Post Production - Sound Design update

After I finished my shoot, I put together an assemble edit. This has shown me a clear picture of what style my film has turned out to be.

The assemble edit indicated that a soundtrack would be required in order to further the story and help create that emotion in the audience.

I have managed to find a music composer who seems enthusiastic about the project and has made some great suggestions about the theme and style of the music piece.

We talked about the idea of giving the Spirit of the Forest her own music piece to help the audience identify when the character is near and to enhance her mystical look. We both showed interest in Hans Zimmers portrayal of the Joker in the Dark Knight. For this, Hans created a droning sound to unsettle the audience and to help introduce the character. Here, Hans explains his methods and reasoning behind the piece:

The music will help create the suspense I wish to create in the spirits scene.

I also asked for a score to be written for the final scene of my film. After watching my assemble edit, I felt that there wasn't an atmosphere of fear and this was something I wanted to create. I think that the music will help communicate to the audience that Ben is scared during this scene and bring a lot more meaning to the images.

For the general theme of the music, I have asked for it to be very ambient. The composer aims to use the sounds of the forest along with wind chimes to create a music piece almost representing the wind and the forest.

I sent him this theme from Zelda as a reference for the theme and style I wish to create.

The final touches need to be made for my films sound design. Various foley sounds need to be implemented and I also need an ambiance track to layer in throughout the piece. For this I plan to record different ambiance tracks from different areas of the forest and maybe add a subtle electronic hum to help create an unnerving feel in the audience.

Sound Design Research (post story development)

After focusing on the visuals for so long, I decided it would be best to put that same focus into sound design.

Sound design is something I have lacked in the past and I think it is something that lacks in a lot of student films.

However, I would not consider myself a great musician but I would know what kind of style I would like for my film.

I plan to get a musician involved during the post production stage but before I do this, I need to research the different types of music and sound design I feel would be appropriate for my film style.

I am currently on my 4th draft of my script and the story has developed into more of a dark fairytale. First of all, I will look at film soundtracks of similar style and mood to my film.

In Princess Mononoke, there are these little characters/spirits in the forest called Kodamas. I would like to do a homage to these characters in my film by creating a similar sound to what these characters create. Maybe I will use a similar sound for my Spirit of the Forest.

I also like the soundtrack at around 1:09 on this clip. Would be very nice for the more mysterious scenes in my film.

After my research on suspense, I felt that it would be best to keep the music ambient during most parts of my film. However, I have come across ambient music. This style of music would blend in very well to the natural sound I wish to create and could make my sound design very subtle but effective.

Using ambient sounds to create a soundtrack would be a great technique to use in my film and I wish to create something similar.

Back to Hitchcock, in the final scene of The Birds, there is a deathly silence to the scene. Apparently Hitchcock created this sound of silence using an electronic hum. In the book ' Hitchcock Truffaut' Hitchcock mentions "To describe a sound accurately, one has to imagine its equivalent in dialogue". He describes his sound of silence "It was a strange, artificial sound, which in the language of the birds might be saying, "We're not ready to attack you yet, but we're getting reading. We're like an engine that's purring and we may start off at any moment" All of this was suggested by a sound that's so low that you can't be sure whether you're actually hering it or only imagining it."

I can't find a clip of the scene online but I will put one up as soon as I do.

Building Suspense

During the last few weeks I have been looking into creating a story visually. My aim in this film is to create emotions of suspense, fear, laughter and sorrow.

To create suspense, I have been researching into the work of Alfred Hitchcock, named master of suspense. The key visual technique I have picked up on is his use of reaction shots and point on view shots. In this sequence in North by Northwest, you can see Hitchcock has used very long takes keeping the cinematography interesting enough so the audience does not get bored. Also, the sound design is very minimal and simple and creates a very tense atmosphere whilst the main character is waiting:

In these next clips, Hitchcock talks about the difference between suspense and mystery. The key

thing to note here is that to create suspense, you must give the audience information. He also

gives a great example of creating cinematic tension.

Hitchcock next talks about his lack of care for content and how his focus is on how he tells the

story. This next clip has been very influential for me during my storyboarding process as it has

motivated me to put a lot of my focus on creating the best way to tell a story through the use of

cinema.

Finally, Hitchcock talks about clever use of materials within a story. This really helps create a

very interesting and engaging film and is a great technique to keep your film original and

innovative.

Another comical insight to the mind of Hitchcock was that he called his actors 'cattle' suggesting

that they are just materials which need to be told what to do. I think this is an interesting way

of making sure film makers don't neglect the importance of actually directing actors and not

leaving the story in the hands of the actors.

Inspirations

As mentioned before, I am taking a lot of inspiration from the videos games, Zelda. The whole fantasy element of the games really tie in well with my film.

At this moment I am working on the design for the character The Spirit of the Forest. In the Zelda games there are several strange characters which I can take influence from.

The characters in these images are not so different from humans and could be achieved as a costume in real life. This is an important factor to realise when I am designing this character. It has to look realistic enough to not look tacky, yet at the same time, it must look like a strange, surreal spirit.

The characters movements are also very interesting to note. Zant's movement ranges from slow fluid movements to fast erratic movements. His long cloak conceals is body and makes his movements seem even stranger. Zant:

The skull kids movement is more cheeky. He acts more like a playful child which could be an interesting style for my spirit of the forest. Skull Kid:

In my script, I have mentioned a desire for the Spirit of the Forest to have it's own sound. Much similar to when the Joker appears in the Dark Knight. In Zelda, it is very common for characters to have their own soundtracks. Depending on what my character is going to look like will depend on which style of music I will require. Here is an example of the a character from Zelda's soundtrack.

Scene Design

From the early stages of creating my idea, I have had a very clear image of what I want the film too look like.

As the film is more part of the fantasy genre, I decided to look at fantasy films, video games and art work to help forge the image in my mind into an achievable film look.

This first clip is a scene from the movie Twilight. The forest they use is very much like the one I had imagined in my mind. They have colour graded the scene blue to give it that cold, secluded feeling which really works well. The use of fog helps create that mystique in the forest and also helps add to the secluded feel of the scene.

I also looked at a scene from the N64 video game Zelda: Ocarina of Time. In this scene, I like bright green colours and also the large, bright floating pieces of dust. I have seen these floating particles in fantasy films before and they really help bring a magical feel to the set. I would like to incorporate these into my film but very subtly. I also love the sound in the scene. The footsteps are echoed, the ambience seems never ending and really makes it seem like they are alone in the very middle of the forest, which is exactly the mood I wish to create.

I have also come across a photographer on flickr.com who has created some fantastic images of a forest.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/haikus59/3408442567/

New Project - Drama

Third year has started and it's time to step up my game.

I have decided to do a drama for my first film, to make a change from the more documentary style I did for my last film.

Over the summer I knew I wanted to create a surreal drama. I am always eager to create something very different to what people normally see.

First I was very inspired by the music I started to listen to. Bands like "Empire of the Sun", "Temper Trap" and "Friendly Fires" all seemed to have this ethereal sound which is the mood I wish to create in my next film. "Empire of the Sun" especially have very unique videos with a style that I love. Here is one of their videos:

During this time, I was also playing the video game Zelda. As a film maker, I feel it is

important to draw inspiration from everywhere and I have always been inspired by this

particular game series.

Due to this inspiration, it seemed I had developed a strong desire to locate my film

in the forest. This location will be the starting point for my idea.

Update

A lot of research has been happening so I haven't been able to do this blog for quite some time.

Here is an update of what I have learnt:

- Shoot in the middle of nowhere as light pollution causes too many troubles on shoot.
- Be prepared to stay outside for a while, this includes bringing spare batteries!
- Low aperture is key (f2.8 works best)
- Do not have an exposure over 15 seconds as the video will not look smooth.
- White balance to incandescent to give the sky a blue colour
- Do plenty of test shots before you begin the time lapse to make sure composition, colour and exposure is how you want it.
- Mockmoon2000 suggests using 6 second exposures and layering the time lapses in adobe after effects with a composite (screen) on the layers to brighten up the image.
- Be aware, but do not be afraid, of noise.

I downloaded a program called star trails and had a play around with making a time lapse with it. I used the photos I had taken from someone's farm out in Cheadle.



I also obtained adobe after effects and I am currently in the process of looking how to export my time lapses in the smoothest and highest quality.

I plan to do 3 nights and days of shooting with the Nikon d3 this weekend and I will edit a draft version of the documentary by Tuesday. This is the make or break shoot for the film so wish me luck!

Interval Shooting Timer Test

My test shoot of the stars did not go as planned because the weather let me down, however I did get a chance to look at the peak district at night and it seems a suitable place to go for my shoot.

As I could not test the interval shooting timer on the stars, I decided to do a time lapse of Mark and Sorcha. Here is how the shoot turned out.

Update

Blogger isn't letting me upload photos for some reason which is annoying.

In our Outside the Box lecture, we watched a film called Baraka by Ron Fricke. This film was 104 minutes and was all done using the photographing time lapse technique I am using for my film. I for one could not keep full concentration throughout this film (as it was far too long) dispite the fact the cinematography and the use of the technique was masterful. 

The final sequence in the film is of the stars. I did some research and found out that Ron Fricke had specially designed equipment for this shoot enabling him to move the camera whilst it was timelapsing. The result is AMAZING and would be far out of my budget to achieve a similar effect. The shoot around 1:10 is really inspiring.

As good as this is in terms of cinematography, I don't believe it is necessary to have so much movement from the camera.

At the moment, I am looking into creating moving star trails and have had a bit of help from this guy.



I hope to have a test shoot tomorrow in which I can try creating a video with a smooth star time lapse and also enough photos to create a star trail time lapse.

At the moment I am developing shot ideas and structure to my documentary, as well as finding music influences.

Test Shoot on the D3!

This weekend, I got a chance to go back home and try out taking photos of the stars with my dad's nikon d3. I tried using the 6400 ISO but there was too much grain in the photos. The best look I managed to achieve were by using 400-500 ISO, f2.8 and a 13 second shutter speed. The only problem with this is that when I put it into a movie, the video will look jerky. I may have to sacrifice a little bit of grain so that I can put the shutter speed at around 3-6 seconds.

Images will come later, problems with upload :(

Useful Link

http://photojojo.com/content/tutorials/ultimate-guide-to-time-lapse-photography/

Testing 1..2..3

On the night of 12.02.09 I went out to near cheadle to do a test shoot. I first tested out using different settings to see if I could even capture the stars on my D70. The night was really clear and there was little cloud cover. The only main issue was that the moon was full and was shining very bright. I could only see and capture stars that were covering abot 1/5th of the sky. There were lights from nearbye villages and towns creating light pollution around the horizons so I was forced to angle my camera high. I also had to block the moonlight going into my camera lense.

I used ISO 400 f4.5/f3.5 and a 30 second shutter speed.

I decided to put something in the foreground and try out a timelapse. I stood there for about 30 minutes taking photos and ending up with a 7 second clip. I believe I had my shutter speed too slow as there are slight jumps in the video when the stars are moving. 

Next time I will use a faster shutter speed and stay there for longer. I will also try and do a test with a D3 in a more secluded environment. Ultimatly, I need to do more research into the technical aspects of this type of filming.

Technical notes

This guy did a few tests and said "All was shot on a Canon 20D SLR (ISO 400, F-Stop 5.6 and 25 second exposures)."

I have read that ISO 400 the common ISO for night sky photography to avoid any grain in the pictures. Anything lower than 400 would be even better, this will have to be something for me to test out.

He also mentions his editing together of the photos for a smoother look " I just took approximately 300 photos
and brought them into Final Cut Pro at 2 frames each."

In terms of the exposure, I think I will use a variety of different exposures. In this next video, the guy does a star timelapse with a long exposure which makes the stars look as if they are falling bombs from the sky. A great idea (though possibly ruined by his choice of "colour changing" edit) which gives a great effect.

Stars in my eyes

Stars in my eyes

Having a look over the internet and speaking with a few people has taught me that I will need to "film" my star shots with an SLR camera.
Mockmoon2000, my youtube inspiration, released a new video! I have been trying to look into what techniques he uses to create these time lapses and because he writes everything in Japanese, things aren't going too well. Google translation can only take you so far.
All I know is that he is using a Nikon D3, a camera my dad uses, and he takes a photo roughly once every 6 seconds. Watch this in HD to do it justice.



I have also come across a few websites with tips on "Astrophotography". The first website is by a girl in california who uses a Nikon D70, which is the camera I have! There is hope! The second link goes into a lot more detail about the technical aspects of photography of the stars.

http://digitalphotographyblogs.com/2008/07/30/capturing-the-night-sky-the-milky-way/

http://www.popphoto.com/popularphotographyfeatures/4064/how-to-astrophotography-101.html

Inspiration continued

I found a few videos on youtube of a HD Timelapse of various landscapes. They are really beautiful to watch. Footage from mockmoon2000 check him out







Amazing footage but the questions for me are:

- How can I incorporate this concept into a documentary?
- Is this even possible within the stoke-on-trent area?

Documentary - Preparation and Inspiration

Here are a few documentaries that have inspired me.

http://www.channel4.com/fourdocs/archive/the_lift_player.html

The Lift - Marc Isaacs

Such a simple idea and works really well. The characters are hilarious, tragic, scary and just plain bizarre!



UFC Primetime

This is more or less a hype video for a UFC fight happening next week, but still falls into the documentary category. The production values are inspiring as they really help to show the different approaches to training both of the fighters have.

I like how the documentary "rules" are broken in terms of the framing and character positioning in the interview sections e.g. the characters may be framed to the right and look right as they are being interviewed. I also LOVE the handheld shot of BJ Penn going in and out of focus at the 00.41 mark.



Planet Earth

What more can I say!?

...more to come!

Film finished! ... for now at least

My first drama has finally been completed and assessed. Now all I have to do is sit back and wait for the results!




Next I will be making a documentary and will try my best to record the production on this page.