Evaluation: On line Portfolio Link

In conclusion to my Professional Practice Portfolio assignment there are things that I have done well and other things that I haven’t done so well.I think the point of this assignment is to jump start thinking about your career more by looking at how to get noticed and using similar approaches that professionals already use.

I have been putting off making a website for years and this assignment has pushed me in the right direction allowing me to create a on-line portfolio for employers to see. The idea of making a website scared me as it’s not one of my talents and I wasn’t sure of how I should approach it. Even if at this point the website isn’t everything I wanted , the module has gave me an understanding of how to produce this product and distribute a professional standard portfolio.In the future I can keep adding to my existing portfolio or create a new one, either way this has given me a better outlook and knowledge  of how to produce a website or on-line portfolio.

This module has also given me the chance to experiment with my filming techniques, which is really one of the reasons I got in to Media Production. I want to get out in to the industry and keep practising my techniques to get better at cinematography after all I think practice makes perfect.Getting involved with different people with different requirements aids me to think in a different way about what is needed to make their video a reality.

I have grown better but am not completely confident in my networking skills. I have had some responses from my emails but I can do much better in my networking. I admit that this is my weakness in this part of the assignment and I did struggle on getting noticed by professionals. Before this module I didn’t realise the importance for networking,Now after a long module I can go on and try to use these skills to network correctly .The challenge for me was putting myself out there and not being scared of what people think.My spelling and grammar has always held me back with networking  but I feel this course has helped me feel more confident and I’m actually pushing myself to get involved with things.

Another thing that held me back was I started with  the intention of doing sound recording I still have an issue but with no responses from companies or students. I feel that this is partly my fault for not correctly applying the techniques at the start. Looking back I can see how important this portfolio is , I didn’t have a lot of examples to show with sound apart from the sound on my films , my music and a few pod-casts which I was still learning about.I  Deciding to go down a different route and include Cinematography which in turn saved my portfolio. I had built more contacts here and I think people are more aware of what’s visual , even though sound is a massive  part of film,I think sound is harder to obtain.  Like I said the body of work is really important in getting work and just from my portfolio at the minute , I’m lining up some wedding videos and short films as well as continuing with my own work.

I think this module has a massive impact on your identity in this industry and its helped me believe in my ability a bit more.Now I can feel confident that people actually want to use my skills and offer me wages I  must be doing something right?

One thing I could definitely look in to more is using on-line groups to my advantage. I did try using the groups but other than call the shots which I spoke about before I had little response,a few  likes on statuses but that’s it. I think this shows how competitive the groups are and sometimes you just might be lucky in responding to a post or someone my catch your work on a page and think I want to use this person. That’s how I met ‘Life is art films’ a few years ago, I watched a video he had made that was very good so I messaged him.Just doing this course has allowed me to meet new people, I met some on the college HND course and some here at Coventry University .

There is a lot of luck in film making and it’s all about being in the right place at the right time. I’m still thinking what can I do to be better and what makes me stand out and be unique, I can see my talents and I’m not going to give up.My outlook is to be persistent with it , I  have a nice portfolio to send to people now and I can use this to get to another chapter in my life.

From what I had at the start of the module I didn’t have a proper online space for others to see my work so it was hard for people to gage what I was about. Now I believe I have more ability and more knowledge to take another step in the right direction.The main result for me is using the skills I’ve attained on this course, Id advice anyone to go down the same route as I have . Each day I look forward to learning  more about being professional and how to improve my portfolio and body of work.

Link to Online Portfolio

http://simpleefilmstudios.wix.com/markleefilmandvideo

Testimonials/ Website Feedback

David Michaels Testimonial(click image)

Lawrence Harrison Testimonial(click image)

Jodie Antonia Testimonial(click image)

Kieran Young Testimonial(click image)

Harriet Finch Website Feedback. Below (click image) I managed to take this point on board and change the colour of the font making it stand out a bit more , however I still found that my website didn’t have the right feel something was missing.

Maureen Parry

My fiancee is always critical when giving me feedback for my work.This is the better way to be as it helps me to get things done correctly. She said that the picture I had at the time which was of me filming Joanna didn’t feel right so I switched it for the one of me and Phil I think this gave the words a bit of a clearer look. She also pointed out a few spelling and grammar issues , which I struggle with so this was really helpful.

Phillip McCullough said that I needed to categorise my Showreel better and put short films , wedding and corporate where appropriate . Which I do plan to do I just couldn’t agree on a font and wanted to move on to the website planning.

Deadline day

I’m still waiting for feedback and testimonials from Komal, Life is Art films and the Wrestlers for Triple x Wrestling who have all said they are busy but will get round to doing it soon.I guess that’s how the industry works sometimes. Either way i still will be able to use their responses in some way once I get them.

Music Video/ Herbert Art Gallery (Two weeks to make it competition)

In 2013  there was a competition set up by Richard Wood who runs Call the Shot/Rootes to Shoot. The Competition was to make a music video with a selected artist in two weeks. The unique quality of this competition was that we were not just paired with a random musician we were paired with other individuals in the industry.This was a great idea as it brought me together with three other contacts that  I might not of ever met.

I was joined with four film makers and industry professionals

Ian Upton-Lecturer/ Machinima Technician

Komal Shastri- Bollywood Movie Producer

Lawrence Harrison and Tim- Video Editor/Coventry Masters Graduate and Artist

Matt Wilkinson-Photographer

Luke Starr-Rapper

We had a great team with various talents and attributes. Here’s what we came up with after two weeks

We came second in the competition which was a fantastic achievement.

The experience was great for networking and chatting to different people with different abilities and joining forces to create a video production. We planned to make a few more videos but with everyone’s schedules it never really happened. I did gain some decent contacts from this experience ones that I continue to use today.

I decided to write this Blog as a few things have happened recently that could aid my future.

When joining the course in September we had option modules and I decided to go for the adobe certified option which was taught by Ian Upton a member of our team. It was good to catch up with Ian and the course was ran extremely well.This course didn’t just offer editing skills it taught you a few tricks about shooting video as well.What I really liked was making five by five videos on your mobile phone as it made you think more about the cinematography of the scene. Here at the two videos I made for this.

Password:pizza

Password: knife

These two videos were good practice for story telling and how to show an audience through film what you need them to see.

Over the last couple of days I’ve been speaking to Komal Shastri again who works for a social media company.She said there maybe prospects and opportunity for me in the company as there is a video section. She said she would find some details for me so I can start networking.This information has just been presented to me so It might be after this coursework is finished when I get to speak to the man in charge of this company , however this is a great prospect to chase up.

Milk and T (2015).{video] Milk&T, LukeeStarr, “WDFA ” – 2Weeks2MakeIt 2013. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxpJE919_5Q [Accessed 20 May 2015].

Lee, M. (2015). [Video] Private video 5×5 Available at: https://vimeo.com/108838242 [Accessed 20 May 2015]

Lee, M. (2015). [Video] Private video Knife Available at: https://vimeo.com/110901419 [Accessed 20 May 2015].

David Michael’s New Show Reel Video/s- 19-05-15

Magician at Work

It’s been a few years since I made a show reel for David Michaels a local Coventry Magician. I’ve made all of his videos from the start of his career and keep a great working relationship with him. We did a morning shoot on Tuesday the 19th of May from 10-3.30 and started off with a meeting at Browns/Drapers. The day’s weather was  on and off showers which was quite frustrating as we wanted to get some visuals outside. We managed to get a few shots outside until the rain started again so we decided to see if we could get some visuals in Drapers. We asked the manager if we could film and they said yes as-long as we had permission from anyone we had in the shots.

Theme 

We decided to go with a theme with in the video’s of ‘Magician at work’ and see what his life style as a magician is. I decided I wanted to focus on his briefcase full of magic tricks , which was symbolic for the apparatus needed for Dave to be a Magician. I wanted walking with the briefcase and the briefcase its self. I believe that this insinuated the life style and  gave some mystery to his tricks as I never actually ever showed what is in the case. I think this theme could give several short videos for David’s website as he does all sorts of different events from close up , to kids magic shows to discos and stage magic. All these events give us lots to think about in the shoots in the future.

As we had permission to film in Drapers we thought we would use the time and space to its’s fullest potential. We didn’t Have close up shots planned but we found a table with good natural light that made it easier. If worst came to worst these can be practice shots for the real version but to be honest I was really happy with most of this material.

Here’s a shot of David performing some close up magic to the camera.

Dave performing close up magic to customers.

It would of been good if there were more people in the location and not everybody wants to be filmed which is understandable. Once we go to a few more places we can get a much better response from more people.

Password: magic

I look forward to more shoots with David for these videos , but these will be after the deadline so I wont be able to include them in my portfolio.This project is the perfect example of Professional Practice and being paid with food and drinks wasn’t bad as I can use this for my portfolio. I believe The badge ”Magician at work fits nicely in to what we wanted to do , I  just wish that I had a cinematographer at work badge  to back his badge up. I look forward to the next shoot which is in roughly two weeks time.

The West Keys- Video

Here is another example of my work as a camera man. The West Keys is a story that I’m developing as a TV show concept. I think this shows off a nice range of camera shots and techniques. This also shows off my editing skills and keeping to a steady pace and theme in a video.

I decided to do a brief video which was no longer than 40 seconds. This would work as a teaser trailer for one of the  main characters. I’ve took inspiration from some TV shows that are similar to the themes and visual looks that I want to replicate for ‘The West keys’. Two Main TV shows that I’m taking influence from for this are ‘Lost’ and ‘The X files’.  I am taking more influence from ‘Lost’ visually as its more current and I believe that they thought about the surroundings of the characters more than X Files’ Plus x files was extremely story based rather than pretty looking shots. In my Show ‘The West Keys’ I want to capture both visuals and good story.

This teaser trailer follows Michael  a time traveller who witnesses a incident that changes the world as we know it. He travels back in time to see if he is able to put things right. This how ever is just one story  of ‘The West Keys’ I also thinks its very important for the teaser to establish a good font and logo. I played around with different fonts and again i wanted something unique that would suit the film. Again I took influence from ‘Lost’ and ‘The X files’

When I found my font I  decided to use the theme of the lens flair behind the font slowly and subtly  going through the words ‘The West Keys’. I believe this adds some depth and style to the teaser.

I wanted the Trailer to have a timed theme to it with all the shots coming in in a nice repetition. I only used shots that make the story look Bigger and intriguing. The idea would be to do teasers for all the characters and try and build a body of work and interest surrounding the TV show concept ‘The West Keys’.

Bibliography

Solidalexei.deviantart.com, (2005). X-Files Wallpaper 3. [Image] Available at: http://solidalexei.deviantart.com/art/X-Files-Wallpaper-3-81201794 [Accessed 13 Mar. 2015].

Lost (2004-2010) [TV show] United States of America. ABC.  J.J. Abrams, Jeffrey Lieber, Damon Lindelof.

Lee, M. (2015). The West Keys Teaser. [Video] Vimeo.com. Available at: https://vimeo.com/128035660

Movies 4 me, (2010). LOST. [Image] Available at: https://movies4me.wordpress.com/2010/05/26/lost/ [Accessed 13 Mar. 2015].

X. Files (1993-2002) [TV show] United States of America/ Canada. Chris Carter.

Hired D.O.P For Richard Williamson’s Short Film Noose

After we wrapped my project ‘The Scarlett Massacre’ Rich Williamson wanted me to film his Short film project ‘Noose’. He said that I had improved over the years of education and could tell that all my unique camera angles to tell a found footage film was thought about to a high degree and he wanted that level of experience for his film. This was a good opportunity to gain further experience on the camera and practice more camera techniques.

This was completely a different experience from ‘The Scarlett Massacre’ as I always had to make it look like a character was either filming or had set up the camera. This film I was aloud to be more observant of the action going on with the frame.

Although this film features to of the actors from my film it will take me on a different journey on the camera.The shoot was different as i just had to turn up and do my job , all I had to worry about was having my equipment charged and ready to go.

The theme of this shoot was acquiring some flashback footage of a happy couple. Although the weather wasn’t perfect I still believe I managed to get some great material for this idea. Rich although was directing what he wanted the actors to do gave me complete free range of what the camera angles looked like. He did ask however for a couple of shots that required depth of field techniques.

We went to Coombe Abbey to gain the footage of the couple and there was no one in the park which gave us a lot of flexibility of different locations to film with.

One tricky factor was covering the DSLR canon camera from the occasional rain. We used a few sandwich bags and elastic bands to cover up the camera, this method worked very well.

A few of my favourite camera shots of the day:

We found a tire swing in the adventure play ground they have there and I proposed using the swing for some shots. This was some of my more creative shots of the day. In one shot I placed the camera on the floor opposite the couple pushing each other on the swing, I believe that this imagery created a bit of atmosphere showing off the surroundings and feel like this could make a good cutaway to there romance.

The second shot  that I like was getting Jodie to lie on rich while we had the swing moving. I decided I  wanted to go on to the swing and film downwards on to the couple .With the slight movement of the using gave this shot just the right presence and I was able to carefully keep my balance while holding on to the swing and steadily filming the couple.

Here’s a look at some of my visuals from the whole shoot.

Password: D.O.P

There are a few shaky shots at the start of the video but should be able to smooth them out with the warp stabiliser in editing.

Over all a successful film shoot and I look forward to filming the rest of the film. These shots seem to be the only happy moments in the script so the rest of the film will have a completely different style of shooting.

links to EPK,TRAILER,FINAL FILM

EPK

Click to access the-scarlett-massacre-epk.pdf

Trailer

Final Film (password protected)

Over All Budget

Budget

Anything past 225 pound I paid for myself.

Evaluation for FMP.

The Scarlett Massacre part 1 has been one big roller-coaster.

My project has been a lot of hard work but I’m extremely happy with the end result.Its not just something I’ve been planning over two separate modules but this project has been in the works for years.It’s gone through different changes in style , different cast members, to different genres to finally ending up as a found footage film. With the ever evolving popularity of YouTube I believe that this is the perfect time for the Scarlett Massacre to be released. The themes are now current and my film fits in to the digital age nicely and has a good solid story that can continue growing even after part one has been released.

I believe my vision and decision on the crew members was the right call visually however something I really regret doing is not keeping someone on to do the paperwork. I thought that it wouldn’t be much of a final major project for them but I have really struggled with that side of my film and ill be the first to admit that.When you get to a certain point and think actually this is a lot of work I could do with some help, well that’s the area I should of got help in. Its a regret  and something that I will not do again in the future.

One more regret is not starting the fundraiser earlier I only gave myself 20 days to raise funds. I did manage to get 250 pound in the end in cash and credit but think i could of done a whole lot better with fundraising. I had so many different ideas but it was all a little to late in the game to start them.

One of my main weakness’s through out this whole experience is writing these blogs. I struggle with what to say and how to evaluate in a academic way. I have struggled with reading and writing but this course has tough me how to attempt to write in a certain way , even if sometimes I don’t get the points across that I wanted to. I am proud of my development over the last three years in writing as it doesn’t come easy to me. The only type of writing that I find a little easier is Script. I think that’s because my brain processes things in a more visual way rather than academically. I think this also shows in my work. especially with this film. Going back to uni after a long period of time has been really challenging but I have loved the experience and am happy with what I’ve gained from it. Being able to make a film that I’m happy with is an achievement in its self and the amount of things I’ve learned and people i have met has been really rewarding.

I’ve decided to do a different release of my film rather than spreading it all over the place I’m including it in the launch of an idea I’m working on. Over the course of Making the Scarlett Massacre I have looked in to YouTube and how it works. Its Mainly dominated by vloggers but does have room for other avenues. I’ve always wanted to make a tv channel that showcase amateur work and builds up a following. Why not combine YouTube with new film and video to make a channel that solely invests its time in to showcasing new projects.

Here is my design for the idea of Believe In Film and Video , which has stemmed from my final major project. A brand New YouTube Channel Devoted to New Films and Videos. This is where I’m going to release The Scarlett Massacre :Part 1 and any other Parts that might be associated in the future. Here is where I can build an audience not only for my film but for other films,documentary and videos. It all starts with the release of a film I’m extremely proud of ‘The Scarlett Massacre: Part 1. I still plan to enter in to a few festivals the main option is Raindance and fright fest.

As for marking of the project I have set up a link with a password which will be included in the documents I upload to turn it it in. Heres the link

I would just like to thank Coventry University for its help with my development, the experience has been challenging and eye opening and will be recommending the course to others in the future.

Trailer for The Scarlett Massacre Part 1

For my trailer I decided to go with a creepy theme and only hint at what the story is about, focusing mainly on the kidnapping but not showing the event happen. The trailer reviews over the disappearance over some music that my friends Abi Lanigan and Ryan Tyrrell created. I wanted people to get the message that Scarlett is a lovely girl that got kidnapped so i picked nice clips for the start , some of her panicking in the middle and then post kidnapping clips for the end of the trailer. the one minute limit was a perfect amount of time for me to display what I wanted to.

For my fonts I stuck with the theme that I used for the main title sequence in the film. So other fonts that appeared in the trailer have the same consistent style.

I struggled with some of the sound clips sounding a bit fuzzy. This was due to my raw filming style which in a music based trailed felt a little out of place. I uploaded the trailer but still a few of the files were loud and sounded quite distorted. I brought the volumes down for  the clips that were distorted and that sorted out the issues.

Over all extremely happy with this trailer. the feedback I’ve received is positive.It’s a good sign when people don’t say negative things.

Isolated (2009)[Music]United Kingdom Abi Lanigan and Ryan Tyrrell

The Scarlett Massacre Part 1 Trailer.(2015) [trailer] United Kingdom. Mark Lee