Production: Stage 2 -- Filming Day 3

On the third day of filming we decided to film the beginning office scene when Frank is fired by his boss Lucas.

We used the room that was booked out by Brian when location scouting, It was a convenient location due to being in Jennison meaning we had less of a distance to carry equipment.

We manage to film this scene quite quickly as we knew what we were doing and learnt from any previous mistakes from last shoots.

Although there was some tension and debate about certain shots, we manage to get initial shooting done in the morning and pick ups in the afternoon.

After two previous shots of acting experience I found this scene easier to do and felt more relaxed and comfortable as the character of Frank. When I enacted the frustration in this scene, I truly felt the anger that Frank would feel and I wanted to convey this emotion as realistically as I could to the audience.

The director worked well on giving me acting directions.

Production: Stage 2 -- Filming Day 2

During the second day of filming we filmed again in Lawrence's flat this time filming "Frank's bedroom".

We found that the scenes we did took longer than the previous shoot due to more technical camera angles we used and the large amount of shots.

This scene required a large use of my facial expressions as there were a lot more close ups of my face. This was a good way for me to learn how to convey emotion to the audience and develop confidence in my acting skills.

We used more shots than required which gave the editor more of an option to choose from when editing the film.

Production: Stage 2 -- Filming Day 1

The first day of filming was done inside Lawrence's flat.

We used this location as the lounge scene for Frank's house.

The scenes only required me as the actor and as it was our first scene we've filmed it took some time to settle in and set up equipment.

The director, Shiv and I talked through what he wanted me to do within the scenes. As it was my first time for this film production it took a few goes so we had to do a few retakes. Although this sadly affected our time management and redoing too many scenes meant we did not have time to do any others we planned in the day.

We also had some issues with sound such as the mic attached to my collar, which was incredibly sensitive and would pick up a lot of loud rustle and static.

Seminar Short Film Project

Short film seminar session: 'The Phone'

In one of the seminars we were set to produce a short film which worked on continuity and had a simple understandable story.

They assigned us different locations in the EDA department to begin filming.

We shot the whole movie within the 2 hour session.

When shown to the tutor, several issues were identified:

• There was too much of a slow pan across an empty room at the beginning of the film.
• Every cut was a dissolve.
• We were missing several close ups such as when I was looking at the phone on the desk.
• Missing key continuity shots.
• No ending to the film.

We decided to do the pick ups required for the film and added more shots to flesh out the storyline and ensure continuity was prevalent in the film.

The finished film is show below:

Actors: Chi-Yin Wong (Me)
             Liam De Costa

Sound:  Brian Wong

Cameraman: Chris Robbins

Editor/Director: Lawrence Thomas James Maskell

Pre-Production: Stage 1 -- Acting Research from movies

Pre-Production: Stage 1 -- Research into Acting and Inspiration

Before production began I decided to some research into acting and looking at films for inspiration.

I have had prior acting experience when I was younger for a theater production of South Pacific. It has been a long time since acting and acting in front of a camera is different than on stage therefore I had to learn as if I was fresh to the experience.

I started with the basics and simply searched up how to act: http://www.wikihow.com/Act

Using this article I was able to learn the basics which enabled me the confidence and skill for acting in preparation for production of our film especially due to the film having minimal dialogue, a lot of the acting requires my body language and facial expression to be able to convey my characters though. The film is mainly action orientated which makes it easier to convey emotions such as fear, anger and concern.

I learnt that the most important points where:

• Pinpoint character traits: Come up with a back story for the character something only I know about the character and how that has influenced that character to be who he is now. His favorite food, music. Ethnic and cultural influences. I found it easy to relate to this character as I also have the same geek/otaku interests and also know how it feels to be undermined by an authority figure.

• Emote to ensure the audience can understand what the character is trying to convey without the use of words due to the lack of dialogue in the film.

• Do not break character, become the character. Get into method and almost live like the character. During the weeks of filming I tried to envision my life as Frank, I did not shave or get my haircut (also due to continuity), I wanted to feel the grubbiness that Frank would feel when he was unemployed and I would hold my whole demeanor as if I was Frank, luckily I enough am already quite a geek,

• Listen to the director, as the director knows the production and understands the vision he wants to create out of the film. Ask the director for questions before filming to ensure I know what he is looking for. Take criticism from them seriously and understand why they want you to act a certain way in a scene.

• Learn and familiarize with the script, so I was prepared and knew what I'd need to do for when I was on set. I read it multiple times and remembered any actions and lines which I would rehearse acting in different way doing multiple takes so I can evaluate my own acting skills.

Pre-Production: Stage 1 -- Location Scouting/Recce

We decided due to the pleasureful weather of that day, we would go location scouting for our location recce after out meeting.

Since we had just read the script we needed a suitable location for where the fight scene (the most prominent scene and where the majority of the film occurs) would be filmed. Preferably a wooded area.

For a suitable location it had to have the following attributes:

• Not a lot of traffic (people walking through interrupting shots).

• An adequate distance from roads and buildings (no noise interruptions from cars and people).

• Had some wide space enough for a fight scene to be performed.

Since we are filming on campus, it was perfect to find a location as there is a plentiful wooded area right on the hill of the campus.

As another member of the group and I had explored this area before we already had in mind certain locations in the forested area to be used for filming.

The area we scouted is located here:

The forest area by the University Road (51.294049, 1.067596)









Below are pictures I had taken of the location: