Sense of Space Audio Influences 2

Another influence of our audio project was the short we were shown in a seminar 'Salaryman' Directed by Jake Knight. We tried to convey the repetitiveness of peoples day to day activities and how each day can be the same as the last, as seen in Salaryman. 

Sense of Space Audio Influences

In order to delve into the narrative of a day in the life we tried to listen to some artists who have used similar concepts. Particularly The Streets who's songs are particularly 'a day in the life' which influenced our production as we tried to use a similar narrative.

Portrait of place: Post Production

The most prominent feature we added to our production during cutting was the desaturation of the image which paired with the melancholic narrative of the production where the mysterious string would eventually lead to nothing.During our cutting we used slight variations of transitions predominantly: fades, fade to blacks and jump cuts. 

Portrait of place: Production

Many of our decisions regarding the production were made on set as we had a closer look at Edale and at where we wanted to film, the story idea also came from the lack of wind at Edale putting a spoiler on our original plans of the map. So we went back to the drawing board and penned an idea where the character follows a piece of string, which was originally brought to drag the map. We made sure we got plenty of footage allowing us to decipher which shots fit well with the narrative and production. We had a hiccup during the production as the camera became moist during shooting the Flash Card began to malfunction but luckily continued to work but had a bit of a temperament which fortunately didn't hinder our production in any way.

Portrait of place: Pre Production

During the pre production of our Edale shooting we had two story ideas going into Edale, as well as shot ideas in conjunction with the progression of the narrative. We were perhaps resting on our laurels though as neither of us had been to Edale so we were 'winging' it when it came to the actual shooting. Our first two ideas, as said previously, one of which involved a lonely character and the theme of loneliness, and the other which featured a character who would lose his map and again be engulfed by the sheer size of the Edale countryside.  These two ideas were not implemented though as we went for a different narrative were the character would follow a piece of mysterious string.

Portrait of place: Parashoot Forms

 

Portrait of place: Shot List

Portrait of place: Storyboards

Sorry for awful drawings !

Edale Project Development

 Screen grab from shoot

Originally Luke and I had an idea of using Edale's vast scenery as space as a way of conveying loneliness, this was to be furthered by the use of the character and his apparent imaginary friend, we then decided that this idea could be too difficult to transfer this meaning of loneliness.

Our second idea which we were going to implement was an idea of having our character losing a map which blows away in the wind, but as we arrived at Edale the wind was not what we expected and wouldn't be strong enough to blow the map nor did we have any relevant string which wouldn't be visible on camera or wouldn't clearly show the conveyance of wind without it feeling forced.

Therefore upon arrival we had to change our idea by using the props we had specifically the string we had brought for the map idea. We then had the idea of our character following this string through Edale by using an array of medium shots of the character following this string. The main element of this story was our struggle with finding an ending to the narrative such as where the string would end, after deliberating about many ideas we decided it to come to nothing. We decided on this ending as to implement the idea of 'nothing in life is special', this melancholic feel was furthered by the desaturation of the colour in the film.

Christmas With Dad

Christmas with Dad - Conor McCormack

Christmas with Dad is a documentary about the life of AJ who is awaiting his eighth child, the story is mainly about the trials and tribulations of AJ who is haunted by his childhood as well as his non biological children who often reject AJ as a father.

I believe the main aim of the film was to give AJ a way of telling the audience about his life and problems he has to overcome even just in his day to day business specifically in the scene where AJ is putting his children to bed. I also believe that the focus of this film was to give a 'voice to the voiceless' by giving AJ who would usually be ignored in society  a voice in order to tell the audience about his life.

I liked this film as it vividly told AJ's story from an equal standpoint as AJ, coming from a council estate and seemingly living on the breadline, could easily be shunned and not given the time of day to tell his story. I believe the film was successful in dealing with its subject matter as it gave a medium for AJ to directly tell his story to an audience, and showed that it can be hard for a father living in an area plagued with problems.

The element of the film which stood out for me was the many shots of the household which exhibits the poverty stricken family specifically with the Christmas day shots which shows how much AJ has to shell out each year just for a simple day.

The film form relates to the content in some aspects specifically during the segments where AJ is talking about his family he is surrounded by his children and when he is talking about his upbringing and personal problems only he is visible in the shot.

A technique that I found interesting about this documentary was its 'raw' style which was implemented by the use of hand-held cameras. I believe the sound used was very appropriate for the film as the silence allows AJ to tell his story easily.

Overall I found this documentary very insightful about life on the council estate and how hard it can be for AJ and families alike who live through a wealth of problems.

Steel Homes

Steel Homes - Eva Weber

Steel Homes is a short documentary about a storage facility, on paper it seems to lack sustenance in the narrative but the story delivers in both depth and quality as it delves into the 'hoarding' nature of the characters and I believe the directors aim was perhaps to tap into the viewers hoarding nature, I believe this as I felt myself often connecting other peoples kept items to mine which will likely not have another use to me.

I enjoyed the film once it got into its full swing but found it quite slow in building its main objective, the element I enjoyed about the slow start was that,for me, it persuaded me into thinking these people actually lived in these 'steel homes' before it was made obvious that these were just storage facilities. I believed the film was successful in dealing with its subject matter as towards the end of the film I read a deep message of how people can hoard items which will have no further meaning in their life but yet they clasp onto these items as they cannot let go of their past.

The element that stood out to me was the characters stories and how they described these items which they kept in this storage facility. Specifically the items which the subjects had a fond memory of but which held no use in their current lives and how they described how they could not let go of these items due to their past significance.

I believe the film form often directly relates to the content in this film as the director has used camera which only shows the audience a brief glimpse into the storage rooms although as the narration from the characters becomes apparent the audience gains a full view of each item.

A technique which I found interesting was how the director never used the standard interview style by using a medium shot of the character talking into the character, instead each character chose their item and would just tell the story behind it which made the documentary seem much more personal and unforced.
The sound used was very appropriate for this film as the sound didn't overpower the stories and let each story come through in their own right.

Overall I found this documentary a very insightful story about people and how they can hoard onto items which once held a significance in their or a loved ones life.