Editing Process: Part 4 FIRST EDIT OF COMPLETE FILM

We began this week feeling uneasy about the editing section of our film. We had worked so very hard on the creating and capturing our vision that to mess it up now was just not an option. Today we felt we had come through the difficult stages and felt a little more confident about the path our film was on and are proud of ourselves so far. By lunch time we had completed our aim to have all the clips and footage we wished to use in the sequence we wanted through the time line. All that was left was to blend and ensure the clips flowed correctly as a story. The effects we had already created to move from one place to another in the story looked good but needed polishing to look professional. We still hve to cut our film down by 20 seconds and implement the credits. We have to re edit and re edit until we feel like we can d no more to it and it is looking its best.


We decided to get a second opinion today from our friend and student Laura Picarelli. Being some one who is wrapped up in her own project she has no idea of what our footage is and does not know the story line so she has a fresh pair of eyes and mind to the film we have created. She had possitive and negative feedback for us which is a good thing for us to move forward with our film. She got the love loss concept and thought the styling and visuals were amazing confusing Markos business card with the look we had created.. a good sign :D Her negative feed back was that the section in the story where the black outfit moves to the white was not clear enough. The 'dissolve' effect have made the footage of the white dress to dark, resulting in the white dress looking to similar to the silhouette of the black and lost its impact in a change from dark and restrictive to bright and free. We resolved this through subtle editing transforming the footage with a combination of lightening and using footage with natural sun light to mimic the change in atmosphere for the story line. This is the section where the character 'finds herself' and feels free.

Below is the clip from today using the 'cross dissolve' effect:

Below is also our first edit of a section of our film, showing the film flowing as a whole and it demonstrates all the effects put into practice.

FILM

The film now needs further polishing for a professional finish, however we are relieved that the difficult hard stages are over in making our film flow as a narrative an audience will understand to an extent. It has been interesting to see how the story board has changed due to planned things not working and discovering brand new mistakes that work beautifully. Due to the fact we ploughed through the footage of over 100 clips we are certain we have not missed any important or unforeseen shots. An important lesson realised is to not get to comfortable with the film you have just created, we had to learn to shake it up and take on board criticism even though we had worked hard to get it to a point, if it didn't work in a tutor or friends eyes then it has to be changed. There is always something new to add and improvements can always be made.


Our tutor Dennis saw the film today with positive and negative feedback. He said that in places sequences drag a bit we felt this ourselves with regards to the letters burning scene and the roses being destroyed. This has given us a direction on specific things to cut. Dennis liked the reversed burning letter footage, and this can be kept and potentially sped up or faded with other footage. Another point made was that in our first look of the long black dress due to being so cold there is a lot of footage evoking anger rather than the melancholic sadness needed, it has been suggested to take this footage out, implement it as a still or work on another transition from outfits so the film is not so jumpy. These are things to take into account for tomorrow.