When my film was screened my film I was generally happy with the outcome and it played the way I wanted to on the three screens. I spend a lot of time when editing and it took several hours to achieve the texts on the screen, due to the phone moving. It also took a long time deciding what footage was used and what wasn't used and what needed to be cut down. If I was to do the project again I would film additional footage to make my film seem a bit more logical and easy to understand, and I also would make the text font bigger because it would make more sense if the viewer could see what was being said.

                                                         Several screenshots from my film.

Finished Piece

The editing process has been a long and tiring process. I have decided not to try and make each clip in time with each other as it is almost impossible to do so. I feel as if I have improved drastically with using After Effects and I feel as if my piece is coming together. Here are some screenshots of my work so far, near completion.

 
    Screen 1 timeline

 
    Screen 2 timeline

    Screen 3 timeline

Green Screen Examples

Flashing alarm clock phone

Using CC Power Pin to get a more accurate positioning of the image

To evaluate on my work, I feel that Simon's After Effects tutorials and various other tutorials online really helped me try and get the hang of After Effects. I would say I can use After Effects to a reasonable standard however I am going to continue to experiment with it and see what I can do. The 3 screen film has been a challenging project however it has made me think more about time management and the way in which I go about filming, editing etc with the time frame I give myself. 

When I put all of my footage together it sadly did not equal the full 60 seconds for each. Since a re-shoot was out of the question due to timing with the people involved in my film, I decided the best thing to do would be to film some additional scenes. I decided to film a bus sequence where I look around the bus, 2 being calm and still and one moving left to right frantically, suggesting he is worrying because he is in a rush. The second piece of additional footage I recorded was of a clock on the wall, in which every clip I had before in the kitchen, Thomas had looked up at the clock. This would help lengthen out my film to 60 seconds and help the person viewing the film understand it more.

Screenshots of the additional videos 

I decided to take my work to Simon for further comments and see what he thought of my updated piece. He liked the fact that all the screen's now play at the same time, however he felt there was something missing in the piece and that I needed to perhaps film additional footage or think of ways to lengthy out my work. I am going to take simon's advice on board and see if I an film any additional footage to improve my piece.

After attending friday's screening of our work so far, I felt confident in what I could do to improve my piece. Simon suggested allowing all 3 clips to run at the same time rather than pausing each one, which tends to make the piece not flow. In addition to this, there were slight editing errors with the shadows and the phones which needed to be resolved. In addition to this, he also suggested removing the green screen phone at the end, as it didn't look right. This constructive criticism has helped me think about my idea a little bit more and I am going to go off and think about ways in which I could improve my piece further.

I decided to look at different tutorials for my Time Art piece. I decided to look at Green Screen tutorials when keying out the green on the mobile and tracking tutorials to replace the green with a picture and make it move with the video. Here are screenshots of the tutorials:

Green Screen tutorial:

Tracking tutorial

I decided to look into another time-related film that is somewhat similar to my idea. I decided to look into the film 'The Butterfly Effect' made in 2004. The film itself follows a young man who blocks out harmful memories of important parts of his life, however as he grows up, he finds a way to remember these lost memories and a supernatural way to alter his life. The film relates to the actual idea of 'The Butterfly Effect', an interesting popular example of chaos theory that discusses how small initial differences may lead to bigger consequences over time. Again this is very similar to the idea I have, and the way in which the film was shot was quite interesting. 

I decided to film part of my film on Friday and part on Saturday. Filming took place after Joe's sound lesson and me, Thomas and Lauren came back to my house and filmed the first half of the film. The problem I automatically faced was that my room is very small, meaning it was hard to set up all the equipment. However filming itself only took around an hour however it took several takes to do due to the tight timing of my film. Also, Lauren looks great in a blonde wig.

On day two, I met Lauren and Thomas' in Farnham town and due to the weather luckily being good, we decided to film the couple meeting in a park instead of on the street, which would also come in handy because the town was very busy that day, meaning that filming there would've been hard.

The remaining shots only took an hour to film, and I ended up recording extra scenes in case I didnt have enough footage. Thomas' gave some good input during the day on how I could film certain scenes and Lauren gave a good performance. Overall filming on Both Friday and today were successful and I look forward to editing the film and seeing what final result I can get.

                                                        Panoramic view of the park.

When thinking of my idea, I decided to look at several pieces of work. Simon suggested some time-related films that have a similar narrative to the one I want to follow. A film simon suggested was 'Sliding Doors' , a 1998 romantic comedy following the life of Hellen Quilley. Her life alternates between two parallel universes based on the two paths that her character's life could take depending on whether or not she catches a train which causes her life to have different outcomes. The film itself much relates to what I want to do for my time art piece, which is that the slightest change in everyday life can make a big difference in the events that follow. 

Idea:

The idea behind this is to do with how people use their time and how the slightest change can make a big difference to what happens in your life. The idea is quite personal to me as I find that I am either early to something, or late. I regularly think about how I wish I could go back in time and change certain things. This inspired me to think of an idea where the same concept was happening in each screen, but because of time and the big effect it has on us, each screen pans out slightly different. Being punctual comes with organising your time correctly, which is why I want one screen to have the person being lazy and late, one screen where the person is organised and on time, and the other where the person is early because they have allowed themselves more than enough time to get everything done.

I want to create a simple, yet informative sequence of a man preparing to meet his girlfriend. The three screens will begin with a shot of a man sleeping in bed (Medium shot, still). In the background of each shot will be a clock. The clock in the background of the first screen shows 7:00am. The clock in the background of the middle screen shows 7:30am. The clock in the background of the third screen shows 8:00am.

Research:

The idea itself was quite personal to myself and mainly from moments in my life where these kind of things have occurred (being late, on time, early), however I read an interesting debate on ‘Debate.org’ that discussed the saying ‘If you’re early, you’re on time, if you’re on time, you’re late’. It talks about the capability of the phrase and really talks in detail about time and how ‘planning’ to be on time, doesn’t necessarily mean you will definitely be on time, which happens to me a lot. This is why I want to incorporate that idea in my film, that if you do not set yourself enough time to do something, and you do not prioritise your time, then there can be big consequences.

For inspiration, I looked into the idea of time management. I watched a video called ‘How to 
manage your time better’ by ‘Watchwellcast’ on YouTube. I found this video interesting in informing me of the ways in which you can spend your time and waste time. I found this interesting and it allowed me to think about ways in which time can affect events in your life.

Films such as ‘Shaun of the Dead’ for instance gave me ideas as to how I’d go about showing the importance of time management. The scene where Shaun forgets to book the table for their meal out is an interesting scene that shows the importance of time management and how forgetting to do one thing can effect everything. This I found interesting, which made me want to create the 3 screen film where one thing in each screen makes a different conclusion.  

Detailed Description/Shot breakdown:

First Screen (Early):

. 0:00-0:02: The man turns over, looks at the clock and goes back to sleep.

. 0:03-0:06: The man is asleep once again. The clock in the background quickly goes to ‘7:25 Am’.

. 0:07-0:19: The man wakes up, stretches, sprays on deodorant, slowly puts his clothes on and walks out of the room.

. 0:20-:0:26: Cuts to bathroom: The man slowly brushes his teeth, washes his face, plays with his hair and leaves the room.

. 0:27-0:37: Cuts to kitchen: The man is sitting down eating toast and reading a newspaper. He finishes his toast, picks up the flowers on the table and walks towards the door to leave. He realises he forgot the chocolates and walks back in and picks them up

. 0:38-0:42:  Cuts to Bus stop: Medium shot of him waiting patiently at the bus stop. He looks at his watch. He looks puzzled at his watch but shrugs.  

. 0:43-0:48: Cuts to interior bus shot. He looks happily at his phone and looks out the window.

. 0:49-0:54:  Cuts to a long shot of him getting off the bus. He walks up towards his girlfriend, kisses her and gives her the flowers and chocolates. She looks shocked and happy at the gesture. He smiles and looks down at his watch.

. 0:55-1:00: Close up of his watch. The watch says 8:00am

END.

Second Screen (On Time):  

.0:00-0:06: The man is sleeping in bed.

. 0:07-0:19: The man wakes up, stretches, sprays on deodorant, slowly puts his clothes on and walks out of the room.

. 0:20-:0:26: Cuts to Bathroom: Medium shot looking at the man slowly brush his teeth. He then washes his face, looks at himself in the mirror and leaves the room.  

. 0:27-0:34: Cuts to kitchen. Medium shot in front of him. He is sitting down eating toast and reading a newspaper. He finishes his toast, picks up the flowers on the table and walks towards the door to leave. He leaves the chocolates on the table.

. 0:35-0:42:  Cuts to Bus stop: Medium shot of him waiting patiently at the bus stop. He looks at his watch and looks back up.

. 0:43-0:48: Cuts to interior bus shot. He looks happily at his phone and looks out the window.

. 0:49-0:54:  Cuts to a long shot of him getting off the bus. He walks up towards his girlfriend, kisses her and gives her the flowers. She looks shocked and happy at the gesture. He smiles and looks down at his watch.

. 0:55-1:00: A POV shot of him looking down at his watch. The watch says 8:00am

END.

Third Screen (Late):

. 0:00-0:05- The man wakes up, stretches, looks at the clock and suddenly looks distressed because he is late.

. 0:06- 0:16:  The man frantically puts his clothes on and rushes past the camera, out of the door.

0:17-0:23:  Cuts to Bathroom: Medium shot looking at the man. He brushes his teeth, splashes water in his face then quickly walks out the room.

0:24-0:30:  Cuts to kitchen. Medium shot in front of him eating. He eats a slice of toast, leaving crumbs everywhere and proceeds to quickly walk out of the room. He forgets to pick the flowers up on the desk.

0:31- 0:36: Cuts to bus stop. Medium close up in front of the man sitting down at the bus stop looking worried waiting for the bus to come. He looks worryingly at his watch.

0:37-0:42: Cuts to interior bus shot. Medium close up in front of the man still looking worried and checking his phone.

0:43-0:50: Cuts to a long shot across the street from the bus. The bus drives away and we see him walk a short distance towards his girlfriend, who looks annoyed. As he walks up to her he looks apologetic, however she storms off in a temper.

0:51-0:54:  Cuts to a close up of his face. He appears upset and rubs his hand on his face. He looks down at his watch.

0:55-1:00: A POV shot of him looking down at his watch. It says 8:30am.

END.

Short Storyboard: 

Locations Used:

The locations themselves will not be too difficult to film in because the majority of them will be filmed at my house. The exterior shots, for instance the Bus stop shot and the meeting of the man and woman will be filmed in Farnham (Alma Lane, opposite my house for the bus shot and just opposite The Marlborough Head Pub for the meeting of the two).

Production Dates:

All scenes will be filmed on the morning/afternoon of Friday the 7^th. If weather conditions are bad then filming will take place the following day.

Editing will take place on the designated times given to us.

Equipment list:

Camera- Canon EOS 600D with a Tamron AF 17-50mm lens.

Tripod- Hama Star 63 

Shooting Risk Assessment:

When thinking of ideas for my project in relation to time, I came up with 3 ideas that I thought would be interesting to develop and 3 ideas that I felt comfortable narrowing down to one overall idea in the end (please excuse the terrible drawings)

Idea 1:

My first initial idea, is to do 3 time-lapses (One to every screen). The reason for this was because I am familiar to Time-Lapse's as I have made several amateur time-lapses in the past.



                        A short Time Lapse I made almost 3 years ago with a pocket camcorder.

The concept behind it was to have one screen that shows nature, for instance the leaves blowing in trees, the movement of water or the movement of the sky, which could be manipulated in After Effects. Another screen will show something completely different, for instance cars driving down a road, the movement of a train or the busyness of a cafe. Finally, the last screen would have perhaps be a time-lapse of the library or a man quietly reading a newspaper whilst sitting down on a bench, generally somewhere quiet, similar to the first screen.

The meaning behind the film would be that time is used in several different ways, and that the progression of time can be fast or slow, depending on the activity. For instance the movement of leaves in a tree is a slow process, if it is not windy, whereas the movement of cars in the day time is fast and constant.

Idea 2-

My second idea uses the concept of looking at how time has changed us and how we use the time we have. Three videos will appear on the screen with a clock in the middle of each. Each clock will be faded. One would be of a park. One would be of an outdated living room and the other would be of a modern boys bedroom.

   
       A photo I found when originally looking into Time-lapse's, which inspired me to use a clock in my film.

The first screen would start by showing the park and suddenly a portal effect appears, and I jump through it. I then proceed to play on the swings. The clock is moving at a regular pace. Whilst this is happening, the second screen (of the living room looking outdated and old) would then begin with a portal effect. I would then come through onto the second screen. The screen will show me with friends picking up a DVD and putting it into the DVD player. I then sit back down and watch the TV with my friends. Again a clock will be in the corner of the screen, moving slightly faster. The third screen will then appear. I come through the screen, and begin to play video games on a computer. This time the clock in the corner is moving very quickly.The first screen will be the main focus of the first 20 seconds, the second screen will then be the main focus between 0:20-0:40 and the third screen will be the main focus between 0:40-0:60 seconds.

Example of the kind of portal id like to create (Still from a Video Copilot tutorial)

The concept behind this idea was looking at how time changes us and how we've slowly become more and more unsociable. In addition to this, it looks at how we waste time and how different activities take up different amount of times.The first screen showed me exercising and socialising in a park, the second screen shows me being slightly less sociable, by staying inside rather than going out and the third screen is the present day, showing me not socialising in any way, and just sitting around in my room being lazy.

Idea 3-

My third idea was to have myself in all three screens, in a similar positions, handed myself photographs of my past.The middle screen will hand both myself on the left screen, and myself on the right screen, a photo of myself, from birth, to the present day. The photo's will be attached to a frame, meaning I will have to take each photo of myself out each time and put a different photo in the frame. The process itself seems quite long, however I feel it will be effective in remembering how time causes aging, and how we all mature into the person we are today.

So far during this term we have had 2 After Effect's tutorial lessons. I was excited to start this unit because I am fascinated at how visual effects are made in films, and hope to improve my knowledge of After Effects. Sadly, After Effect's is a program I've never used before, so I know that it will take some time to learn all the different features After Effect's has to offer. 

Lesson 1 

During our first lesson, we looked at the basic's of After Effect, in particular, 'Masking'. During the lesson we made a composite of video footage. We were firstly shown the basics of After Effects. For example how to change project settings to fit the footage you're working with, how to create solid shapes and how to create composites. The footage we we're given was not completely still, so we also were taught how to reduce the amount of shaky movement during a video. We then masked around the footage, to manipulate the water and the sky to whatever colour we wanted. I found this helpful as when you know how to accurately mask around an object, then you can do various things such as Green Screen masking. I found this task quite challenging to start, however as the lesson went along, I got familiar to the features. 

Lesson 2

During our second lesson, we looked solely on how to make a still image look as if it is moving. The image we were given was of a mountain. We were then shown many of the basics, such as how to add smoke filters onto the mountain, again using masking to select certain parts of the mountain that need to me moved and also how to remove certain parts of an image, and overlay them by using the blend tool. I found this challenging as I wanted the image to look as professional and natural as I could, however the actual outcome made the image look heavily edited. We also added other effects such as particle effects that gave the piece more of a realistic look. 

When thinking about time, I decided to look at places and the effect time has on them. I then decided to look at somewhere familiar to me, so I chose Chingford, where I grew up. I felt it would be interesting to look into the history of Chingford, to see how it has progressed over time and how much of an effect time really has had on Chingford of the Past/Present. I came across a section of a film posted on a page called 'Old Chingford', on Facebook.

The film was aired several years ago on BBC 2, looking into the history of Chingford. The film, called 'Chingford- Three Decades of Archive Film (50s,60s and 70s), looked at Chingford around that era. The film itself showed the progression of Chingford, for example the use of Steam Trains up until 1960 and a long establishing shot of the streets of Chingford. I found this particularly nostalgic because I recognised a lot of the locations, even though the footage was filmed so many years ago. 

Throughout the film, I was shocked to see how different some of the locations were. However, a lot for me were recognisable, and events such as Remembrance Sunday appear to be a very big event in Chingford in 1958, similar to today, where the event is still a very important day to the older and younger generation. 

The town that I was brought up in now seems so different to the way in which I had looked at it previously. The documentary style film made Chingford seem a very important part of London, which hosted several historic events. The documentary was very informative and really gave me a more in depth look at Chingford. The Documentary also showed me how time has such a big effect on places. Several landmarks had been knocked down and some parts of Chingford were somewhat unrecognisable to me, which I found quite saddening. Overall, the film was particularly useful in helping me think about time, and what effect it can truly have. 

A still from the film. 

When looking into time, I decided to look into the past and the present. I came across a website called ‘Buzzfeed’, which posted an interesting collection of photographs of locations in London that had history. The article ‘18 Photo’s of London’s past blended in with the present’ told an interesting story of how long ago some of these historic events truly occurred. It’s interesting to look at how the location has changed visually over a long period of time. This is truly shown by layering an older image of the location over a current image. For example a photo of Queen Victoria Street, had been overlaid by another photo of the bomb damage at number 21 Queen Victoria Street in 1941. 

The post itself made me feel quite nostalgic. For example an image of Hyde Park music festival in 1970 was blended over an image of the park today. This for me was nostalgic as I regularly go to Hyde Park and its interesting to look at the way its changed not just visually but culturally. 

Photo courtesy of The London Museum collection. 

Time, defined as 'an observed phenomenon, by means of which human beings sense and record changes in the environment and in the universe. A literal definition is elusive. Time has been called an illusion, a dimension, a smooth-flowing continuum, and an expression of separation among events that occur in the same physical location.'- techtarget.com

I feel that time can only be determined by the kind of person you are. I feel time is quite broad and very complex, which makes it challenging to define. I feel time is unpredictable, as we never know what time will tell. 

We all look at time differently. I feel time is a way of measuring the progression of our lives. As time progresses, so do we. Time keeps up organised and sane. I feel without time, our lives would be all over the place, especially mine.

Time has several pro's and con's. For example time helps us build up 'memories', we allow us to reminisce in times where we were happy, however it also can make us remember the times that made us sad.  

Photograph by Norvz Austria