Semester Reflection

These last couple months have been very productive. I have created my most favorite video projects I've ever made. I was editor for each one, so my skills in that regard have increased significantly. The projects in question were a Commercial for Reese's Puffs, Music Video for Seventeen by Peach Pit, and an original short film named Roughhouse Rock. I have grown a lot as an editor.

Reese's Puffs Civil War Commercial

This was my first project of the year, and definitely my favorite. My team of five was assigned to make a commercial either 30 or 60 seconds long. Deciding on Reese's Puffs as the product, and the American Civil War as the setting, I was already very excited about the project. 

Filming went very smoothly, taking only 2 hours to get everything we needed. Our actors worked with us very well, with our own Courtney playing the wife as well as directing.

In editing, I learned how to color correct with Courtney's help. It was also my first time in editing music to fit what we filmed. I remembered a certain part from a favorite classical piece of mine and dropped it in. It fit pretty well, but not perfectly, so I made many splits and crossfades to have It match as well as it does now.

Everything about this project was nearly perfect, and it turned out excellent. That's why it's my favorite.

Music Video

Our second assignment of the year was to create an original music video for a song of our group's choosing. My group of four had some trouble picking a song, though. It took us 3 days to finally decide on Seventeen by Peach Pit.

We had our first shoot day on a Sunday night, and it did not go too hot. We filmed the intro scene too late in the evening, so we had to scrap that. We got some workable shots that night, but we were kind of down. Wednesday afternoon was our second shoot day, and we got the bulk of the video filmed that day, burning through the park scenes, intro, and closing shots. Our last shoot day was Friday. we shot the colorful band scenes that night in front of my projector and were finally finished with production.

In post, I went OFF. I had about three days to edit everything, and edit I did. I submerged myself in the effects tab of Premiere Pro, finding cool effects and figuring out how to make them look good. After a total of 14 hours spent in front of the Mac computer I took home, I was finished with editing.

I learned many new effects and techniques in Premiere with this project. It's the one that taught me the most.

Roughhouse Rock

My last project of the semester was to create a short film. My group was three strong and we were itching to make something we were proud of. Individually, each of us had written a short story script for a previous assignment, and we decided to pick from there. My script was just plain bad. It was about a plane crash and there was sand everywhere in it. It didn't make sense and it was not feasible.

We chose Jack's script. His was about a band manager who is in charge of an awful group and finally snaps. It was the most realistically possible film of ours. I took the script and re-wrote it into something fit for the screen and drew up some story boards. There was a problem, though. We could only film on one day. We couldn't mess around.

It was Saturday and time to film. Things got off to a rocky start, but we got on track eventually. Filming at three different locations over the course of 8 hours, we managed to get done. 

Editing at home in my bedroom was a new experience for me, as well as a stressful one. I got through it ok though, even with the multiple instances where Adobe crashed, erasing half an hour's worth of work each time.

I am pretty happy with how it turned out, but if I was able to I'd fix the music in the transition from the bedroom to the parking lot.

Guest Speakers

Social Media Apex came in to speak to us one day. Their whole presentation was a sell for us to come and intern for them, and I was interested at first. But after seeing what they were offering for us to edit, I became uninterested. I hated doing unimaginative commercials.

I was not present when Gordon Lamb came in.

Drew Connors, a recent graduate from my Northwest came in as well and talked to us about the importance of character arcs and development. 

Reflection

I am now embroiled in our class's feature film as an audio engineer, editor and script writer. I can't wait to get started and exercise everything I've learned.

Roughhouse Rock Short Film

Dominic Vergara, Jack Weidner and I decided to make a short film together. Jack had written a script about a band manager being in charge of a really annoying group of people, so we decided to make our film based on that. Roughhouse Rock is the product.

Pre-Production

We started with revising Jack's script. I headed that operation, and operation it was as I practically rewrote everything past Marc waking up. 

We wrote some story boards so we had a good idea for the beginning shot of Marc tossing and turning in bed before waking up to Kacey's call. Except we scrapped that and put in AFTER Kacey's call. I think it turned out better, honestly.

We got our actors, script and costuming the day after, as well as our locations, so we were ready to film it all on that Saturday.

Production

I worked that Saturday from 10-3 so Jack and Dom had to start without me at 1 pm. When I got to their location however, they said that they were unable to get anything good yet. The camera didn't fit on the tripod we checked out so Dom had to go find one to use and they couldn't find the mic for the boom pole (which I found sitting in Jacks car). I helped Jack get everything rolling, though, and we finished filming that midnight phone call and bedroom scene in about an hour and a half, ending a little before 5 o'clock.

Next was the shot of walking into the studio. Jack Avery and I rolled up to the Dillard parking garage at the Oak Park mall while Dom went to go pick up Quinn. While I was getting the dolly out of the car Jack just went ahead and filmed Avery walking into the building in a really long (almost a minute) tracking shot. It looked good, and the cops showed up, so we called that scene a wrap and headed to our next location.

Jack Avery and I arrived at JCCC at about a quarter 'til 6 o'clock and found a nice spot for our hallway and stairwell fight scenes. We figured out shots and sequencing over the course of about 5 minutes or so and head back to where we parked to wait for Dom and Quinn. They arrived some couple minutes later and we explained what we were shooting to them on the walk back over to the building. We reached it only to find it locked. JCCC closes at 6. We panicked slightly, but luckily there was a different building they kept unlocked. We headed in and the first thing we found was a perfect staircase - better than the one before. We filmed the first part of the fight scene in less than an hour.

Finishing up in the building, we moved onto the ending scene of Marc knocking out both Kacey and Bradley. I played the part of Bradley after our actor bailed. I choreographed the punches like I did the stairwell and we filmed it in about 15 minutes. It was time for our final scene.

It was around 8 when we got to the Iverson's house. We went into their studio (which I prepared the day before) and got to filming as quick as we could. We filmed all the shots with both Marc and Jacob in them first, but then our camera died. Luckily we had a battery charger, and Jack's personal DSLR, so we just kept going, hoping that what we shot with the new camera wasn't to different. We filmed some more, then Jack's camera died. We kept doing this back and forth until eventually we finished with Marc's solo shots at 9:45 pm, concluding our NINE-HOUR shoot for our FIVE MINUTE film.

So Basically

Editing is editing. I did my thing - went ham and all - and turned the film in a day late after a couple days spent in front of my computer at home.

I am pretty happy with how this turned out. Very proud, in fact. I still can't believe we filmed it all in one long day, and I can't FATHOM  how Avery stuck through it ALL with us. 

Shout out to Avery for being a great actor, in more than just the traditional sense. He sacrificed his entire Saturday and kept encouraging us to keep going when we thought we wouldn't get it done.

The only thing I wish I could change was how the music cuts pretty bad at the jacket transition from bedroom to parking garage. That's about it though. 

Very satisfied with the finished product.