Wednesday, December 11, 2024

Production Day 1

 Going into the production of the documentary, we decided to film b-roll before the actual interview. This is because we didn’t have access to the lighting we used until later in the week, and didn’t want to be rushing around last minute. We decided to film with two cameras. Bellow is the list of equipment we used on both days:

Day 1:

-T7I

-90D

-Tripod

-Rhode Mic

-50 Mil Prime Lense 

-18-135mm Zoom Lense

Day 2:

-Sony A7III

-Sony ZV-E10

-2 50 Mil Prime Lense

-2 Tripods

-GVM 3 Point Light RGB Kit

-Cob Light, Stand, and soft box

-GVM Mics




The equipment from day 1 is from my school, and day 2 from this equipment renting place called BEACON TV. Knowing that I would have different camera brands for the 2 days concerned me. I was scared that it would look a lot different. The only solution to this would be color grading, which I was prepared to do. I’ve done research for along time on color grading, because I want to be a cinematographer, so I was ready to deal with whatever footage I got. For the 2nd day, I could’ve filmed with the school camera, but the BEACON TV camera’s are better quality. I am debating whether to extend this documentary to submit to film festivals, and didn’t want to reshoot the interview. Asking the same question again just doesn’t get the same response out of people. Although, I knew I could refill B-Roll a lot easier, so I wasn’t worried about that. 



Continuing on with lighting, I wanted to have creative color in the interview, so made sure to get a RGB light kit, and got a soft box to balance it out. This stylistic choice is why we had to wait longer to shoot the interview, but was worth it in the long run. I wouldn’t have had the lighting I desired if I filmed without these lights. 

During the first day of filming, I was surprised with how it went. I expected to just get some cinematic shots, but I wound up getting really good sound bites of him talking about his sketchbooks. He went through all of them, explaining why he chose every little detail. I was worried these sound bites would have bad audio because we didn’t bring any mics, but it turned out fine after some tweaking in post production. Life lesson, always bring some laav mics with you, they’re small and useful. 



While filming B-roll, we decided to have him draw on his iPad. Right before he started, I had him screen record the entire thing which allowed for creative B-Roll. This was something to “raise the floor” of our documentary that I really liked. 

Coming out of the first day of filming, I added a section of him going through his sketchbooks into the documentary, because the sound bites were so good. It totaled 2 and a half minutes. I wasn’t sure where this part would be, but it was nice to know that I had 2 and a half minutes cut up before the interview that was done a couple days later. 

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