PRODUCTION • Shoot Day 3

Wednesday 21st February:

On our third day of the shoot, we were using the green screen in the living room which needed to be set up properly to make sure that it didn't create any issues with our filming; there was some bright sunshine which added some extra challenges with the lighting as our main light source was daylight. 

Lighting: 

For this day we had very bright sunlight which brought with it some challenges when we were filming in the living room and through the doorway. In the living room of our location, there are large French doors which we were initially going to leave of open to use as our main lighting source however due to the sun giving hotspots in the room and in our actors, a solution had to be found. In an attempt to reduce the brightness of the sun, we attached an ND filter to the doors to reduce some of the light strength, this helped somewhat, however, wasn't enough. We ended up pulling the curtains closest to the section with the hotspot and then lighting that part with some artificial lighting. I still wasn't happy with the way this looked so I decided to work with the director to change the shot slightly so that the hotspot was no longer in the frame. 

Making this slight adjustment made all the difference and although the shot was not the same as we had originally planned, the framing and shot size still worked for the scene and conveyed the emotion and tone that was intended to come across. We also encountered a few challenges when filming our over the shoulder shots in the doorway as we had the same bright sunlight outside creating and extremely blown out background and then a dark foreground. To counter this issue, we exposed the camera to the background and then using the LED lights, lit the foreground and our subject to bring them up and be the focus of the shot; this increased the quality of the shot made it more of what we were aiming for. This technique worked well and is something that I have learnt and will remember for future projects as a way of contracting really strong backlight and a low lit foreground if this isn't the intended look. 

Cameras: 

The camera plan for these days was relatively simple compared to our other shoot days however it wasn't without its challenges. The first we had was for scene 6 and 7 which we were filming separately but when edited together will intercut between the two scenes as they happen simultaneously and should look seamless. This meant that they had to flow well and work together which was difficult as we were filming them separately. Due to this, both scene 6 and 7 were filmed from multiple different angles so that when it came to the dit was had different options to work with in order to make the scenes transition smoothly. Due to the layout of the house, from our position in scene 6, we could see into the room where scene 7 was taking place therefore when filming, the actors had to be in their positions and run through both scenes for continuity and to make sure their dialogue was said with enough space between lines. 

Throughout the course of filming these scenes, we changed our original plan slightly in that we decided it would be more efficient to film using 2 cameras at the same time. We started with one camera in the living room and one outside the front door, these filmed the scene simultaneously and meant that we got two different shot sizes done at the same time. We also did this again with the camera in the living room on a different shot size and the second camera inside the hallway looking through the front door at the postman. 

This day was also the first time we were filming with a green screen on the television which added another element to our set up. Due to a previous test that I had done, we were confident that this would work for us. During the scene we use it for, our character Annie is supposed to be changing the channels until she finds a yoga video. This was difficult in terms of continuity because she would move her arms and press the buttons at different times in each take. To help with this issue we gave her markers so she knew when to change the channel, for example, after or just before a specific piece of dialogue or action. To also stop our actress from accidentally changing the television, we took the batteries out of the remote. 


Overall, this filming day was another successful one. All of the issues we came across were solved and we had no issues with our sound of this day either after fixing our sound equipment the day before. In terms of my role, I think this day tested my communication and coordination skills due to camera and sound operators being in different locations, however, as a team we worked really well, making sure everyone was informed of what going on at all times and discussing if a take was good or bad and how we could adjust things to make it work better if it didn't go so well.