Blog 18- Creative camera use

In this blog I have print screened various clips from our final video, of Florence and the Machine- My boy builds coffins, which show any interesting techniques or special effects we have used with the camera and through editing.

Reverse sped up sunset.

This shot is used as the opening clip in our video showing the sun coming up. This clip was originally filmed as the sun set. It took us around 45 miutes to film the sun going down and then we edited this clip to speed up so it lasted 3 seconds showing a 45 minute sunset in 3 seconds which created an interesting effect with the sun and the clouds. We then reversed the shot of the sunset to make it appear like sunrise so we could use the sun set and sun rise at the beginning and ending of the video.


Experimenting with lighting.

This shot was orinially us playing around with the lighting because the image was too bright therefore we adjusted the lighting. However, when watching this shot back we thought the gradual change from a bluring bright lighted shot to the correct lighting was a really good effect therefore used it in the opening sequence. I think the gradual focus on the girl could also represent her coming out of a dream as though she is waking up.


Eyes opening on beat

We timed the girl opening her eyes to match the first beat of the music exactly. I think this represents the begining of the song well because it is the first human movement that introduces the rest of the video.

We had to cut the clip shorter in the middle to time the girl opening her eyes perfectly with the music. The middle that is cut is not at all noticable because the girl stays still through this first shot.


Establishing shot

We wanted an establishing shot which showed the surroundings of the following clip however this clip was filmed very slowely meaning it dragged on for too long therefore we sped up this clip through editing to make it last 10 seconds instead.

This shot showed goot camera creativity because we used different angles from up into the trees then tracked along the river which shows that we though about all the interesting angles we would fit into one shot to create a picture of the whole scenary.


Change in angle


We filmed the dancer running into the shot and spinning around once and we then filmed her from a new angle spinning around then running out of the shot (in the image below)

We put these two clips together when editing and created a small time lap so that you see the dancer spin twice as if the movement had been repeated in two different shots.

















Composition


I think this is a good use of camera creativity because we thought about interesting compositions we could use to make an image look more affective.









Time jump.

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We filmed this shot of the 4 girls walking through the forest. I thought the composition of the whole shot worked really well, however the clip was too long to put the whole thing in the video. Therefore, when editing, we created a time jump so the clip skipped a couple of seconds between each shot creating three seperate shots and showing the girls at 3 seperate stages of their journey.



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Use of shot types/composition

This close up shows we have thought about using different types of shots to show the use of camera creativity through out the video.

The composition of this image is good because the character is not in the center of the shot creating a more interesting image because we can see her location in the background as well.





Use of editing transitions

We used the fade transitions between a close up of the girl singing and the girl singing on the floor.

We had to get the timing of the lip syncing perfect for this to work. Therefore, as the girl fades out in one shot, she is singing the same word in the next shot so you can see they are singing the same lyrics.

The second shot of her lying on the floor also shows use of camera angles as we have shot from above to view the girl from a new angle.


Slow motion

This shot was originally the girl spinning around fast. However, we slowed down the speed to match the slower change in pace of the music.

If we did not slow this shot down then it would have not matched the pace.







Extreme close up

We used extreme close ups of the boy's features to create a mysterious look about him. The audience never get's to see his who identity which makes an interesting effect.












Close up of detail

This shot realates specifically to the name of the song 'My boy builds coffins'. The close up shot allows the audience to see the specific detail of the boy hammering a nail to create the coffin.








Creating shadow's

We created a shadow on the wall of the boy building the coffin. The shadow on the wall creates a more interesting effect than if we would have just shown the boy himself building. This also adds to the mystery of the boys identity and gives an old fashioned look as though candle light is effecting this shadow on the wall.

We also slowed down this clip to create a smoother effect and the timing fits in better with the music.




Fade effect

We again used the fade transition effect from the boy building coffins to florence to show how the characters are relevant to each other and this also helps the audience make a link between the two scenes.








Change in angles

We shot this movement from the front. And then shot it from a low angle looking up to the character (shown in the image below).

Then, when editing, we put the two movements together as though the camera changes to another angle in that one single movement.

The timing had to be perect during editing otherwise the movements would not look like one single movement and would look obviously edited.

This shows our use of angles as well as linking two angles together to create one scene.










Reflection


We filmed the dancers dancing in the reflection of the river to create new interesting idea's.










We then filmed them continuing this dance sequence to create the same shot as in their reflection.









Running

We adjusted the lighting on the camera to look very bright to create a dream like effect. This links in with existing video's which also create an abstract dream like effect.

We also slowed this clip down to fit into more of a dream like theme and to also contrast with the pace of the music.




Conclusion

Through out filming we were very creative with different ways of filming such as use of all angles compositions and lighting. Editing helped us to pick out the effects that worked well and the effects that didn't work well which we experimented with whilst filming. Editing also helped us create new effects such as changing the speed of shots and using transitions between shots. Without using these editing techniques we wouldn't have been able fit in the shots with the timing and pace of the music to work effectively. Therefore, our camera creativity and new knowledge of editing skills and effects helped us toward creating a video that shows many aspects of good camera use which fits well with the pace of the song.