Post Production Timed Response

“The post-production process can be the most important part of the filming process.”

How important has the post-production stage been in your foundation and advanced portfolios and how have your skills developed over these two years?

Across my two productions (thriller opening at AS and music video at A2) the post-production stage has been vital in creating convincing work. This particular stage was in some ways the most important because without it the original still images taken for my music video would not have made sense on their own, and the raw footage for my thriller opening would not have been convincing or clean cut. Eisenstein believes that editing is ‘the foundation for film art’, meaning that it is what holds a piece of work together and without it, it would be meaningless.

                In my thriller opening I used a number of transitions such as fade in and out and cross dissolve between scenes in order to let it flow smoothly. Due to having to include titles, the text had to fit in with the transitions properly to appear as a real thriller opening and they also had to be used in the right places effectively. For example, I had the producer’s name sweep upwards from the bottom of the screen and land on a rooftop, so the text was not placed just anywhere within the shot. This worked successfully because it was easy to do but had effective results. However, if I made this production again I would have included a wider variety of transitions and experimented further with them. A slow motion effect was introduced in the scene where the audience first sees the ‘main dealer’. As he stands up from his chair, I slowed down the motion of the footage to exaggerate the sense of danger and anxiety, building tension for the audience and making them aware of the villain. Slow motion is often used in these circumstances to achieve the same result. Along with these two techniques, I also used a colourisation effect to create a black and white scene of a conversation between the protagonist and his sister. This scene is a flashback, and using black and white here connotes that because it is a typical convention found in existing thriller openings, so the audience are aware of its meaning. 

                In my music video some of the same effects were used but more effectively, as a combination with more complex ones. Fast cut montage is a convention often seen in music videos, but my own was created by using stop frame animation. I took original still images in a continuous order and after uploading them onto iMovie from iPhoto, used a technique called splicing to make a sequence out of them. The result of this was a convincing moving image production that made the toy camper van appear to be travelling on its own and going on a journey. By having the image change exactly on every beat of the music, this created a relationship between music and visuals, which is a vital concept in any successful music video. My skills developed dramatically here from my AS production because no still images were used in my thriller opening, and my music video also included filmed footage meaning that my wider use of technology advanced my skills and allowed me to be more creative. I also used colourisation in my music video, but not black and white. This time I had to match the colour change to the beat of the music to develop the music-to-visuals relationship. The swap between blue and green on the stairs sequence emphasised the ‘jump’ that the camper van was undertaking whilst adding to the playful feel of the video already created by the toy vehicle and genre pf music. Having the colours blue and green was not a random decision either; they match the coloured water used in the kitchen scene before. Another one of Eisenstein’s concepts is the idea of an editing technique called ‘intellectual montage’, meaning that editing is used in a certain way to depict or suggest meaning. I hoped that by including a guitar player in my music video and not showing their face, but by having them play in sync with the music, the audience would recognise that it is a band member. By not including their face this suggested that meaning.

                I feel that I have progressed greatly from my AS production through to my A2 music video and would not have been able to without the important post-production stage. It allowed me to develop my ideas and my skills along with them in order to create a more successful, convincing production at A2. I agree with Eisenstein’s quote that I featured in my introduction because without editing, raw footage or images that have not yet been manipulated hold no meaning and cannot be classified as anything in particular, whereas after editing, they become a polished product.

Bladerunner and Inception Essay

Discuss two or more media texts that you would define as 'post-modern' and explain why you would give them this label.

The term 'post-modern' describes an approach to culture which sees all texts as being intertextual, and meaning as mediated rather than representative of a state of original reality. Postmodernists believe that it is no longer sensible to describe media texts in terms of how they represent real life or events, and that instead we should understand that the boundaries between reality and media-reality are increasingly blurred. When looking at film in particular, many techniques can be used to make a film post-modern such as bricolage (genre cross-over etc.), intertextuality, pastiche, metafiction, hyper-reality and style over content.

            Most of these techniques and others appear in the recent film 'Inception' which achieved huge popularity, mainly due to the post-modern features aside from the familiar main character. The characteristic used predominately is the confusion over time and space, with the introduction of time-bending in particular. With dreams being the theme that runs throughout the film, the overlapping of dreams brings in the slowing down of time because time does not work similarly in different layers of the dream. For example, what would be five minutes in reality is actually one hour in a dream, meaning that the film is deeply fragmented. Because outside of film and other media texts the subject of dreams often wants to be understood, by producing a film around this theme audiences may have watched it in the hope that it will explain the concept of dreams to them, whereas it was likely to just confuse them even more. This characteristic can link in with another post-modern technique used in 'Inception', which is hyper-reality. In the film, hyper-reality appears in the form of dreams, which are often more desirable than real life. An example of this involves the central character Mr Cobb and his wife Mal, who seems to appear in the dreams but not in real life. Although the audience and Cobb see her die, this is within a dream state so it becomes unclear whether she is real in the dreams and this remains unclear even at the end. This is hyper-reality because of course Cobb wishes Mal was still alive and believes she is when he sees her within dreams.

            The flattening of effect is associated with post-modernism within film meaning that the audience and characters become to feel emotionless about something. A way to get out of a dream in 'Inception' is through death and when this happens frequently the emotion that should be felt with it becomes detached, both for the characters involved and the audience watching. In terms of intertextuality, the music that features throughout the film when the characters are coming out of a dream state was originally sung by French singer Edith Piaf, who was played by the actress playing Mal in a film about the singer.

            Another film that can be described as 'post-modern' is 'Bladerunner'. This was less of a box office success when it was released in 1982 and was notorious for being misunderstood at the time. Replicants make up the majority of characters and the plot line is based around them, which immediately makes it post-modern, because these are effectively more perfect than humans. A predominate characteristic of post-modern films is genre cross-over and 'Bladerunner' is now a cult classic partly due to this. The film is a mixture of Science Fiction and Film Noir which causes confusion throughout, and the Film Noir element could also be viewed as a pastiche, copying the style in tribute to classic Film Noir films. When examining style of content, it can be assumed that the overall visual style and content was strong at the time it was released, but with the development of technology it no longer appears this way to audiences because of the continuous technological advances and what we are now used to and expect. However, it can be appreciated for being advanced for its time. Like 'Inception', confusions over time and space also feature in 'Bladerunner'. A particular lack of light causes confusion over the time of day and whether the time of day ever changes. In relation to the replicants who are supposed to be 'perfect humans' or more perfect than possible, they only have four years each to live, but do their other features and characteristics make up for this? Again, hyper-reality appears which brings confusion over the location with it for the audience. The main location or city is made to look like a mixture of LA and Japan in the future with flying cars and other advanced technology along with the replicants. The use of a combination of Japanese, English, Spanish and German as a language also disrupts what the audience expects of the location.

            Many concepts, characteristics and techniques can be described as 'post-modern' and in essence it is anything unfamiliar to us, that we do not expect to find in modern society or the modern world. Boundaries between the media and reality are increasingly becoming blurred and this 'post-modern' element seems to be featuring more frequently in media texts, and also more being more popular with different audiences. 'Inception' in particular was a huge breakthrough for the post-modern genre.

Post-Production

“The post-production process can be the most important part of the filming process”.

How important has the post-production stage been in your foundation and advanced portfolios and how have your skills developed over these two years?

Across the two productions I have created (a thriller opening at AS and music video at A2), I feel that the post-production stage was significant because without it none of the footage or stop motion images would have made sense or created a story on their own. Eisenstein believed that editing was “the foundation of film art”, and he means by this that it holds together a piece of work, and essentially makes it what it is. In this essay I will discuss my skills development using these ideas.

In my thriller opening I used a black and white colourisation effect in the scene where a conversation takes place between the protagonist and his sister to represent a flashback. Black and white flashbacks are a typical convention found in thriller films meaning that the audience are aware it is a flashback, and the colourisation tool on iMovie allowed me to create it myself. This editing technique was simple to use but still had an effective outcome. I also used a slow motion effect when the 'main dealer' stood up from his chair to exaggerate the sense of danger and anxiety, and make the audience aware of the villain. If the original raw footage for this section had been better then this effect would have worked better, but having not used this before we could not predict how it would turn out.

In my music video, the editing effects that I used were much more complex due to the stop motion feature. In particular, splicing had to be used in order to trick the audience into thinking the camper van is moving and travelling on its own. Splicing simply means placing still images from the unedited selection next to each other to achieve a moving sequence. Having the image change on every beat meant that a relationship between music and visuals was produced, which is a vital element of any successful music video. Again colourisation was used, but also to match the beat of the music and correspond with the story of the video. The swap between blue and green as the camper van jumps up the stairs makes the jump even more prominent and continues the colour theme from after the blue and green water in the kitchen. Although in my thriller opening the colourisation was used to create a particular effect, I thought a lot more about how I was using it in my music video due to having to consider matching music to visuals and cutting on the beat. The bright colours added to and emphasised the playful feel already created by the toy camper van and upbeat genre of music. I would like to think that I used Eisenstein's editing style called 'intellectual montage' in my video to suggest ideas. For example, it is not clear who the guitarist is, but hopefully by having them play in sync with the music it made it obvious to the audience it is a band member.

I feel I have progressed greatly from AS to A2 due to having previous experience with the editing software, and being given a more challenging task with the introduction of new conventions and theory and using them in my own music video. The post production stage made it a lot easier to actually create a convincing music video with all these conventions because of the effects on offer. Although the material which has not been manipulated is important and has to be correct in order to produce what is needed, the post production stage brings the footage to life and in essence creates the final, polished outcome which is the most important.

Digital Technology

“Digital technology turns media consumers into producers”. In your experience, how has your creativity developed through using digital technology to complete your coursework productions? [25]


"Digital technology turns media consumers into producers" is a relevant quote to focus on when examining my own productions, starting with my thriller opening at AS through to my music video and ancillary tasks at A2. The range of digital technology on offer allowed me to express my creativity how I wanted and develop my production skills throughout the process, because without it I would not have been able to carry out my initial ideas.


Having previous experience using a digital camera and editing software on iMovie, I was able to have very clear ideas for what I wanted to produce and how I would use the technology to do so. However, when creating my Foundation Portfolio the option of being able to use software such as iMovie was still exciting and allowed me to be even more creative if I wanted to experiment with something I was not familiar with. For example, including titles in my thriller opening was a new challenge due to having to follow typical conventions used in that particular genre. The titles had to flow with the pace of the edited footage and therefore not fragment it, in order to achieve a convincing outcome. Exploring different font styles, colours and transitions led me to choose the correct ones to also match the pace and genre of the soundtrack, for which iTunes was used to legally download. Flashbacks are another typical thriller film convention, and the option to make footage black and white helped me to achieve this flashback effect. Limitations with the digital technology when producing my thriller opening would have been having to book out cameras and only being allowed them for 24 hours at a time, this gave me little time to actually film the footage needed . The same applied to having to share Apple Macs with other students for editing. Instead we chose to use our spare time outside of lessons to complete the work.


A way that I overcame this problem in my Advanced Portfolio creating a music video was by using my own camera so that nobody else had access to it, and I could have all the time I needed. With my music video also being predominately stop frame animation, I needed much more time than I did for my thriller opening in order to take the vast amount of photos. The particular Panasonic digital camera that I used to take the images allowed me to film the footage for my music video as well, which allowed me to not need great amounts of equipment and be more efficient with my time management. Before uploading my footage onto iMovie, I knew that I wanted to include some colourisation effects on the stairs sequence, and having previous experience with doing this I had no problems making this idea come to life. I was introduced to the software on iPhoto to upload my photos, which meant I could then transfer them onto iMovie and create a video. The ability to change the length of time an image actually appears on screen for gave me the opportunity to produce fast-paced video from a continuous set of images. By setting the time to 0.5 seconds for each image, this created the illusion that the toy camper van, which is the main concept, is really travelling on its own. Because of the need to use an unsigned artist due to issues with copyright, I resorted to MySpace to look for my particular band. Social Networking Sites are an integral part of music distribution and file sharing in this age of the Online Revolution, so MySpace allowed me to find an artist almost instantly. However, music cannot be downloaded directly from MySpace, which meant having to contact the band themselves and asking them to send me an MP3 of their song.


Again, when creating my ancillary tasks ( a magazine advert and album digi-pack) I had previous experience with using the software on Serif PagePlus having made a magazine before. However, this was two or three years ago, so I had to become familiar with the software again before planning out my initial ideas. In this case, the technology allowed me to be more creative instead of the other way around. I also had to use Serif PhotoPlus which I had not used before, so I experimented here. I used this software to erase the background on an original image I had taken of the camper van, in order to place it on top of the background layer on my magazine advert. To do this I simply selected the 'background eraser' and moved the cursor over the parts I wanted to erase. Layers needed to be built up using Serif PagePlus and I achieved this by moving certain parts of the magazine advert behind and in front of others, for example bringing the text in front of the background so it could be seen clearly.


Without having had all of this digital technology on offer to me, I would not have produced convincing and effective Foundation and Advanced Portfolios. "What a computer is to me is the most remarkable tool that we have ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds" (Steve Jobs). In other words, digital technology allows us to be creative in our own ways and without it our ideas would not be as exciting and yes, it does turn media consumers into producers when they choose to use it.