The Editing Process

 Spring break was incredible. I did great at my MUN conference and went on an amazing road trip to Charleston, South Carolina. However, I definitely slacked a little on moving forward with my project, but I can say editing is in progress. This post goes through how I began editing the film opening.

Starting any edit is a daunting process. Seeing that blank editing screen really puts the amount of work I need to do into reality. This image shows my favorite format to edit videos on Premiere. I keep it mostly default, but I make sure the timeline is zoomed in a lot because I like to be able to see and work with as much of the clips as I can. For this edit in particular, I will leave the graphics tab open so that I can easily add titles and credits.

                                                                          This photo pretty much describes my experience editing with Premiere. It is a powerful editing software, so it often causes my computer's tiny processor to crash a lot... and I mean A LOT. So much so I literally have to save my work every five minutes. I would hate for an hour of work to disappear (which has happened an overwhelming amount of times)

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              Now is the time to start putting the clips on the timeline. At this time I go through each clip in chronological order and double click so I can do some quick trimming (in the top right corner)

                                                                                                                                                                With all my clips on the timeline, so much work is now to be done. Layering of audio, connecting the clips in a cohesive manner, color correction, adding text, and so much more. So I guess this is what I'm going to say, I got some work to do! I'm so excited to see how this turns out and I hope you are too!

Making My Footage Cinematic

This is a little last minute research that I have done just to get an idea of ways to make my footage more cinematic and editing techniques specific to short films. Like I have said in my previous posting about editing software, my editing experience has never really expanded into short films, so this is just as much a learning experience for me as it is for everyone else. But overall, I just want to be able to salvage any "iffy" shots and give my piece a professional feel.

Like always, I found comfort going to YouTube for help :)

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Here is an incredibly helpful video I found that lays down important instruction on proper color correction to turn bland footage into something visually appealing. I feel like this is a solid overview of the things I need to do on Premiere just to increase the quality of my piece overall. 

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I really needed to find a tutorial specific on editing night time footage. Playing it safe, I never really shoot at night, just because of the difficulties revolving lighting and such. Thankfully, the video below does a great job in detailing how to deal with night time footage. Judging by how my footage looked after filming, this tutorial will be my best friend. 

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This last video I found is just for aesthetic purposes. I find most films are presented in a widescreen 21:9 ratio, so sort of the finishing touch of making any footage cinematic is to simply slap on that aspect ratio. So I quickly sifted through YouTube and found this video that helps me do just that!

Filming

Today was officially the day we filmed for our film opening, "Younger."

Knowing today was really the only time we will be able to film, the stakes couldn't be much higher. We started filming around 10:30 p.m and because of our planning, we finished filming in less than an hour! I know filming at 10:30 p.m sounds a little late, but I can explain. This whole weekend has been full of stress. I actually just finished a weekend long Model United Nations conference in FIU. These debate oriented competitions are extremely stressful and competitive (this girl was full on sobbing when she didn't win anything), and I was lucky enough to claim a 4th place award with my partner Annabelle!

Getting back to the whole filming thing, Raul came over to my house at around 8:00 where we filmed some opening shots with my mom and then we had to wait until around 10:00 for Ellie and Liz to come home. Sadly, Ellie wasn't feeling well so we had her friend Ashlynn fill in for her. Also, I am extremely worried with how this is going to turn out, I'm nervous about how fast we finished filming and I haven't looked at any of the footage yet!!! But I have worked with bad footage in the past (our music video) and in the end, everything worked out fine.

Anyways.. here are some behind the scenes pictures from our filming!!!

The Set for Younger

This post right here is an inside look at the set for the hit upcoming movie, "Younger." But one difference is all of these photos were taken in the daytime. I know you are probably wondering, "Shouldn't you show us what it will look like when you film?" I SAY NO. Well.. just because I am planning a later post specifically about lighting and I want to keep you all on your toes. So this post is just to go in depth about the set choices and the reasons for them.




Right here is where the shots of outside the dinner table where the friend is motioning for the boy to sneak out are. The large, wide window provides an open look into the kitchen and dinner table, perfect for the scene we are trying to create.





Here is the street the will be home of the final shots of our film opening. It is a long stretching rode which will give off that idea of "running away" as the kids ride their bikes off into the distance. At night, the street lights will look great on camera!






This is the place that the dinner scenes will take place. As you can see, the table is placed perfectly in front of the window, which will look cool pairing it with shots from outside. The table is not perfectly neat, showing that it is not some perfect family. The actors will be seated around the table during the scenes. 

 So this is where all of the kitchen scenes are going to be. It is a simple contemporary/modern style which compliments the "suburban feel." I think that the black counter tops will look great in contrast with the color food on camera.

Here is a shot of the room of the teenage boy. I added lights around the window frame which will aid in lighting as well as give off that indie feel. The bed comforter is rustic which again, furthers the whole feel of the piece. 

 This is the place where the shots of the boy sneaking out their window and talking to his friend will take place. With the bush right next to the window, it provides ample opportunity to play with focus and foreground blur.

Preparing for Editing

Editing is a huge deal in film making, which is why I have to choose a editing software that I can both be comfortable with and get the most out of.

And my choice is....



Premiere Pro!!!!

Being what I have used for all of my past videos, including some of the ones I have made that are not school related. In fact, I used Premiere to edit a music video I made with my friends about a little adventure we had. Here is the link for that video!

Overall, Premiere really is an incredible piece of software. I love the incorporation of many manual options so you can customize basically any part of the footage, from color grading to adding multiple layers to footage. Even though it is extremely pricey, since I took a dual enrollment class at Broward College, I get the student discount for the adobe suite which changes the original $52.99 price tag and lowers it to $19.99! In my opinion, I think that is extremely worth it considering how much I use the software.

With all that said, I still am quite new to the program, and have never edited a short film with
dialogue in it. Let alone a short film on any editing software. (Yes I was one of those kids making edits with a GoPro on Windows Movie Maker) So this will still be quite the learning experience and of course with that comes research!

These videos give a great explanation about work flow and the steps to take when making a short film on premiere.

Choosing a Font

To many, choosing a font seems like an easy task. But the font of the beginning credits sets the mood for the whole movie. Imagine if Jurassic Park had bubbly letters in their opening scene. It would just look silly. So that is why I find it of utter importance to find a font the correctly embodies the feeling we are trying to put out with our piece. We know we want the piece to be playful yet impactful.

So first I went to FontBundles and found this font

Maskoolin 
I really like the 90s feel of the font. Its playful and I feel like it compliments the comedic value we plan on incorporating in our opening.



Honey Bee
This font is definitely something different. For some reason I feel like it does a good job describing the feel of the movie. The contrast of the smooth and flowing font and the dark opening will be incredibly interesting.



Inflatable Flamingo
Ok I really like this font. It gives of that 90s feel and definitely follow teen movie conventions. It also adds a refreshing change to what normal credit fonts are. I really want our finished product to be something out of the ordinary.

So for right now, I'm pretty sure one of these three fonts is gonna appear in our opening. Of course, stay tuned for more updates.

Group Meeting #2

Knowing that I was going to have another group meeting this week was really exciting. Having not filmed yet, I've felt like my progress on the opening has been a little slow. So getting updates from other people and their progress has made me feel a lot better. I've actually realized I am going at a pretty good pace considering all the things I have had to worry about this month (finishing the quarter with decent grades, improving on SAT, and training for a Spartan Race). Yep, you heard that right, I signed up for a Spartan Race at the end of April and I couldn't be more excited. But to get to the important stuff, here are some of things I took away from the group meeting:

Sophie

I was really impressed with how much she has done so far! She is doing a magazine and already has a good layout for her cover and table of contents. She is doing a beauty magazine and is demonstrating a green theme for a march edition. For her story, she mentioned how she wanted to show pictures of beauty products and their descriptions. However, she was having issues formatting her masthead and front cover image. 

Justin 

I am extremely excited to see his finished product. His plot is extremely creative and he is going to film at a skate park in Miami. However, he seemed to be a little behind on the blog. I encouraged him to post more and perhaps have longer and more in depth posts.

Ashley

Ashley was the second person in my group meeting is doing a magazine. She plans on doing a food magazine and I am both excited and nervous to see how it comes out. Food magazines definitely seem a lot easier than they are to make. She is still developing color schemes and is in the process of planning her cover and table of contents. With trouble finding the best software to edit, Sophie and her had a great conversation about the program, Canva.

Valeria 

Valeria has an interesting yet difficult plot for her opening. She plans to illustrate a family moving to Miami and mentioned how she wanted the opening to have more a montage feel. With plans to use a drone, she was a little worrisome about her lack of experience. She mentioned her struggles achieving permission for a song (Which I spoke more about in this post.) Also, I love her blog!