After shooting our short film, our next step was to begin the editing process. Although two members of our group were responsible for the actual editing, there were several decisions we had to make as a group in terms of how we wanted our film to look.
Based on the short films we have analysed, we know what standard we have to maintain in order for our short film to do well.
Black Strip
After finishing the editing process, one of our final decisions was to add a cinematic black strip to our film. This is also known as widescreen.
Our reasoning behind this was to make our film look more professional.
We also did this...
Shot Change
Part of ensuring that a film remains interesting requires a variety of shots. Viewers must be engaged by the different shot types. Here is an example of our film continuing but the shot changing.
During the filming process, the actors were instructed to always repeat their movements despite the change of shot.
As shown above, the male actor has his left hand pointing at someone else. The shot changes to an over the shoulder and he is seen doing the same thing. This helps to maintain a high standard and authentic film. It is important to change the shot to keep the plot exciting but also keep authentic continuity.
Use of Constant Power
One thing that let down our short film was the sound. Due to not having a high budget, we could not gather the necessary equipment to ensure the sound was perfect.
As a group, we decided that we would experiment with several audio transitions to try and make sure the sound does not really jeopardise the quality of the film.
We checked the Adobe website, which gave a description of all the preset transitions in Premiere Pro.
From these descriptions and also experimenting with them, we established that Constant Power was the best fit transition for our sound issue.
After using the Constant Power transition, our sound between the two clips was much better and as a group we were happy.
Dramatic Music with Close Ups
We had climaxes in our film, where we knew that the use of sound would be very beneficial in certain scenes. One particular scene in our film is very dramatic, and to match it, we wanted music that sounded epic and dramatic. After conducting a search on YouTube, we found music that fit perfectly.
After finding the clip we downloaded the MP3 file and added it to our film.
We used the dramatic music with our close ups because...
Reaction Shots
As our film was heavily reliant on dialogue, it is important we varied our shots. We used reaction shots, ensuring we did not break the 180-degree rule, otherwise known as crossing the line.
It was important to use reaction shots often because..
Ringtone Decibels
In our story, there is a scene where one of the character's phone rings. Instead of using the natural phone ringing sound, we downloaded the ringtone sound and used this. We did this so that we could manipulate the audio how we wanted and actually control the ring.
Although the phone is ringing in the scene above, the ringing sound is still heard when the other character is outside, however the decibels are lowered. This was done because there is actually dialogue from the character outside, which is crucial to the plot.
It was also done to make the film more abstract. The ringtone continuing makes viewers ask several questions about what is going to happen and keeps them on the edge of their seats.
Shot Change
Part of ensuring that a film remains interesting requires a variety of shots. Viewers must be engaged by the different shot types. Here is an example of our film continuing but the shot changing.
During the filming process, the actors were instructed to always repeat their movements despite the change of shot.
In this example one of the actors is seen...
The shot then changes to a...
We made this editing decision because...
Shot Change
Part of ensuring that a film remains interesting requires a variety of shots. Viewers must be engaged by the different shot types. Here is an example of our film continuing but the shot changing.
During the filming process, the actors were instructed to always repeat their movements despite the change of shot.
In this example one of the actors is seen...
The shot then changes to a...
We made this editing decision because...
