Evaluation Question 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the production process?

I used many pieces of both hardware and software technology during the production of my opening. These included an iMac (plus software such as iMovie), a Canon HD CMOS Pro camera (and accessories such as a tripod and a dolly). I also talked about how I have used Blogger in order to keep all of my planning and research for the production in one place, which aided the process of making the film. 

Strengths of the camera

The HD quality which the camera filmed in was very
helpful in making a professional looking media
product.

The camera had an excellent assisted focus control, which made it easy to create a strong depth of field within certain shots of our film. This is because it automatically zoomed in to allow the shot to be perfectly focused, then was able to be zoomed out in order to film the shot. Another strength of the camera we used was it's high quality built in microphone, as I had feared that we would have to set up an external microphone - this was not necessary because the built in microphone on the camera was ample to be able to capture the audio which was needed for our opening. 

Weaknesses of the camera

The battery life of the camera was quite weak, which meant that we had to keep the camera plugged in for the majority of the shoot. This restricted the shots we could do, as we always had to keep the camera within a certain distance of a plug socket. Another weakness was the fact that it recorded onto built in memory rather than SD card - it meant that we had to wait until we had got the footage into school before we could edit it, whereas we could have begun editing at home using Final Cut had we had access to the clips via an SD card. Whilst not necessarily being a weakness of the camera, it would have been better to have a camera with an even higher resolution and frame rate - this would have taken our product to almost cinema levels of definition, although this in turn would have meant that the camera would have been much bulkier and harder to operate.

Additional camera equipment used

We only used a basic tripod, like the one which
is pictured. This is because our tripod shots
did not require much complexity. 

There were two main external pieces of enjoyment which we used in order to film our opening - a tripod for static shots and a dolly for tracking shots. All the shots were filmed on one of these, apart from the YouTube video which can be seen within the clip - we purposely chose to film this by hand in order to make it appear to be mobile phone footage. We chose to use a dolly for the shots at the beginning because it gives a much more stable tracking shot than we would have been able to achieve by hand - it will make this part of the product look much more professional. Additionally, we decided to use a tripod because not only will it make these shots more stable, but it will mean that the camera is always in the same place if we have to film a scene in multiple shots. 

Software

The hardware which was used for the editing phase of our film opening was a 2011 27inch iMac. This computer was chosen because it has 8gb of flash memory RAM, a huge 1tb hard drive and a larger screen than most computers have - it gave us a better gauge of how the film would look when being watched on a television or in the cinema due to it's adaptable screen ratio.

As the picture demonstrates, iMovie is basic software
which can yield effective results if it is used effectively

We decided to edit our film on iMovie. Whilst I know how to use Final Cut X, we only had Final Cut Express available to us at school, and I thought that using more simplistic software that I am skilled on would result in a more cohesive and professional looking product than creating it on more complicated software which I would struggle to use. In terms of things which I learnt about the software, I learnt about the different things which can be done with titles. For example, I learnt about the huge amount of options which are available for designing titles within iMovie - this is how we were able to create titles which we're appropriate to the drama genre which our film falls within.

Problems we encountered with the technologies

The problems which came about from using the technologies were mainly the difficulties of using equipment we had no experience with. This means that if we were to film our film opening again we would come out with a much better finished product because our experience with the equipment would be visible within the product. Another problem which we came across was following the storyboard exactly based on the limitations which we suffered due to the equipment, for example the bad battery life on the camera. This meant that we had to edit some of the angles in order to position the camera in a certain way, although we managed to embellish these new angles in a way that they didn't actually detract from the overall product - the product is still good despite the on the fly edits to plan which had to be made.

Blogger

I found Blogger to be incredibly useful in the production of my film opening - it allowed me to digitally store all of the planning I had done for my film. This meant that when filming, I had a digitalised version of our storyboard. This was much easier than having to carry around a paper based storyboard, as I could access the storyboard and shot list and any other material which I needed from the Blogger app on my mobile phone. 

Additionally, YouTube was a website which has been very important throughout the production and pre-production of my film. It has allowed me to watch and evaluate other film openings - this is how I eventually built up the inspiration of how I wanted my opening to run. Additionally, it has allowed me to upload my finalised film opening, and I can upload unlimited cuts of the opening - without YouTube I would be limited to a certain number of cuts due to a limited amount of space which would be available on the physical medium which I would have to burn my film opening onto.