Filming Evaluation - Day Five - The Forest

For my third day of filming in the forest, we had changed the ending of our narrative, so I needed to film some new shots for the end of our opening sequence. I filmed on Saturday 23rd January, but unfortunately David was unavailable to film on this day, so I had to use an appropriate double, Tyler, to record the shots needed.

I got David to give me the jumper, trainers, jeans, gloves and hat so that Tyler would be wearing exactly the same thing. Unfortunately, David forgot to bring the hearing aid again so we were unable to use this aspect in the filming and had to be careful to avoid continuity errors in the footage. Tyler came over at around 1pm and we both got ready before walking to the forest to start filming. Again, it was very cold so I had to put my coat on between shots. We worked very effectively and, as he is also an A-Level Media student, we were able to combine our expertise to get some really creative shots. We had a checklist of what we needed to film:

• Point of view shots of the killer in different locations, 'watching' the victim
• Close up of the killers eyes
• Shots of the victim running
• Shot of getting into a clearing and looking around as if I've heard something
• Shots of killer running through the trees
• Long shot of victim being kidnapped by the killer
• Shot of headphones on the floor
• Shot of headphones being crushed.
• Shot of victim getting carried over the kidnappers shoulder
• Shot of victim being shut into a car boot

We filmed all the shots, but watching them back decided that we didn't like the close up of the killers eyes, as we felt the identity is better hidden, and eyes portray too much emotion that the killers eyes wouldn't be seen during the opening scene. We also attempted to do the shot when I was in an opening and could 'hear' something, but this was very hard as it was hard to imagine the killer being in more than one place. We really liked the shot of the killer kidnapping the victim, as it looked realistic enough and not staged, but this took many takes to get right. We also did the victim getting carried over the kidnappers shoulder, but this looked too staged as it was hard to be completely limp as if i was unconscious. Finally, we were able to get some creative shots of being shut in the boot, both a POV from the killers perspective, as well as the victim inside the boot. 

Overall, Tyler and I work really well together and I am grateful for his help. When in the same clothes, he looked similar to David meaning there would be no continuity errors in the editing stage. We managed to get a wide range of footage meaning that we have a choice of shots. Also, the headphone shot looked very effective and played on our idea of the killer being deaf, but my headphones got ruined. If we were to do it again, I would prefer if we had someone else there to help, as when we were both in the frame, we had to set up the camera and then get into position and record, which slowed down the filming.