OFVM Week 2

This week on my course we were filming a spaghetti western. We were given a pre-made storyboard made up of 10 shots. Each of us were given a chance to take on the different roles (Director, Camera, Sound, Clapper and Asst Director)except the actors who stayed the same throughout. The Director was in charge of setting up the scene, giving instructions to the actors, checking all components of the filming were set up correctly and telling the crew "action" and "cut". The Camera-man after being told what to do by the director would then make sure the shot was in focus and that there was nothing in the shot that wasn't meant to be. The Sound-man is in charge of making sure there is no irrelevant background noise that could distract from the filming and reporting these to the director, however we were told unless there was a disturbance near the beginning of the shot then we should not stop the filming to tell the director as it may be possible to edit it out. The Clapper-man had to keep track of the shot number and the amount of takes and put this on the clapper before every clip. This helps when editing the piece as you do not have to view the whole clip to see what piece of action you are seeing.

As I was not an actor I got a chance to have a go at all of these roles. I am very keen on being camera-man as I already knew from my previous filming experience, however I enjoyed being a sound-man as I have never done this before and it felt like a different world listening into the headphones as I could hear in much more detail.

I feel the whole class learnt how long it can take to film even the shortest of pieces and also how important it is to make the storyboard as detailed as possible trying to think of all possible problems and then sticking to it.

I now have to come up with an idea for a short film for next week.

PG