Post-Prouction

We structured our editing stage of the production in a very similar way to the principle of photography and agreed to meet over three sessions.

We arranged to meet on the Friday to film our last scene at the church and begin editing. However Ellie (our main character) did not show up after 'falling back to sleep' due to a late night out.  Myself and Joe used the rest of this day to begin editing.

Thalia joined us but left after an hour as she "didn't think we'd be spending the whole afternoon at college" even though the deadline was the Tuesday and Joe had sent an e-mail to everyone after we'd agreed dates and times.

We had concerns how the footage would look, especially due to the low standard of acting but once we began looking through what we'd captured, it was clear that the effort we'd made in the principle of photography, had paid off.

I contacted Ellie to re-arrange the filming of our last scene and she asked us to come in on the Monday. This was a massive inconvenience for us as a team as myself and Joe had to yet again cancel working due to being let down but Monday was the last day we had free before the deadline. It was almost predicable that this would be the case but we gave her the benefit of the doubt and agreed to come in.

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Monday came and Ellie turned up for no more than 15 minutes before she left the room to "have a fag" with a friend. Thalia went out to speak to Ellie and explain the pressure we were under to complete the last scene. 

Ellie then came back to the room to grab her bag as she went off into town. We tried to contact her and she messaged us back to say she would only be five minutes. In this time we carried on with the editing and yet again Thalia had to leave.

Ellie eventually came back to the room after about an hour and a half of editing and myself and Joe had nearly finished the rough edit (minus the last scene). She told us that our actor would not be coming and that she had to go home.

As this was a group project, I made Ellie fully aware that she'd not played any part in the editing but she insisted she needed to leave, as her friend waited for her at the door.

It was at this point, that me and Joe decided to stop relying on the rest of the group and to just get on with the work ourselves. We put the footage together, utilising our RGB and basic editing skills and even managed to sort through possible music options. As the day came to an end we realised we'd almost finished the editing, which gave us some free time for the Tuesday morning and came up with something that looked really good.

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On the Tuesday morning we agreed to hold an urgent group meeting. However due to another night out Ellie did not show up. I made the decision for the group to get in contact with Ellie and if she wasn't on her way to college, then we would just forget about her role in the group and just go out to film the ending ourselves.

Ellie said she would be coming in for 1:30 after lunch which was 1 hour before the deadline. As this was Ellie's last chance to take on the role of the Producer, it was a shame she could not have made the effort to come in.

I took on the responsibility of Producer again, as well as the role of Director Of Photography to film the closing scene. Pressure was also put on Joe, as he had to become an actor due to Ellie not completing / uploading the appropriate pre-production work to our box file for our actor.

We had to compromise a scene that should have ended our film and use the back of Joe walking towards a grave, rather than the face staring into the headstone. This did not give the same dramatic effect but we managed to tie the whole thing together.

We completed the last scene and finished the edit before Ellie had even arrived at college. I felt that even though Ellie was left out of this process, it was the right thing to do, to ensure we'd meet the deadline.

I have learnt from this production not to rely on certain team members, as some are just there for the easy ride, good grades and are not willing to put in the effort to gain them.

Alun was also a great help throughout the whole of the post-production and taught myself and Joe (as we were the only two to show up) new tips for using Premiere Pro. I learnt how to use basic things like the workspace layout and the RGB monitor, to create a real professional looking piece of work.

Alun also taught me how to edit the audio from a shot in Audition straight from the Premier timeline. This is something I will be able to use in future productions, as it is very basic and straight forward to use.