How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Construction Stages Continued:
When it came to our music video, I wanted to ensure that we were using a software that allowed us to be precise with our editing, mainly due to the fact that we were incorporating a large proportion of lip syncing within our product.
When we started filming, we used one of the schools cameras which was a Canon Digital Video Camera. This camera is extremely easy to use and enabled myself and Ian to both use it whilst filming. The camera was easy to turn on and to playback footage we had already shot so we were able to look quickly at what was filmed and make modifications if they were needed. Personally I would like to have used a different camera if myself or Ian had one. This is due to the fact that our final outcome is quite grainy in some shots. On several occasions I would experiment with the lighting in order to make the footage less grainy, however this only worked on a small scale before making the video seem off coloured. I also found the camera to run out of charge very quickly even if it had been charging all night long which interfered with our timing on some occasions when trying to film. Although the camera proved to be a nuisance on a few occasions, it was simple and easy to use and nice and small meaning it was very portable so we were able to carry it around with us to different locations. Also when filming, we used a standard tripod which we would attach to our camera. This tripod had 3 levels, allowing us to film low down to the ground up to a height of around 7 ft. This enabled us to film low angled shots and high angled shots, however we often chose to use normal height shots as this would not belittle the characters in any way. We did however use a low angled shot to show the girl getting out of the car, and a shot angled down over the shoulder when the girl picks up the fallen lovehearts.
When it came to editing our footage, we uploaded what we had filmed via USB cable from the camera to the Apple Mac Desktop Computers in the editing suite within school. We used the programme 'iMovie' which enabled us to upload and edit our music video easily and efficiently. We were both familiar with this programme after using it during our AS task of filming and editing the opening sequence to a thriller film. This allowed me and Ian to edit our music video without teaching ourselves the basics and wasting time. In order to suit our genre of music, we did not want too many transitions, however to ease the continuation of quick cuts, we used a 'cross blur' transition which blurs the end of a frame into the beginning of the next frame. iMovie allowed us to place our song over our selected footage, however background noises from me and Ian filming could still be heard. To overcome this, we individually highlighted each shot, selected 'Audio Adjustments' and muted the volume on each shot so no background noises could be heard. I found iMovie extremely easy to work and the 'Precision Editor' allowed us to match the lip syncing scenes to the lyrics of the music extremely well. If i were to do this task again, I would use iMovie to help me edit.
