Editing = Done!

Today I had the day off because of test block and I finished all of the editing that I needed to do in order to improve the aspects of my film that Mr Andrews suggested for me in his feedback. I covered the jump shot of Steve that was obvious and I made the argument of my Terms and Conditions/Privacy Policy point clearer by adding in quotations from both the Instagram and Facebook Privacy Policies that show what these companies do with the information that people volunteer. Here is one of the shots:

The text over the shot of someone using Instagram types onto the screen. I am really happy with how this turned out because originally, I was just going to replace the shot of the phone with a screen recording of the Privacy Policy and me highlighting the particular points. I also think that this links mine and Eliza's thirds quite well as she has shots which are quite similar to this in her third. 

However, I was not able to remove the hiss from the audio of the interview with Steve. I googled a number of way to remove it and I tried every method and it either didn't work or it made his dialogue have really bad quality - it was like we had recorded it on a laptop. So I just decided that it sounds better with the hiss rather than it being terrible quality. Also, I added some shots over the top of the narrator, as Mr Andrews suggested, however I don't think it looked very good, it was a bit too much, so I decided to just leave that part the way it was.

Tomorrow after our tests are done, we are meeting up as a group to record the narrator for the other two thirds which shouldn't take very long, and we will also combine the thirds together and match our audio levels.

Feedback, Progress & the Linking of the Thirds

Today after I had finished test block, I went and saw Mr Andrews for some feedback on my film before I hand in the final on Thursday during the test block period. There are a few things that need improving:

- Remove the hiss from the audio

- Make sure that the audio levels match with the rest of the film

- Cover any jump cuts

- Place some shots over the narrator

- Make the terms and conditions point clearer

- Make sure that the colour of my third matches the rest of the film

I am going to film some quick shots to place over the top of the narrator on Wednesday after my test and I will add them on top of my narrator, and I'm also going to Google how to remove the hiss from the audio so I can also do that on Wednesday. I will be adding in some shots highlighting points in the terms and conditions of various social media sites to emphasise the fact that people need to read it (e.g. posts people make that the company now owns, selling information to third parties, etc.) and I will place these over the top of when Steve is talking. I will also be adding in some background music - I have been looking and I can't find one that fits the documentary perfectly.

Another thing that will need to be done on Wednesday is recording the dialogue of Eliza and Ashlee's thirds as Eliza currently doesn't have a narrator (making it weird since I suddenly appear in the middle third) and Ashlee is using herself as the narrator, meaning that it doesn't match.

Eliza and I are working really well together and I feel like our thirds match quite well considering the colours, etc. The only thing that could be improved with the linking of our thirds is that she could move her point of people posting anything and everything online to the end of her third as this connects with my points more effectively, which I have suggested to her.  However, Ashlee has not really been working with the rest of our group very well and the first time Eliza and I saw her third was today when we handed it in and had to put the thirds together - which she was not there for. Her third really doesn't match Eliza and I's thirds because of the lack of colour correcting, types of shots, etc. and it doesn't really link effectively with ours. I understand that it's all of our fault, not just hers,  as we all haven't communicated well as a group, but it's really difficult to fix it now and link it all together as we only have until Wednesday. With the little time that we have left, I think that she could film some quick shots to place over the top of the interview, colour correct it to make it blue, then add in the dialogue which I will record for her to to make it more cohesive.

New Dialogue

Since the dialogue that the narrator was originally saying didn't match up with the content of the interview shots, I wrote some new dialogue for the different shots of the narrator throughout the film:

1. With the dramatic rise in popularity of social media, everyday more and more teenagers are becoming increasingly public with their lives online and are posting private information, such as photos and videos of themselves, information about where they live, their full name and their date of birth, making them an easy target for cyber criminals.

2. Voiceover: A recent study found that the majority of teenagers don’t believe that posting their personal information on social media is unsafe, and nearly half of the teenagers surveyed are not worried at all about others using their personal information in ways that they do not want.

3. Steve Hackett, partnership manager at Headspace Southport, discusses the dangers and the effects of posting personal information on social media.

4. However posting about our private lives on social media is not the only thing putting us in danger. How many times have you actually read the Terms and Conditions or the Privacy Policy when creating a new social media account?

5. In order to prevent the negative effects of social media in terms of lack of privacy, what do we, as teenagers, need to consider when deciding whether or not we should post private information on social media?

6. Therefore, next time you go to post private information about your life on social media, you may want to step back and think about the implications this may have on your life.

Filming = Done!

This afternoon, I finished filming all of the shots that I needed to add into the film meaning that all of my filming (for now) is completed! All that I have left to do is find background music that suits the film and create the Video Scribe files to place over the top of the statistics. I am going to get this finished by Monday so that I have time to receive feedback form Mr Andrews early next week, when he gets back from camp, and to make any adjustments before it is due during our test block period on Thursday.

Straight after I finished filming, I also edited the rest of the film. I have made all of the shots a bit more blue to emphasise the negative tone more effectively and it is just a couple of seconds under the time limit of 3 minutes. The new shots of the narrator that I have taken aren't as good as the previous shots I had which is a bit disappointing, however, there was no way that I could have used them as they just didn't have the right dialogue for the interview. And this time I actually remembered to turn on the microphone, so I didn't have to record the audio separately and try to match it! :)

Adjustments Needed + Extra Shots

- Re-film narrator with dialogue more relevant to the interview in order to make it flow

- Close ups of someone typing on a keyboard, message chats, etc. plus extra filler shots to place over the top of the interview. Since I know what sections of the interview I am including, I need to make these shots more relevant

- Find background music that suits the documentary

- Create the Video Scribes

I will be re-filming everything that I need to this afternoon and I will edit them and add them into the documentary during tomorrow's lesson. I'm kind of glad that I have to change the dialogue because it means that I have to re-film the rest of the shots of the narrator (since they're all basically the same shot), meaning that the audio is going to match perfectly instead of having a voiceover that doesn't match 100%. I don't think filming will take too long as I know exactly what I need and most of the shots (the fillers) have a really short duration. 

Editing Progress

Today during class, I finished editing the shots that I have for my documentary so far. I had already finished editing all of the shots of the narrator and the shots of the electronics last week, so all I had to edit was the shots from the interview we did on Thursday. I do not need to get another interview as all of the points that I wanted to cover are in the interview from Thursday, plus the documentary would go over the time limit if I were to add in another one. This is a positive as I didn't think that Steve or Monica would be able to answer my questions to the extent that I wanted. The only things I need to do now are to create the Video Scribe animations to place over the top of the voiceover of the statistics, and to film a few more filler shots to place over the top of the interviews.

I will be filming these/creating these before the end of the week so that I am able to put my entire documentary together in order to show Mr Andrews for some feedback early next week. Compared to the last film assignment, I am doing quite well in terms of time management because with my last film, I was still filming just days before it was due and I edited the majority of it during the lesson we got during test block. Because of this, I have made sure that with this assignment, I edit along the way and film in advance to give me time before it is due to fix anything up.

Interviews - 16th March

During the lesson today, Steve Hackett, from Headspace, and Monica, who is the mother of a teenager who took her own life as a result of cyber bullying, joined us for an interview. We set up for the interview in the beginning of the lesson, with two cameras and two lights, and we positioned them the exact way that we wanted them so that all that we had to do when they joined us was test the audio levels. We originally scheduled our appointment for 12pm so that we would have plenty of time to set everything up, however, the interviewees rescheduled it for 12.30pm. This ended up being a good thing as it took us longer to set up with two cameras, then it had before with just one. This was because we had to position it correctly so that the power plugs in the wall could not be seen, or were less obvious. 

The interview went really well and we got some really good information from both interviewees. Steve had a more professional approach to the questions, and answered most of the questions providing both sides of the argument, however Monica had a very personal approach and just showed the negative effects, as she had been directly affected by the effects of social media in a very negative way. The interview with Monica was extremely emotional and to be honest, it was quite hard to film. However, for the purpose of the documentary, the emotion that was displayed is a good thing as it appeals to the emotions of the audience and is manipulative to convince the viewer of the argument that social media has a negative effect.