Experimental Evaluation

'Lights'

The inspiration for our piece came from technology, we wanted to explore how it could be perceived from a child like perspective, as many of us do not fully understand the inner workings of our computers or phones, yet we use them every day. Our original idea for our sound piece was to try to convey a sense of going inside a computer and into a different world, we wanted to show this by emphasising the difference between the outside world, which was to be full of modern technical sounds, and the inner world which was supposed to contrast this with sounds of old machinery, for example typewriters and cogs clicking and turning like that of a 1950's style factory. We took inspiration for the sound piece only from an advert created for sony by Wes Anderson, it featured sounds of letters flying by and little robots carrying messages too and from places, this was supposed to represent texts being sent. Alice and I were on the same wave length creatively for the visual and we opted to go for a more abstract approach for our video, neither of us had done anything like this before so it was a new challenge for us. For the video we took inspiration from 'An optical Poem' by Oskar Fischinger, this enabled us to really be bold and play with colour, and it also inspired us to try and make our abstract images fit with the soundtrack we were going to create. We wanted to create a dream like world with our images, we planned to use time lapse and draw over the top of the image, and overlay colours, to achieve this goal. We also wanted to establish a colour theme, as we both talked about simple details that can really make films stand out, and this is one of the things thats is included in many films, and it really compliments the story line. We chose blue and orange almost by accident, as when we were filming our first time lapse, we had composed the shot to include blue/ green buildings, we chose it as the colour within the shot seemed to really work, but as we shot our time lapse it got dark, and the blue and green was no longer visible and was replaced by the orange lights of cars flashing by and the street lights above. Alice and I both agreed that this was a good choice for our colour theme and it gave us something to strive for when planning our further shots. 

Our project is not directed at a specific age range, but it wasn't aimed at children although it is suitable for children, it was intended more for an audience with similar interests as our selves, for example experimental film and art, as the film isn't obvious in its purpose and plot and does require some analysis. 

On finishing our experimental project, I think that both I and Alice feel that we have been successful in achieving our aims creatively, there are some things that could have been improved upon, such as more visual planning as when we got to the planning of our experimental film, we had finished our sound piece but we were not sure how to link images to it as our idea was so abstract. For our sound piece we created a sound shopping list, and had to use our initiative in collecting the sounds, as our original idea was to go to kelham island industrial museum, but we were unfortunately unable to visit during the days we had planned as the BBC were filming there. Consequently we walked around sheffield brainstorming for new ideas and we found the Sheffield police and fire engine musuem. We explained our project to them and the employees graciously allowed us to walk around for free and collect any sounds we might need. We collected sounds from old fire engine pumps that were used to dispense water, squeaking the old mechanisms proved to be very useful to us as the microphones picked up the sound very well. They also had a war exhibition that provided us with old style radio voices and music, we recorded this using our initiative as the radio talk was played through a phone for visitors to listen to. Putting the microphone next to the phone proved a very effective way of collecting the sound. We also happened upon a antiques shop, and when we went in found that it had old typewriters on display, we again asked permission to record the sound of the typewriter, and this has been used throughout our final piece. For the computer sounds we wanted to create a sound that showed more depth than just recording a computer turning on, so we used a contact mic to record the internal sounds of a computer. This in my opinion worked very well and proved to be one of the strongest sounds in our piece, as people are instantly able to recognise it as a technological sound. Combined with a computer starting up it is easily recognisable and now forms the beginning of our sound piece structure. For the visuals we had little planning as it was difficult to envision the inner workings of a computer, initially after our group tutorial we were very keen on creating a stop motion for part of our film, but this proved to be quite expensive and time consuming, so we resorted to plan B. We built a house out of cardboard and played with light coming through the windows, we experimented with lamps and the lights on our phones to see which one gave the best effect, it was actually a flash light app on my phone which gave the best results as we had so much control over the movement of the light as it was small and handheld, for the filming we experimented with using a 28mm lens that i had done a little bit of research on, we got it out from stores and tested it out, as i was under the impression this would give us a much closer depth of field for the interior shots of the dolls house, on comparing both lens's the difference was only slight but we decided to use the 28mm lens anyway as we thought it might make all the difference on a bigger screen. The lighting we used also gave us the basis of our theme for our film, from this we decided that we would use light and time as our main starting point, as time was quite fitting to our piece as we were attempting to exhibit two separate spheres of time in industrial history.  Some of the weaknesses of our film have been that we may have over used some of the shots, because of lack of planning. If i was to do this project again i would write up a schedule and try to stick to it, allowing for more time to experiment with what works and what doesn't work, as we have admittedly had to use our initiative and improvise heavily throughout the piece, however it was a very enjoyable experience.

Showing our work in the week before the final exhibition proved useful as it gave us confidence and confirmed some of our existing doubts about the visual and also helped us iron out some teething problems with the sound, such as checking levels on larger speakers. Our film was critiqued and we were able to make executive decisions based on an audience reaction, for example we spent a whole day filming clocks around sheffield only to find that when we put it in to our edit it did not fit with the aesthetic of the film. Luckily we had already discussed alternatives and because of this i had recorded an out of focus light, that was actually the light my phone gives of while on charge, and it had occurred to me that if i swung the tripod from side to side of this light it reminded me of a pendulum on a clock. This is the footage we have used in our final film. Overall my individual contribution was being a camera operator, which was shared fairly between both I and alice, this is the same with the sound recording. Doing both of these tasks on a largely equal basis proved to be very effective in the post production, as we were both completely aware of the footage and sounds that we had captured so we were able to speak with ease about our planning for the edit and assembly for our sound piece, after this to save time we both allocated roles, i became the sound designer for the most part and Alice became the the editor. There was a fair amount of crossover with the roles and we both played a part creatively in each role, this was made possible by planning and booking computers next to each other in the edit suites. Sound design has helped me to learn new skills on soundtrack pro even though it is not usually my strongest area, and as i had never been taught how to use it to its full potential before this was a useful experience that took me outside of my comfort area. The largest challenge was creating a sense of space using all of our recordings, i had to build up sounds and keep a momentum going throughout the piece as we were trying to create an interior of a factory, and to do this i had to build up lots of little recordings with various effects on to make each one overlay the other to give the illusion of a busy space, when in actual fact each of the recordings were separate in their own right, as we didn't want to sacrifice any of the quality of sound by recording a busy area, so our creative decision was to go the long way around, but i think this pays off in our final film. Another major challenge we were faced with largely up until nearing the end of the project was how to create the illusion that the audience were being taken in and out of the computer, we tried whipping sticks around, whistling dropping things next to the microphone, eventually we figured out if you keep whipping a wire round in a constant motion it sounds very interesting and gives the sense of something continuously moving, this was the sound we used for entering the computer, we didn't want to use the same sound again so for exiting the computer world we played with the idea of surfacing from water, to connote surfacing from the computer, to achieve this i used an underwater mic and recorded myself speaking underwater and then coming out of the water, i think this worked quite effectively and i really liked the sound this created.

Technically i think i have improved throughout this project and i have as i mentioned above i have learnt how to effectively use soundtrack pro, which is not a skill i possessed before, i have also been experimenting with camera techniques and have been forced by the abstract nature of our project to come up with new and inventive ways of creating an image for the screen, and also creating sounds that were interesting and created I feel i have been dedicated to the film, largely because i was having fun creating interesting images for the audience and if i had an idea stuck in my head i would have to go and do it just to see how it looked on film. The abstract lights at the beginning were created by   the ending of our experimental film i think is one of the strongest points, this was created through actually physically waiting for a streetlight to go out, as i thought this would work well with theme of lights throughout the film, and then the street light going out at the end signified the finality of the piece. 

Working with Alice throughout the piece was one of the easiest experiences creatively working as a team, as we were both dedicated to achieving the best possible result from our film, and we both had a similar vision for the aesthetic of the film, and for the sound piece, i am very happy with the final experimental film, and i think that the techniques i have learnt from this film are going to be useful in the future for my films, i am happy we decided to go for a more abstract approach as i really think our film stands out more than anything despite some minor technical faults we may have experienced during the process. I think for my next project i will be paying much closer attention to planning and pre production instead of facing the problems in post, but i plan to take on board all i have learnt from this piece and to will continue to look upon film as an art form as well as a means of storytelling. 

Jay Burgoyne.