TASK 2
Shoebox Christmas Film
The task of this project was to create a Christmas short film inside a shoe box where our creativity could really be used as we could do it any way we wanted as long as it was mostly shot inside a shoebox.
Therefore I decided I would do my first ever stop motion film for this project as I could use the shoebox as a 'stage'. I even green screened the box to get the background I wanted.
Over 400 photos was used and over 70 hours of my time was put into this project for me to see whether I would be able to pull off a great first stop motion film. At the end of the film, you can see all the things I used to create the film.
One of the newest things that I decided to research was animation, as I wanted to know and understand how it all works because it's in about 90% of the films produced today. I did some research and found a program called Blender which once you know very well, can produce almost Disney level animations, and what's great is that it is a free program for anyone to use.
The image on the right is one snapshot render from my first animation I tried to do, where the character is doing a karate kick. As of right now I need to learn the program more for the animation to look decent enough for me to be satisfied, but at the moment, a still picture from it will do.
Radio Story
In a group, we were given a task to make a short radio style story, kind of like an audio book, where two narrators would read out a story that they made together. As it was horror themed, we all pitched in Ideas and eventually came up with this as our script. I wrote the script (Linked Word Document), Freddie pitched ideas, Sam edited the video (which you can see some of the editing steps below) and Leah and Daniella read out the story. Sam put in sound effects and music to make the story more suspenseful.
Sam's Editing
Script
Elevator Pitch for my Advert
For my advert, I will be making it on a pair of the Sony WH-Series headphones. These headphones are some of the best you can buy in the industry for the price it goes for and making an advert on it would make people realise what they are missing out on while listening to their music and watching their films. The style of the ad is going to be very simplistic but very cinematic so it’s eye catching to the viewers.
Evaluation
Overall I think the pitch for my advert went really well. I think I had spoken it clearly without any hiccups and felt like I had explained all the things that I thought were necessary well.
Audio Compression
Uncompressed
This audio clip here is uncompressed and this is what the audio sounds like without any compression effects enabled.
Compressed
This audio clip is compressed and you can tell a slight difference between the two if you listen carefully. Compressing the audio by making a threshold makes the louder parts quieter and the quieter parts louder.
Threshold – Anything above the threshold is compressed - ceiling
Ratio – The amount of compression
Attack – Measured in time (milliseconds) How long it takes for the compressor to kick in
Release – How long it takes for the compressor to stop (milliseconds)
Makeup Gain – Output of the compression – pushes the whole volume up, making the quitter bits louder
Compression – volume – dB – Decibel
Audio Parametric EQ's
No EQ
This example here is the EQ not being applied, it is standard flat.
EQ Applied
This example is with the EQ applied, I have put the higher frequencies down and you can hear a difference with the higher end.
Saving and Sorting Sound Effects
When saving sound effects, depending on your storage situation, you should be saving the sound effects as WAV. files if you can. This file type takes up more storage than MP3 or other variant of file type but has the best sound quality as the audio basically isn’t compressed, but by such a small amount that you can’t really tell. MP3 is another save option which frees up more storage if you are tight on it but reduces audio quality so you should only use this file type if your are low on storage space or when necessary.
Sorting sound effects should all be on a sound effect spotting sheet so you can visually see what the name of your sound effect is, what file name it is, what file type it is as well as where it’s saved. Doing this can save a lot of time in post-production in the editing room as the editor can just search up and go straight to that sound effect.
Example of a Sound Effect Spotting Sheet
Mastering Audio
1st Step: Set gain so it’s not higher than -6db
2nd Step: EQ: For vocals, put in a low pass filter for the higher frequencies so its rounded off, increase 2KHz – 3KHz to gain more clarity, then put down bass and mid bass to cut put any unwanted noise.
3rd Step: Mulitband Compression: Compression for certain frequencies instead of the whole frequency spectrum.
4th Step: Add in a limiter to push up the volume of the audio clip to the ceiling. +4db most