Intro Scene Shoot

After planning the story board and sorting out actors I went home to Wrexham, the location our film is set to start off the production. 

The image above (Cara's Bedroom) shows the location of where the introduction scene will be filmed. 

I will be filming the introduction scene on my own with Cara and Dan, the only two actors needed for the scene. The scene is only short, so it wouldn’t have taken very long. 

Planning 

Introduction scene

Cast:

• Cara Hammond
• Nathan Edwards 

Equipment:

• Canon 550D
• Flycam 300 Steadicam
• Tripod
• 60W Desk Lamp
• Fairy Lights/Coloured Lights 

Crew: Director/Camera operator 

• Ryan Hammond

I would be filming the scene on the Tuesday night I arrived but the first actor Dan Thomas could not make it because he had a family emergency. So I decided to move the filming date to the next Monday and my sister and I had to quickly find another main actor to play the boy on short notice. Luckily over the weekend we managed to get hold of Nathan to play the main role. 

On the Monday I prepared the equipment and set up for the shot, Nathan arrived and I helped calm him as he was quite nervous because his first scene was going to be just him and my sister, who luckily he already knows through a drama.

I decided to film all the moving shots with the Steadicam first then switch to the tripod to film all the still shots. I started with the moving shots because if I kept switching between the tripod and Steadicam, I would have to configure and reset the equipment to perfect balance every time.

I followed the story board first then I shot some other scenes that I thought would look good, I shot enough footage as it was only me working on it  and it’s better to be safe than sorry.  

Above is a picture of me filming Cara.

The shoot was going well until I was about to switch to the tripod and the battery died. I only own one battery so I could not swap to another, so I put it to charge and planned to film the rest the next day. The next day we filmed everything on the tripod.

The shot went well and the first part of the transition shot worked well. I measured the distance between the camera and Cara so when we pick up from the next shot on the wall, we will place the camera the same distance away. I have also taken stills of the beginning of the transition in the bedroom so later we can match up the framing and position of Cara.   

There were two positions for this Shot. The first was filmed using the Steadicam which was 29” away. The second was filmed on the tripod and was positioned 44” away.

Also when it came to focusing with the Steadicam I would set the focal depth, using a standard EFS 18-50 mm lens, first to where they were positioned, then I would set it to auto focus.

Intro Story board

Here is a story board of how the scene will look using the footage. The images go traditionally left to right and then down to the next row. (I apologise for the Windows back ground). 

This scene transitions into the next scene as Nathan passes the camera. 

Here are the pictures I have printed out to keep record of what the framing has to look like when this scene transitions into the next. 

The picture above is a still image of the first half of the transition shot which was filmed using the Steadicam from 29” away.

The Pictrues below were all filmed from 442 away using the tripod. 

These will help us frame Cara into the correct position on location for the transition shot. 

After the shoot I went through the ideas we had planned for the rest of the narrative scenes with Cara. I told her about the park idea and she liked the idea she would follow the boy to the park to see him with another girl, she still insisted that it wasn't to serious and that it was fun. She didn't want the message to show her to be sad and lonely, she would rather make fun out of the situation. For example, one of our ideas was that she would be swinging on a swing, and so would the boy, we would film it to make it look as if they were swinging next to each other. Then we would move or zoom out to reveal the boy is swinging next to another girl and Cara is on her own on another swing. Cara thought it was quite depressing so we changed it to Cara playing her guitar and standing in between the boy and girl on the swings in her dream/ unreal like state. she wanted to have a scene where she pushes the boy off and the girl runs over to help him. 

We had a similar scene that would be set in a cinema, where the boy and Cara are would be sitting next to each other in their seats, then it would zoom out and he he would be sitting next to another girl also. Cara didn't like this idea as much so we got rid of the cinema idea and added to the park areas. 

The next step will be to complete the narrative story board, get actors, set dates and make a shooting schedule.