UNSW SCREEN PRODUCTION III

THE CONVENIENCE

A jittery passer-by encounters a series of unfortunate events on a mission to relieve himself.

The hallmark of our in-class projects, The Convenience showcases our group's effort in filming a cinematic masterpiece within the comedy genre on a strict 2 hour time-limit. The objective of the film is to be a light-hearted, unexpected satire that makes audiences giggle whilst highlighting our progress as filmmakers throughout the term. The film demonstrates a huge improvement in our cinematography, with special attention towards blocking, headspace and focus. We could have improved the quality of sound and sonic complexity, as well as produced a more engaging/comedic script, had we had more time to work with, which is also a testament to our need to further improve time management as a team. Overall, I think this work is reflective of our progress throughout the learnings of Screen production 3!

THE LIBRARIAN

An anxious librarian faces a troubling dilemma as she starts her usual round of shelf checking.

Our first installation of in-class projects for Screen Prod 3, The Librarian utilises a guerrilla-filming tactic as we navigated the strict rules of filming inside of the Law Library at UNSW. Considering we were on a very tight time-limit, this work highlights strengths in cinematography and a simple, yet fleshed out storyline. This is due to our success in taking time to plan and properly pre-produce (script, blocking and ideas) prior to getting into filming. I think the end of the film feels a little rushed, and the soundscape could have been made more engaging, using more foley or the addition of music.

'What Is Your Favourite Film?'

A one-take interview exercise incorporating b-roll and talking to camera.

This simple but effective one-minute interview was a warm-up exercise into the concept of in-class projects for Screen prod 3. I think the short clip highlights strengths in basic colour grading, balancing A and B roll footage, and improvisation (of dialogue, staging and location). I think we could have improved some of our pre-production aspects, especially scripting, to have more engaging things to say about our 'favourite films'. And additionally the introduction of more variety of camera angles would have helped enhance viewership.

Lighting Set-up Experiments!

A rough collection of various lighting exercises practiced during class in Week 3 of Term. These exercises involved working on excerpts of our script for the Midterm Project (Courtside) whilst practising different lighting setups that might appear in our, and other genres of film. The objective was just to test various lighting techniques and act out certain scenes/potential exchanges between two characters to study the type of emotion they evoke. I think we definitely could have done a better job with shooting in the dark, given that a lot of our footage is grainy, but captures the essence of this exercise.

THE POKER GAME

Inspired by The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) and recreated on very rushed scale, this ad-hoc poker game attempts to use a variety of camera angles. This activity involved a lot more pre-production preparation than we anticipated, which is seen in our more rushed and less coherent finished product. Whilst I think it highlights a certain strength in camera shot variety, it is lacking a purposeful and dramatic array of angles and shots that The Thomas Crown Affair uses so masterfully to hint at subtext.

Week 7 exercises

A brief collection of filming exercises involving "mirroring", "communication through facial expression" and "emotional transitions in acting/dialogue".

These exercises, filmed on a super tight time-limit, depict the dynamic and iterative process of filmmaking. The objectives of these exercises were to practice choreography and bodily expression, facial expression and framing, and dialogue delivery and emotional exchanges. I believe whilst we did an alright job at these directorially-focussed activities, there is certainly room for improvement when it came to time management and more exciting camera shot variety. in addition, using more cinematic references to inspire some of our performances/cinematography would have helped elevate these exercises, coupled with a less rushed edit.