Drama - Camera

For this drama project I will be the camera operator/cinematographer. To be succesful in this role I will have to work closely with the Director in order to realise their vision so a lot of communication is vital. For the 2 minute part of the drama the filming will be handheld and very close up as we want the full appearance of the protagonist to be a shock reveal to the audience towards the end of the film. Also this technique literally makes the audience closer to the character as they are in fact physically closer to them. I would like the shots to be from a low angle where possible to show how the character is in awe of the city around them and attempt to full immerse the audience in the feelings that the protagonist is having. The low angles and objects that the camera shows will suggest that the protagonist is in fact a child and as is stated in my first post, the audience will then find out that the protagonist is in fact an adult.

For this film we will be using a Canon 550D and as I am doing camera it is important that I know how to use this device. I have added new software called Magic Lantern to this camera to give a whole array of new settings such as white balance, light temperature and a measure that shows the distance that you are focusing at, which will be very useful for doing focus pulls. This sortware will allow me to use the DSLR in the same way that you would use a professional filming camera so I believe that should improve the quality of the footage we can record. Also another group member has the same camera so we will be able to use this to not only get twice the footage but much better coverage of things that could be hard to reshoot.

In my role as cinematographer I will mainly be working with the director but in small parts I will have to work with everybody on the set as they will have opinions on how different shots will work and how they will compliment their roles.

First assignment - 2 minute film

In the first week of Seminars the whole group was given an assignment to find somebody interesting in the street that they did not know and analyse them without the person in question noticing. After noting down traits and quirks of these people we had to write an in depth back story for the person that we had selected. I found the person I wrote a story about in the train station drowned in an oversized red coat, with matching suitcase. This woman was clearly around thirty years old but was wearing the typical attire of an eight year old girl, she was also talking to herself having a very in depth conversation. My first thoughts were to give her an imaginary friend and make her genuinely believe that and the influence for that was watching Drop Dead Fred when I was younger.

I decided that this woman should have a slightly simpler back story whereby something quite dramatic had happened in her childhood and she had reverted to the mental state of her eight year old self in order to block out this event. A lot of different shocking events occurred to me but the necessity to decide on one has not arrived yet. I imagined that this woman would live a very sheltered lifestyle with little or no freedom extended to her therefore her biggest dream and ambition in life would be to break free and be able to live independently without feeling trapped by those who are trying to take care of her. The oppressive people in this story would technically be the antagonists although I do not believe that the audience would necessarily dislike them as they are trying to do the right thing but the only issue with that is the fact that they are opposing the protagonist’s ambitions.

I thought that the woman in the train station as a part of this story could be her lost in Sheffield and trying to get back home as she has been entrusted with the freedom to go into the city, perhaps with a care worker but has somehow found herself in trouble. I think that the audience will be able to sympathise with this character very easily if they can make a strong enough connection with her. The audience should realise how the protagonist lacks all of the daily freedoms that we all take for granted and feel empathy when they put themselves in the protagonists shoes and realise what this would be like, I would like to maybe use a bit of Point of View filming to help the audience make this connection. I think we will need to start early if we are to get suitable actors for the roles in this film as it could rely on quite strong performances to really pull of this character and the others in the story.

The first film we will be doing about this character is a short two minute character profile of sorts where you get to know the character but we do not tell the ten minute story, it will be sort of like a trailer but will concentrate on the main character. We are not allowed to use speech to tell the story at any point so this will make the whole thing a lot more difficult, especially building a relationship between the viewer and the protagonist.