Last blog ever

Thursday 18/06/2015

My journey to this point has been a challenging yet fulfilling one. Today I have finalised my evaluation and reflected on the work that I have produced this year, in my evaluation I have talked about my research, planning and production, and my practical skills and presentation of my FMP.

I am pleased with the way that everything has turned out despite my lack of enthusiasm of the subject of my FMP at the beginning, I have learnt a lot about dyslexia as a disability from the research that I have done and taking the opportunity to talk to other people about dyslexia.

I have enjoyed my time on the level 2 creative media course and have high hopes and excitement for next year where I plan to come back and do level 3.

show

my  final show  display
 The poster is high up because people can see it from the whole room.
Everyone else put their poster in the middle above their screen but I wanted to be different.


I had some ideas. One of these was to have words related to my experience of dyslexia around the screen. I positioned my poster above the screen to the left so my work stood out and to catch people’s eye. It was effective because it draws people in and gives them additional visuals to further personalise the experience.

plan of show

This is the floor plan and layout of my show.

For the show, I drew the room design and my area. I laid out bits of paper where I thought things would go to get a picture of how it would look when I finally presented it.

FMP overview

For my FMP I made a documentary about Dyslexia. I chose to do this because I am dyslexic and I wanted make people aware of the learning difficulty, and to encourage others who suffer from dyslexia to not be shy and to seek out the help that is available, either from technology or by support staff. I want them to recognise that they are not alone.

The product is different from the proposal in several ways; I did not interview people my age because the people I asked were too shy. This meant I used more of my experiences and used older interviewees.

I developed my idea to include an interview with Learning Support. This led to me learning how to use green screen to make a silhouette and taking more area shots.

I added a quote from Richard Branson because he is famous, everyone knows of him and believes in what he says.

my chosen FMP picture

This is the picture that I have chosen to use for my biography. I chose this picture because I feel that it represents my personality well.

FMP biography

I chose this course because I wanted to learn how to make videos as I want to be a paid YouTuber.

I took a year out last and I am really glad I decided to come back to learn new things.

I have learned so much about editing and genre.

I am particularly proud of my FMP documentary because it is good and I care about the subject.

In the future, I plan to go on to level 3 media production. 

Show planning

I did lots of work. I planned my display for the end of year show. I had to make ideas about how the work would be displayed in my space. I sketched the layout of the room and my bit of wall to help with my planning. I wanted to paint it an individual colour because it would suit my documentary about celebrating difference, but  wasn't allowed to. I wanted to write words connected to my documentary on the wall next to my video screen so i did. In the end I made a border with printed words on it and I will write the same words underneath in my handwriting.I used my phone to take pictures of the space and my progression. I want the border to draw people's attention and help them understand my documentary better. I shared my idea with my classmates and my teachers and they all liked it. Everything but the poster is below the screen in a straight line because if it were any lower people couldn't see it properly.The poster is at the top because it is prominent and it will draw people's attention.

fmp

heres the free muics http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?genre=Jazz&page=4
and my film

19/05/15

 

Today I was cutting my video down as close to 10 mins as possible, at the moment it is at 12mins long  so it should be ok. It was very had to cut out parts of the video because I like it all. The sound levels were to high so I turned them down, so it's all good now.

14/5/15

Today I have be editing my audio interview. I needed to change the volume levels because the interviewee was quite quiet and I was very loud when I rerecorded my questions. It took longer than I thought it would but it came out good enough. I placed it on my video. I finished the poster that is advertising my documentary.

up date ae

I had a plan to fade in and out of the interview clips but I changed it slightly by adding text that shows the question I say. I did this within final cut. It looks good, I like it but it took a while to do.

I stayed in late to work on the green-screen section. I needed to match the silhouette I made to background shots. I used a pan shot looking down on the college and establishing shots of learning support. It looks a bit weird, but I think it will do.

editing

This morning I have been editing my green screen footage as well as arranging the interview clips I edited, ready to be put in order in my documentary. I couldn't work out how to make the silhouette so left it for this afternoon. I hope to finish this part by the end of the day.
The silhouette is now done.

Update covering changes I made to the original idea.

Since I wrote my proposal I changed lots of things.

In my original plan I was going to put stats just in final cut pro but I decided to do it in after effects because it is easier and I can put a cover over it and show it bit by bit. It should look better this way if I do it right.

I planned the learning support interview to be on video but the interviewee didn't want to be on video because she is shy. I didn't want to cut it out completely because that would make the video to short and I needed some expert knowledge with facts and statistics to make my film less moany and more like the documentaries in my research. I got her to agree to an audio interview. This meant I had to film scenery shots and make a green screen  silhouette to put up instead.

In other documentaries I looked at they had a conclusion part at the end that thanked the people involved and gave some kind of opinion. I decided to add this to mine to folow the conventions of documentary making.

In my research I looked at the film angle shots and the way things are filmed.(over shoulder,pan and shots of hands). I added some of the shots that I liked the look of to my doc. This will make it harder to edit though.

I took  advice from someone with professional experience to film some of my interviews with 2 cameras. It took more time than I thought it would to change the angle in editing but it looks good now I have done it.

I have added some still shots of me as a child when I talk about my childhood. I saw this in at least 1 documentary I researched. It was easy to do. It captures the mood and is effective.

I decided to add a quote on the screen as part of my introduction because it looks good in other documentaries I saw.

Poster designing

What i did to change my poster and why i did it.
I took a photo of the poster and put it on photoshop.
I took some words and made them slanted so that i could fit them on the path in the image. I had to turn the text into a vector image before I could use the perspective tool to reshape it.
I spent some time looking at fonts and choosing oner for my poster. To make it striking and draw peoples attention, I made the text 1 word, made it massive and put a question mark in. I made the text white on a separate black background. I resized the image to take out the margins.

7/05/15

Today I had to re film some footage as I had blue trousers on the first time so I couldn't use the original footage. I then continued to film some scrabble footage and thought about how I may design a poster, I will use the scrabble footage to break up some of my documentary.

5/5 Video lesson

I have finished my After Effects intro (apart from the quote bit).
It looks alright.
I put my old photos into the video where I talk about my school experiences. They suit it so it's alright.
I didn't really mention secondary school so there was no obvious place to put the second picture. The cuts were a bit jumpy so they helped to smooth out some of the jumps.
I thought I had saved my footage from Thursday but it was in the wrong format so I had to find the camera I was using and put it on from there. Next time I will make sure I save in the right format.
I have been experimenting with my green screen footage. It was not easy to work with the footage because I was wearing similar clothes to the screen and the lighting wasn't perfect. I may have to film it again but first I will see if I can use the footage the way I want. I lost quite a bit of time because I didn't do it right.

Jason's lesson Tues 5/5

Today we looked back at the grading criteria, and the meaning of reflection and refining.
We assessed our blogs to make sure they did everything they needed to do. I realized I need to add more to my blog:

• What is working well or isn't working?
• Am I on track?
• Have I done what I said I would do?

I also assessed the research and planning I have done so far. I have done many things that I forgot to post about in the blog.I plan to make a detailed blog entry on Thursday to cover these points.
I am feeling a bit overwhelmed with the blog workload.

Friday 1st May

I watched a  Richard Branson documentary video to find quotes I could put on screen. It wasn't a proper documentary, just a Youtube video  I have got 3 I could use.
I wrote notes on things I could use for a closing statement.
I started to think about the print work I will do.

30/04/15

Today I have been filming using the green screen and doing some around the college filming. I mangaed to gain access to the roof and got some nice shots of the whole college.
I will use the green screen footage of myself when the person talking does not want to be seen on camera. I think this will be effective to keep my audience engaged visually.
When I get round to editing my footage I will use final cut pro to cut my silhouette out and then use after effects to apply the background, I have not yet decided what I will use for this background therefore more research will be required.

reshes

Data from World Bank

Last updated: Apr 17, 2015

 the uk population

28/4/15

In audio, I made my script better and organised my folder
Today I started editing my talking. I made a list of things I still need to do, including:
Audio interview with learning support (tomorrow)
Film myself in green screen room to make a silhouette
Film shots of me responding to Jason
Film me at a computer
Film a learning environment
record audio to go over stats
get recce shots of radio room from phone to memory stick
 continue to work on script
write and record conclusion
I started the after effects work for the opening title sequence. It went well, I am on track with it.
I learned how to separate sound from video and started doing that.

up on friday

updated blog I made hyperlinks for my research

script

learning support interview questions and leaflet

This leaflet helped me think of questions.

These questions are for the learning support interview. I tried to make them open. The interviewee doesn't want to be filmed so I filmed location and area shots which I will use when she is talking. I need to film more of these in corridors and in learning support.

my interim assessment record

23/4/15

Today in my theory lesson I took the opportunity to do some more editing and use after effects to start my opening title sequence.
I have also updated more of my blogger entries and another updated SWOT analysis, this is so I can track my progress. I have looked into how my research has helped and influenced my documentary.

During research of similar documentaries there are some ideas that I myself would liked to of included such as a logo, but due to time constraints I unfortunately cannot do this.

updated swot

SWOT analysis

(Dyslexia documentary)

I am now about half way through my FMP and am currently on track for what I have planned.

Strengths.

My strengths so far have been keeping to my schedule, sourcing information to be included in my documentary. I have also grown to like my project subject as previously I didn't have much enthusiasm for the subject.

Weaknesses.

The weaknesses that I have come across so far are researching all the facts that I need to put into my documentary as it took longer that I had initially planned for it to take. 

Opportunities.
My opportunities have stayed the same throughout my research. I have personal involvement in the documentary, I have managed to gain participants from college to talk about being dyslexic and what their views are. I have also taken advantage of the facilities at college by using the cameras and studio time to do my editing.  I have also gained some knowledge through a PowerPoint given to me by John on documentary making which I have found to be very helpful.

Threats.

The threats that I previously faced are still the same, even though I have already done some filming I still need to rely on other people to complete all the filming that I would like to do, and I still need some assistance in recording for my documentary.