Mary
Directed by Kathryn Pogue
Composed by Graham Woolley
Above is my video for the music video Mary. Within the video we
follow young George as he goes throughout his life with his lover, Mary. We see
him walking as he reminisces what he lost with his love. We then see that she
died an early death and this explains why he is reminiscing. I felt this linked
with the song as it describes the pain of saying goodbyes and how to say
goodbye.
When I filmed the video, I wanted there to be a sense of being
lost and not knowing what was actually going on. This would hopefully help the
audience empathise with the main character, George. Throughout the storyboard
when filming I realised that I had to cut out a lot of shots due to the length
of the song and I changed the narrative arc of the story to a three act story.
I felt this worked well as it allows the audience to meet and connect with the
audience.
During filming I found it good trying to try and use angles to
tell the story, for example in the shots in which we see the couple together I
wanted lots of low angles looking up at the couple and I wanted some handheld
footage for some parts to add a sense of a home-made movie feel. I think this
really adds a sense of reality to the footage as it gives it the authentic home
movie, amateurishness feel that would be expected in this type of
footage. I also used grading throughout the film to reflect the feeling of the
characters within the film. For example I have used a 4 colour point grade in
the lighting for the parts in which we see the couple together as I wanted a
rose tint glow for the scenes as there is an old saying “looking back at
an experience through” (Cowley, 2006) I wanted this to be a key feature within
the film as it shows that idea of losing time and how we see life when we look
back. Then in the time which is in the present I wanted it to feel cold and
very clinical. This was to give the idea of everything being mundane, and to
give the audience a visual signifier of the feelings which George is feeling,
also it gives a signifier of the idea of a funeral, walking to the coffin. I wanted
the colours to follow the idea of everything being drained and hope being lost.
This juxtaposes with the use of extreme saturation of the times when Mary and
George are together. This aids the storyline I think as I think it over
exaggerates the difference between the periods of time.
One particular scene when George proposes to Mary I wanted the
scene to juxtapose itself, I did this by shooting this at night and I wanted
the colours to be saturated but cold colours like blues and greens as this
mirrors what part in the song I wanted it to be at. In the song the singer, Graham
Woolley refers to the girl saying “You gave yourself to a man who was sleazy”
and I wanted this to be sung at the point in which we see the proposal as it
indicates an alternative for the audience rather than death so that they are on
their seats till the end.
Throughout the production element I felt that the filming went
well. I feel that my weakness was in the directing of the film, I found it hard
to directly tell the actors exactly what I wanted them to do in the scenes,
this was because I wanted the film to have a naturalistic feel to it and I
wanted the actors to method act within the sequences. The shoot took three days
in total and we ran to schedule for the entire of the shoot and the actors
found the set very accessible. In terms of Budget the film cost in total £25
due to the travel of the actors and the props for the film. I think that the
budget was good and that it was a necessity to create the piece at that level.
For the edit I took 5 days editing using the following tools;
The clip crop tool: This was to cut out the use of the
clapperboard and to cut the clips down to what was required for the film.
The opacity tool: To change the opacity level of the clip so that
we could see another clip behind it. This can be seen in the graveyard sequence
or the walking into the house sequence.
The sound level tool: I changed
the level on the sound for the actual clips so that they were mute and then I
added the sound effect of rain on for the beginning and end of the film and
personally I feel that there is a connection between death and rain
The Opacity tool: I changed the opacity so that I could layer the footage to add effects, a prime example of when I did this is in the scene where the audience see both Mary and George in front of Mary's grave.
RGB Curves: I used RGB curves to enhance the colouring within the shots, this was mainly done to add contrast to the images. I also used this to take the colour out of the shots in which we see George. I wanted the shots to reflect the colours used in Batman directed by Tim Burton. I wanted this effect as I felt it would emphasize the idea of the dullness of the present and a lost word without her. I wanted to make this alarmingly obvious as I wanted people to subconsciously already know what happened.
Other editing tools were used throughout the production, but these were the main ones which I used frequently. I found that by sing these in the premiere pro software I was able to learn how to edit in a more succinct and aesthetically pleasing style.
In terms of time management I felt that through this project the timing could have been done a lot better in terms of organising my time, I found that due to mitigating circumstances I couldn't fully complete the piece to a standard I wanted to. I also found that if I worked on a project like this again, I would ensure I made a contingency plan as I found that managing both my own time and the time of my actors and this had a major impact on the film.
I felt that through the filming process I learnt a lot on how to both direct and work with the actors as this is something that hasn't been explored previously. Throughout the process they worked well and I feel that they appear within the film as being in the mindset and the characters they needed to embrace.
Within the making of the film I was the camera operator on all shoots, director and did lighting for all but one scene in which I asked for the aid of Danielle Paige. She programmed the lighting within a studio so that it would change between different colouring such as Yellow and Green, to the lighting below which was a blend of purple, red and yellow. Danielle really helped in this scene and made this part of the film come alive.
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Audience Feedback
I sent out a survey through Social Media websites such as Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin asking people how they felt about the film. To find out the demographic that were answering my survey I asked the age of the people who were taking part in the survey.
As can be seen from the graph, I got collection from people of a variety of ages. I thought this would be useful so that I could see how they reacted to the film and if they understood the story of the film.
If I did this question the morning I would have asked more information, I would have also corrected the age brackets as one overlaps.
From this I found that my main audience were aged 16 - 24 year olds, in my original proposition I said this would be the age group I aim the film at so I feel in this respect I achieved my goal in terms of target audience.
After asking about the demographic of the audience of the survey I then asked the audience how they felt about the film and their thoughts of the storyline. The answers gave a mixture of good and bad points, one of the answers stated "Quite a sad song really, I do think the ending needs a better explanation though" I agree with this, I feel that the ending is quite sporadic which was done intentionally as I wanted it to be a shock to the audience. I feel that on reflecting on the end product that although the original idea is in place it could have done with some indicator to how she died as this was one of the biggest responses I got from the film. Another answer was "Story was far too sombre for the beat of the music"upon reflection again I agree with this comment in term of the beat. I think I, as a film-maker got caught up with the depressive lyrics of the composition and I feel that I didn't fully get across the humour which was shown in the storyboard. Although there were many issues, one answer was "filming was sharp and clear" which I think it was and the composition of the shots within the film I believe are the best I have yet and I think that I learn a lot about lighting as I throughout filming made an effort to ensure that the shots were filmed to fit with the saturated grading that I planned to do.
To conclude the survey I asked the audience if there were anything that they felt could be improved within the film. Again, I got a lot of good information on the error such as within the shot of the Mary and George at the grave, "The Ghosts arm is half cut off then it just appears". This happens because I shot it so that the actors went through the same actions twice in which Abigail is shown in one but not the other.
I think that the overall consensus of the film is that it was good and achieved the aims which I wanted to go along side the music. I feel that there are areas which I have outlined which could have been made better such as the ghost arm but I am happy with the final product.
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| Shot from Batman, directed by Tim Burton. |
Other editing tools were used throughout the production, but these were the main ones which I used frequently. I found that by sing these in the premiere pro software I was able to learn how to edit in a more succinct and aesthetically pleasing style.
In terms of time management I felt that through this project the timing could have been done a lot better in terms of organising my time, I found that due to mitigating circumstances I couldn't fully complete the piece to a standard I wanted to. I also found that if I worked on a project like this again, I would ensure I made a contingency plan as I found that managing both my own time and the time of my actors and this had a major impact on the film.
I felt that through the filming process I learnt a lot on how to both direct and work with the actors as this is something that hasn't been explored previously. Throughout the process they worked well and I feel that they appear within the film as being in the mindset and the characters they needed to embrace.
Within the making of the film I was the camera operator on all shoots, director and did lighting for all but one scene in which I asked for the aid of Danielle Paige. She programmed the lighting within a studio so that it would change between different colouring such as Yellow and Green, to the lighting below which was a blend of purple, red and yellow. Danielle really helped in this scene and made this part of the film come alive.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Audience Feedback
I sent out a survey through Social Media websites such as Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin asking people how they felt about the film. To find out the demographic that were answering my survey I asked the age of the people who were taking part in the survey.
 |
| Question 1: How old are you? |
If I did this question the morning I would have asked more information, I would have also corrected the age brackets as one overlaps.
From this I found that my main audience were aged 16 - 24 year olds, in my original proposition I said this would be the age group I aim the film at so I feel in this respect I achieved my goal in terms of target audience.
After asking about the demographic of the audience of the survey I then asked the audience how they felt about the film and their thoughts of the storyline. The answers gave a mixture of good and bad points, one of the answers stated "Quite a sad song really, I do think the ending needs a better explanation though" I agree with this, I feel that the ending is quite sporadic which was done intentionally as I wanted it to be a shock to the audience. I feel that on reflecting on the end product that although the original idea is in place it could have done with some indicator to how she died as this was one of the biggest responses I got from the film. Another answer was "Story was far too sombre for the beat of the music"upon reflection again I agree with this comment in term of the beat. I think I, as a film-maker got caught up with the depressive lyrics of the composition and I feel that I didn't fully get across the humour which was shown in the storyboard. Although there were many issues, one answer was "filming was sharp and clear" which I think it was and the composition of the shots within the film I believe are the best I have yet and I think that I learn a lot about lighting as I throughout filming made an effort to ensure that the shots were filmed to fit with the saturated grading that I planned to do.
To conclude the survey I asked the audience if there were anything that they felt could be improved within the film. Again, I got a lot of good information on the error such as within the shot of the Mary and George at the grave, "The Ghosts arm is half cut off then it just appears". This happens because I shot it so that the actors went through the same actions twice in which Abigail is shown in one but not the other.
I think that the overall consensus of the film is that it was good and achieved the aims which I wanted to go along side the music. I feel that there are areas which I have outlined which could have been made better such as the ghost arm but I am happy with the final product.
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