intoVIEW: Finished Film

Below is a link to the completed version of intoVIEW.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4a8gOgtA-zY

Very Final Edit: 30th April 2012

Having watched my initial export through at home I decided that despite being happy with it I would like to make a few more small changes. In the initial interview sequence between Mike and Lewis, there is a section where I have both of their shadows on screen with dialogue alternating between different characters and roles. Although I liked this sequence, I felt that the visual imagery went on a bit too long. For my film Scopo Networking, I used lots of split screens and I felt that I could experiment with using this technique to make that part of the interview a bit more interesting. As the dialogue for this section was a question with a yes or no answer I thought I could synchronise Mike's yes or no answer with Lewis's face and vice versa. This was quite a difficult process as the pace of each interview is different - the one where Lewis is acting as the Support Worker and Mike as the homeless man is much slower in pace than the one where Mike is acting as the Support Worker. I had to overlap some of the sounds and get the timings just right so everything was synchronised.

Below are some screen grabs from this revised edit.


This is Lewis with Mike's shadow - here Lewis answers the question on screen but we hear Mike's voice.

This is Mike with Lewis's shadow - here Mike answers the question on screen but we hear Lewis's voice.

This is both Mike and Lewis with both shadows - here both characters answer in their own voices.

I watched back through the film and am now very happy with the result. I am now exporting the final copy.

Sound Edit: 23rd April - 29th April 2012

I set this week aside for my sound edit and met with Patrycja for some advice.

Echo

The opening interview sequence between Mike and Lewis is very echoy in places. Rod voiced his concerns about the sound when being played on the cinema projection screen at our Sideways Looks exhibition, he felt that the echo may mean that the audience are unable to pick up certain parts of the dialogue. Patrycja and I tried exporting the sound and editing it using audacity. We took a clip of ambient sound in which the echo is not present and then used this to reduce the additional echo noise using the noise reduction tool. Although this eliminated the echo, we were unable to get a balance that sounded naturalistic. Following several failed attempts we looked at some tutorials to see if there were any tools on Final Cut Pro but none of these worked very well either. I didn't want to eliminate the echo completely as I feel that it adds to the intensity of the scene making the two characters seem very alone, Patrycja agreed. We tried adding echo to the second interview to try and make it more similar but again I quite liked the contrast in atmosphere between the two scenes. Patrycja told me that she was sure the echo wouldn't make the vocals hard to understand in the exhibition set up so I have decided to keep that element of the sound as it is. 

Levels

I spent a lot of time going through the clips and making sure that the volume level remains the same across all of the clips. Some clips were really loud in contrast to others so I had to reduce the levels quite drastically in some places. I have managed to even everything out and am happy with this.

Mono/Stereo

I had already begun converting some of the clips from mono to stereo which was quite a time consuming task. This week I finished this and now all of my clips are in stereo.

Audio Transitions

Patrycja showed me how to use the audio cross dissolve transition on Final Cut Pro so the sound from each clip carries across smoothly between. This worked well in some places where I had to quite quickly cut the clips as to avoid the characters talking over each other. It also made the cuts in the second interview between Mike and my mum much smoother.

Ambient Sounds

Patrycja suggested adding some ambient sound and having this running continually throughout the first interview. As there is a lot of echo, some of the sudden breaks in sound cause a split second of silence. The ambient sound made this a lot smoother and kept the sound continuous. 

General Feedback from Patrycja

Having watched my video through in full, Patrycja was able to give me some feedback. She asked if the initial scene was a flashback and I agreed that in a sense the use of some of the initial interview clips   in the second interview aim to draw the audience's memories back to the first interview. The characters roles are never defined and in the same sense neither is the timescale. 

I have exported an initial copy of my film as I feel that I need to look at it in my own time away from the editing suite. I also wanted to show my actors a copy to get some of their feedback.

This is the link to my initial export:

http://vimeo.com/40971590

Editing Week 5: 16th - 22nd April 2012

This week I worked towards completing my fine edit. I re-watched the film, making sure all the cuts are clear and in the right place so there were no overlaps in sound.

Second Interview: Support Worker & Estate Agent


I was already happy with my first interview so focused this week on editing the second interview to a standard I was happy with. I had a much more limited selection of footage for this interview which made things slightly more difficult. I decided to use clips from the first interview sequence throughout this part to make the link between the questions being asked more crudely obvious. Initially Lewis's character is happy to divulge his personal information, such as previous address and national insurance number, compared to the first interview where he refuses to answer any of these questions. I wanted to get a comparison between his responses so this is why I used the previous footage here.

Next Week


I have managed to finish my fine edit and have got the visual side of the film up to a standard I am happy with. My film is now 8 minutes 30 in total which I think is an appropriate length - if it went on any longer, the continual switching in roles may loose the audience's attention. Next week I will complete my sound edit. I have asked Patrycja for a tutorial to get her advice on how best to approach the sound. I will also show her my completed visual edit and get her feedback on this too.

Tutorial with Cluna: Tuesday 17th April 2012

I had a brief tutorial with Cluna today. I asked her for her feedback on my project. Cluna told me that she wasn't too sure whether she understood my film and was therefore unable to be too constructive with her feedback. This was initially rather disheartening, however it forced me to think objectively about my film.

Neither Lewis or Mike's roles are ever clearly defined. I selected Mike's scruffy, layered costume following inspiration from my own experiences and the photographs shown in an early blog entry. I uploaded two sets of photos, one set that I collected following my time volunteering at St Petrock's day centre in Exeter which are images of the service users that visit the centre, the other set are images I found on google so are much more stereotypical. Although there are certain elements of Mike's costume that are stereotypical, like the fingerless gloves for example, the majority of the attire was constructed from my own experience and knowing that homeless people are forced to wear items of clothing that they have collected from services such as day centres that have donated by other people meaning they are often quite ill fitting and old. Homeless people by default are forced to spend a lot of time outdoors, walking around public spaces with very little shelter from the elements, this means they often wear clothing that will be appropriate for drops in temperature or rainfall, hence the layers being warn by Mike's character. I have also included clips where Mike is answering the homeless questionnaire as a homeless person, his answers here are very stereotypical, for example he admits to having been sleeping rough for a long period of time and to using heroin. By setting up the stereotype of a homeless man within his character it confuses the audience when he switches roles and becomes the support worker, which happens continually throughout the first interview sequence. The overall effect I hope to achieve through this is to force the audience to question why they were initially so certain that his character was homeless and that Lewis's character wasn't, I also want them to question why they don't think Lewis's character isn't homeless. Despite his outfit being less scruffy, he isn't in a suite or dressed in a manner that gives him visual social authority yet initially it is believed that he isn't homeless. 

I have prepared myself for the fact that the audience may not all understand the story being told, the social status of Lewis's character is never defined, and neither is that of Mike's. The constant switching of roles makes the narrative quite complex, however, my main hope is that the audience will leave still questioning the stereotypes and social roles of each character. If this happens, then my film has been successful.

Editing Week 4: 9th April - 15th April 2012

This week I had my final tutorial with Rod which was really useful and made me feel confident about my progress and the development of my project.

Sound


I began doing a bit of work with the sound. Some of the files were in mono format rather than stereo, this was a problem I had with my film Scopo Networking last term. Luckily I remembered how to fix it. I unpaired the two sound clips at the bottom and deleted the one with the minimal, quieter sounds. I then copied the other clip and pasted it back onto the time line, moving it back into position before repairing the two clips. I also began adjusting the levels because at the moment some of the clips are extremely loud in comparison to others.

I need to work on reducing the echo in the initial interview sequence between Mike and Lewis as at the moment it dominates the vocals making some words hard to distinguish. I am going to work on this once I've completed my fine edit.

Fine Edit


I began working on my final edit this week following the completion of the rough edit. I have really been looking forward to this part of the production process as this is where I can be a bit more creative with the visual aspect of my film. So far I have included some split screen shots as shown in my previous blog entry. I have also started switching the roles of the characters so in some clips Mike is behaving in a very stereotypically homeless way - answering questions talking about a history of homelessness and a heroin addiction, behaviours we have come to expect from a homeless individual, in other clips he is acting as a support worker, asking Lewis's character the questions from the night shelter admittance form. The shadows I captured are working very well and I have been able to crop the physical character out of the image leaving just the shadows - again as shown in my previous blog entry. I have also started experimenting with mixing up sound clips from different clips so cutting between Lewis and Mike asking and answering questions. This works quite well with the shadow split screen clip as you can't tell that the clips are out of sync with the original footage.

I have had to step back a bit from my editing this week in order to get on top of other deadlines so haven't made that much progress. I am aiming to have finished my fine edit by next week so I have a full week to work on the adjustment and quality of my sounds.

Final Tutorial: 12th April 2012

Final Tutorial

Today I had my final tutorial before I finish editing my film. I have begun mixing up the roles of the Support Worker and Homeless Man in my initial interview scene so was quite keen to get some feedback on this. 

Split Screens

I have included some overlapping clips one set in which the screen is split horizontally with an extreme close up of the Support Worker's eyes on top, and Homeless Man's eyes on the bottom of the screen, and one in which the screen is split vertically with the Homeless Man's shadow on the left and the Support Worker's shadow on the left of the screen. For each of these clips I cropped the images and used the edge feather tool to further emphasise the divide between the two images on screen. The edge feather tool created a slight black border around the outside of the screen as well is separating the two images which Rod suggested made the whole clip stand out from the overall feel and style of the rest of the film. 

 This is a screen grab of the shadow clip with the edge feathering.

This is a screen grab of the eye clip with the edge feathering.

I really liked having the divide in the middle of the two clips as I felt that this created a distinction between the two and neatened up the divide in shots, Rod agreed but felt I needed to experiment with different techniques aside from edge feathering in order to create this middle divide and prevent a blackened boarder around the outside. For my last film, I used a slug behind the clips as a way of keeping a black background if I re sized the clips to neatly fit the screen. I decided to put a slug on top of the two clips and then crop it down to a small strip, I then used the edge feather tool on the slug soften the box. This however then made the slug smaller at the top and bottom so I had to increase the size using the scale tool. The results are shown below and look much better than before.

This is a screen grab of the shadow clip with the slug layered on top.

This is a screen grab of the eye clip with the slug layered on top.

Cross Dissolves

I have also included some long dissolves between clips to show both of my actors almost merging into one. I wasn't too sure about this and Rod agreed saying that it differed from the overall aesthetics of the rest of my film as I am not using transitions elsewhere. I have decided to remove these entirely which is quite a good result as it means that there will be less time rendering! I am going to carry on experimenting with different ways of showing the merging of roles between the two characters.

Interview Audio Mix Up

Towards the end of the first interview scene, I have used an extended clip of the shadow split screen (showed in the above screen grab) and have begun mixing up the interview questions and responses. Although you can just about make out when each character is talking in the shadow clip, you can't lip read so the audio sync being slightly out doesn't really matter. I have mixed up the interview so first the Homeless Man will ask a question (in the role of Support Worker) to which the Support Worker will answer from the position of the Homeless Man, then the roles will switch. The switch over happens three times during this clip as there are quite a few questions with yes or no answers. Rod felt that some of the audio was unclear as the responses are often only one word answers. There is also a real distinction between the audio I'm using for the Homeless Man's response (in which he IS playing a Homeless Man) and the Support Worker's responses this is because the audio for the homeless man comes from a shot in which Mike is facing the camera and I am directing the mic at him face on, whereas the audio for the Support Worker comes from an establishing shot in which the mic is directed at both actors rather than Lewis. I am going to take some audio from a shot I have of Lewis that is framed and recorded in the same way as the shot of Mike. This should cancel out the real distinction between shots. 

Overall the feedback was really positive, leaving me feeling confident about my progress and the coming deadline for submission. I am hoping to have finished my visual edit by the end of the weekend, leaving me plenty of time to work on my audio which I am beginning to think will be quite a complicated task as I need to adjust the volume and levels on each clip and reduce the echo. 

Editing Week 3: 2nd - 8th April 2012

This week I focused on completing my rough cut and correcting all of the 'yellow' shots.

I showed the rough edit to my tutor Rod. I was concerned about the cuts between scenes as mentioned before as I haven't edited in this way before but he said these were good. There are some cuts where the dialogue overlaps and is repeated which will need to be corrected.

My plan for the next week is to begin playing around with the rough edit and mixing up the two interview sequences. My aim is to keep the audience continually reassessing which character is the homeless man - is it Lewis's character or Mike's. In the second interview sequence between the Support Worker and the Estate Agent, the Support Worker gives his name as James Rose, which is the same name given by the Homeless Man in the initial interview sequence, which is a subtle link between the two characters which will hopefully be picked up on by the audience.

Next Steps:

1. Watch the rough edit back through deleting any overlaps of dialogue and neatening any cut away edits.
2. Begin mixing up the first interview between the Homeless Man and the Support Worker. I filmed the interview shots with both Lewis and Mike looking directly at the camera twice - in the first sequence Lewis (Support Worker) is completing the entire questionnaire with Mike (Homeless Man) answering as if he were homeless, in the second Lewis begins asking the questions and then Mike takes over. I want to add these clips into the interview sequence so the audience are constantly changing their minds as to which character is homeless - the one who looks homeless, or the one who is in the position of a homeless person.
3. Begin mixing up the second interview between the Estate Agent and the Support Worker. I have a slightly more limited selection of footage from this filming session but as I used the same questionnaire as the backbone script for this section I am planning on cutting back to the initial interview sequence between the Homeless Man and the Support Worker, again re-iterating the similarities and confusing the audience's perception of Lewis's character and whether or not he is homeless.
4. My sound needs a lot of work. I know how to make the mono sound stereo which is quite a time consuming process so once I've got the rough edit into a more final state I am going to begin correcting this. I'm not going to start working on the overall sound - levels, echo, buzz and so on, until my editing is complete.

I have booked another tutorial with my lecturer on Thursday so I am hoping to have made some substantial progress by this time so he can give me some feedback. I am also planning on getting in touch with one of the other instructors to help me with the sound further down the line.

Editing Week 2: 26th March - 1st April 2012

This week I didn't make much progress due to focusing on other commitments and deadlines. I have begun work on my rough edit and have completed the first half - the interview between the homeless man and the support worker. So far this is going well and I am pleased with my results.

I have noticed a further problem with sound in some of the footage from the second interview between the estate agent and the support worker. The first few clips captured on Fin's camera have no sound - I think this must have been where I forgot to turn the microphone on. As Fin's camera only has one output and this was taken with the microphone connection, we were unable to simultaneously record and listen to the sound so didn't notice this! Luckily we were filming on two cameras so I have spent a lot of my time this week attempting to synchronize the sound from different clips. This has worked really well and isn't noticeable but has proven to be quite a time consuming task.

Editing Week 1: 19th March - 26th March 2012

This week I began editing my footage. I uploaded and named all of my clips creating bins within Final Cut Pro for each scene then categorizing them into shots of each character and shots of both characters together. This will make things easier when I come to edit.

I have already noticed that the sound is quite random - the footage filmed on the HMC camera is all mono whereas the footage captured on my SLR or Fin's Panasonic is stereo, also in certain shots the sound is much louder or quieter than others suggesting I accidentally readjusted the audio levels when filming. I am confident that this is something I can adjust post production.

Secondly I noticed that the footage captured on Fin's Panasonic camera is very yellow - this is because I couldn't work out how to set the white balance when using the Red Heads. I have begun to play around with the colour corrector to try and adjust this and these are the results so far:

Establishing Interview Shot - Before Colour Correction

Establishing Interview Shot - After Colour Correction

Close Up of Homeless Man - Before Colour Correction

Close Up of Homeless Man - After Colour Correction

I am really happy with the adjustment to the close up of the homeless man however I still feel the establishing interview shot needs some work. I enhanced the cyan hue in the image which worked really well except in the areas of the image which were much brighter and more exposed to the light as they have gone slightly blue! This is something I will continue to work on but I have saved the colour correction formats used for each to my favourites in Final Cut Pro so they are there as a guideline for future reference.

My next task is to complete the rough edit. Once this is done I can begin experimenting more with the sequence. I am a bit aprehensive about the cut aways between clips that I will need to edit as all my other projects have been quite abstract so have used dissolves and fades to move between clips. This is something I will need to experiment with.

Shoot 3: Smoking/Tea Making Sequences

Shoot 3: Smoking/Tea Making Sequences

Sunday 18^th Sunday 2012

6.00pm – 9.00pm

Cast: Mike Evans (Homeless Man) & Lewis Marks (Support Worker)

Crew: Natalia Gonzalez, Finian Pye & Myself

Equipment: Panasonic HDC SD900, shot gun mic, tripod

Location: Midland Road, Old Market, Bristol & My House

What we did:

The aim of this shoot was to capture some extreme close ups of each character smoking, and each character making a cup of tea. The idea was that the audience will assume that it was the homeless man smoking, and the support worker making the tea. I wanted to film each character doing each action so that I can experiment with this in postproduction, possibly merging the opacity of certain shots to give the illusion the characters are actually merging into one.

What went well?

I managed to capture all of the shots I needed and was also able to capture a couple of nice close up and medium close up shots of both the homeless man and the support worker which I felt looked really good. These shots were similar to the shots in the beginning of Hunger where the prison warden is smoking outside stood next to a wall, except my shots are much closer than these. I’m not sure when or if I will definitely use these shots but I thought they worked well as potential character introduction shots as they simply show each character stood by a wall leaving the audience with nothing but their visual appearance to base an opinion on.

What didn’t go well?

There were numerous problems with this shoot. Firstly, I forgot part of Mike’s homeless man costume so had to drive back to collect it, meaning we were slightly later starting than anticipated – only 15 minutes but still enough to have to hurry a bit more than I’d have liked. Secondly, we were supposed to be filming in the tea making in the Bristol Methodist Centre – a homeless day center where I used to volunteer. I had picked up the keys from the manager earlier in the week but there must’ve been a double booking as there was a meeting in place in the main room where I had intended to film. The meeting was going on till 8pm, which was too late for me as cast and crew had other plans for the evening. We decided to capture the footage in my kitchen in the end. As the shots are all extreme close ups, the background isn’t too important as there isn’t enough visible to give away the location, I did quite want to capture some establishing shots of just the posters on the walls and so on, to give the audience an idea of the setting. This is something I can do at a later time if I still feel it is necessary. Finally, after having to rearrange a location for the tea making shots, we began to lose the light and being outdoors meant there was no way of adjusting this. Luckily I had the HMC camera, along with the Panasonic and my Canon 550D so was able to switch between cameras to find out which one worked better at low lighting- it turned out that the Panasonic was considerably better and we were able to get some light from a street light which is was hopefully enough to light each shot effectively. I have had to warn my actors that we may need to reshoot these sequences but I am hopeful that I have been lucky and that the footage is okay, as it looked good on the camera monitor.

Shoot 2: Support Worker/Estate Agent Interview

Shoot 2: Support Worker/Estate Agent Interview

Saturday 17^th March 2012

2.30pm – 5.30pm

Cast: Lewis Marks (Support Worker) & Sally Bartram (Estate Agent)

Crew: Finian Pye & Myself

Equipment: HMC camera, Panasonic HDC SD900 camera, 2 x shot gun mics, 2 x tripods, Red Head Lighting kit.

Location: Towry Law Offices, Bristol City Centre

What we did:

The aim of this shoot was to conduct the same interview as with the homeless man and the support worker, but with the support worker and an estate agent. The idea is that the support worker is collecting the keys for a new house and is asked by the estate agent to answer a few ‘routine questions’ which then leads on to the same set of questions being asked as in the night shelter. The only difference in this scene is that rather than going through the risk assessment form, the estate agent talks the support worker through the rules and regulations, which are again those that apply to the night shelter.

This is another relatively static sequence in which both actors are sat at a desk the entire time. The aim was to capture similar shots to those in the initial homeless man/support worker interview.

What went well?

Having an extra crewmember to help out worked really well in terms of being able to change the set up of cameras and lights quicker. My mum (playing the estate agent) did a fantastic job. She is a financial advisor and is used to conducting interviews with clients and just acted in a similar, professional way as she would for her paid job. This also really helped Lewis get into character as he admitted afterwards to feeling quite intimidated. He hadn’t actually read the terms and conditions before so was hearing them for the first time on camera in the first shot captured making his reactions much more real as well as some of the rules weren’t what he was expecting.

What didn’t go well?

Despite having been to my mum’s office many times in the past, I hadn’t come down to access it in terms of a potential film set, this meant that the layout was quite new to me. I the choice of three potential meeting rooms to film in one was simply too large and would’ve looked strange with only two people in it, and the other one’s, despite being a much more appropriate size, had a very large table in the middle of the room which was too big to move and became quite awkward in terms of setting up equipment in order to achieve the best angles. As a result, I wasn’t able to recreate the same shots I had captured in the earlier shoot and had to become slightly more creative with the positioning and angling of the camera.

There was also a large white board behind my actors, which caused a major glare when the lights were turned on, this again meant I had to work really hard when positioning the equipment as unfortunately I was unable to move it.

Shoot 1: Homeless Man/Support Worker Interview

Shoot 1: Homeless Man/Support Worker Interview

Saturday 17^th March 2012

9.30am- 12.30pm

Cast: Mike Evans (Homeless Man) & Lewis Marks (Support Worker)

Crew: Myself

Equipment: HMC camera, Panasonic HDC SD900 camera, 2 x shot gun mics, 2 x tripods, Red Head Lighting kit.

Location: PH86, St Matthias Campus, Fishponds, Bristol

What we did:

The first shoot this weekend was the main interview between the homeless man and the support worker. This was filmed in one location, with both actors sat at a small table for the duration of the scene. I wanted to experiment with different camera angles, high and low angles to show power switches between the characters, shots with both actors talking directly to the camera to put the audience in the position of each character, close ups of each characters’ eyes and mouth and establishing shots based on the interview sequence in Hunger. I also wanted to film each actor reading each set of lines; so once with the homeless man answering the interview questions as you would expect a homeless man to, and once where he’s asking the questions, something you wouldn’t expect him to do – and the same with the support worker.

 What went well?

I knew I wasn’t going to have a crew with me to help with this shoot so I tried to plan everything as best as possible, I also was very aware that Mike had to be finished and dropped off as close to 1pm as possible. I spoke with the campus CSOs and the technical instructors and was able to set the equipment up in PH86 on Friday afternoon and leave it locked in there overnight. This was really good as it meant on Saturday morning I didn’t have to spend a further 20 minutes getting everything in the correct position.

Having previously held a run through in PH86, once with Fin practicing with the equipment, and once with Mike and Lewis, I already had a clear idea of the shots I wanted to achieve. This again meant that I could quickly set up each shot without having to worry about what was and wasn’t going to work.

My actors were both really prepared for the day following briefing earlier in the week and I ensured that we all took regular breaks to get out of the room which quickly became stuffy due to the small size and the hot lights. This gave my actors time to relax and gave myself a few minutes to collect my thoughts and mentally assess the footage I’d captured, and what I had left to capture.

What didn’t go well?

Not having a production crew made things a little harder, especially since I was filming on two cameras simultaneously. This meant that I had to set one camera up and rolling then run over to the other one and set that one up before calling ‘action’. It also meant I couldn’t monitor the sound or what the each camera was capturing constantly. However, having already held the practice shoot meant I was confident in what each shot looked like. Sound did prove problematic and I have ended up with the footage from the HMC camera being recorded in mono rather than stereo which is annoying but is something I know can be fixed in postproduction.

Script Run Through/Briefing for Shoots: Thursday 15th March

I spoke with Mike Evans, my actor playing the Homeless Man and suggested a meeting to run over the script as he had a few suggestions for re-phrasing some of the lines so they felt more natural.
I spent the evening reading through the script with him so he could grasp the lines. We attempted running through using the 'homeless forms' that I'd created (shown in a previous blog entry) with Mike improvising his lines. This proved very useful as it made the interview conversation seem much more natural, it also made Mike feel more confident overall about the coming film shoot.

Having spent this time briefing Mike on the coming shoot, I called Lewis (who lives in Exeter so was unable to meet with us this evening) and took him through all the changes and suggestions we had gone through.

One of the main changes I have made to this scene came following a discussion with my workshop leader Rod. Rod suggested that rather than have the Homeless Man instantly start interviewing the Support Worker, I lead up to the change with both characters taking on their normal roles - so the Support Worker beginning the interview then the Homeless Man taking over. This was a good idea as it played on the existing stereotypes with each character acting the way the audience would expect. I decided to have the Support Worker ask the initial, basic questions (name, date of birth and so on) and Mike suggested that the turning point could be asking for the Homeless Man's national insurance number.

These are the additional lines/stage directions I have added following this:

SW: Okay, and what's your national insurance number?

HM: (taking questionnaire and pen from SW) Why don't you tell me your national insurance number?

SW: (confused) I'm not telling you that! Why are you asking me the questions?

HM: These are just routine questions we ask anyone who's staying in our night service.

The interview conversation will then continue as per the original script.

I ran through all of this with Lewis over the phone and he understood the changes and is happy to go ahead with them.

In terms of costume I have asked Mike if he can bring some old trousers and an old t-shirt that are slightly mismatched and ill fitting if possible. This will give the impression that they are either really old, or items he has had donated from various other shelters that weren't selected out of fashionable choice, but out of lack of other options. I am going to provide a large black puffer jacket, a woolen hat and some fingerless gloves - the hat and jacket to suggest he has been using them to shelter from the elements, and the fingerless gloves as they are something I feel are commonly associated with homeless people. For the support worker, I have asked Lewis to wear normal clothes, jeans and a shirt - working in the night shelter required us to dress comfortably but not overly smart in a way that deliberately separated us from the service users visually, making them feel uncomfortable in their clothes.

In preparation for the shoot on Saturday, I am clearing the room of all it's clutter - there are lots of filing cabinets and bags of old papers and so in there which are quite distracting. I want the scene to be as visually simple as possible so as not to distract the audience from the conversation and the characters.

Preparation For Filming

Below is are the storyboards I created illustrating
 the opening sequence. In this sequence we see someone rolling and smoking a cigarette, and someone making a cup of tea. The idea is that the audience automatically assume it was the Homeless Man smoking and the Support Worker making the tea, however, I plan on filming each sequence twice with each actor doing each role. The shots are extreme close ups so it will be hard to tell which actor is doing which action, I'm hoping to be able to experiment with this sequence in post production potentially adjusting the opacity of each shot so the two characters literally merge into one.

I also drew a rough sketch showing the costume I have in mind for my Homeless Man character. The clothes are based on the images shown in my early blog posts and my own experience.

Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity

Goffman, E (1968) Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity Penguin Group: London

I read the opening chapter of 'Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity' by Erving Goffman to get a bit more inspiration for my film shoot this weekend. I found the information particularly interesting and despite being quite an old source, very relevant to the subjects I am exploring in my film - stereotypes, identity, and so on.

Goffman begins the chapter by discussing how in Ancient Greece, any social deviant was marked so society could see that they were different - this was called a stigma. A stigma can take three main forms; physical stigma which relates to deformities or visible disabilities for example, stigma relating to a flawed, weak or undesirable character traits, and finally 'tribal' stigma which refers to the race, religion, personal history and so on of the individual in question (Goffman, E: 1968) Goffman believes that we have been culturally trained to react in certain ways to people carrying with them the various stigma described above. He talks mainly about the stigma that are immediately recognisable upon meeting or encountering an individual, and expresses the view that we automatically, subconsciously, categorise an individuals social identity/status within the first few moments of meeting them. (Goffman, E: 1968)

Goffman also believes that we are able to anticipate the certain interactions we will have with stigmatised individuals and have again been culturally trained how to react and interact in such situations,
"The routines of social intercourse in established settings allows us to deal with anticipated others without special attention or thought" (Goffman, E: 1968: 12)

How this relates to my project?

This is all relevant to my film as according to Goffman, homelessness is a stigma. We have been brought up with a stereotypical view of how a homeless person dresses and behaves, where they typically 'hang out' and so on. We have also been culturally conditioned with how to interact with a homeless individual, for example, putting a few coins into their hat if they are begging, or simply ignoring them.

The character of the support worker in my film has been brought up with a slightly different set of rules for dealing with interactions with homeless people due to the nature of his job, however, he still has a set of expectations for such encounters. My film breaks these anticipated set ups involving homeless people through the role reversal of the two characters. The homeless man behaves in a way that neither the audience or the support worker has anticipated thus forcing them to question what it was that immediately made them assume he would behave that way in the first place. The character of the support worker embodies the confusion of the audience, and in his line "Have you answered these questions?" he emphasises the idea, here suggested by Goffman, that stigmatised, in this case homeless, individuals are slightly 'less than human'. (Goffman: 1968)

Shot Lists for Saturday and Sunday

Below are the shot lists for each different location - I will print out a copy and tick off each shot as I capture it. Having already carried out both a practice shoot and a script read through with my actors, I have a good idea as to which shots work and which don't. I also have a few ideas I would like to experiment with.

Shot List

Saturday 17^th March 2012

9.30am – 12.30pm

PH86, St Matts

Actors: Homeless Man (HM) played by Mike Evans & Support Worker (SW) played by Lewis Marks

• ·      Medium shot with both actors on screen
• ·      CU of HM from the side
• ·      CU of SW from the side
• ·      CU of HM from front
• ·      CU of SW from front
• ·      Over the shoulder of HM
• ·      Over the shoulder of SW
• ·      Shot of HM shadow
• ·      Shot of SW shadow
• ·      ECU of HM hand filling out form
• ·      ECU of SW hands holding cup of tea
• ·      ECU of SW drinking tea
• ·      Shot of HM and SW in each others costumes
• ·      ECU of HM mouth talking
• ·      ECU of SW mouth talking
• ·      ECU of HM hand/pen tapping on desk
• ·      Low angle of HM
• ·      High angle of SW

2.30pm – 4.30pm

Towry Offices, Bristol City Centre

Actors: Estate Agent (EA) played by Sally Bartram & Support Worker (SW) played by Lewis Marks

• ·      Medium shot with both actors on screen
• ·      CU of EA from the side
• ·      CU of SW from the side
• ·      CU of EA from front
• ·      CU of SW from front
• ·      Over the shoulder of EA
• ·      Over the shoulder of SW
• ·      Shot of EA shadow
• ·      Shot of SW shadow
• ·      ECU of EA hand filling out form
• ·      ECU of SW hands holding cup of tea
• ·      ECU of SW drinking tea
• ·      Shot of EA and SW in each others costumes
• ·      ECU of EA mouth talking
• ·      ECU of SW mouth talking
• ·      ECU of EA hand/pen tapping on desk
• ·      Low angle of EA
• ·      High angle of SW

Sunday 18^th March 2012

6.00pm – 7.00pm

Bristol Methodist Centre, Midland Road

Actors: Homeless Man (HM) played by Mike Evans & Support Worker (SW) played by Lewis Marks

• ·      ECU of hands tearing green card
• ·      ECU of hands pulling out rizla
• ·      ECU of hands putting tobacco into rizla
• ·      ECU of hands rolling
• ·      ECU of tongue licking rizla
• ·      ECU of thumb sparking lighter
• ·      (ECU of hand striking match) – possible alternative
• ·      ECU of cigarette ember glowing
• ·      ECU of mouth blowing out smoke
• ·      ECU of hand flicking cigarette
• ·      ECU of foot stubbing out cigarette
• ·      ECU of hand grabbing cup
• ·      ECU of turning kettle on
• ·      ECU of sugar going into cup
• ·      ECU of tea bag going into cup
• ·      ECU of kettle steaming
• ·      ECU of kettle switching off
• ·      ECU of water being poured
• ·      ECU of tea bag being squeezed
• ·      ECU of milk being poured in
• ·      ECU of tea being stirred

(I want shots of both HM & SW doing each action)

Preparation for Film Shoot: 17th - 18th March 2012

This weekend is my official production weekend. I am hoping to capture all of my footage this over Saturday and Sunday which is a very short space of time meaning everything needs to be planned very precisely. I am filming in 3 different locations over the whole weekend and am using 3 different actors. I have decided to add in another interview sequence in which the Support Worker is meeting with an Estate Agent to collect the keys for his new house, when collecting the keys, the Estate Agent asks to run through some routine questions and then proceeds to go through the same interview questions as in the previous interview sequence. This is still currently a work in process - I am re-working the current script to make it relevant for this sequence and am editing the questionnaires slightly so they are more relevant for the Estate Agent sequence.

Below is the 'To Do List' I have conducted to ensure I am on track with organizing everything for this weekend.

To Do List

General

• ·      Hire equipment
• ·      Complete risk assessment and get it signed
• ·      Pick up equipment
• ·      Format SD cards
• ·      Charge my camera battery

Interview Sequence in PH86

• ·      Get permission from CSOs to have PH86 opened on Saturday
• ·      Clear excess clutter from PH86
• ·      Work out costumes for actors
• ·      Write shot list
• ·      Meet with actors to run through script and brief

Interview Sequence in Office

• ·      Create slightly different questionnaire
• ·      Write script
• ·      Work out costumes for actors
• ·      Write shot list
• ·      Meet with actors to run through script and brief

Stereotype shots at Bristol Methodist Centre

• ·      Complete storyboards
• ·      Collect keys from Ian Webb (centre manager)
• ·      Write shot list
• ·      Meet with cast and crew to brief