Reservoir Dogs- Evaluation

I have finally finished editing my video and its finished. I took me about three lessons but its done now.

Thing that I found difficult were putting the text on for the names of the actresses and writing Reservoir Dogs at the end and the credits, because I didn’t even know how to even do it. With the help of Rosy I was shown how to do it. Once I learned how to do it I saved a customized font which was similar to the original one in the film and it saved me time when doing all the rest of the text.

What went well?

Things that went well in our video was the walking past the wall part, where everyone’s in sunglasses and the music is playing. It really recreates the ‘cool’ scene like in the film, and our version is like the female version and still looks just as good. Once that scene got put in slow motion when I did my editing it made it so much more similar to the film.

Another thing that went okay was the voice over I did, it could have been improved if I’m honest but only because I hadn’t listened to the original voice over before I did it myself so it wasn’t as similar. I think I spoke a little too fast but I did put on the american accent and try to speak deeply.

I think most of our costumes looked like the characters we were supposed to be, if you watched it you would be able to tell who was playing who. We decided to pay lots of attention to detail with things like the props on the table in the canteen, including the old fashioned mobile phone which Kate brought it, Ketchup and fake monopoly money. This made out video more convincing because we tried hard to recreate the scene as best we could with the resources we had. We also drew the wrinkles and bags on our faces if our characters had them, my character for example had LOADS of bags and was an old man so Robyn did my makeup for me and did a good job of making me look tired and old.

What could have been improved?

Things that could have been improved was when we filmed the part where the characters are shown with their names in yellow font, we should have zoomed in more on the characters faces, this would have made it more like the film because in the film the characters head is at the very top of the shot and their neck is at the bottom and the top of their shoulders showing.

I could have also padded out my outfit more as my character Joe was fat, and I only stuffed the front of my top, therefore making me look pregnant instead of fat.  If we were to do it again I would pad out all my clothes to make me look more like my character Joe.

When editing the shots together I found it difficult to put text on the ending shot where the group of characters are walking down the street and the credits roll up the screen saying ‘Reservoir Dogs’. This text stops at the top of the page. I found it extremely difficult to do and didn’t grasp how to do it as Mr Grant was always busy with someone else so he never got round to showing me how to do it. I asked some of my peers but I still didn’t understand, this was a problem because it meant that my ‘Reservoir Dogs’ text just rolls off the top of the shot and doesn’t stop.

What I enjoyed from this task

From making this video I have thoroughly enjoyed dressing up and making ourselves into the characters we are supposed to portray. That  was probably my favorite part as it makes the video look so much more colourful and interesting if we are dressed as our characters instead of wearing uniform.

I also loved trying to make our version of the film as close to the original as possible. It needed alot of focus from all of us to get the attention to detail but overall I think we achieved a pretty good outcome.

Here is our finished video:

Re making our Video

Thomas, Ben and I decided that we would re make our Preliminary exercise video, therefore, we stayed after school, used the really good camera and got to work in having another go at our video. An advantage of us filming after school meant that we got the pick of pretty much any classroom we wanted to film in. We picked room 18 because it was most suited to our storyboard.

We altered our story just a tad, by making Ben’s character quite creepy as if he knows that the world is ending, we included some creepy laughing from him and ditched the cup cam as it was too obvious that there was nothing in it when Ben was drinking.

After an hour of trying to get all our shots done and include a good match on action, we packed up and finished. We now have to put it all together on the macs so I’ll make sure it goes up when its all done and dusted.

I also think it would be a good idea to put our other one on as well because it will show how we’ve altered it, made it better and learned from our mistakes.

Here is the new video which Ben uploaded to youtube, hope you like it better than the other one!!!:

Teddy has an Operation

I thought I would blog about this extremely trippy and weird video that we watched in Media today, here it is:

Firstly I would like to say how intrigued and amazed I was whilst watching it. I don’t know what it is about it but I love how each part of the teddys organs is almost fairytail mixed with real life. For example, Teddys bonbons have turned to cigarettes instead of sweets. I love the idea of that and I think its really clever. Its almost disturbing as the voice of the speaker is so calm, also all the medical instruments laden around Teddy look quite sinister, and then there’s this cute fluffy teddy bear in the middle. This contrast makes the video so mesmerizing to watch and it’s quite funny because of Teddys Unicorn Crotch and the bad boy that broke Teddys heart.

Each thing in Teddys organs has a meaning for example, Teddy has a BIG heart, because teddy bears are supposed to be childrens best friend. And Teddys sprinkles are supposed to symbolize the sweetness of a relationship between a child and their teddy.

The background sound of dings and calm fairy like music makes the whole video seem like a dream, as the video is so different and quirky it feels like your imagination.

I just find this whole video really interesting and think anyone should watch it because its a bit different.