Account of shoot day

The planning for out shoot day consisted of our pre-production pack. Which had our story, storyboard, props list, cast list, set and lighting plans. The studio and lighting had been set up prior to our shoot day. As our story changed a number of times, our finished set was no where like our original storyboard. We were probably not as well prepared for our shoot day as we should have. We new how we wanted out characters to look, but as our story had changed a lot we were not entirely sure as to the exact shots we wanted and the order we wanted them in, I think we would have benefited from a little more planning time.

As all of our shooting was done in the studio we were on the same set all day. Which was less stressful, as we didn't have to think about how long we would spend on each set. We used a lot of lose-up shoots to get the full feel of the expressions and emotions on the characters faces. We didn't do many camera movements as they were not necessarily crucial for out shooting. The shots I like the most were the close-up shoots we had of Lou, the young child. Being so close meant you really saw her expressions and believed there was something wrong with her. The shoot I liked the least was the birds eye view shot, I just felt that we were to far away from what was happening to really get into what was happening.

We chose to use the studio as our location, because our story was only set in one place. We made the studio into one room which looked like an interrogation room. We then had a two way mirror so we could film the 'government' people on the other side. Just using one location meant we didn’t waste and time moving from set to set, or in setting up. The only thing I thought was wrong was the set, was it was quite small, so was hard to get some of the camera angles.

Our props were the table, chair, drawings of the pentagram, and a pen. Our story did not require us to have lots of props, we kept it simple. Russell, the man who was interrogating the little girl, wore a simple work suit, to show he was important, and a business like man. Lou who was the little girl, had crazy/messy hair, pale makeup and worn looking clothes, to give the effect of a strange girl, who is clearly not entirely normal. The three other 'government' men, wore shirts and suit jacks, to show they were important, business people.

We had an external actor for the main guy. We chose Russell because he looked like he would fit the character. We needed someone who looked important, and slightly scary. He was a great choice to use, as he really fitted into the part, and made it convincing that there was really something wrong with this girl, and sense to all the stuff she was doing. We chose Lou to play the little girl, because we needed someone who looked a young age. Lou was extremely convincing in her acting, and mad you believe she was possessed by the devil, so it was a good choice in casting. The other three men, we chose three boys who had old looking faces, as not much of them was seen so it suited.

In the interrogation room we just had a simple light bulb hanging from the ceiling. In order to use the two way mirror we had to have direct lighting from above and angle it correctly, this was already set up for us. We then had blackboards which went around the set to lose the reflection of the camera and crew, when using the two way mirror. I feel our lighting was successful. We did no use any separate sound recording but we will be using some prerecorded sounds in editing.

My role was the camera girl. I was on the camera all day, setting it up for each shot, filming the shot, saying whether the lighting was to bright, or off. Lottie, was watching the mini screen, telling us if the shot was off, what was wrong, whether it was good, if something needed to be changed. Millie was helping me holding the microphone and helping me move the camera around, and directing the actors as what to do. Emma, was writing down the shots list, did the makeup for the cast and directed the actors in their parts.

Overall I think we worked well as a team, although some could have perhaps got involved a bit more. But we had no arguing on the day and all agreed with everything said, so we were effective overall.

Shooting the last shot was so good to do, as we new we were done and it went successfully. We were happy with all the shots we had got and how they turned out. The footage did not follow our storyboard in anyway, as on the day, the actors and cast all contributed little ideas to the story, so the storyline grew and change significantly. Which I
think was an improvement to what we had already got. The changes really grew our overall story, and the shoots we were then able to do were even better than the ones originally planned to do.