Pre-Production
Day 1
I decided to work alone, and began finalising my ideas, the main idea being that i wanted to do a mockumentary about a college. The use of single camera would be acceptable for this as typically there's only one camera in documentaries, the one that's held by a camera man, and the same would occur for my humour filled documentary. which i had already come up with, i was thinking up ideas in my head for scenes and characters that would compliment these scenes.
Day 2
I began Pre-production, starting with character and casting ideas. I thought of both characters that could be played well by certain people, and also began thinking what certain people i knew were like and made characters out of them, since their performance of this character would feel more natural. The best example of this is Jack's slight awkwardness when it comes to social situations, this influenced his David Brent like character.
Day 3
I continued pre-production, i started by brainstorming ideas and making a mood board. With these ideas i began writing the initial script, knowing changes would likely have to be made due to potential casting setbacks, and general setbacks, perhaps with locations, etc.
Day 4
I finished off my script, and began to work on the rest of pre-production work, i started with the location reports/ideas and also began to consider backup locations if they became necessary. I chose rooms that best suited the idea for my film that i had in my head, hence i planned to use MA27 (An IT room full of computers) for the IT scene, i also planned on using the large art room for the art scene, so that there would be as much space as possible for my actors to do their questionable behaviour in there. I then went on to consider Music choices, the songs i decided to use were selected for a number of reasons, i like every song that is chosen so won't mind working with them. They also have their own reasons, for example 'Fortunate Son - Creedance Clearwater Revival' is used since it is a famous Vietnam War song and used stereo typically in a lot of Vietnam War films, therefore would be useful for my little Vietnam war segment.
Day 5
I began filming, following the production schedule, First we filmed scene G, we spent about 50 minutes filming, continuously re shooting, mistake after mistake. We decided it'd be best if Jack didn't follow the script word for word, and instead got the general idea and improvised it on the spot, since he'd have less pressure on him to get the words correct. Another problem with this scene was since it was a single camera, documentary style film, we needed all scenes to be done in one continuous shot, so we couldn't just stop filming after jack messed up and continue from there in another shot. We would have to redo the entire thing. This could be considered a con of single camera productions, that being that you get a lack of shots unlike you would with a multi-camera production.
Day 6
Today we filmed Scenes: L, A, B, D and Joe's interview, again, we decided to only lightly follow the script as to make it easier and more natural for the actors to inherit their role and lines. Scene A came out very windy and the audio was essentially ruined by this. Unfortunately I only realised this by the time it was too late. This, again could be another con of single camera work. Because i only had one camera shooting, the footage on that was bad, and there was no other camera/recording to check to see if it had better audio. B was a stress to record as we only really had one shot to get it right because we had one banana skin and once jack slipped on it it wouldn't be usable again as it'd smush and break. Luckily it worked on the first try. But it goes to show that the lack of cameras and recording doesn't just affect audio like with scene A but also affects the fact that there wouldn't have been a second recording of this scene that might've looked better had the recording i got looked bad.
Day 7
Today we filmed James' interview at lunch, and Scene F and Laura's interview at 4. These went fairly smoothly and there were no real issues regarding lines, camera work, etc. All of these scenes just followed the script as no adjustments felt necessary. However Scene F and Lauras interview went some changes in the way that Euan and Oliver acted, In the interview we decided to have both of them standing on the other side of the door, visible through the glass, essentially stroking the pane and looking at the camera. In the scene F itself Euan was given some clay and we found a wet floor sign, so put that on his head. Oliver was given blue paint to cover himself in and we wrote "If lost call *phone number*" this made the pair of them seem more stupid which was just what I wanted.
Day 8
Today we filmed Scene I and K at around 9AM and Scenes: C and Hashim's Interviews at 4PM. During the filming of scene C, Hashim had the brilliant idea of playing Indian music at full blast whilst I, the camera, and Jack made our way to the room. This added more humour to the stereotype about Indian students and teachers being in IT. Scene I, apart from Jacks interaction with Bradley at the beginning was also improvised, partly. I gave Matt and Jay the script, let them understand their characters and the general idea of the scene and had a few trial runs so they could get the hang of things. This was done for almost every scene since it made things feel more realistic and not really as smooth, which felt right for a mockumentary in my view. It made it seem more organic and awkward which complimented Jack's awkward character well.
Day 9
Today we filmed Scene H at 4PM in the canteen. This was a long and tedious process since due to the fact there was obviously one camera I had to keep readjusting the tripod height, and camera position, and angle to film each seperate shot of the food fight montage. This would've been made easier by having multiple cameras set up, potentially recording two different things at once or the same thing at the same time so I could choose the better shot.
Day 10
Today we re-shot Scene G since on day 5 Jack was wearing a blazer and he forgot it on day 6, so we decided to shoot all scenes without a blazer, to keep continuity and it was an easier choice than re shooting all other scenes with Jacks blazer.
Day 11
Today I began editing, I first made the title cards i would use for Scene A, i made 3 of these, I also attempted to fix the audio within Scene A as it was very windy, i was unsuccessful. As well as all this, i also downloaded Pink Floyd - Another Brick In The Wall, this song opens the film, it begins loudly and fades out as Scene A begins so that the scene is the only thing you can hear. The reason i decided to use this song was because lyrics like "We don't need no education" imitate the mindset of almost all characters in the film, i initially wanted to use Common People by Pulp, but decided that'd be a better fit for the outro. It was at this point that i decided it'd be vital to re shoot scene A since it is very windy and the dialogue is much quieter than the sound of wind. I then decided to have it fade back in as the next two title cards show up, these title cards essentially explain the reason for me documenting and getting a tour of the college. and then once again fade out as it changes to scene B.
After Scene B, instead of having it cut straight to Scene C, i decided to implement a clip of Alex Hardesty watching YouTube with the text "IT (Information Technology)", this informs people that the next scene will take place in the IT department/room.
After this i moved onto scene C, About partway into scene C i cut at a particular point and put in footage of an interview with the IT teacher, this is because it opposes what the headteacher just said, adding humour. I then added an interview with Bradley after the scene where he admits to using the school WiFi to masturbate, this makes him the creepy character, which i felt was necessary for a stereotypical, humerous college documentary. After this scene i implemented Don't Look Back Into The Sun by The Libertines, this is because it is a song i enjoy and also the whole idea of not looking back into the sun could imitate the idea of moving forward, like how these students have moved forward onto college and should leave their school days behind them. By the end of the day, after looking through all the footage, I had come to the realisation that despite all the cons i was able to highlight about single camera productions throughout the production stage, there was one positive, since there's only one camera, and therefore one tripod, there were no other camera equipment pieces in the background of shots or reflections in windows, etc.
Day 12
Today i began with scene D, this short scene required little to no editing, all i had to do was cut off the beginning where i say "action", that's all, the rest of the footage was good for use. I ended the scene with A-Punk by Vampire Weekend, simply because i enjoy the song and it's very upbeat and light-hearted, much like my film, so it keeps the same mood going.
In scene E i decided to keep the music playing quietly in the background so it makes the scene seem more fast paced.
I then moved onto F, which required very little editing. All i had to do was cut scenes to the required length and add a name effect for the interview. I decided that despite the rest of the film having no cuts in the middle of scenes unless it's cutting to an interview, that having this scene cut in the middle straight to another angle of the same scene would be necessary since i wanted some dialogue from jack before and after the interview with Laura as opposed to both after.
At this point I decided that it'd be helpful to make all of the text cards that come up in between certain scenes so that all my scenes would link together. I decided that these title cards would act as the main plot describer so that viewers would be able to understand why there's a camera crew at the college and a few other questions they may have.
Day 13
Today I started editing scene G, this was perhaps the easiest scene, it required no editing apart from trimming the start and end to cut out parts that are unwanted. After this i used the song Parklife to act as a transition, i paired this with a bell sound that viewers can make the assumption that it's a lunch bell, especially considering the next scene starts with jack saying "ahh lunch", speaking of the next scene, scene H required the most editing, I wanted to use my footage of the food fight, paired with old Vietnam war footage to over dramatise my fight. So i downloaded a half an hour long video of Vietnam War footage and cut certain parts of it out to put in the film. After this i chose all the footage i'd use and cut it into the right length. Then i put all this footage into an order i deemed suitable. Afterwards I put a tint effect (making every piece of footage black and white) so that it looked more like old archived footage which is what i wanted to go for. I was going to also add an orange tint to it to make it look aged but after doing so decided it didn't look as good as it did in my head so i removed the orange tint. After careful consideration I thought that Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son was the right choice of music since it's both a famous Vietnam War song and is typically used in a lot of Vietnam War films so viewers would have even more chance of realising the effect i was going for.
Scene I is what i moved onto next, this scene, again, required a very little amount of editing, i just trimmed it, slightly altered the colour to make it a tad lighter. Unfortunately in the final take of this scene i don't successfully manage to look down and zoom in on the bag of cocaine, so instead of missing it out i cut partway through the scene after Jay has run away and dropped the cocaine and inserted the footage of the cocaine from another not so successful take. I then made the scene red to infer a theme of evil, and added png pictures of Pablo Escobar, El Chapo, and Walter White which all fade in and out at different times. This just adds an element of humour whilst making viewers aware that this is a controversial theme for colleges. After finishing editing the whole scene by trimming the end off i thought it'd be funnier to add some evil music for the cocaine scene, so, considering i had coincidentally just watched Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (I don't know why, it's not even that good) i instantly thought of using Dual Of The Fates which is the main fight music used when Obi Wan Kenobi and Qui Gon Jinn fight Darth Maul, i thought this too would be very humerous to add.
Day 14
Today i begun by making the transition from scene I to scene J, i used the song Take Me Out by Franz Ferdinand, which is arguably the hardest/loudest song in the film, which is justified since the next scene is set in a music room and the footage during the transition is 3 people playing instruments very incorrectly so it's quite humerous, as for scene J which came straight after, there was no editing except trimming required. After the scene ends i inserted a little part of Killer Queen by Queen since it directly relates to one of the main talking points of the previous scene. I made the transition quite swift since i didn't want too much of the song being present, i just wanted the part where it says "She's a killer queen" as this is the most memorable part of the song and people will likely know its a queen song due to this lyric. Afterwards i began work on scene K which didnt require too much editing to begin with, initially I just had the interview, cut it in half to put in footage of Sameer's now dead body since it was what added the most humour to this scene. But after careful consideration i decided that simply having jack mess around with the camera wasn't as good as it could be, so i spent around an hour or so making an effect, very reminiscent of a glitch, to make it seem as though Jack is really violently shaking the camera to the point where it almost breaks. Finally the last scene also required very minimal editing apart from trimming. At the end of the scene i added a still frame of jack running out of the room with a cocaine covered nose with the text "That concludes the tour"
Day 15
Today we got our feedback on our film, i took this into consideration and began working on making the film better using my feedback. I began by editing each interview, i made names for each interviewee and made an effect where they fade in from one side of the word to the next, i also distinguished their position at the college by writing either student, or (Subject) teacher, this way it made it easier for audiences to distinguish the different characters roles since one part of my feedback was that it was fairly hard to know what each actor was. I then moved onto changing the font, so i remade all the title cards and changed the font to Tahoma, it was more clear and suitable. I then made the transition into the lunch scene a bit shorter since it was said to be a fair bit too long, i didn't just trim it, i had to move it back a bit to ensure the part of the song that i wanted was heard. Next I got ADR of Sameer saying "What do you want?" due to the fact that it's very hard to hear in the raw footage. I then overlayed it over the original scene and adjusted the volume to make it seem as if it wasn't ADR and it was actually a part of the footage.
Day 16
Today i reshot Joe and Bradley's interviews due to lighting issues in the initial shooting, they originally seemed quite green which was odd so we shot them in a room with more natural light that was more orange to make it seem more welcoming and fit the general tone of the rest of the film.
Day 17
Today i shot some more footage for the food fight since i felt it was quite dragged out and had more Vietnam War footage than own footage, I decided to use more messy food as it'd be funnier and arguably more realistic, plus it was on my list of things to do on my feedback, so it felt necessary. When i got home I imported the footage into adobe premiere pro and added the black and white tint effect and replaced some of the Vietnam footage with this footage.
Day 18
Today i began work on the credits since everything else was done, I decided to start with "Directed by Jake Clarke" and have it fade into "College" as that's the name of the film, then have rolling credits showing all the actors/actresses, and also all the music used, including the credits music which was Pulp - Common People, since the characters in the film clearly aren't common people so i thought it was quite contradictory, therefore fairly funny.
I decided to work alone, and began finalising my ideas, the main idea being that i wanted to do a mockumentary about a college. The use of single camera would be acceptable for this as typically there's only one camera in documentaries, the one that's held by a camera man, and the same would occur for my humour filled documentary. which i had already come up with, i was thinking up ideas in my head for scenes and characters that would compliment these scenes.
Day 2
I began Pre-production, starting with character and casting ideas. I thought of both characters that could be played well by certain people, and also began thinking what certain people i knew were like and made characters out of them, since their performance of this character would feel more natural. The best example of this is Jack's slight awkwardness when it comes to social situations, this influenced his David Brent like character.
Day 3
I continued pre-production, i started by brainstorming ideas and making a mood board. With these ideas i began writing the initial script, knowing changes would likely have to be made due to potential casting setbacks, and general setbacks, perhaps with locations, etc.
Day 4
I finished off my script, and began to work on the rest of pre-production work, i started with the location reports/ideas and also began to consider backup locations if they became necessary. I chose rooms that best suited the idea for my film that i had in my head, hence i planned to use MA27 (An IT room full of computers) for the IT scene, i also planned on using the large art room for the art scene, so that there would be as much space as possible for my actors to do their questionable behaviour in there. I then went on to consider Music choices, the songs i decided to use were selected for a number of reasons, i like every song that is chosen so won't mind working with them. They also have their own reasons, for example 'Fortunate Son - Creedance Clearwater Revival' is used since it is a famous Vietnam War song and used stereo typically in a lot of Vietnam War films, therefore would be useful for my little Vietnam war segment.
Day 5
I began filming, following the production schedule, First we filmed scene G, we spent about 50 minutes filming, continuously re shooting, mistake after mistake. We decided it'd be best if Jack didn't follow the script word for word, and instead got the general idea and improvised it on the spot, since he'd have less pressure on him to get the words correct. Another problem with this scene was since it was a single camera, documentary style film, we needed all scenes to be done in one continuous shot, so we couldn't just stop filming after jack messed up and continue from there in another shot. We would have to redo the entire thing. This could be considered a con of single camera productions, that being that you get a lack of shots unlike you would with a multi-camera production.
Day 6
Today we filmed Scenes: L, A, B, D and Joe's interview, again, we decided to only lightly follow the script as to make it easier and more natural for the actors to inherit their role and lines. Scene A came out very windy and the audio was essentially ruined by this. Unfortunately I only realised this by the time it was too late. This, again could be another con of single camera work. Because i only had one camera shooting, the footage on that was bad, and there was no other camera/recording to check to see if it had better audio. B was a stress to record as we only really had one shot to get it right because we had one banana skin and once jack slipped on it it wouldn't be usable again as it'd smush and break. Luckily it worked on the first try. But it goes to show that the lack of cameras and recording doesn't just affect audio like with scene A but also affects the fact that there wouldn't have been a second recording of this scene that might've looked better had the recording i got looked bad.
Day 7
Today we filmed James' interview at lunch, and Scene F and Laura's interview at 4. These went fairly smoothly and there were no real issues regarding lines, camera work, etc. All of these scenes just followed the script as no adjustments felt necessary. However Scene F and Lauras interview went some changes in the way that Euan and Oliver acted, In the interview we decided to have both of them standing on the other side of the door, visible through the glass, essentially stroking the pane and looking at the camera. In the scene F itself Euan was given some clay and we found a wet floor sign, so put that on his head. Oliver was given blue paint to cover himself in and we wrote "If lost call *phone number*" this made the pair of them seem more stupid which was just what I wanted.
Day 8
Today we filmed Scene I and K at around 9AM and Scenes: C and Hashim's Interviews at 4PM. During the filming of scene C, Hashim had the brilliant idea of playing Indian music at full blast whilst I, the camera, and Jack made our way to the room. This added more humour to the stereotype about Indian students and teachers being in IT. Scene I, apart from Jacks interaction with Bradley at the beginning was also improvised, partly. I gave Matt and Jay the script, let them understand their characters and the general idea of the scene and had a few trial runs so they could get the hang of things. This was done for almost every scene since it made things feel more realistic and not really as smooth, which felt right for a mockumentary in my view. It made it seem more organic and awkward which complimented Jack's awkward character well.
Day 9
Today we filmed Scene H at 4PM in the canteen. This was a long and tedious process since due to the fact there was obviously one camera I had to keep readjusting the tripod height, and camera position, and angle to film each seperate shot of the food fight montage. This would've been made easier by having multiple cameras set up, potentially recording two different things at once or the same thing at the same time so I could choose the better shot.
Day 10
Today we re-shot Scene G since on day 5 Jack was wearing a blazer and he forgot it on day 6, so we decided to shoot all scenes without a blazer, to keep continuity and it was an easier choice than re shooting all other scenes with Jacks blazer.
Day 11
Today I began editing, I first made the title cards i would use for Scene A, i made 3 of these, I also attempted to fix the audio within Scene A as it was very windy, i was unsuccessful. As well as all this, i also downloaded Pink Floyd - Another Brick In The Wall, this song opens the film, it begins loudly and fades out as Scene A begins so that the scene is the only thing you can hear. The reason i decided to use this song was because lyrics like "We don't need no education" imitate the mindset of almost all characters in the film, i initially wanted to use Common People by Pulp, but decided that'd be a better fit for the outro. It was at this point that i decided it'd be vital to re shoot scene A since it is very windy and the dialogue is much quieter than the sound of wind. I then decided to have it fade back in as the next two title cards show up, these title cards essentially explain the reason for me documenting and getting a tour of the college. and then once again fade out as it changes to scene B.
After Scene B, instead of having it cut straight to Scene C, i decided to implement a clip of Alex Hardesty watching YouTube with the text "IT (Information Technology)", this informs people that the next scene will take place in the IT department/room.
After this i moved onto scene C, About partway into scene C i cut at a particular point and put in footage of an interview with the IT teacher, this is because it opposes what the headteacher just said, adding humour. I then added an interview with Bradley after the scene where he admits to using the school WiFi to masturbate, this makes him the creepy character, which i felt was necessary for a stereotypical, humerous college documentary. After this scene i implemented Don't Look Back Into The Sun by The Libertines, this is because it is a song i enjoy and also the whole idea of not looking back into the sun could imitate the idea of moving forward, like how these students have moved forward onto college and should leave their school days behind them. By the end of the day, after looking through all the footage, I had come to the realisation that despite all the cons i was able to highlight about single camera productions throughout the production stage, there was one positive, since there's only one camera, and therefore one tripod, there were no other camera equipment pieces in the background of shots or reflections in windows, etc.
Day 12
Today i began with scene D, this short scene required little to no editing, all i had to do was cut off the beginning where i say "action", that's all, the rest of the footage was good for use. I ended the scene with A-Punk by Vampire Weekend, simply because i enjoy the song and it's very upbeat and light-hearted, much like my film, so it keeps the same mood going.
In scene E i decided to keep the music playing quietly in the background so it makes the scene seem more fast paced.
I then moved onto F, which required very little editing. All i had to do was cut scenes to the required length and add a name effect for the interview. I decided that despite the rest of the film having no cuts in the middle of scenes unless it's cutting to an interview, that having this scene cut in the middle straight to another angle of the same scene would be necessary since i wanted some dialogue from jack before and after the interview with Laura as opposed to both after.
At this point I decided that it'd be helpful to make all of the text cards that come up in between certain scenes so that all my scenes would link together. I decided that these title cards would act as the main plot describer so that viewers would be able to understand why there's a camera crew at the college and a few other questions they may have.
Day 13
Today I started editing scene G, this was perhaps the easiest scene, it required no editing apart from trimming the start and end to cut out parts that are unwanted. After this i used the song Parklife to act as a transition, i paired this with a bell sound that viewers can make the assumption that it's a lunch bell, especially considering the next scene starts with jack saying "ahh lunch", speaking of the next scene, scene H required the most editing, I wanted to use my footage of the food fight, paired with old Vietnam war footage to over dramatise my fight. So i downloaded a half an hour long video of Vietnam War footage and cut certain parts of it out to put in the film. After this i chose all the footage i'd use and cut it into the right length. Then i put all this footage into an order i deemed suitable. Afterwards I put a tint effect (making every piece of footage black and white) so that it looked more like old archived footage which is what i wanted to go for. I was going to also add an orange tint to it to make it look aged but after doing so decided it didn't look as good as it did in my head so i removed the orange tint. After careful consideration I thought that Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son was the right choice of music since it's both a famous Vietnam War song and is typically used in a lot of Vietnam War films so viewers would have even more chance of realising the effect i was going for.
Scene I is what i moved onto next, this scene, again, required a very little amount of editing, i just trimmed it, slightly altered the colour to make it a tad lighter. Unfortunately in the final take of this scene i don't successfully manage to look down and zoom in on the bag of cocaine, so instead of missing it out i cut partway through the scene after Jay has run away and dropped the cocaine and inserted the footage of the cocaine from another not so successful take. I then made the scene red to infer a theme of evil, and added png pictures of Pablo Escobar, El Chapo, and Walter White which all fade in and out at different times. This just adds an element of humour whilst making viewers aware that this is a controversial theme for colleges. After finishing editing the whole scene by trimming the end off i thought it'd be funnier to add some evil music for the cocaine scene, so, considering i had coincidentally just watched Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (I don't know why, it's not even that good) i instantly thought of using Dual Of The Fates which is the main fight music used when Obi Wan Kenobi and Qui Gon Jinn fight Darth Maul, i thought this too would be very humerous to add.
Day 14
Today i begun by making the transition from scene I to scene J, i used the song Take Me Out by Franz Ferdinand, which is arguably the hardest/loudest song in the film, which is justified since the next scene is set in a music room and the footage during the transition is 3 people playing instruments very incorrectly so it's quite humerous, as for scene J which came straight after, there was no editing except trimming required. After the scene ends i inserted a little part of Killer Queen by Queen since it directly relates to one of the main talking points of the previous scene. I made the transition quite swift since i didn't want too much of the song being present, i just wanted the part where it says "She's a killer queen" as this is the most memorable part of the song and people will likely know its a queen song due to this lyric. Afterwards i began work on scene K which didnt require too much editing to begin with, initially I just had the interview, cut it in half to put in footage of Sameer's now dead body since it was what added the most humour to this scene. But after careful consideration i decided that simply having jack mess around with the camera wasn't as good as it could be, so i spent around an hour or so making an effect, very reminiscent of a glitch, to make it seem as though Jack is really violently shaking the camera to the point where it almost breaks. Finally the last scene also required very minimal editing apart from trimming. At the end of the scene i added a still frame of jack running out of the room with a cocaine covered nose with the text "That concludes the tour"
Day 15
Today we got our feedback on our film, i took this into consideration and began working on making the film better using my feedback. I began by editing each interview, i made names for each interviewee and made an effect where they fade in from one side of the word to the next, i also distinguished their position at the college by writing either student, or (Subject) teacher, this way it made it easier for audiences to distinguish the different characters roles since one part of my feedback was that it was fairly hard to know what each actor was. I then moved onto changing the font, so i remade all the title cards and changed the font to Tahoma, it was more clear and suitable. I then made the transition into the lunch scene a bit shorter since it was said to be a fair bit too long, i didn't just trim it, i had to move it back a bit to ensure the part of the song that i wanted was heard. Next I got ADR of Sameer saying "What do you want?" due to the fact that it's very hard to hear in the raw footage. I then overlayed it over the original scene and adjusted the volume to make it seem as if it wasn't ADR and it was actually a part of the footage.
Day 16
Today i reshot Joe and Bradley's interviews due to lighting issues in the initial shooting, they originally seemed quite green which was odd so we shot them in a room with more natural light that was more orange to make it seem more welcoming and fit the general tone of the rest of the film.
Day 17
Today i shot some more footage for the food fight since i felt it was quite dragged out and had more Vietnam War footage than own footage, I decided to use more messy food as it'd be funnier and arguably more realistic, plus it was on my list of things to do on my feedback, so it felt necessary. When i got home I imported the footage into adobe premiere pro and added the black and white tint effect and replaced some of the Vietnam footage with this footage.
Day 18
Today i began work on the credits since everything else was done, I decided to start with "Directed by Jake Clarke" and have it fade into "College" as that's the name of the film, then have rolling credits showing all the actors/actresses, and also all the music used, including the credits music which was Pulp - Common People, since the characters in the film clearly aren't common people so i thought it was quite contradictory, therefore fairly funny.
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