PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE: Project Evaluation

I started this project open to any type of 'real-life' work as I hadn't had any work experience or ever had to create work for someone other than my own student projects. I originally wanted to do a work placement, until I heard about the commissions at the Guildhall Museum, and the 100 Objects That Made Kent exhibition.

Pre-production
I agreed a date to meet Rachel and Steve at the museum at the beginning of the project to find out what they expected from me and my film. It seemed pretty straight forward to create a story from an object and I started by researching into the 100 objects exhibitions and choosing which object I wanted to film. At the first meeting Rachel said it would be good to have a video for the Fly Tool and that it has a good story behind it, this is what made me want to take on the tool and create a professional video for it. 

I started by creating the script which was the voice over for my film as that was the only dialogue I wanted in the video. I used the information from the 100 Objects That Made Kent website to create the story for the tool. I made sure the dialogue was child-friendly and I only used words I thought children would understand. I started with introducing the tool and then spoke about what it was used for and who used it, and finally, the description of the tool came at the end of the film. 

The shot list came next so I could plan out what shots I would need to get on the filming days. This was fine until I got to the editing stage and struggled to find stock photos that I could use in the video. 

Production
Getting access to the tool was simple as I had Steve helping me throughout the first filming day. I had the whole day so managed to get all the filming done that I needed. After filming at the museum, I took the camera to the Medway river to get a couple of shots of that. Seeing as I live in Margate, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to go to the river then, instead of coming back to Rochester another day for a couple more shots. 

The filming at the house of the chalk, clay, kiln and grinding action went well, after I had to re-shoot the grinding shot. They are simple and nice-looking shots which children would understand that these materials helped in the process of cement-making. 

The shots of someone digging down the beach now seem useless as I didn't use them, but everything is a learning curve and if I hadn't filmed those shots I would have never known if I needed them or not. The shots definitely made me realise that I wanted the movement of the tool and the digging involved somewhere in the film but as I wasn't able to get access to really muddy mud, I was unable to feature the movement in the film, but I think I made up for it by getting access to the scan from the Medway archive team.

Post-production
Copyright was the biggest problem in this process, in the end I received photographs which had expired from their copyright from the Local History and Archives Enquiry and Research Service and I was allowed to use these as long as I acknowledged them in the credits. The rest of the editing process was simple. I didn't need many shots to complete my short video. I described the tool with a couple of graphics showing the measurements of the length and width of the spade, which should help the children visualise the tool easier. 

My video is short and sweet at 1'20'', enough for children to learn something from it but it's not too long that they get bored. A short film was one of the only requirements from Rachel and Steve, as well as that the film had to be aimed at children. Apart from that we were free to film and create whatever we wanted within reason.

During this project I had a work experience week at Suite TV, a post-production house, so I have been able to experience two different types of working in the industry within a couple of months. The placement and commission were very different, as at Suite I was a runner and then sitting in with editors to see what it is really like but with the commission I was planning and researching for the video and filming and editing it myself. 

Skills attained
I gained a few skills during the 5 week commission period, such as:
- Liaising with the client - we had four meetings (including the filming day) and it was essential to schedule these and attend them.

- Time management - on the first shoot day I had to film the Fly Tool and the shots of the Medway river. I had to plan my time carefully so I wouldn't be too late in getting to the river as it's getting dark earlier now. As I was there quite early at half 11 and it didn't take long for me to film the tool and I was successful in getting to the river with plenty of light. I also had enough time to look back at footage and re-shoot different angles if I missed them the first time/were new shots I had just thought of. 

- Basic camera skills - I was filming on my own for most of the shoot days so just having basic camera skills came in handy, as there was no one I could ask quickly if I had any problems. 

What worked?
- Arranging the commission was easier than I thought and I had no problems in doing this. The project was underway as soon as Rachel and myself agreed a date to meet and have a tour of the museum.

- I had really good access to all the objects in the exhibition. Once I had chosen the Fly Tool for definite, I had a whole room to myself with it on the shoot day and I was allowed to take it outside. They were very open to what I wanted to do with it which was also really helpful. I had the whole day to film the tool and the next day if I needed it so I had plenty of time to get all the coverage I needed. 

- After struggling with the 'muddies' footage, it worked out for me in the end once getting the photographs from the Local History and Archives Enquiry and Research Service.

- My video is definitely aimed at a young audience of school children which was the idea of making the video in the first place and was really the only requirement Rachel and Steve expected from the video. I think I wrote the voice over well so children can understand the dialogue and the shots describing how they made the cement with the flame, powder and clay were good visuals for the materials that were used.

- I made sure I attended every meeting at the museum and took on all their feedback and responded to it appropriately in my film. 

What didn't work?
- I thought I chose a relatively straight forward story to put with the Fly Tool, until I had the problems with getting photos/videos of the 'muddies' in the 18th Century. I didn't think this would be so difficult but the 'muddies' weren't very well known so it was a struggle to find a proper images of them online.

- Once I found a reasonable photo/video I wasn't sure about the ownership rights and crediting so as my video might be going on the 100 Objects website, I didn't want to risk using someone else's photo and not crediting it correctly.

- The other option instead of stock footage was filming it myself but I couldn't find anywhere muddy enough to film. I tried getting the footage at a beach but this meant the film was confusing as I don't mention sand anywhere throughout the video - this is where getting in contact with the Local History and Archives Enquiry and Research Service came in handy.

What did I learn?
- During the filming and editing process of the project when I was struggling to find appropriate photos/videos of 'muddies' or any ideas instead of using stock footage, I thought back to the beginning of the project and thought that I should have researched properly into the stock footage before choosing the Fly Tool. From the beginning, I knew I wanted to use the royalty-free stock footage/photos of the 'muddies' but I didn't look into the footage then and I should have, because I might have chose a different object if I knew it was going to be this difficult to find the footage. 

- I learnt that ownership of footage and photos is really important, especially as we were making this film for someone else, I didn't want to get into trouble by not getting permission/crediting properly.

What could be improved next time?
- I will make sure I will research into everything next time, just in case there is a reason why I cannot get the shots/photos I need, then I can sort a plan B in the pre-production stage. 

- Maybe taking someone else to the shoot days from the TVP course so I had another creative eye when it came to different shots.

- Next time I would test different shots and have a number of different ones to show the client rather than doing one type, putting them on the film and then getting the response from the client. This way I would have known the digging shots wouldn't have been any good earlier on instead of finding this out at the fine cut.