Section A: Theoretical Evaluation Production.
1a) Describe how you developed your skills in the use of digital technology for media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to your creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills have developed over time [25]
From AS to A2 I managed to advance my skills in the use of digital technology to complete my two briefs successfully. In AS I created a two minute opening sequence for a film Noir film including titles. In A2 I had to create a music promo package including a music video, digipak and advert for ‘Good Time’ by Owl City & Carly Rae Jepsen. I will discuss how my skills have developed throughout the two years of creating my two different briefs through the use of digital technology.
During pre-production I used websites such as Youtube to research into what to include on both our briefs. In AS I simply searched for ‘Film Noir films’ in the search box which brought up an average choice of videos to watch. This was very simplistic for me to use in AS as I didn’t have much of an idea on what to search for for ideas. However, in A2 because we had more freedom in the form of choosing our music genre I could search for videos such as ‘indie music videos’ or ‘owl city – fireflies’ to find specific videos we needed for inspirational ideas. My use of youtube had improved during the two years as I could be more open on what I could search for which provided me with more information and evidence to include in our music video and also for the use of Blogger which was used throughout the whole project in AS and A2. Blogger had the same functions in both years, to post updates and posts however in A2 it was essential that we posted more posts on our blog than in AS. At the beginning of the use of Blogger in AS I found it difficult to link different posts to different pages and sync various other creations from websites such as Slideshare which took up more time to get the hang of than expected. In A2 because I had gained the knowledge of how to share different presentations from other websites and link different posts to different pages on my blog, this saved me time which gave me the opportunity to upload more posts for A2.
In AS and A2 I used Final Cut in order to arrange and create the final piece of our two minute opening sequence and music video through post production. At AS there were only the basic essentials that I managed to include in our opening sequence. One of the most simplistic tools that had to be used were the different layers, in AS I only used two layers, one for the soundtrack and another for the footage. To resemble an original film Noir film I decided to make the full footage in black and white. I done this in final cut by using the ‘fade’ action and changing the color balance through hugh and saturation. I also managed to have a little mess around with the software by looking at different transition effects to change from one scene to another. I managed to gain my knowledge of Final Cut in A2 as to create our music video I had to be more adventurous of what tools I should use. In second year I managed to use more complex essentials within Final Cut such as including more layers and locking the different layers by pressing the padlock at the left hand side of each layer. This prevented the locked layer from moving around when altering and arranging other layers and sequences. I also used the speed tool in A2 which changed the speed of the clips which was essential for our music video in order for the soundtrack vocals to be in sync with our lip syncing. This wasn’t used in AS as there were no scenes that needed speeding up or altering. During the production in AS we used a Sony Handycam which had simple functions and was fairly easy to use. This was handy for our first brief as the only functions we decided to use when recording was zooming in and out. In A2 we used a more complex and professional camcorder, Panasonic handycam. This camera had more functions to use and was also in HD which made our footage look more professional and clear. Like AS we still used the zoom for various scenes but we thought of other camera adjustments and effects such as hand held in some scenes. Due to the camera having more advanced functions one of the essentials we used which we didn’t have the opportunity to in first year was the shake control. For scenes where we used the camera free-hand the shake control helped prevent our footage looking too frigid and shaky. Due to the more advanced camera in A2 this meant we could be more creative and rely on its extra functions more compared to AS where the camera had to be locked on a tripod to prevent it shaking. Thanks to the Panasonic our footage was much clearer.
Another form of software I used during post-production in both AS and A2 productions was Photoshop. This software was essential in AS to create a professional company logo and in A2 in order to create our digipak and advert. In AS we used Photoshop to create the company logo. Again there was little knowledge on how to use the different tools in first year so the basics that were used was the ‘duplicate layer’ tool which you produce by pressing ‘Ctrl + J’. This duplicated the layer which we could then alter. We also used the text tool which was found down the left hand columns, this was used to create the text for the name of our logo ‘Lunar Productions’. Although there were other functions such as ‘transparency’ we already had an idea of our logo in our minds and certain other functions didn’t need to be used. In A2 I developed my skills in Photoshop massively. As well as using the duplicate layer I also used ‘surface blur’ to make the skin tone of the two artists on the CD and digipak look smooth and professional. I found this tool by going into ‘filter’ – ‘blur’ – ‘surface blur’. From there I could alter the heaviness of the surface blur to prevent making the skin tone look too smooth and fake, it took some time to get this correct but the outcome was near to perfect at the end. In first year the duplicate layer was only used once, however in A2 there were several layers included, one for a duplication of the image of the artists, another for the background, another for the text and a final one for the different brush tools to be used on. With the use of more layers I could again mess around a bit and be more creative. I managed to alter the transparency so you could see the artists slightly faded which was something I never would of thought of in AS. A final use of a function used on Photoshop in both AS and A2 was the us of text. As said previously we used the text format to create the title of our company logo, however in A2 I found out I could download a wider variety of fonts created specifically for Photoshop. This made me have a wider choice of text to use which would be relevant to our Indie-pop genre.
