One of the Edits for our Sound.

When planning, me and my partners wanted to play music when the car was pulling into the parking lot. We brainstormed a lot for this and when filming attempted different stunts of how we were going to implement this. We tried from music playing in the car, but it sounded poor with the sound and music out the car but it sounded unrealistic. We came to the conclusion of editing our sound in using Adobe Premiere Pro with adjusting the sound effects.

Me and my partners had to search up a video on how to perform this but all we had to do was add an equalizer to the music audio and adjust the effect controls of it . With a few tweaks, we were able to the get music/audio to sound like it was coming from a car successfully.

About Our Editing.

This weekend, me and my team will begin to edit our video, and I want to give some background on our experience with the program we’ll be using. We’ll be editing in Clipchamp, which is a simple and efficient video‑editing software that makes it easy to organize and create projects. My teammates and I have used Clipchamp before, so we already are familiar of how it works, which should make the editing process much smoother. One of the times we used it was for our Music Marketing Project, where we created a two‑minute music video for a chosen genre. We earned a good grade on that assignment, and we’re hoping to reach the same level of quality again.

When recording footage for this project, the files were automatically arranged in the order they were filmed, which makes importing everything into Clipchamp much easier. Since Clipchamp and OneDrive are owned by the same company, we can import our videos directly from OneDrive, which saves time and keeps everything organized. Clipchamp also allows multiple people to work on the same project. By clicking the share button and inviting teammates through their email, everyone can edit on the same timeline together.

A difficulty we had last time while editing in Clipchamp was that the app’s performance depends heavily on your computer. My computer isn’t very strong, so when I was editing the Music Marketing Project, the video kept buffering and lagging. It got so bad that one of my partners eventually had to take over and finish the editing. Another issue we ran into was importing files. Sometimes Clipchamp doesn't let you import a whole folder of videos at once if the total storage size is too large, so you have to upload each file one at a time instead.

CCR Question #1

HOST: Welcome back to The Spotlight Session. Today we’re talking with Sebastien, the creator behind a new short psychological film that’s already getting people curious. Thank you for being here. 

SEBASTIEN: Thanks for having me. I’m still trying to figure out if these lights are supposed to be this bright. 

HOST: Its fine, it's part of the broadcast. Anyways, Question #1 How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues? 

SEBASTIEN: The opening is designed to pull people in through tension and uncertainty. Instead of explaining everything, it lets the audience experience the moment the same way the character does. The closeups, the sound design, and the slow reveal of the object all build curiosity. People relate to the themes too. The story deals with pressure, influence, and how easy it is to lose control without realizing it. Those ideas feel familiar, especially for younger audiences, so even though the situation is exaggerated, the emotions behind it feel real. 

HOST: It has that “something’s off but you can’t look away” energy. 

SEBASTIEN: That’s exactly what I was going for. The kind of moment where you’re not sure what’s happening, but you want to keep watching to figure it out. 

StudioBinder. (2020). What is sound design in film? Definition & examples. https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/what-is-sound-design-in-film/

No Film School. (2019). How sound design can change the way you feel about a scene. https://nofilmschool.com/sound-design-change-feelings

Group Meeting Experience #2

Today, students were assigned to share our film ideas and project progress with 6–7 classmates that my instructor grouped us with. I did something similar earlier in Group Meeting Experience #2, when we had just started the project and were still brainstorming ideas. Now, most people in my class have a clearer sense of their concept and how their project is going so far. Out of the six people I spoke with in class, I chose the three that I found the most interesting.

"Calling Card" by Marat and Andres was a interesting one in my opinion. Most because they changed their idea and I was unaware of it. Their opening follows a thief called Shade (antagonist) who steals random objects. Shade leaves a single clue in an envelope/"calling card". These envelopes hints at where Shade plans to attack creating a trail of mystery for the protagonists to follow. The protagonists are Oliver and Matthew, two detectives hired to take on the case. They work together to track Shade's movements and piece together the meaning behind the objects he steals and the clues he leaves behind. Their issues were that they didn't film as much this week, their main problem their facing is their lack of problems so their focusing on building the setting, setting up the headline and gathering the items needed for the film.  Marat and Andres have an idea of the CCR answering 2 different questions with 2 different media activities. I enjoy the thief's eerie calling card creating a suspenseful trail that pulls people deeper into the mystery. I would like to see opening a lot.

Original Title Unknown by Ava is a story about a protagonist who discovers she is pregnant and, feeling scared and overwhelmed, decides to run away blaming her boyfriend for the situation. This whole situation creates an emotional suspense in the opening. One of the obstacles she faces is that Ava originally planned for the protagonist to escape on a bike, but since she no longer has one, she is forced to use a car which confuse viewers as they wonder whose car she will take and how she will get it.

"Cadence" by Sofia L. follows a runner who participates in long-distance track running while facing mental issues. The story shifts between scenes of him running and moments where he breaks own emotionally, highlighting the mental pressure he faces. One challenge Sofia faces is that she ponders on how the breakdown/mental issue film will be seen since it will have a powerful effect on the opening and is central idea of it. Sofia also has an idea of the CCR answering 2 different questions with 2 different media activities.

I didn’t receive much feedback during this group experience, but it was still enjoyable to hear everyone’s film‑opening ideas and learn how they plan to film their projects.

The Difficulties of Our Filming Process

While filming, we realized there was a major issue in our story that we should have planned for but didn’t. One of my partners arrived a bit late to the filming location, which meant the sun was already going down. Because of this, viewers will be able to see a noticeable change in lighting, which might cause some confusion. We filmed on a Friday at 5:30 PM, about two to three hours after school. In the future, we should have scheduled our filming earlier in the day, especially if we knew someone might arrive late.

At the Start:

Towards the End:

Another difficulty we had was that cars were going in and out the parking lot when we were filming. This difficulty was not as bad, but it did cause annoyance as we had to wait for a few minutes for them to leave again.

The last difficulty we faced during filming was that our original helper, who was supposed to help us on set, was unable to come. The original actor was meant to act as a substitute for Nicolas, but that plan fell through. Fortunately, Teo (who plays Nicolas) arrived with an electric car, while the original actor drives a gas‑powered one. The electric car made almost no noise during filming, which actually helped us keep the audio clean and avoid the unwanted car background sound.

Finished the Filming Process

Just yesterday, we finished filming our opening scene. In total, we recorded around 100 different clips, and the entire process took about three hours. We faced a few obstacles such as lighting issues and cars passing through the shot, but overall everything went smoothly. One of my partners, Kai, brought the main production equipment, including two cameras (one for filming and one for behind the scenes), as well as lighting and stands.

One of the most interesting scenes to film was the bag scene, where the characters fall into a trance. This moment is the central point of our story, so it needed to be executed perfectly. For this shot, we placed a light inside the bag so that when Ethan opens it, a bright glow appears, hinting that something inside is taking control of him. We used a low angle shot to capture Ethan’s facial expressions and build suspense as he opens the bag.

After filming, we now have to edit around 100 clips for our movie opening. In my opinion, the editing stage is the hardest part after filming, and I will definitely need the help of my partners.

The Casting for the Opening.

For our movie opening project, we had one director/actor , one cinematographer (me) and three actors. Two of the actors are members of my production group, while the other two are friends we invited to participate, one of them being a group member’s sibling. Choosing our group members and assigning character names didn’t take long at all, since we already had strong connections and received great suggestions from others. Below are the names and pictures of everyone involved.

Sebastien Nicolas( Cinematographer) 

Sebastian (Group Member)

Nicolas

Ethan

Chris (Group Member, Director)