planning, should create a nice story line to run through our doco, and personalise dumpster diving to the audience.
It cleared up on Thursday so we gathered some of our friends and took a box of food and went down to Island Bay supermarket. They had some open dumpsters that were filled with cardboard so we set up the shot so you couldn't see this and planted some of our food in there. We filmed our friends taking food from from the dumpster and putting it into boxes. There was a bright light directly above the dumpsters so we could see them clearly on the film, though it was quite grainy. It was a very public spot so we had quite a few interruptions, including a (pretty drunk) guy who ended up acting in a few of our shots. We also got a really cool shot of the silhouettes of our friends pretending to climb a fence around the back. This was also pretty grainy, but we have decided that this could be to our advantage, underlining how society forces criminalizes people that only wish to recycle what others are wasting.
After these we took some shots of the supermarket from out side which contrasted really well with the dark, grainy shots. I think that we have all the material we need for our opening montage, and that will be our next step - to start editing the opening sequence of our film. I'm also pretty sure that we have all the interviews and other cutaway footage that we need so we will be into full time editing from now.
It cleared up on Thursday so we gathered some of our friends and took a box of food and went down to Island Bay supermarket. They had some open dumpsters that were filled with cardboard so we set up the shot so you couldn't see this and planted some of our food in there. We filmed our friends taking food from from the dumpster and putting it into boxes. There was a bright light directly above the dumpsters so we could see them clearly on the film, though it was quite grainy. It was a very public spot so we had quite a few interruptions, including a (pretty drunk) guy who ended up acting in a few of our shots. We also got a really cool shot of the silhouettes of our friends pretending to climb a fence around the back. This was also pretty grainy, but we have decided that this could be to our advantage, underlining how society forces criminalizes people that only wish to recycle what others are wasting.
After these we took some shots of the supermarket from out side which contrasted really well with the dark, grainy shots. I think that we have all the material we need for our opening montage, and that will be our next step - to start editing the opening sequence of our film. I'm also pretty sure that we have all the interviews and other cutaway footage that we need so we will be into full time editing from now.
next
This week we had really good luck, and shot three very successful interviews. At the beginning of the week I called Holly and set up another interview time with her for Wednesday. She was quite concerned about remaining anonymous on camera, but we had been thinking about this and she was happy with our plan to shoot only her hands as she talked. We also told her that we would shout her a coffee to thank her for her time.
The first interview we actually shot this week was our second attempt at recording Scotty. This time we got all the gear we needed and were on time. While we were waiting for Scotty to get ready for us, we got talking to a social worker-in-training who did some dumpster diving on the side. She (Jessie) told us about how she uses some of the food she gets to provide free meals for the needy in her community. This fit perfectly with the image of a dumpster diver that we wish to portray, so we asked her to give us an interview. She agreed (after some convincing). It will be good to get another female voice in our film.
After the lucky meeting, we interviewed Scotty again. He asked us if we would like to use the same room, but this time we had had a bit of time to look around and I suggested a room at the back with a black leather couch, yellow walls and a large window (this doesn't sound very attractive but I knew it would look good on camera). We took what we learnt from the repeated Wilson shoots and spent a long time setting up the shot. This year we seem to have spent a lot of time trying to keep the horizontal lines in our frames straight, like in this shot the lines of the window and couch were very difficult to line up as we had to have the camera off to one side because of all the equipment in the room blocking our way. However we spent a lot of time on it and I think we achieved a pretty good shot. The lighing was perfect as it was, with no shadows on Scott's face or yellowish tinge. We did have to ask him to turn off the air-conditioning, but that was the only background noise. Scotty had had time since our last interview to really consider what he was going to say, and so he was extremely articulate and prepared this time round. He went above and beyond the questions we asked him. Like Paloma said, he was an interviewers dream.
Jessie contacted us that night and suggested an interview the next morning, which suited us so we set it up. We wanted to interview her at Newtown Library but it was closed when we got there, so we made a last minute decision to film in WHS library. We followed the same aesthetic we used with Wilson and Scotty, using a mid shot, concentrating on the hands, torso and face, with a flat background and clean white lighting. She was a little nervous and giggly but said some things that will definitely be of use. It was very very kind of her to be interviewed after only meeting us the day before, though.
Our last interview of the week was with Holly. We arranged to meet at Offbeat and she had to bring her young son along, so we were expecting a noisy informal interview. We were planning to film outside but it was very windy and raining a bit so we had to go inside.This shot was something of a fluke really. Holly had brought her own gloves along to cover her tattoos, and these just happened to perfectly match a jar in the background of the frame, which linked the whole shot together. I set up the camera on the table with Holly's hands around her coffee cup on the right and the jars in the background on the left. I ended up just holding the camera for the whole interview so that Paloma could stretch the mic as close to Holly as possible. Although we chose a table as far from the speakers and the other customers the background noise was pretty loud. We did quite a few sound checks but decided that, under the circumstances, it was best to stay where we were. She brought a very personal side to our dumpstering story. Perfect example of the people that Scotty talked about, people for whom dumpster diving is a necessity. There were quite a few topics that she didn't feel comfortable talking about on camera, such as the work she has done/is planning for single mothers. This was unfortunate for us, but of course we have to respect this. We still got some really interesting information and personal accounts out of her. Her son did pop his head into the frame quite a few times, making shots unusable, but there is nothing we can do about that.
I really like this shot, but I don't know how easy it will be to make it flow with the rest of our interviews, which are all shot in very different ways to Holly's, with minimal background noise.
The first interview we actually shot this week was our second attempt at recording Scotty. This time we got all the gear we needed and were on time. While we were waiting for Scotty to get ready for us, we got talking to a social worker-in-training who did some dumpster diving on the side. She (Jessie) told us about how she uses some of the food she gets to provide free meals for the needy in her community. This fit perfectly with the image of a dumpster diver that we wish to portray, so we asked her to give us an interview. She agreed (after some convincing). It will be good to get another female voice in our film.
After the lucky meeting, we interviewed Scotty again. He asked us if we would like to use the same room, but this time we had had a bit of time to look around and I suggested a room at the back with a black leather couch, yellow walls and a large window (this doesn't sound very attractive but I knew it would look good on camera). We took what we learnt from the repeated Wilson shoots and spent a long time setting up the shot. This year we seem to have spent a lot of time trying to keep the horizontal lines in our frames straight, like in this shot the lines of the window and couch were very difficult to line up as we had to have the camera off to one side because of all the equipment in the room blocking our way. However we spent a lot of time on it and I think we achieved a pretty good shot. The lighing was perfect as it was, with no shadows on Scott's face or yellowish tinge. We did have to ask him to turn off the air-conditioning, but that was the only background noise. Scotty had had time since our last interview to really consider what he was going to say, and so he was extremely articulate and prepared this time round. He went above and beyond the questions we asked him. Like Paloma said, he was an interviewers dream.
Jessie contacted us that night and suggested an interview the next morning, which suited us so we set it up. We wanted to interview her at Newtown Library but it was closed when we got there, so we made a last minute decision to film in WHS library. We followed the same aesthetic we used with Wilson and Scotty, using a mid shot, concentrating on the hands, torso and face, with a flat background and clean white lighting. She was a little nervous and giggly but said some things that will definitely be of use. It was very very kind of her to be interviewed after only meeting us the day before, though.
Our last interview of the week was with Holly. We arranged to meet at Offbeat and she had to bring her young son along, so we were expecting a noisy informal interview. We were planning to film outside but it was very windy and raining a bit so we had to go inside.This shot was something of a fluke really. Holly had brought her own gloves along to cover her tattoos, and these just happened to perfectly match a jar in the background of the frame, which linked the whole shot together. I set up the camera on the table with Holly's hands around her coffee cup on the right and the jars in the background on the left. I ended up just holding the camera for the whole interview so that Paloma could stretch the mic as close to Holly as possible. Although we chose a table as far from the speakers and the other customers the background noise was pretty loud. We did quite a few sound checks but decided that, under the circumstances, it was best to stay where we were. She brought a very personal side to our dumpstering story. Perfect example of the people that Scotty talked about, people for whom dumpster diving is a necessity. There were quite a few topics that she didn't feel comfortable talking about on camera, such as the work she has done/is planning for single mothers. This was unfortunate for us, but of course we have to respect this. We still got some really interesting information and personal accounts out of her. Her son did pop his head into the frame quite a few times, making shots unusable, but there is nothing we can do about that.
I really like this shot, but I don't know how easy it will be to make it flow with the rest of our interviews, which are all shot in very different ways to Holly's, with minimal background noise.
Monday, June 21, 2010
getting some direction
Took some cut away shots of dumpsters that we will probably have to turn into freeze frames as we didn't have a tripod, and handheld is not the look we are going for. Have set up an interview with Scotty for Tuesday, at his work (Zeal). We will have to find somewhere to film on the spot as neither of us has ever been there and he is usually pretty pushed for time.
Did THIRD Wilson interview, which I'm really happy with. He didn't turn up to our planned lunchtime shoot, so we spent this time wandering round with our camera and tripod finding the perfect setting. We decided on the upstairs art room and booked with Ms Bates for after school so we could be sure that no-one would interrupt us. We got Wilson to sit cross-legged on a table against the white, paint splatted wall. The lighting was very white and clean, due to the sky light things, which is exactly what I wanted. Thank God at the last moment Paloma realised that Wilson would have to put on his jacket because the pale blue of his top blended in horribly to the wall. I was worried that the interview would sound rehearsed after doing it so many times but it was fine. The was some echo in the room, but the shot looked so nice that I'm not going to worry about it.
On the day of our interview with Scotty we got a camera and tripod, but there were no mics left!Louis tried to help us get one but they were definitely all gone. As a last resort we went and talked to Terry and he gave us a tiny little mic that clipped to the shirt. He showed us how to We aren't sure if it is going to give us any sound at all, but we had no choice but to do the interview with it anyway. Scotty is very intelligent and said somethings that I think might influence the direction of our film.
Checked out our footage. The Wilson interview is perfect, finally. But the Scotty interview has no sound. We contacted him again and he was very nice about giving us a second shot.
Still no word from Jo Cain.
Did THIRD Wilson interview, which I'm really happy with. He didn't turn up to our planned lunchtime shoot, so we spent this time wandering round with our camera and tripod finding the perfect setting. We decided on the upstairs art room and booked with Ms Bates for after school so we could be sure that no-one would interrupt us. We got Wilson to sit cross-legged on a table against the white, paint splatted wall. The lighting was very white and clean, due to the sky light things, which is exactly what I wanted. Thank God at the last moment Paloma realised that Wilson would have to put on his jacket because the pale blue of his top blended in horribly to the wall. I was worried that the interview would sound rehearsed after doing it so many times but it was fine. The was some echo in the room, but the shot looked so nice that I'm not going to worry about it.
On the day of our interview with Scotty we got a camera and tripod, but there were no mics left!Louis tried to help us get one but they were definitely all gone. As a last resort we went and talked to Terry and he gave us a tiny little mic that clipped to the shirt. He showed us how to We aren't sure if it is going to give us any sound at all, but we had no choice but to do the interview with it anyway. Scotty is very intelligent and said somethings that I think might influence the direction of our film.
Checked out our footage. The Wilson interview is perfect, finally. But the Scotty interview has no sound. We contacted him again and he was very nice about giving us a second shot.
Still no word from Jo Cain.
repeat
Filmed the second Wilson interview. I'm pretty sure this one will be fine. The audio may not be the best as we filmed it in a bathroom, I think there might be a slight echo, but it's not a big problem. We filmed in the bathroom because he had a whole board of badges in there which, as a backdrop, gave the impression that he is a thoughtful and opinionated teenager. He was more comfortable with what he was saying this time having done it before.
We went back to the house on Abel Smith Street to talk about Food Not Bombs and found it empty. We went back later in the evening and were met by the caretaker who told us that the guy we had talked to the day before wasn't a part of their projects and had no idea what he was talking about. He invited us to leave a note asking if anyone at the house would give us an interview, but wasn't very optimistic about our chances of finding anyone. We left a note but it was all very disheartening.
We had nothing to do for the rest of our afternoon so we filmed some B-roll footage of some dumpsters we found behind Manners Mall. The light was pretty bluish, but at this point we were very tired and just wanted something done and weren't worrying about that. We took turns filming and it was good to get some more practise with the camera. It is always good to have some spare cutaway footage, anyway.
Dylan introduced us to Scotty, who said he would defintely be keen to give us an interview and might even let him film him dumpster diving. Paloma will set up an interview time with him on facebook. Paloma has also texted Jo Cain again, and Wilson has promised to call him, but still no answer.
We looked at the footage from the SECOND Wilson interview. It's alright..but we don't love it. The line of the skirting board in the background is skewed and the lighting is terrible. We failed to notice the huge shadows under Wilson's eyes, which , for me, ruins the shot. The sound is better than I thought it would be, no echo at all. However, we are going to shoot again. All this repetition has taught us the hard way to check and recheck our lighting, sound , lines, framing, angles and everything else before we rush into filming.
We went back to the house on Abel Smith Street to talk about Food Not Bombs and found it empty. We went back later in the evening and were met by the caretaker who told us that the guy we had talked to the day before wasn't a part of their projects and had no idea what he was talking about. He invited us to leave a note asking if anyone at the house would give us an interview, but wasn't very optimistic about our chances of finding anyone. We left a note but it was all very disheartening.
We had nothing to do for the rest of our afternoon so we filmed some B-roll footage of some dumpsters we found behind Manners Mall. The light was pretty bluish, but at this point we were very tired and just wanted something done and weren't worrying about that. We took turns filming and it was good to get some more practise with the camera. It is always good to have some spare cutaway footage, anyway.
Dylan introduced us to Scotty, who said he would defintely be keen to give us an interview and might even let him film him dumpster diving. Paloma will set up an interview time with him on facebook. Paloma has also texted Jo Cain again, and Wilson has promised to call him, but still no answer.
We looked at the footage from the SECOND Wilson interview. It's alright..but we don't love it. The line of the skirting board in the background is skewed and the lighting is terrible. We failed to notice the huge shadows under Wilson's eyes, which , for me, ruins the shot. The sound is better than I thought it would be, no echo at all. However, we are going to shoot again. All this repetition has taught us the hard way to check and recheck our lighting, sound , lines, framing, angles and everything else before we rush into filming.
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