Thursday, 27 September 2012

Action Scenes

In this lesson I worked with Ben Pilston examining an action sequence from the film equilibrium. The scene was the final fight sequence heres a link to it on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeHrq_Fs1vk


In this scene we discovered how when the fight is taking place the scene rate increases dramatically to keep the pace of the film up and to keep the excitment. Alot of this scenes are over the shoulder reverse shots showing the 2 characters faces and shoulders.
 The other shots are extrme close ups of the characters hands and the guns they are holding. This allows the viewer to see the technical aspect of the fight sequence but still keeps them guessing as to what will happen next.
The final shot is a high angle shot showing the good guy leaving the scene of the fight and the bodies of the guards and bad guy strewn on the floor.    

Camera shots, angles and movements

This lesson we looked at all of the camera shots, angles and forms of movement we could use when doing our final project. some of the shots we learnt about are

  • ECU-Extreme close up. This shot can be used to portray a characters emotions without the audience focusing on something in the background.
  • MLS-Medium long shot. this allows for the audience to see multiple people with relative detail but still gives them a sense of the set and location
  • DAS-Dutch angle shot. This shot is where the camera is tilted over at a slite angle to make the straight lines become more angled adn a bit more dramatic. 
We also learnt about how different camera angles can create or take away tension. For example  an extreme close up can show how the character is feeling and create tension due to the lack of their surroundings and the mystery this creates.

 here are some examples of different camera shots in films.

This is an example of an extreme close up showing just the characters eyes and nose. however this has a reflection of another character in the glasses of (in this case Harry Potter) this gives the audience some perspective of what is going on but still remains mysterious.




This is an example of a medium close shot where you can see the characters head and shoulsders which allowes us to partially see what is going on in the scene but still gives us an insight to characters emotions. 
This is an example of a dutch angles shot it was often used in the old batman to show a scene where soemthing is going wrong. For eample an enemy has taken someone hostage or there is about to be a fight scene. 

Thursday, 20 September 2012

The Orphanage

Last lesson I studied the spanish film "The Orphanage". this film is about a family that move into an old orphanage which is where the wife and mother of the family lived as a child. It involves mainly the mother and small boy as he is playing with imaginary friends which turns out to be ghosts which are haunting the house.

From looking at the first few scenes I can clearly tell that this film is a physcological horror. This is due to many reasons but here are a few; the lighting in all of the scenes allows us to very clearly see some characters but manges to hide the more mysterious characters faces. This gives the audience the feeling that they are bad and you suspect them immediately from the beginning of the film. 

The scene I watched showed the orphanage in older times when the wife/mother was still at the orpahnage or so we presume. This scene is ended with and old woman who clearly runs/owns the orpanage( due to how she is looking down on the children as they are playing) ending a phones call and saying "your friends will miss you". This gives the audience a feeling that the little girl( on which this is being said uppon) has maybe done something which she is being sent away for or maybe she is being sent away to protect her from the other children or somethin else that is in the house.

An another scene I watched is where the family have brought in a paraphyscologist and a medium to see if the house is haunted.

The sound effects and dialogue in this scene are very important as they have to build tension not onyl through the diagetic (sounds the characters could actually hear) but also through the non diagetic( sounds the characters cant hear). the director does this by using mainly stringed instruments at a low slow note and then as the tension builds the speed and note creschendo to an almost overwhelming sound. however the diagetic sounds still maintain to be loud and very over exagerated. for example ther is a scen where the assistant of the paraphyscologists is drawing on a map of the house and as the tension builds you can even hear the pencil scrape across the paper. by doing this the scene creates more tension than what could be done with just using a camera alone or just using diagetic sounds on there own or non diagetic sounds on their own.  

Monday, 10 September 2012

IN THIS BLOG I WILL BE DOING MY A-LEVEL MEDIA STUDIES COURSE HERE ARE A FEW WEBSITES WHICH WILL HELP ME ALONG THE WAY

http://www.thebluemask.com/shop/ - FOR ROYALTY FREE OPENING MUSIC

http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/subjects/media_studies/index.aspx - FOR EXAM QUESTIONS AND PRACTICE PAPERS

http://www.artofthetitle.com/ - FOR OPENING TITLE SEQUENCES OF FILMS

These links will allow me to explore the use of certain forms of media in films such as music, different types of camera angles and effects put on after the original filming.