Mise en scene

Today, we got to know, in detail, about the elements that come under the term 'mise-en-scene'. This particular term carries in it the most imperative component of every scene. Our teacher discussed all the visual elements which goes in the frame, so that when we produce our media product we keep all these elements in mind.  As we have to watch more documentaries and de-construct them later on so the knowledge about miss en scene will really help us in our assignments.

The following come under mise-en-scene:

• Settings- mood, background etc.
• Color palates
• Props
• Costume, Hair and Make-up
• Facial expressions and Body language
• Lighting and colors 

Whatever goes into a frame holds importance in it's own different way. Every other object that has been placed in a scene has the meaning of its own, either it could be used to produce a particular tone or mood to it or either to manipulate the thought process of the audience the way the director wants them to interpret it.
After going into detail, we have realized that the significant of all the elements present in every scene cannot be over emphasized.

Moving on to the first content-Settings. The setting of a scene is done in a way that portrays the story line the director tries to convey to the audience. An example could be taken in order to make it more clear. For a horror scene we would witness some worn out furniture covered with in some cases covered in white cloth to give an anachronistic feel to the milieu,  low key lights with the moon light or candles being the only source of light in the area, the sound of the wind is prominently played in the scene to give a feeling that something supernatural is heading its way to the place etc, as we can see in this picture taken from the movie Woman in Black. All these factors together create the mood in the scene which make the viewers curious and frighten as they are provided with signals that the 'ghost' is about to carry an act.





COLOR PALETTE:
Every genre of a film has a particular color palate which defines it better than just choosing random colors and connoting it into a film. The color palate of a film also helps define the mood of the story line of the film to the viewer. For example, for action films, the use of dark colors would suit the story well. The example of these poster of the films THE DARK KNIGHT RISES and X MEN aids in explaining my point well. Imagine if bright colors such has pink or light blue colors were used in the poster of the DARK KNIGHT RISES. Would that explain well the personality and the attitude of Batman? No, it will not. The name BATMAN explains lot, it has derived from those creates who dwell in dark areas and so black, grey and at some place white colors blended with grey or black would suit well the theme of the film overall.




PROPS: Now comes the props! Props are objects that actually help signify a feeling or has some action revolving around it. An example taken from the film HARRY POTTER. The wand that Harry carried with him at all times hold a significant position in the film as it defends him against all evils. That's why a wand could be seen in the hands of Harry and his friends in the posters and film itself.



COSTUME, HAIR AND MAKE-UP: These three terms define a number of aspects of a film. They help create an idea of the personality of  different characters, the culture, personification, genres etc. With the help of two picture taken from the same movie these terms could be identified. 





These pictures are taken from the movie HANNAH MONTANA-The movie. In the first picture Miley is dressed as Hannah; her clothes, her make-up and her wig could easily help the viewers establish that Miley is carrying out the character of Hannah. Being a star of the music industry, Hannah is bound to dress up and carry herself this way and so her costume, hair and make-up illustrates the life of Hannah. Whereas, in the second picture Miley Cyrus is dressed up as the person she actually is, a normal girl from Tennessee. Her clothes explains the simplicity that relates to her hometown, she is not wearing any wig which shows she is not presenting herself as someone else and the amount of makeup is not as much as compared to when she is dressed up as Hannah as she is at a gathering of her family and friends.

FACIAL EXPRESSIONS AND BODY LANGUAGE: The facial expressions and body language of characters help address the feelings they are trying to show to the audience while playing their respected roles in a film. These features and actions must be carried out with great caution as a poor 'acting' or even the minute facial expression could sometimes give out a misleading message to the viewers who could then start to deviate from the original plot.

An example of facial expressions could be taken from the movie THE BATMAN BEGINS. His expressions tell that he is sitting and listening to someone talking to him directly. The opinions going on in his mind are brought down to the way he has held his features. It seems as if the conversation of the second man does not seem amicable due to which the expressions are a bit irritated but simultaneously the smile he has on his face explains that he is not letting his thought process become obvious to the person talking to him.




Another picture, from the same film, has been captured to elaborate on our  point even more. This picture shows that the person standing in the front is either conveying or acting as a guard to the man sitting behind him. However, this could also be interpreted by the picture that the man standing is listening to what the other person behind him is saying, but considering the gesture in which he he standing, with his arms placed at his back tells that he has presented himself in this way out of respect to the man seated behind him.




The third picture is from the movie WOMAN IN BLACK. In this picture as Daniel Radcliffe gets closer to the camera moves backwards showing his movement, where as, the camera tracks inwards towards the door to show he is getting nearer to the door. During this scene, the movement of the camera and the character himself signifies that something frightening if about to show up after he opens the door. The sound coming from behind the door also signifies that horror is on its way. These scenes could work as signifier.




LIGHTING & COLOR:
Lights help create different moods, tones, environment etc of a scene, It's job is not merely to make things visible but there is way more than that when it comes to movie making. Lights help create the   
a particular feel to a scene. Example: In horror films, usually a scary scene is portrayed with low key lights where shadows take over most of the area. Had it been bright colors during the scene when a paranormal activity occurs would not manage to give away the frightening idea to the viewers and the scene would become less serious.

Research-Genres

The synopsis has been finalized and now, we have finally move on to the next significant step of our blog i.e. is identification of a genre. There were basic 3 categories were research on classic documentary, docu soap and docu fiction.A genre converges the media texts which share the same form and iconography etc. The genre of any film, documentary or soaps etc. play a very important role in terms establishing the target audience  After extensive research, we came across various forms of a documentary. They are as follows:

Docu-soap

Docu-fiction

Classic documentary

Docu-theater

Docu-drama

Out of all these options; the forms which relate to our synopsis are Docu-soap, Docu-fiction and Classic documentary  We carried out research on these three kinds of documentaries. 

Docu-fiction is a sub genre of documentary which presents facts in a dramatized way i.e. the setting of he characters and events are fictional. the main aim behind this is to crate a made up image or a parody of events as ti represent them in a more interesting and different way than that of a normal documentary. Also known as mockumentary. 

During research, we came across a docu-fiction documentary as posted. This is a project of an A levels student who scored an A. The characters in this documentary are completely made up. The story line is also fictional but it's roots lay in an actual event. This was shown in the documentary in the starting in order to tell the audience of what becomes the inspiration behind the title of their documentary. The codes and conventions are followed, the voice over, self created characters and story line based on reality, camera shots e.g. close shots while taking interviews, interviews of people on the matter etc could be witnessed in this clip.

 https://12345proxy.com/Go.php/L5_2BC4T/JoygREtE/Aeb1DwNn/kT_2B3_2/FUaHV_2F/IyC4mbI4/j4kZGQa8/t2w_3D/b0/

Classic documentary is solely based on facts i.e. it is non-fictional. The events that are shown are based on facts, without any made up characters.

An example of a classic documentary could be seen in this documentary taken from National Geographic named Inside the NSA -Americas Cyber Secrets 2012. the documentary states all the actions, decisions taken and events that took place inside the NSA before and after the attempt on capturing Osama Bin Laden. The documentary is based on facts and authentic information that was derived on this particular matter. There is voice over, close shots on interviewees, interviews, real footage of events, archive footage or still etc.

https://12345proxy.com/Go.php/L5_2BC4T/JoygREtE/Aeb1DwNn/kT_2B3_2/FUaHV_2F/IyC4pokP/3PxJThmO/wEY_3D/b0/

The documentary could be further characterized into different forms, which are as follows:

• Poetic documentary
• Expository documentary
• Observational documentary
• Participatory documentary
• Reflexive documentary
• Per formative documentary

Our project is going to be based on an expository documentary as we are going to prove our claim that a change in activities could be experienced in today's generation than those of earlier ones. Although, it is going to follow the codes and conventions of a normal documentary but we do take some elements from other forms. Such as, our documentary will revolve around two characters  We will be capturing their day to day activities as to prove our stance. This relates to both docu-fiction and docu-soap, however, our character would not be made up or be given a script to act accordingly. Whatever they will be doing would be natural without any roles assigned to them. 

COMPARISONS:
The types of documentaries that relate to our documentary have been stated, we now move on to compare these types with each other so that we understand fully what distinguishes them from each other. A documentary basically shows facts. It has a lot of styles to make is look interesting for the viewers. A documentary can be simply of one genre or can be a mixture of different sub-genre or styles. Below we compared few documentaries so that we can have better understanding about them. This exercise will help us with our documentary so that we know how we want to make our documentary look like and under what codes and conventions will our work fall:

I did comparison of these two genre's . sabaina did comparison on travelogue & docu-fiction. It is posted on her blog .

Docu-fiction & Classic Documentary

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1083782/air_crash_investigation_ripped_from_the_cockpit_part_1/

Docu-fiction: Air crash investigation is a renowned program aired on National Geographic Chanel since years ow. It falls under the category of docu-fiction due to a number of reasons. Like any other documentary, a docu fiction documentary is based on facts. However, those facts are presented in a dramatized or fictitious way i.e. the director creates a story line out of the reality. The characters are made up and scripted. As in Air crash Investigation, the story of every episode is based on a real incident that had occurred but the characters that we see as passengers are people assigned with their respected roles as to add more emotions and exaggerated the happenings in order to capture the sympathy and drive the audience towards watching the program. E.g. in the beginning of the program we can see that the crew of the airplane are shown interacting with each other. Further in the video, at 3:25 one of the passengers talking to the attendee.

 






The documentary could be further classified into observational form. What makes it observational is that the the program is based on the analysis on an event that took place some while ago which left a lot of mysteries to be solved. The errors that led to this unforeseen event are stated in the end of the every episode after the extensive research and observance of the people. Also, the pilots and the passengers act as the interviewees and tell their point of view of the particular scenario in the middle of the episodes in order to provide the audience with the first hand information.



Moreover, the codes and conventions of a docu-fiction documentary are followed. the story is fictitious, the characters are not real, the narration takes place in the beginning of the  every episode in order to give a summary of the episode to the viewers, the camera angles (medium shot on the interviewees while they tell what they have to say and vista shots and still shots on the airport as to show the area where the error initiated from), interviews of people and eye witnesses in particular etc.

CLASSIC DOCUMENTARY: 

https://12345proxy.com/Go.php/oSAOXMtl/mPucGVfN/_2FIwyH_/2FjZt1bQ/dmA0nrCT/mY5GsXt_/2FQ0ErX_/2F4_3D/b0/

For classic documentary, we chose to carry out our analysis on a documentary called 'Eating with Cannibals' aired by the National Geographic Channel. This documentary is portrayed as a form of research carried out by Piers Gibson based on identifying if Cannibals. The documentary comes under the category of a classic because it is based on facts, the people shown in the documentary are NOT fictional or scripted and the events captured  are based on reality i.e. it is non fiction. 

The documentary could be divided into two categories, Observational and participatory  Observational means that the events highlighted in the documentary is observed and analysed as to get to know about cannibals and their way of living. With that, participatory is when a person himself takes the initiative to be filmed while exploring the answers to his questions. The documentary is carried out Piers Gibson who goes deep into the jungle and interacts with people and interview them.

The documentary follows the codes and conventions of a classic documentary. It's based on facts, the interviewees are people on whom the research is based on, the documentary is not fictitious, camera angles and narration etc.


COMPARISON:
These two documentaries could be distinguished in a way that they both are based of a completely different nature of stories. One is fictitious while the other is cased on reality. The characters in docu-fiction are roles assigned to people whereas, the people shown in the classic documentary are the actual people being filmed while carrying out their day to day activities etc. However, as docu-fiction and classic documentaries both come under the term documentary; there are some elements in every documentary that are similar to each other e.g. the narration, the interviews and the camera angles etc.

Lights analysis

The scenes I have taken for my analysis based on lights are from the movie Pulp Fiction. It's when Vincent and Mia get together for dinner at a restaurant.

The scene starts when Vincent takes Mia out for dinner at a restaurant. When the car stops we can witness that lights used are just key lights from the left side of the characters while they were seated in the car. The lights are fluorescent as to show the night time. The light is just enough to highlight the faces of the characters. There has been no use of a fill light or a background light as to develop the mood of night time.

The scene further unfolds into the restaurant and the lights used indoors are low key as to compliment the theme of the restaurant. Moreover, while Vincent goes through the restaurant we can see that he turns out at points where the tungsten bulbs are just above his head, this could be as to capture his expressions in the film.

When they both are seated, there is tungsten key light placed on the faces of both the characters. When the camera comes on Vincent the key right has been balanced with a fill light, however, Mia’s face is being shown with the help of a key light and the light set above her head as we can see the reflection on her hair.

While the waiter takes order from them, the light on the waiter is different from that falling on both the characters. The light on the waiter is florescent key light, with no fill light. Whereas, Mia and Vincent are highlighted with reddish tungsten light.

Moreover, when the camera takes a side mid close up shot of Mia and Vincent, the light on Mia’s face tones down a bit. Her face is made more prominent due the low key light falling on her face from the other side which compliments her expressions of observing Vincent while he’s having his drink.

3 point light set-up

Posted by : Sabaina and Aiman 

In class, we learned about lights and its importance. Light is a very important aspect in film making, it affects the whole mood of any scene.

We got to know about the 3-point light set up and we experimented with it during the class. The following are the lights we studied about:

• Key lights
• Fill lights
• Background lights

and also:

• High key (Lights that are evenly distributed in a particular area which prevents the occurrence of shadows)
• Low key (Lights that create a contrast between dark and light areas which creates shadows.)

Below are a few pictures in which we show the usage of different lights. Keeping in mind the 3-point light set up.

Due to no availability of proper equipment and resources, we had to to make use of the lights that were available to us at home. We chose an object for experimenting the three lights.


At first, the light was placed at the right side of the object. This made one part of the object lit up and the other darken. This was to show the Key light when put upon a person or an object.

Secondly, we used a chart paper as our reflector. The reflector was placed at the left side of the object which aided us in balancing the light to some extent. Compared to the picture taken of the Key light, the face of the object can be seen in this picture due to the light falling of the other half due to the reflector. This shows the fill light.

 

Thirdly, we placed a light at the back of the object in the presence of the Key light and the reflector as to show the results we get when three of these are combined. After the putting in light in the back this picture is what we managed to get. the second picture is to show how the light was set at the back of the object.

DIFF USER:
when we took this photograph there was very harsh light on sun which was acting as key light for us at the moment. We took diffused and diffused that light .

Below are some pictures of objects on which we experiment with light. As we did not have people at that moment to take pictures of so we thought to practice light with the objects.


BACKGROUND LIGHT: we used a object to show back light of the subject.It created a dark shadow in front of the object

                                                              TUNGSTEN LIGHT:

FLUORESCENT LIGHT:

Important points.

I got to learn some very important details today which would aid me in producing a good blog. While creating my own blog I need to make sure that I :

• lay emphasis on the Codes and Conventions.
• never produce bland reports.
• give details on each and every thing that I do while making my own short film.
• use media related technical terms
• give references!

All these factors would compliment my written text as the reader would be able to relate whatever I write with what inspired me into writing that particular context.

Cinematography

Posted by : Sabaina and Aiman

Today, we learned about cinematography, which includes various techniques that are used in the making of a film. All the terms and conditions that were studied during class were then experimented practically, during which we released that it's not easy to capture even the simplest of shots which we study in theory. Although we are amateurs with handling a camera in a professional way but in order polish our skills in this particular area we carried out this activity so that we could get comfortable with it during our shooting of the short film\documentary. The results are stated:

There are a few credentials one must follow in order to develop a scene:

• Objective, one must be clear about the reasons behind a particular scene so that everything is done accordingly preventing it from going off the topic.
• Set up a scene, this includes the mise-en-scene i.e. the lights, background etc.
• Establishing the characters, placing the characters at their correct places in a way that they effectively give away the idea behind the roles they are playing, to the audience.
• Elaborating the activity, this would put focus on the subject's activity the director is trying to highlight to the viewers.

CAMERA MOVEMENTS

stationary moves: (when the camera is on tripod and not physically moving)

Tilt Up and Tilt down: when a camera lens moves upwards/downwards while being fixed at a particular place capturing the character or an object for a scene. The difficulty in this particular task was when we had to keep the camera at a consistent level, due to the unavailability of a tripod, in order to get a clear shot.

http://vimeo.com/64968254

Pan: It is a horizontal camera movement, when the camera moves from left to right or from right to left to capture a particular object or to give a sweeping view across the screen. The problem with this task was almost the same as that experienced in capturing the tilt moves, the camera had to still in in order to prevent it from being rugged.

http://vimeo.com/64968221

Zoom in: when camera lens magnify/minimize to capture the object or to lay emphasis/distance an object or a character. This shot was comparatively easy to do as compared to others as we only had to keep a camera at one position but our hands were still very shaky when we took this shot as the camera was not on tripod. Whereas, we had to magnify the lens to capture the object for Zoom in and then for Zoom out the camera was placed at the same point of the same object with the lens of the camera being minimized in order to capture the surrounding substitution of the object.

Zoom In

http://vimeo.com/64993957


Zoom Out
 http://vimeo.com/65193690                         

(zoom in )(zoom out)

Travelling moves: This is when a camera moves physically. Which includes the following:

Dolly Up and Down: This is when a camera is set on a small crane used indoors in order to capture various angles from above or below the object or a character.

Tracking: A camera is set opposite to a character on a track. The movement of the camera is sideways to the character.

Crane: In this term a camera is fixed on a crane which is used to capture a scene from below or above, this is carried out outdoors to capture a wide area.

For all these three travelling moves, we requires objects such as a small crane or track in order to capture these three shots. As we did not have the resources it was difficult for us to capture these moves.

Following Move: In this term a camera follows the character while walking or running etc. In order to get the correct results we had to try this task two to three times. The problem was that the velocity of the character was not matching the velocity of the camera. We had to move the camera at a slow pace in order to avoid it from being distorted so, it took us a few minutes to adjust the speed of the camera and the character with each other.

                                                http://vimeo.com/64968090

CAMERA ANGLES:

High angle: this is when a camera capture a character from  above it facing downwards. It's usually used to give an impression of the character being weak or frightened. This shot was relatively complicated as one of us had to stand on a chair in order to get take a picture from above the head of the character. we personally think that this angle was most difficult to shoot .

http://vimeo.com/64968108

Low angles: this is when a camera captures a character from below facing upwards. This particular angle gives an impression of awe or power surrounding the character. This was the most difficult shot there was. During taking it we faced some confusions. When one of us sat of the ground and tilted the camera a bit the picture we got seemed like a normal shot. It did not give any majestic feel it to. So, in order to get it right we had to adjust the camera again and again to get the correct result.

http://vimeo.com/64968206

Eye level: a camera is set at the height of the character. This required us to keep the camera in line with the character as to give a feel to the viewers as if the character itself is observing. The following picture was taken from the movie SALT so that we could better understand in practical terms along with in theory.

CAMERA SHOTS

Long shot: This shot captures the full person. As this experiment was taken place in afternoon the light available to us was very harsh outdoors that prevented us from getting a picture with the correct lights. So, this shot was taken indoors in a classroom. Due to chairs and desks we faced distractions while making an area for us to stand and take a picture from a suitable angle .

Medium-long shot: This covers a character till it's knees.We did not face any problem during a picture of this particular  shot.  

Mid shot: This shot covers area of the character from waist till above. We had to make sure that the zoom we took in order to bring the lens towards the waist was adjusted correctly. Other than that, the shot was taken easily.

Close up: This shot cover the face of the character. While taking a zoom on the face of the character, the face of the character took too much space in the entire screen so we had to distance a bit so that some space was left in the surroundings of picture e.g. the head room.

Extreme close up: This shot covers a particular area of the character in order to lay emphasis on that particular area. This shot was easy to take as compared to others as it only required to take a zoom of the eyes of the character. It did not require any movement.

180 DEGREE RULE: 

Over the Shoulder: This shot is taken in way that the front of one person and some back portion of another character is shown while they are interacting. This shot was taken by placing a camera behind the second character that gave a clear view of the first character while having a chat with the other. We did not face any difficulty while capturing this shot as it did not require any adjustments of speed or angles from which we were taking the shot.

180 degree movement: This shot is taken at the angle of 180 while placing the two character at a horizontally. This shot was a bit complicated as this term was new to us. We had to set the characters horizontally at the right place and with that during the shooting we had to keep the camera smoothly in order to get a consistent picture. There was a fixed chair in our way which was becoming a disturbance during shooting the shoot of the video. The video had to be re-taken a couple of times after which we were able to get the authentic footage. Other than that, we thought that this movement could be captured by placing the camera above the shoulder of the other person however, we were told that we could tilt the camera at different angles as well. Unfortunately, the footage we captured was not in accordance with the rules of 180 degree, so, we decided to place a picture taken from one of the tutorial videos posted on YouTube so that we could get an example of how it is done correctly.

Rule of thirds: When character or object is slightly off center so that it catches viewer's attention. it was really easy to practically apply this task as we have learned photography last year and we have experimented with this rule a lot as its the most important rule in photography.

 

Lead room: when we making a video or take a picture. The character should have a lead room. which means space before him/her which he/she is leading to. So it gives a comfortable impression to the views.

                                             Wide shot: This shot covers the wide area.

http://vimeo.com/64968156

We experimented with this cinematography technique as well: 

Shallow focus : This is one of our favorite technique and we were very excited to experiment with this shot. Basically  it is when the object near the camera is in focus and the background is out of focus. When we took this shot we felt our camera was very shaky during this shot as we very experimenting with this shot for the first time

http://vimeo.com/64968231