Semester 1 Entertainment Video Final

Semester 1 Projects


 
PSA
One of the first projects we completed in this class this semester was our Public Service Announcement. For this project, our goal was to create a video that illustrates the importance of a topic in the world today. My group chose Healthy Eating as our topic. For this video, we had around a month to go through pre-production, production, and post. In pre-production, we assigned production roles and began to storyboard the video. Our group's video required a lot of actors and props so we had to work to schedule times to film with everyone. In production, we mainly filmed during the school day in our video class. We visited various teachers around the school and filmed students as well. Once we had all the footage, we began editing the clips together to make it a visually interesting way to learn about the importance of healthy eating. Because our PSA required so many props and actors, we ran into scheduling conflicts and we forgot props a few times on set. However, since we lacked organization during production, I learned the importance of creating an accurate agenda for the shoot and scheduling precisely when to bring in certain equipment. Overall, our feedback was pretty positive on this project, and we mainly needed to work on having shorter phrases about healthy eating at the bottom of the screen. If I was to do this project again, I would probably spend more time casting a variety of actors in different sports. We weren't able to get all the actors we had hoped for originally because of our time limit, but I think having a wider variety of people could make the video more interesting. Overall, this video helped me learn how to use after effects and to film under a time limit and I liked the video that we were able to create.




Short Film
The next project we created was our short film. For this project, we had around a month as well to create our film. We began the process by forming production groups and assigning roles. We then read through various scripts before we chose the one In Cellulum by Drew Conners. Once we selected a script, we began storyboarding, location scouting, and filming the overall video. For this video, my group faced a lot of problems. Since the main location of the film was an empty room, we had to find one at school or someones house. The only room similar to what it was supposed to be was in the band practice room at school. This location limited the time we could film since we could only use class time. We also ran into major conflicts with our actors since our lead was only available one day at school and one day on the weekend. We had to rush to get a majority of the shots and they were not as good as they could have been. In the final stages of the production, we also had trouble figuring out how to visually edit the clips together that would make the short film long enough. Despite our conflicts in production, I really learned how to communicate to create a film. Lilly and I took lead on this film and together we were able to work together really well to communciate with the actors and to get all the props on set. For this film, we got lot's of positive feedback on the sound effects in the video. Since the video was supposed to seem very ominous, we were able to accomplish this through horror movie style audio. If I was to change anything for this film, I would want to film the opening scene in a different location that would allow more space to move. Overall, this video had lots of conflicts which made it very stressful, but I am proud of the editing I was able to use for it.


Time In Class
In video class, I have been spending lot's of time researching video techniques and completing client work. This semester I have done a wide variety of client work ranging from back to school videos to engineering team pictures. Whenever I have free time in class, I usually spend it working on client work I have recently been given. This semester, I was able to create a Spark 101 video for an education company where I worked to design a video that showed how their site could be made. The company was very impressed with my work and are interested in giving me a Summer internship to help create more videos for their organization. If in class there are times I have no client work to work on or have any video projects, I spend time researching how to become better at film techniques. I have recently been studying how to apply transitions to your videos and I have begun a rough edit to practice this. I have also done a lot of in-depth studying on color psychology and finding ways to apply it to my photography as well as film. Outside of class, I work on client work and create videos myself. Photography has slowly become one of my main hobbies and pretty much every weekend I take pictures of my sister in various locations around Olathe.

Favorite Photoshoots:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/146217311@N05/albums/72157687734733202
https://www.flickr.com/photos/146217311@N05/albums/72157689197368715
https://www.flickr.com/photos/146217311@N05/albums/72157661258670578

Recent Client Work:
Spark 101-

Raven 50-
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1mmp8XbGPCp9Jfefl0x6D9_l_IKiGOQUm
Electrathon Promo Video-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVCMN-w39i4
Engineering a Better World Headshots-



Strengths
One strength I have as a video production student is my ability to be creative and try new things. When working on set, I am good at coming up with new ideas on ways that shots can be filmed. My film and photography style constantly changes and I am able to try lots of new things to make everything I create unique and different.

Improvement
One area of improvement I can work on is my project management. I am able to always get my projects turned in on time, but I usually stay up really late editing or I overbook myself with too many client work projects. Next semester will be very busy with filming, and I'm going to need to make sure I stay on top of all my video and school work to stay organized and ready to produce the feature film.

Guest Speakers
I really enjoyed learning from the two guest speakers. When I first entered e-Communication as a freshman, I knew that video was something I wanted to be involved in for my whole life. I initially wanted to be a movie director for the rest of my life. However, after hearing the guest speakers, I have learned that there are a lot more ways to be involved in the film industry. Hearing about making commercials and working as an advertiser for companies helped show me that I can make videos locally and still have an amazing career. Also hearing about their experiences at the KU school helped me realize that it is still an amazing school to study at and that I don't necessarily need to travel far to get a good film education.

MX4D
Visiting MX4D was a really exciting experience and it shows how much film has evolved over the past years. Visiting movies has no longer become a popular outing for most teenagers, but having MX4D available, definitely makes going to the movies more exciting. Seeing how movies have become less popular over the years, makes me want to work harder to find ways to make my shots more interesting and something that will appeal to all people. I think the new movie technology will eventually benefit the film industry, but I think there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to improve it.

Summary
Overall I have loved working on our Feature Film the most this semester. Collaborating and developing a plan for the film has been really exciting and has introduced to me what It will be like actually making movies in the future by having casting calls, storyboarding, and location scouting.

If I could change anything about this semester, It would be the many class periods where we simply worked on our computers individually. I think it would have been more enjoyable if we did a music video while the script writers worked on developing the feature films plot.

Overall, this semester I learned how to be more confindent behind a camera and how to become a better editor. I don't usually work as an editior, and this semester I edited around 6 videos that all were very different. I have learned how to use after effects, become better at premiers effects pannels, and have become confident in color grading.

For next year, I really want to be able to add transitions into my videos and to completely story board the video. I also want to become better at free handing shots and finding ways to be creative in shot variety without super expensive equipment.

Overall, I have really enjoyed this semester and I am really excited to spend the next half of the school year creating a feature film.