OK: Reflection On Shoot

On the 10th January 2016, Myself, Finn and Leo went to Westerham Woods to shoot our horror film. We had planned to film the most important scenes first, including the shots with Finn dog and the shots in the woods before it got dark. It didn't matter too much if we filmed the shots inside the building as it began to get dark as we planned to use candles to light the inside of the building as well as making it looking more chilling. Throughout the day, I helped Finn with the camera work whilst I was needed for acting as the antagonist in the film. We all helped contribute to new ideas that we hadn't thought of, producing shots that helped our film to look more scary using the equipment provided including the jib and the tracking dolly. Together as a group, we all contributed to the production of our horror film. I helped Finn to set up the Jib and the tracking dolly, which proved to be a challenge at times as we filmed a few of the shots on the grass which didn't help to shoot a smooth shot.

Our storyboard helped us to plan the main shots for our film. If we hadn't storyboarded out film, we would've had to shoot our scenes from our treatment which sometimes lacked detail and creativity. Leo and I had never been to the location before so we couldn't plan all of our shots therefore we made room for extra shots that we would plan on arrival to the location. Using the storyboard/animatic also helped to identify which camera angles would be the best to film that particular scene. Throughout the day, as a team, we were particularly pleased with the shots using the jib. We successfully used it in our Wilderness Woods production so therefore knew that we would be able to capture even better footage using the jib, if we we to follow our own storyline. Another thing I was particularly pleased with was the footage we captured inside the building. We were able to make the inside look very chilling by scattering candles inside the walls and along the floor. This helped to perceive the antagonist to have a motive to killing the protagonist as well as continue to keep on track with our sub-genre by using props and locations that you would usually see in a slasher film. We experienced a number of challenges that we had to overcome throughout the day. It had rained the previous day so therefore, the environment was wet and muddy. This proved to be an issue to us as we had a half an hour walk from our meeting point to the actual location we had planned to film in. We had to work as a team to carry the equipment to the location as well as to look after Finn's dog who was also featured in our film. In order to overcome this challenge, we had planned before to wear suitable footwear for this environment, as well as being careful where we walked as the mud was very thick.

From this experience, I have learnt that you cannot plan everything beforehand. This is because we have no control over the weather or if the environment of the location we plan to film in changes. For future filming, I now understand that a storyboard is useful in ge the end film.