It all began with assigning our groups, I was placed with Joe, Sam, Luke, and a level 2 media student who ended up not staying with us for long. I was assigned as the director with the mission to create a promotional video for West Kent College's own Artisan Restaurant.
The first problem we encountered was a lack of a brief, our group is exempt from the others because of how specific it is. We weren't creating a video for the colleges or their courses, it was instead purely for the Artisan. As the director and kind of group leader, I wanted to ensure a really strong communication with our client. So for this reason I set out to email Ian Chilcott almost immediately asking what he'd like to see in our production, what we should be covering. This is the email I received in return:
Thank you for your email. I would like you to liaise with Karen (manager) in the Artisan to take some footage of the Restaurant when it is busy. Yesterday would have been perfect but I understand that it was your day off.
- Busy lunch time
- Busy Thursday nights
- Interview with Karen about The purpose of the Artisan restaurant.
I have copied Karen into this email, please contact her to arrange
From the get-go I've treated this email like our client brief, it works because he's detailed the specific things that he wanted to see included. This is the way that the project has played out, we were generally always completely left to our own devices. Allowed to tackle the project how we wished, obviously remaining professional.
After receiving permission to film in the Artisan by talking to the manager Karen, we sat together as a group to organise our shooting dates (visible in my pre production) I believe that my time management and leadership skills came through here, I set my group off on the right track as quick as possible. Even though Ian was not consistently replying, I remained persistent in my messaging.
We only had until the 16th June to have our video complete and exported, I think we worked to agreed timescales very successfully.
We soon hit the biggest constraint of the project, a legal problem. We had just found the perfect track: "Keem The Cipher- Aloe" but unfortunately it was independently created by a lone artist. After emailing him and asking in a friendly manner whether we could use the track, he replied with this:
This quickly settled our legal problem, but arose a financial constraint. Being students, we don't really have the finance to pay for his video, especially considering he would normally charge £50
When filming in the restaurant, we really struggled to find a time where it was busy with lots of customers. Especially a busy evening- one of the things that Ian wanted us to include.
This is something that we never really managed to fix, the only way we managed to film multiple customers was by heading in on multiple days. When the client studying everyone else's videos had a look at ours he even pointed this out, saying the restaurant never looked busy enough. After reasoning with him and explaining that we just couldn't find a full evening, he seemed to agree. I pleaded this case to Deborah as soon I received this criticism. I think Luke and I performed really well as a group to vocalise this problem immediately rather than have it look like we just ignored their feedback. The sometimes vacant restaurant and shaky camera (mentioned further down) are the things that I'm the least happy with and would change if we had more time.
As for what our client thought of the video: After never finding a time where Ian Chilcott could arrive, he sent down the Artisan manager Karen and head chef Darren to evaluate it for him. They stated they would relay their decisions back to him. After watching it they both had similar decisions, they stated they both really enjoyed it; especially the music. And they were both pleasantly surprised by their involvement in the interviews, Karen especially was slightly concerned about how they would come off.
It seemed from this point that we'd already achieved the agreed outcomes, creating a successful promotional video to showcase the Artisan. The final thing that needed to be fixed was a regulatory problem, our Artisan logo at the beginning of the video was created by us. But the client stated that he wanted to see the college and Artisan logo displayed at the beginning and end. The college logos were easy to add but we ran into a problem when trying to add the Artisan logo, it was very small and blurry. I brought this up with Deborah and stated that i'd rather use our created logo at the start and just use the Artisan official logo at the end. Making it smaller in the credits sequence increases the quality because of the fact that it was sent as a small image. I exported one version that has our logos but the artisan at the very end to test it, she stated it works.
I would say that overall my filming skills have improved and i've even acquired some new editing skills. Firstly the way in which my camera skill has improved primarily refers to tripod-panning shots, specifically high up. Because of my height and arm reach I had the idea of holding up the camera-mounted tripod into one of the very top corners of the restaurant to pan from right to left. This shot turned out really well and it was even praised by some peers and our clients. Utilising my height in this manner hadn't exactly crossed my mind.
The way in which my editing has developed refers to visual effects. We had a big problem at first with shaky camera, we weren't using the tripod enough on that first shoot. So we tried a new effect 'Warp Stabiliser' this effect basically halts any shaking, focusing on the very centre focus of the video. This salvaged so much footage and we even had to share it with the rest of the class because of how effective it was!
As for what my peers think of our production, It seems as though the response is generally good. Alot of people state they like the music and the tone, as well as some of the pretty shots. But the criticism arrives at both the interview scene and one particular shaky camera nearer the end. Here are two examples:
Tim: "The use of tracking and pull focus shots were very getting along with the style of editing that kept the video light along with good use of cutting to the beat. different mic used during interviews would have been nice but other than that great!"
Reece: "I thought that the edit was amazing, smooth and works well with the music. There was a couple of shots that could have been re done, for instance the shot where it pans the alcohol could have been taking again and stability could have been improved. besides that it works very well and is impressive to watch"
The problem with the interview, as also brought up by the client and tutor is that it cuts too violently from the smooth beats into this faster paced interview. I tried my very best to fix this, making the transition alot slower and more obvious to separate those scenes, Deborah and the client were happy with the outcome but it is still not perfect as proved by the peers response. I believe it is better in this form than the alternative, the reason I cut it this way was because not only does the interviewee state something that can't be used along the lines of "The students could be doing more" But the scene also has loud music in the background from the restaurant. I take responsibility for this obvious mistake as I was in charge of setting up the interview, I should have asked for the music to be turned off during the filming.
Overall I believe we met all of our requirements, carrying out the client's simple email brief while maintaining a strong communication with all clients, tutors and team members. To conclude, here is my feedback from my tutor Deborah:
After receiving permission to film in the Artisan by talking to the manager Karen, we sat together as a group to organise our shooting dates (visible in my pre production) I believe that my time management and leadership skills came through here, I set my group off on the right track as quick as possible. Even though Ian was not consistently replying, I remained persistent in my messaging.
We only had until the 16th June to have our video complete and exported, I think we worked to agreed timescales very successfully.
We soon hit the biggest constraint of the project, a legal problem. We had just found the perfect track: "Keem The Cipher- Aloe" but unfortunately it was independently created by a lone artist. After emailing him and asking in a friendly manner whether we could use the track, he replied with this:
This quickly settled our legal problem, but arose a financial constraint. Being students, we don't really have the finance to pay for his video, especially considering he would normally charge £50
When filming in the restaurant, we really struggled to find a time where it was busy with lots of customers. Especially a busy evening- one of the things that Ian wanted us to include.
This is something that we never really managed to fix, the only way we managed to film multiple customers was by heading in on multiple days. When the client studying everyone else's videos had a look at ours he even pointed this out, saying the restaurant never looked busy enough. After reasoning with him and explaining that we just couldn't find a full evening, he seemed to agree. I pleaded this case to Deborah as soon I received this criticism. I think Luke and I performed really well as a group to vocalise this problem immediately rather than have it look like we just ignored their feedback. The sometimes vacant restaurant and shaky camera (mentioned further down) are the things that I'm the least happy with and would change if we had more time.
As for what our client thought of the video: After never finding a time where Ian Chilcott could arrive, he sent down the Artisan manager Karen and head chef Darren to evaluate it for him. They stated they would relay their decisions back to him. After watching it they both had similar decisions, they stated they both really enjoyed it; especially the music. And they were both pleasantly surprised by their involvement in the interviews, Karen especially was slightly concerned about how they would come off.
It seemed from this point that we'd already achieved the agreed outcomes, creating a successful promotional video to showcase the Artisan. The final thing that needed to be fixed was a regulatory problem, our Artisan logo at the beginning of the video was created by us. But the client stated that he wanted to see the college and Artisan logo displayed at the beginning and end. The college logos were easy to add but we ran into a problem when trying to add the Artisan logo, it was very small and blurry. I brought this up with Deborah and stated that i'd rather use our created logo at the start and just use the Artisan official logo at the end. Making it smaller in the credits sequence increases the quality because of the fact that it was sent as a small image. I exported one version that has our logos but the artisan at the very end to test it, she stated it works.
I would say that overall my filming skills have improved and i've even acquired some new editing skills. Firstly the way in which my camera skill has improved primarily refers to tripod-panning shots, specifically high up. Because of my height and arm reach I had the idea of holding up the camera-mounted tripod into one of the very top corners of the restaurant to pan from right to left. This shot turned out really well and it was even praised by some peers and our clients. Utilising my height in this manner hadn't exactly crossed my mind.
The way in which my editing has developed refers to visual effects. We had a big problem at first with shaky camera, we weren't using the tripod enough on that first shoot. So we tried a new effect 'Warp Stabiliser' this effect basically halts any shaking, focusing on the very centre focus of the video. This salvaged so much footage and we even had to share it with the rest of the class because of how effective it was!
As for what my peers think of our production, It seems as though the response is generally good. Alot of people state they like the music and the tone, as well as some of the pretty shots. But the criticism arrives at both the interview scene and one particular shaky camera nearer the end. Here are two examples:
Tim: "The use of tracking and pull focus shots were very getting along with the style of editing that kept the video light along with good use of cutting to the beat. different mic used during interviews would have been nice but other than that great!"
Reece: "I thought that the edit was amazing, smooth and works well with the music. There was a couple of shots that could have been re done, for instance the shot where it pans the alcohol could have been taking again and stability could have been improved. besides that it works very well and is impressive to watch"
The problem with the interview, as also brought up by the client and tutor is that it cuts too violently from the smooth beats into this faster paced interview. I tried my very best to fix this, making the transition alot slower and more obvious to separate those scenes, Deborah and the client were happy with the outcome but it is still not perfect as proved by the peers response. I believe it is better in this form than the alternative, the reason I cut it this way was because not only does the interviewee state something that can't be used along the lines of "The students could be doing more" But the scene also has loud music in the background from the restaurant. I take responsibility for this obvious mistake as I was in charge of setting up the interview, I should have asked for the music to be turned off during the filming.
Overall I believe we met all of our requirements, carrying out the client's simple email brief while maintaining a strong communication with all clients, tutors and team members. To conclude, here is my feedback from my tutor Deborah:
The final video is well crafted. Shot choices well made and
visually balanced. Cutting is generally to the beat and visual and audio tempo
in synchronicity. The logos, credits and house style has been adhered to. This
is an engaging promotional video.
There are a couple of slight alteration which would have
improved the overall product: if the interviews had been conducted without the
radio noise, as this is a little intrusive and filming had been scheduled
during some busier times in the restaurant to depict it as a more ‘buzzing’
environment.
I've underlined the three key things that are stated here, the first being how it is an "Engaging promotional video" this confirms that we've achieved the outcomes and accomplished what we set out to do. She also confirms the negative points that i've mentioned: the loud music and the lack of customers. These are slight alterations that I must take into account for any next project I create, but they don't ruin the project on a whole.
