alexjameswilliams

[alexjameswilliams]

PLAN

So my plan over the next few days is, tomorrow I will speak to Geraint about my idea and hopefully solidify it over the weekend. Then I will hopefully be able to film on Monday if everything goes according to plan, leaving me the rest of the week then to edit which shouldn’t take long if I am just doing 1 shot for my piece and then I can really focus on the colour grades that I will also choose very soon, and by that I mean the emotions I aim to create through colour.

[alexjameswilliams]

This is quite a nice looking aesthetic that I could experiment with in the filming process, I am not sure if just someone holding or stirring their drink will enough of a visual whilst the colour grades are moving across the screen, I think there needs to be secondary elements to the composition so in this image it would be the smoking element, it just adds a little something extra to the composition.

Similarly with this shot, it is at a different angle with the background taking a large chunk of the composition up, this is something else I like the look of. 

I will express all these ideas to Geraint, however I feel for what I want to achieve there can’t really be multiple shots, as that technically defeats the objective, which is to show how colour grading can influence and invoke emotions in audiences just by using colour as a story. 

[alexjameswilliams]

This is a great example of emotions within colour grading, very inspiring and it actually interprets certain colours in a completely different way, for example in this video, yellow was seen as madness and insecurity which I thought was very interesting.

[alexjameswilliams]

OPEN BRIEF IDEA

For my open brief I am going with the “subject of your choosing” section of the brief, as the others seem very motion graphics and I am honestly beyond terrible at motion graphics.

So I already sort of know what I want to do for this brief, as I have stated in multiple previous posts of projects, I am now focusing on colour grading. So for this assignment I wanted to portray all the different types of emotions that a colour grade can show or provoke in audiences, for example:

Happiness 

Sadness

Lust

Fear

Anger

There are lots more but they are very common ones.

So what I wanted to do was have a very impressionable visual, meaning that it is not clear what is really happening or what the correct emotional response should be, which is where the different colour grades would come in, to multiple different times change the mood and the tone of the visual.

Kirsty actually came up with a good visual which was someone stirring say a drink or a cocktail at the bar as this doesn’t automatically show its intentions therefore there is no correct emotion to feel. However say I made the colour grade rather red, using those sort of tones and undertones that could be lust, completing changing the feel of that piece of footage, vice versa I could make it rather dark and maybe blue undertones which signals sadness or depression maybe. That sort of visual is open to lots of different interpretations.

I hope I am able to create this idea in the way I imagine it, as this is Geraints project I will be speaking to him in the near future about this idea and the visual that I could possibly use and what I can do with my idea to push it further and make it better.

[alexjameswilliams]

EVALUATION

As per usual this assignment has been left quite late to complete, I don’t know why I do this to myself because it adds so much unnecessary pressure onto my when it is my own fault at the end of the day.

I did however get the filming and editing done fairly quickly because like I have stated in previous posts I wanted to have a really nice colour grade, which if I had more time I probably would have done it in DaVinci Resolve and started to learn the techniques and tools in the software. However I forced myself to use After Effects because of the time constraint I have given myself. 

Naturally the colour grade was my favourite part about this assignment, I was able to create two different colour graded versions and was able to ask peers which they preferred, all preferred my second graded version to the first one because they thought having it lighter was more complimentary and it just looked visually more appealing. 

Also after asking Geraint why my tracking wasn’t working he was able to show me a few steps I had to do before to fix it, I needed to change my FPS as it was et at 60 (lol) and the actual clip itself was too long, and I believe they were the main reasons why my track wasn’t working, and after that then I was able to do it quite easily. However in regards to time management I would have encountered this problem sooner and would have got the feedback from Geraint sooner meaning I could have put more effort into my track which I really wished I could because doing the initial track is easy its just making it look more appealing is where it was lacking. Yes, I did have them all fade in and up to their positions and had the ones in the background more faded out with a Gaussian blur but that is very basic and I could have done so much more to bring the whole piece together as I was really happy with my other colour graded footage.

This does all boil down to time management which myself and my lectures know is my biggest weakness in terms of uni work. However, I really do need to start pulling my finger out because I know that I can create much better work even if I started it a week before. I know that I can do better work and so do my lectures but it is very much down to me if I act on this.

The music that Kirsty found was also so lucky, it was the first one she heard and was instantly telling me this is the one to use it matches so well with my composition and it really does.

Overall, I am happy with my outcome, I actually think it looks quite quirky and really cutesy but I know that I can do better. I also wish I did more initial research about styles and pieces of work that I took inspiration from. However I aim now to start my other assignments this weekend, fully researching ideas and documenting this process. Also for future assignments I need to push myself to start them straight away because even though we have 3-4 weeks for assignments, they really do creep up on you and unfortunately I have learnt that the hard way.

[alexjameswilliams]

This is my final render for my tracking project, I will explain in detail my thoughts and feelings but I actually like the final output, I think its quirky and fun but obviously I would have loved to work more on it and work a lot harder on the tracking aspect of this brief.

[alexjameswilliams]

Final length

The final length of my promotion did turn out to be slightly longer then 30 seconds, it came out at about 39 seconds which isn’t too overboard I believe this will be acceptable in my lecturers opinion.

[alexjameswilliams]

OPEN BRIEF!

[alexjameswilliams]

This is also what the final shot fades to, just a clear cut logo of Cardiff just to clarify this was a sequence to promote a little bit about Cardiff, I used just a simple fade in technique whilst fading out my final shot so that it looks smooth.

[alexjameswilliams]

My Track

So I did ask for some help with my track from my lecturer Geraint who was obviously happy to help, he was telling me where I went wrong and what I needed to do to fix it and once he told me I felt so stupid because then tracking was made so much easier by just doing a few simple steps with the footage beforehand. 

I do feel the track is very basic, because it is, I have just labeled a few things that you would see in Cardiff like, Park, Castle, Church etc, and then I made them rise up and fade in just to add more detail. It isn’t the best looking for what I could have done if I gave myself more time but I am now much more confident in terms of how to do tracking, primarily in After Effects. 

[alexjameswilliams]

This is what the colour graded version of my final scene looks like, it is the same grade as my other shots and it worked out really nice, it did make the weather a bit more rainy looking but it is a nice looking aesthetic, it made the darker areas much darker which I really like as well.

[alexjameswilliams]

This is the music that a friend of mine helped me acquire, she went onto this royalty free website called free stock music and literally the first song she clicked on she said it matched perfectly and I wasn’t convinced but I listened to it and I was so shocked that it actually did fit amazingly, I am so happy because I thought this would actually be one of the hardest parts to complete.

I am now rendering my final output for the project for hand in, more progress slides will be posted shortly.

[alexjameswilliams]

This is my second colour graded version without the tracking element, after looking at both and asking for advice on which people prefer, they have all said they prefer this version and after consideration I have to agree, I like how it is a lot lighter compared to the other version, so this is the version I will be sticking with and adding the tracking element too.

[alexjameswilliams]

This is my first colour grade version without the tracking element, this version is darker then the other version but I still do really like it and will see how I feel about both of them tomorrow, this is also not featuring music.

[alexjameswilliams]

RENDERING

Despite not having the tracking element yet I am rendering both colour graded version of my project too see what I like best in full quality.

[alexjameswilliams]

MUSIC

The final thing I will do in this assignment is adding music, I will hopefully get the tracking element completed early in the day tomorrow so I can then spend time finding the right music piece for my assignment. 

The general editing is done it is just the final tracking element that is holding me back.

[alexjameswilliams]

TRACKING ELEMENT

I have actually been really struggling with the tracking element of this project, I believe I have followed the steps exactly how I am supposed too but it still isn’t coming out the way it is supposed to be so I will go and see my lecturers and ask for some help with it, it is only a short shot so it won’t take long for them to show me and I can add it into my piece.