MDDN 211 - Interview

So i have been absolutely horrid at updating my work on the blog for this whole paper in general. So here's a sort of recap on what ive been doing for the past assignment!

First off ill start by uploading the storyboard for the assignment. I intended to interview a club of people called the Company of the Dragon. They do medieval reenactment and western martial arts (SWORD FIGHTING!) Before anyone asks or thinks it, NO it is NOT like LARPING. Seriously, those nuts give us bad names! The Company of the Dragon use real metal weapons and though they practice the art as safely as possible, some serious injuries can still happen. The members wear armour that can range from 15 kg to 25kg full plate, wearing full faced helms and carrying steel weapons that weigh approximately 2-4kg each. This is no joke (unlike LARPING, which is a joke in everyone's eyes). I decided to interview this group because i was a member of a similar club in my hometown of Palmerston North, where i participated in Medieval Reenactment for about 7 years.
Storyboard:

I got the film (with the help of Josh Hargreaves) of the Company of the Dragon all in one sweep. I had about an hour and a half of footage to sift through and sort out so that the audio files from the recording device matched up with the video files. That was a fun fun fun job... took a long time and i have a few audio files left over that i cant seem to pair with any of the video.. But i have what i needed. The interview, once put together in Premiere will be just shy of three minutes, because im interviewing a group of people about a common hobby, rather than a single person (which seems to be a big theme). Somehow i feel like my interview will be easier to make longer because i talked to about 4 or 5 different people and got lots of different footage from the questions i asked.

MDDN 211: Proposal

The intended concept theme for Assignment One Iterate is Lava and its effect on landscapes. I will edit together found footage of volcanos, lava and smoke to create three different iterations with different atmospheric moods. There will be a visible contrast between the created atmospheric moods to make a difference. I intend to rely heavily on the editing techniques used for each iteration to create the atmosphere rather than relying on music or sound.

The first chosen iteration's atmosphere is Aggression. Lava has the natural appearance of aggression because of its danger, especially when a volcano is erupting. To create the impression of anger without using these particular scenes will require the editing techniques of jump shots, cross-cutting and speeding up footage to make each scene appear as if there is an intense motive behind the movement of lava. This will make it appear as if it has a purpose and look like it has somewhere to go. The speed will definitely affect the atmosphere of lava. Using jump cuts will remove a lot of unnecessary footage of slow moving lava, which will assist in making it look as if the lava has motive. Also, cross cutting to over events that are occurring such as plumes of smoke or flowing lava will make it appear as if all of the footage is occurring from one volcano.

The second chosen atmosphere is Melancholy, a complete opposite to the previous iteration. This will create a large contrast between the two while using similar themed footage. Again, due to eruptions of a volcano, creating a Melancholic feel to the footage will require a large focus on the particular editing techniques, without relying solely on sound. Slow cutting will make the shot appear more emotional to the viewer, as a clip over 15 seconds long approximately appears to be slow in Western culture. Dissolve will be particularly important to create a melancholic feel. Slowing down footage and using rewound footage would create a slow, melancholic feel. By using match shots between shapes found in the smoke or lava to the shape of more emotional, sad images or footage, the melancholic atmosphere is more easily created.

The final iteration atmosphere is Tension created by the sense of stalking and following. This is the more comedic iteration over the other two. To create the sense of tension, the order of footage will be most important. It can be created by footage of lava appearing on shot is following an anxious character using cross cutting. This will give the impression that both shots are occurring at the same time and making it look as if the lava is following the character. Establishing shots could be used to create this scene with the anxious character. It is possible that a montage of jump shots could be used to show the character running from the emerging lava, cutting a long scene of running down into a few short shots.

MDDN 211 - Found Footage

From my first attempt at finding footage to use for the theme of Volcanoes / Lava I have come up with a few videos, each with footage that can be used in multiple iterations. I get the feeling that once i start editing, 1 minute will be a lot shorter than i originally think. Therefore, some of the videos that are linked below might not actually be used.
I also found a video called Burn, that involves a lot of things being set on fire. A specific scene in the video is a man on fire running down a hallway and collapsing on the table. This sped up - Could increase its aggression, which would work fabulously.

Lava and volcanic eruption videos:
http://vimeo.com/57103247
http://vimeo.com/63518399
http://vimeo.com/6793654
http://vimeo.com/8648162
http://vimeo.com/67687294
http://vimeo.com/24084400

Burn video:
http://vimeo.com/20706577

MDDN 211 - Video Theme

For Assignment One, we need to select a theme for the video iterations we are creating. The examples that were shown in the lecture today were the theme of Coffee, a theme of Meat and a theme of Babies. Each theme has three videos with a different atmosphere "emotions".

The theme that i have chosen is 'Lava'.

Lava is interesting to turn into atmospheric emotions. I have chosen to make the iterations into:
                                              - Aggression
                                              - Soothing Calm
                                              - Stalking / Following

Because Volcanoes and lava is naturally aggressive, especially when they are erupting, I intend to use different footage other than eruptions to create an aggressive atmosphere, specifically by speeding up flowing lava and using fast motion footage. This will make the aggressive lava appear to have a purpose, giving it aggression by giving it motive.
To create a Soothing Calm, the opposite effect would need to be created to get that atmosphere. Slowing down the footage to make the lava appear calm and nearly ambling with no purpose, as well as using a lot of softer footage to create a calm appearance.
To make the iteration of stalking or following, footage of a suspicious person who seems to keep looking over their shoulder and appearing worried about their own safety. If this was put alongside footage of lava appearing over a hill or over a ledge, making it look as if the lava is 'watching' the person. This will give the appearance of the lava stalking the person.

I do not want to rely on the music to get the atmosphere but would prefer to rely on the footage. It is important that the music or sound effects support this footage, but don't over-rule it and take away from the effect created by the footage.