Reflective evaluation

I feel our finished film is a success, and am happy with how it turned out. We had many issues that affected how the film looked and sounded, but the finished piece is close to how I imagined it whilst planning. We originally intended our nightmare sequence to be longer, with two more 7 second film clips and other scenes shot on tape. However, unfortunately due to issues developing the film two film clips were destroyed, leaving us with only the other two. I feel the strongest areas of the film are the opening and nightmare sequences, where the pace of the film is much quicker than other scenes, we experimented a lot with different styles/imagery and the music helped create atmosphere in these scenes. The saturation fading down the tunnel conveyed the protagonist’s blindness, and the low quality of the hi8 tape format added to this. Weak points of our film are that some parts, like the reception, lift and corridor scenes are quite slow and boring, as well as being too narratively driven. We gave the film a subtle, non-linear narrative that can be interpreted by the viewer, but the narrative elements of the film detract from the experimental, stylistic scenes that don’t require narrative.

Although most of the slow narrative parts were too slow and unexperimental, I did like think the lift scene was unnerving and emotional, and I’m happy with how the footage looked.

I feel our use of three formats was successful in conveying the varying states of the protagonist’s vision; tape whilst blinded, film (and more abstract footage on tape) for the nightmare sequence as we see through his minds eye, and digital as he awakes and takes off the bandage, connoting his sight has recovered and colour/quality has returned. The tape/film sequences also suggests a time difference, as if decades had passed between scenes, and technology had improved. Although this is not what we intend through this, it makes time much more ambiguous. We also scratched into exposed 16mm film for the scratch transition to the corridor scene, and scratched/burnt into 35mm film for the burning into the nightmare scene and the titles.

I was inspired to use the camera formats we did by The film’s Gummo and Julien Donkey Boy by Harmony Korine. Julien Donkey Boy was a dogme95 film shot on MiniDV, transferred to 16mm and blown up to 35mm, giving the film an ugly, off coloured aesthetic that is as headache inducing as the camerawork. In Gummo, Korine shot much on 35mm and handed out 16mm, 8mm, VHS, hi-8 tape and Polaroid cameras to the crew to use in the film. The varying mediums and saturation levels were also inspired by how Tarkovsky used both colour and black and white in all of his films shot in part in colour, from Solaris (1972) to The Sacrifice (1986).

From shooting the film I learnt a lot about scheduling shoots, as it was nearly winter and we required daylight for many shots, meaning we often couldn’t film past 4pm. Deciding to shoot on 3 formats was my own individual contribution to the film. I shot film as a hobby, and decided to attempt shooting 5fps video individually before we started shooting the film. The effect was successful, and so I pitched the idea to Natalie and we agreed to incorporate it in the nightmare sequence. I had not seen any similar effect used in film before, and had little idea how the footage would look, so the effect was very experimental. Shooting using a low frame rate was inspired by the opening scene of Chungking Express (Kar Wai, 1994). Step printing was used to repeat frames, lowering the frame rate of the footage from the scene. A slow shutter speed/camera shake makes these frames of the scene blur, creating a jumpy, blurred style that conveys the rushed, cramped and claustrophobic street setting perfectly. To create our slow frame rate sequences, the frames were placed two frames apart in a 10 fps sequence. The second tenth of a second of each frame I flashed black, making each frame flash on for 1/5 second then flash black for 1/5 second.

 I also suggested shooting on tape, yet we had both previously used tape in our film last year, Scarlet Heath. We worked well as a team and balanced the workload between us well. I did the majority of the cinematography, whilst Natalie recorded most of the audio. Working in a team did not prove a challenge, yet working in such a small group made shooting to simply carrying equipment to the set difficult and time consuming. Thankfully our actor, Dan helped us carry equipment and set up for shoots. We both came up with the concept of the film together; we went through many different ideas before settling on the story of a blind man who mysteriously doesn’t realise the disrepair of the world around him.

The lampshade man scene was a scene I had planned personally, and felt it was not as successful as I had hoped. As I held the lamp and played the lampshade man, Natalie filmed, and the footage was not how I imagined it. I imagined the footage being extremely subjective, filming the mans hands as it made contact with first the shoulder of an unseen receptionist (making him believe he was in the presence of a person), then he feels again and it has mysteriously turned into a lamp, making him question his sanity, reality or expect the supernatural. Unfortunately, the first shot had a poor zoom mid shot, the shoulder was visible far too early and her shadow blocks half of the shoulder, and in the second shot the lamp is visible far too early. This damaged the meaning of a scene, and so it is now harder for the viewer to follow. Apart from this  small issue I am happy with how we worked as a group.

Although I am happy with how the film turned out, I feel it hasn’t aided much in professional skills development. Filming using tape and stills film are not popular formats to shoot on, and shooting on these is not developing professional cinematography skills in the same way shooting on a high end digital camera may. There was very little actor direction, and our choice of location was unrealistic for a practical, professional film. However, I learnt a lot about how to go about planning and creating an experimental film in small groups or as an individual, as many experimental films are. I also got the opportunity to edit to some fantastic music which helped create atmosphere and gave me experience filming for and editing to music, which is a useful skill for editing and music video production, an area I am interested in.

Bibliography

Kar Wai, W. (Director). (1994). Chungking express [DVD]. Hong Kong: Criterion Collection.

Korine, H. (Director). (1997). Gummo [DVD]. USA: fine line pictures.

Korine, H. (Director). (1999). Julien donkey-boy [DVD]. USA: fine line pictures.

Tarkovsky, A. (Director). (1972). Solaris [DVD]. Soviet Union: Artificial Eye.

Tarkovsky, A. (Director). (1986). The Sacrifice [DVD]. Soviet Union: Artificial Eye.

Post-Production

final cut link

We filmed, as planned, using 3 mediums; tape, film and digital, to reflect the varying ways in which the protagonist views the world.

I scratched the titles onto partially exposed ends of 35mm film strips, making the image vary in brightness.

The film grew a sort of possible, non-linear narrative from the experimentation,  that the protagonist had visited this hotel in it's (and his) prime, burnt the hotel by accidentally dropping a cigarette (and perhaps perishing with it) which caused the fire that ultimately destroyed the hotel. Blinded by guilt and unable to see/accept what he has done, we see him return in a dreamlike state, unaware of the hotel's disrepair, reliving his terrible past. He then awakes in the clear, truthful present, having, through his subconscious suppressed guilt resurfacing through the nightmare, come to terms with what he has done, he takes off the bandage and sees again, and we, like him, see the world in it's true colour.

The second nightmare shot was achieved by shooting burst mode at 5fps as the man takes a drag, and as he breathes it out, I stopped recording and tightened the tripod at the same time to preserve the frame as if it were still recording. Natalie then donned a Poncho and danced as the shutter was left open for up to 30 seconds per shot, as me and Dan altered the light. I varied the exposures to make the figure vary in blurriness, altering the aperture to correct the exposure. This effect allowed us to manipulate time entirely, tricking the viewer into thinking they are viewing real time, when actually they are viewing 30 seconds at intervals, condensed into each frame and presented as continuation.

The two shots give unnatural lifelike features, such as veins and a ghostly apparition. This anthropomorphises the hotel, as it is a character in the film, and adds to the guilt the character feels; did he burn this place, and if so, did anybody perish? the growing black vains and ghost could be those haunting him in his nightmare, or could simply be a figment of his own tormented mind.

Daniel Dowson, the star and musician of the film, with the lampshade. We didn't use many shots where he also played the lampshade man walking around at night. He allowed us to use some of his music for the piece, which fit perfectly with very little editing, as if made for the piece.
Links to the music used for the Opening and Nightmare sequences on Soundcloud.

For the end of the nightmare i quietened the track and mixed it with the background sound, panning it to appear as if it were emanating from his sleeping head. As the man wakes, the music disappears.

The Pentax Q we shot the digital part on. The small sensor and scale of it make it similar in depth of field and camera shake to the tape camera. The sensor is so small, the crop factor from 35mm is x5.6. The 8.5mm lens was adapted down to 3.825mm, equivalent to a 21.42mm lens.

The tape camera was a Samsung VP-L500, standard consumer hi8 tape camera. Due to it's inability to transfer digitally i filmed a television screen playing the footage. The screen stretched the footage to the 16:9 proportions, and i recorded it on a Canon EOS 550D at 16:9 (1920x1080) I then squeezed the footage in to 1440x1080, the correct 4:3 format.

I burned holes into an exposed end of film of varying sizes, scanned these and put them in order to create the burning of the film after the cigarette drops. This connotes the dropping of the cigarette could damage the film itself, and could perhaps be the cause of the location's destruction.

 I shot the animation sequences using the canon EOS 5, as planned. I shot on fomapan 400 black and white film, and developed the film using a budgetary/stylistic alternative to traditional developer, Caffenol. The mixture includes Coffee (caffeinated), washing soda, vitamin C and water. The image is darker, grainier and higher contrast than most developers. I left the film out to dry in the open to collect dust and hairs. I then cut them into strips to scan.






I discovered the wide angle adapter i used for the pentax q could also be held over the lens of the tape camera to create an extremely distorted fisheye effect. This helped create an uneasy feeling that we are seeing through the eyes of an unseen observer.








We booked and using the steenbeck, but ultimately scanned the 16mm scratch transition. I made sure to scratch a large area with no black at all to make the transition completely hidden. The transition is important, for it marks the transition from seeing the truth, feeling pity through dramatic irony for the man, to a much more subjective view of the world, as we see the intact hotel he is imaging and visualising in his head for his surroundings.





Although not the best software,  I edited on Motion 5, as it was affordable I could use it at home, allowing me to edit, develop and scan in the same place.