Won% Film Opening and Creative Critical Reflections

 Won% Film Opening and CCRs

Won% Film Opening

https://drive.google.com/file/d/11Vo0fi_FvQcycR06IduyHs5lFlzKLz6f/view?usp=sharing

Creative Critical Reflection #1 for Questions 1 and 2

1. How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?

2. How does your product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a real media text?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RWP8pZnQ36JR15EmLfgUma6XRii_KSrb/view?usp=sharing

Creative Critical Reflection #2 for Questions 3 and 4

3. How did your production skills develop throughout this project?

4 .How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PAPcWRuvpyjUKaABQci7lmW5BpWRQl5k/view?usp=sharing

 Final Reflection

WOW! I feel like I need to sit in silence now that I have reached the end of a very long project. I can’t lie, I have been waiting for this day to come. It has been a roller coaster of motivation and procrastination. There were days when I was excited to write a blog, film, and edit and days where I really didn’t feel like it. Yet, I made it through. 

I am so glad I did this with my partner! Whenever I felt stuck, I was always able to communicate it with her and find a solution. We’ve been working on projects together all year, so this was a nice way to wrap things up. I have lots of gratitude for my sister Macie who filmed our behind-the-scenes clips and showed up for my CCRs and my friend Pear who took time out of her day to be in one of my CCRs. 

My favorite part of this process was writing the blogs. I really enjoyed the genre research blogs because you learn so much about a genre that you did not know existed. I liked the production blogs too because I got to recall all the silly moments from the filming day. There were definitely some low points! The anticipation for filming day was always annoying because filming and editing always looked like so much work from a zoomed out point of view, until I actually dug in and realized it is not as difficult as I imagined since I prepped in advance. I am glad I got to film with friends because it made the production process way more enjoyable. 

I have many takeaways from this portfolio project. The biggest one is to just dig in. Towards the end of this project I just wanted to procrastinate everything because I had a very “ugh this again” mindset. But after beginning the activity, whether it was blogging or editing, I realized that I could have saved myself so much stress if I just got to work instead of thinking about how much work that has to be done. Also, I learned that once you actually do it, editing and filming really aren’t that bad. Now I see the value in getting straight to work, rather than procrastinating. At the end of the day, it is all of the silly moments from filming and editing that I will look back on.

To wrap up this post, here is my favorite moment from this entire project! It is a blooper of me and Pear filming the CCR for Questions 1 and 2.

Post-Production (Editing) of CCRs

 Editing of CCRs

Now that production is over it is time to edit! 😀To be honest, editing is always a little scary because I don't want to find out all of a sudden that a clip doesn't fit right and I have to refilm. But besides that, we just need to get started and find out.

I edited both videos on Clipchamp and began by importing the videos. When I downloaded them, I named them in numerical order. This allowed me to easily import them into my Clipchamp in order and avoid rearranging a bunch of clips.

Editing CCR for Questions 1 and 2

Editing this was fairly easy. After importing the clips, I went through and cut out the ends of the clips that did not include content. I went through and followed the CCR with my script to make sure there are no missing parts. I thought this was the most boring part of the process until I began adding any clips of my research. I was able to copy and paste the images from the blog post into my blog, but for the videos, I had to pull those from their original source. Searching for the exact placement of the image/video was very tedious. So, thankfully that's done.

For the credits, I was going to do a rolling credit. Clipchamp does not allow me to do that, so I had to make it manually on Canva. However, it did not look clean since I had to create the animation path by hand with my mouse pad. When I put it into the CCR, I realized that I can just copy and paste the text from Canva into Clipchamp and fit it to the screen. So, I ended up doing that in a still credit. The reason I did not put the credits directly into Clipchamp was because the text box had a character limit that could not carry all of my credits. For Pear, I put her nickname only in the credits for privacy purposes.

Now that I have bypassed all of these issues for one CCR, editing my second CCR should be easier.

Editing CCR for Questions 3 and 4

As predicted, editing this CCR was way easier. I followed the same exact steps I took with the first CCR. Pulling my research to put into this CCR was a breeze since I was able to pull it from past Canva projects and my camera roll. I could not find the original location of the research for my first CCR. Finding the exact placement of where to place the research was easier too because I remembered the timestamps when I went through the clips (a lesson I learned after editing the first CCR). What really sped up the process what that I did not have any sources to credit. My responses came directly from my head since questions 3 and 4 are reflective of my process.

 Production of CCRs

We have finally filmed the CCRs! So here is how they went! First I filmed my CCR for questions 1 and 2 because of availability issues.

Production of CCR Questions 1 and 2

This is a parody of Subway Takes as seen on Tiktok, but with our own playful twist on it. We don't have a subway near us, so we filmed at a random bench in Miramar Regional Park. Subway Takes usually use a subway card as the microphone, so to fill this gap, I used a subway sandwich and my friend used a stick. This allowed us to maintain the subway aspect and still incorporate the park theme into the CCR. The host of Subway Takes wear sunglasses and a suit. So, I had my friend's costuming be an out of place outfit: a puffer jacket, jorts, and sunglasses. It was hot outside, but thankfully she fought through. 

When we sat down, I explained to my friend Pear how everything will work and how to open the clip. You can me doing this in the video below. 

My friend Pear was the host and my sister Macie filmed for us (you can see her in the picture on the left). It was a super fun experience. Of course, there were issues. For example, we struggled finding a bench (who knew how limited benches are in parks). We also needed to be far from people and birds, so the camera (iPhone 16 pro) can pick up on our voices. Also, acting serious around Pear was tough at first! After multiple takes I was able to hold myself together. Check out the clip below for a good laugh!

Production of CCR Questions 3 and 4

Just like with CCR Q1&2, this CCR is a parody (of Carpool Kareoke). I turned it into a carpool interview. I kept the intro and ending similar to how James Corden does it. This is with a phone call in the beginning and wrapping up the conversation in the car for the ending.

This was by far the toughest one to film. I did not know how to place the camera securely. I tried multiple methods, such as at the base of the center console (but the angle was too low) and on the dashboard (but that looked like a safety hazard). 

I ended up holding up the camera, with a selfie stick. I was going to film it on my phone, as seen in the image on the right, but my front camera is damaged. So, that left me to film with the back camera, but I ended up cutting my head out of the frame since I couldn't see what I was filming. You can see an example of this below. 

We had to refilm shots because of this and I just knew that I could not continue filming on the back camera. So, Macie, who is playing as the host, let me film from her iPhone 16's front facing camera. Macie's costuming was a nice button down top and jeans because James Corden usually wears a nice button down in his carpool interviews.

I initially planned on filming this as we drive to get some food, and we did get some food, but had to refilm so many clips because of the tone of our voice and distractions on the road. This messed up continuity since different parts of the conversation continued at different parts of the street (and this is obvious through the car windows). Also, holding the selfie stick on the main road was not easy. Because of all of these issues, I changed the direction of the video from us getting food to us going for a drive because it is nice outside. This way, I can keep control of the camera by driving around our neighborhood and we can avoid distractions on the road. 

I was going to leave my sunglasses off for the video, but it was sunny outside and I am the kind of person that needs to wear sunglasses when in the car. Besides, wearing sunglasses supported the idea of it being nice outside.

 CCR Production Ideas

What's up! Now that I have my CCR's prepped, let's look into some ideas for my CCR productions!

Idea #1- Carpool Interview

I've mentioned this before. It is inspired by James Corden's Carpool Kareoke interviews. I was concerned that it will be distracting to answer the questions and drive at the same time, but I just realized that it isn't me that will be driving. I feel this is a super unique idea that I will have lots of fun doing. I'm thinking it can be of my sister and I and it can open similarly to the once in the video above. For example, she'll call me and ask if I want to grab some food with her, and I will enter the car. She is also taking AICE Media Studies, so the conversation can spark up by her bringing up our portfolio projects. What I really like about this idea is that it can include raw moments that balance out my answers to the CCR questions. I feel like this will work best with CCR Questions #3 and #4 because I can turn the conversation into debreifing the filming days.

Idea #2- SubwayTakes

https://www.tiktok.com/@subwaytakes/video/7613071218777820447

A man on TikTok films Subway Takes (click the link above for an example) and goes up to random people on the subway, that person shares a hot take, and the man says "100% agree" or "100% disagree" and they talk about it. This will work perfect for CCR Questions #1 and #2 because I can have a friend play the interviewer and I can make a statement, like "Won% challenges drama conventions and represents social groups and issues." There are many public spaces available for me to film this, such as the park or a parking lot outside of a grocery store. The parking lot one would be super cool because I can have the interviewer catch me walking to my car with groceries and stop me with the questions.

 Research for #4 Question of CCR

Welcome back! We finally made it to CCR Question #4! Yay! Let's start planning it!

Question

How did you integrate technologies- software, hardware, and online - in this project?

Step #1- Script

My partner and I filmed on the iPhone 13. After our first day of filming, we noticed I had a shakey hand in some clips, so we had to refilm them. I found a gooseneck phone holder that helped me stabilize some shots. It also helped me film a more seamless and steady pan. All of my research and planning, including my schedule, was done on Blogger.com straight from my Google search engine. This allowed me to keep everything I need in a single location. To make our production company logo, my partner used Canva and drew it onto the platform with her apple pencil and 10th generation iPad. Because we drew the logo ourselves, the graphics and font choice were not limited to what Canva offers. To edit our film opening we used Clipchamp and ran it online though our Google search engine. We chose it becasue we've used it in the past and feel comfortable with it; however, it has many flaws. We have to open and close the program multiple times before actually opening it because it directs us to a blank screen instead of the project. Also, when you do open the software it takes a while to import all of the videos. A major issue with Clipchamp is that only 1 person can be working on it at once. Otherwise, it will tell you to keep refreshing the page to update your partner's changes. Once you do update it, your most recent changes are undone. We easily bypassed this by editing on one computer together, or editing one at a time. However, this significantly slows down the editing process. If I did this again, I would step out of my comfort zone and edit the film opening on another editing platform, like Adobe Express, to bypass these problems all together.

Step #2- Research

Research for #3 Question of CCR

Hi! Let's prep for CCR Question #3!

Question

How did your production skills develop throughout this project?

Step #1- Script

In other projects, my group and I would plan ahead, but never as detailed as we did this time and because of this, I became more disciplined when following a schedule. I usually do general research with no specific goal. With this project, I used metacognition and thought about how my research will apply to me when I am making my plot and filming. For example, when I was researching dramas, I made sure to research a clear map of how dramatic plots are developed so I can use it as a guide when making my plot. My production process evolved too. My partner and I wanted to use low-key lighting to show Alea sitting in the dark as she watched TV; however, filming in the dark lowered our camera quality a lot! I had to adapt to this by making the lighting on set brighter and utilizing the editing platform to achieve our mise-en-scene goals. So, I learned how to separate certain tasks from the production process. Also, some clips turned out too long, like the one of Alea opening her mail, because we felt every second was important. This resulted in us refilming the clip to compress only her important emotions into a shorter time span. My judgement was tested during this because I had to determine importance of certain clips.  Refliming taught me to pay close attention to shot composition to maintain continuity. I did this by looking back at clips showing a specific part of  the set, and following the protagonist's movements. Ultimately, I started as a very go-with-the-flow planner and ended as someone who values sticking to thier schedule for the sake of the production process. Plus, I began using metacognition during my production stages when playing around with shot composition and determining the priority of certain shots.

Step #2- Research