DIRECTIONS: Workshop with Steve Finn

As I was ill on Monday today was my first session with Steve Finn. I was looking forward to meeting him and hearing his stories and what he had to say as he has directed a block of Eastenders recently which I love watching. The workshop we did today included getting a small cast and crew together and filming one page of a script.

It was a scene in an office with two employees, a man, Robert and a women, Helen and after a lot of analysing we had worked out that Robert was quite high up in their business, possibly had part-ownership and he committed fraud and was leaving the job. We then found out that Helen was further down in the business, had framed him for the crime and stitched him up. 

After we worked out who the characters were we created the scene and we were our own directors. I had Sophie and Jack as my Helen and Robert, Callum as my cameraman and Oliver as my sound man. After a bit of a think I set up a table and chairs with the camera in front of them, then got Sophie to walk in and start talking, while Jack was looking through his filing cabinets getting his paperwork out because he was packing his things away. I think it worked well but then Steve explained to me that I needed to act more like a director and 'block' my scene out. I should have been standing in different places as if I was the camera, rather than behind the camera and seeing how it played out on there. This was all really good feedback and I learnt a few new things today. For next week we were given new scripts and we have to plan how we will direct them, before filming on Monday. I am hoping to make this scene better than the one today as I will have time to plan it and I won't have to think about it on the spot.