Assignment 1 - Film Analysis
- So before we start creating anything let’s talk about analysis. Understanding the nuts & bolts of what others have done in creating their videos. We could easily devote an entire class to film structure and several more to camera and editing techniques alone so this is really just an introduction to film analysis but it is important that you start thinking about these things now. This link is a basic guide to analyzing films.
- Your assignment is to select two different scenes from a movie and use the guide I provided to write your own short analysis of the scenes. Try to pick two scenes somewhat distant from each-other so that a bit of time will have passed in the plot. Focus primarily on the "Aesthetic Analysis" part of the paper as well as the "Music/Sound" part when writing your analysis. The "Literary Analysis" you may be able to write something about but because I'm not requiring you to analyze the entire film you may not be able to respond to some of the items in that list. Don't worry about them if you're not able to include them.
- What I want from you before next class is a written analysis, following those guidelines, emailed to me at lbaker@nvcc.commnet.edu
Assignment 2 - Getting Footage
- It's time to get something we can work with. For this assignment we're going to eschew any bells and whistles and work with the most basic piece of equipment there is: the cellphone camera. I'm including a link to a presentation about composition. These are useful guidelines whenever you're composing your shot and for now I recommend trying to stick to them. As you get more comfortable with filming you can start to break these rules in creative ways but for now stick to the basics.
- I'm also including a link to a document detailing advice for filming with a cellphone camera. It follows a lot of the basic rules of working with digital camera but has a few quirks specific to the device. Hopefully you're already fairly well acquainted with your cellphone and how to capture video with it.
- For your homework I want you to read both of these then go out and capture some quality footage we can edit in the next class. If you can’t think of what to record look for short (VERY SHORT) stories you can shoot with some friends or family. Maybe take a poem and film clips that you can set narration of the poem over later. These are just a few ideas but I want you to be creative. Record as much footage as you can in as high a quality as possible and plan to edit it into something no longer than five minutes in length.
Assignment 3 - Editing Footage
- So now that we've covered some theory in class about the nature of continuity editing and how to construct sequences of edits (link to presentation here) that make sense to the viewer it's time we start to chop up that footage you captured for the previous assignment.
- You're going to place the footage into the project folder structure we created in class and from there import it into Premiere. Remember when creating your new Premiere Project that it should be set to save to the correct folder and that we're using the default settings in most of the project panel's options.
- Creating a New Sequence can be done quickly by pressing Control+N on the keyboard. Your sequence settings should match your footage. If it doesn't match when you go to place your footage on the timeline it will ask if you would like to change the sequence to match the footage or leave it as it is. You should make the sequence match your footage.
- Creating in and out points in the Source Monitor is a good first step in the editing process and will help you make the initial selections of your footage that you can bring down to your timeline. Remember to be careful of the difference between the Insert versus the Overwrite buttons.
- When positioning things in the timeline remember that the time indicator can be made to snap to clips beginnings and ends by holding shift on the keyboard. If you need to cut up a clip already on the timeline you can use the Razor Tool to create a new break in the clip. Clips can be repositioned by simply dragging them around in the timeline. Clicking and dragging on the beginning or the ending of a clip can let you change the In or Out point manually of a clip already on the timeline.
- So with all that said what I want from you is for you to take the footage you captured and begin editing it into a coherent narrative. That means it should be edited to fit your story, your poem, or whatever narrative you've chosen to structure your short video. Be sure to acquire music and possibly sound effects and narration if you need them. The K drive on the school computers has a sound effects folder full of effects and simple music that the school has licensed so you are free to use that as you see fit. Don't worry too much about editing your audio or adding transitions to your video just yet. We want a rought cut with everything present and with correct timing and placement on the timeline that we can edit further after next class.
Assignment 4 - Transitions & Audio
- For this assignment you're going to take the clips you've placed into Premiere and cut up into a coherent sequence and apply transitions. The transitions should be used in a manner that's effective. Don't put fades or dip-to-black transitions between every clip. Think about what needs to be implied between those clips. If it's within a single scene and you're just going to another camera angle consider just using a cut instead of something more time-consuming like a cross-dissolve or a dip-to-black/white. If you're going from one location to another maybe a cross-dissolve would work well.
- Remember to do something that links the scenes together. It can be an action that's continued in some way in the next scene, it could be referenced in the previous scene and then transitioned to, it could be connected by having the audio of the preceding scene continue to play over the new scene for a moment, there's a lot of ways to link scenes together.
- Your audio should sound decent for the next stage of the assignment. If you have narration make sure it's in place and audible. Use your gain settings and possibly the normalization function to make sure all similar audio is at roughly the same level.
- You should have some sort of sound track in there. You can find royalty free audio in the sound library on the school's K drive. Your music should be leveled so it is "behind" anyone speaking. That means that it should be quieter but still audible. Using an audio crossfade at the beginning and end of a clip is useful if you want it to fade up then fade out. Not fading something like music when the sequence ends can lead to a sudden jarring cutoff.
- If you add sound effects remember to level them appropriately. Quieter sounds should be behind the voice and maybe even behind the music while loud, abrupt sounds can be louder than the other audio. Something like a door slamming could be leveled louder than a long clip of soft footsteps.
- For next class be sure to bring in your project edited together, given appropriate transitions, and with properly leveled audio.
Assignment 5 - Midterm Script & Storyboard
- To really get the most out of the topics we covered in class today you’re going to need more than the simple video you’ve been working on so far. So your homework is going to be to create a script (or adapt a story into a script you can shoot from) and create some storyboards.
- I’m going to provide several short story-starters in this link that you will use as the basis of your story.
- Ultimately keep in mind that these videos will be no more than 7 Minutes long, no less than 3 minutes long, contain appropriate edits including any necessary cuts; fades; or other transitions, have correctly leveled audio including dialog; music; and necessary effects, and make use of at least 2 video effects in a way which makes sense in the context of the story.
- Your storyboards should be set up so that you have a panel for ever major action which occurs. That means if a character turns, if the camera zooms, if you cut to a new shot, you need to have another panel of the storyboard. Use the information in this link when creating your storyboards.
- Storyboards are both for you to organize your visuals before filming and provide a pre-production guide to your post-production editing as well as to communicate your idea and direction simply and easily to anyone who reads them.
- Don’t worry too much about how your script looks just yet. There are standard guidelines for formatting a script and what to include in it, but for now just write in a way that you find helpful when planning out the story for your video.
Assignment 7 - Finalizing Your Midterm & Uploading It
Assignment 8 - Bring Your Costumes & Read Your Lines
Assignment 9 - Edit The Class Movie
Assignment 10 -
