Editing Begins

After a quick tutorial from our teacher, we learned the basics of Adobe Premiere, the software we will be using for editing and compiling our footage. 

The first scene was edited by Chandler as the rest of the group were occupied on the day. Although Jasmine, James and  I could not be there, Chandler made sure to update us on the footage he edited via the Whatsapp group chat. 

. As you can see, we gave him feedback and made sure our ideas were acknowledged. Below is the footage Chandler edited. He used the cross dissolve to create a smooth transition between the flashback and the present day scene of our main protagonist. Overall, we were very pleased with how the exposition turned out.

We hope to edit the footage together soon :)

Case Study: (A Grade Exemplar) 'Playing Judas'

To give us an idea the quality of work that is expected of us, we were tasked to count the scenes, cuts and transitions from this exemplar. The pace was one of the best things about this trailer because the exposition was built up well as it immediately introduces a problem. 

Feedback on the footage we have so far

Our media class held a screening of all the groups' footage to gather some feedback.   

Here is a brief outline of the feedback they gave to us:

What went well:

• The mise-en-scene and characterisation "Smoking seems like something a gangster would do" / The iconography in China Town i.e. stone lions and lanterns 
• The ambient lighting - "it was not too dark so you are able to see the smoke clearly" (smoking scene) 
• The diegetic sounds were not overwhelming and would work well with the scene if we were to include it
• There was more than one version of one scene - it gives us more variety 
• A wide variety of clips to choose from and different settings 
• The shots with a deep focus were good, "moments of clarity hit the audience well"
• The progression of the story is becoming clearer 

What could be improved:

• The diegetic sounds 
• Some shots were not in focus i.e. pan and tilt shots, ensure the lens is focused on the subject otherwise it detracts from the effect
• The ambient lighting in China Town was "off", too dark

Now that 80 per cent of our filming is complete, what our group needs to do now is to prioritise compiling the footage and piecing together the different clips. This is the most challenging part of the project as we need to consider the music that will go with the footage and the style of editing. 

 

Compilation of Vlogs (Before editing)

VLOG: 5th Day Filming // China Town montage

SCENES: 

• Various clips of lanterns
• People walking in China Town
• Location shots on Gerrard Street
• Behind the shoulder shot of James walking 

ACTORS:

• James - Gangster roaming the streets 

These scenes are for the purpose of a montage so we didn't need our actors.

During half-term we organised a day out during Chinese New Year in China Town to film the iconography for our trailer. Although this may not be culturally authentic, the location and mise-en-scene fits in with the overall oriental theme of our film. (If there was a Tokyo Town in London we would have filmed there instead). 

China Town was buzzing with activity; the atmosphere, the lanterns and the people provided us with enough footage to create the montage that would be used to present our theme. The wind was actually on our side this time because it made the lanterns shake. We thought about using the shaking lanterns as the turning point of our exposition. 

We didn't plan to film in a specific location within China Town so we just walked around and explored. We stumbled upon a restaurant called 'Imperial China'. The interior was stunning. It had a bridge over water which had Koi fish in it. In Japanese the word Koi is a homophone for 'affection' or 'love', koi are therefore symbols of love and friendship in Japan. 

We particularly liked the scenes we filmed of a man standing outside a restaurant that was painted black on the outside:

His costume fit the role of gangster as the glasses and all black outfit made him look intimidating. We had no intention of disturbing him so we discreetly filmed him from far away. His expression looked stern and his eyebrows were furrowed; he also kept scanning the area so it looked as if he was on the lookout whilst some men brought in some vegetables in boxes.  

VLOG: 4th Day of Filming // Flashbacks, Bowing, Dinner, Tattoo scenes

ACTORS:

• Child version of Kaya Maki - Venice Anonuevo 
• Child version of Kazuo Maki - Tyresse Anonuevo 
• Young Kazuo's Karate teacher - Raymond Pham
• Tattoo artist - Ranch Clemeno
• Kaya Maki (protagonist) - Chantelle Anonuevo
• Kazuo Maki - Marcus Francisco
• Kato Maki aka Head of the gang and Father - Francois Francisco  
• Kaya's bodyguard/henchman - Chandler Idos 
• Kazuo's bodyguard/henchman - James Tuano

SCENES: 

• Childhood flashback scene of Kaya Maki tending to the bonsai tree
• Childhood flashback of Kazuo (Kaya's older brother)
• Present day Kaya tending to the bonsai tree
• Tense dinner scene
• Bowing to head of yakuza scene
• Tattoo scene

PROPS:

• Bonsai tree
• Plates
• Cutlery
• Glasses
• Marker pens

2 weeks prior to filming, we asked our friends: Nina and Patrick, for permission to film at their houses. Coincidentally, both of them owned bonsai trees though we favoured Nina's bonsai tree over Patrick's. Venice doesn't own a kimono so we asked Chantelle to dress her up in a dress; we picked the middle dress. 

We decided to film at Nina's house first because it is closer and we anticipated that the time taken to film the shots with the bonsai tree in her garden would not take as long as filming the acting at Patrick's house. 

Our child actor, Venice, is the younger version of Chantelle's character. Venice wore a gold dress to project the wealth of the Yakuza. Jasmine and I worked together to film this scene at different angles so that the flashback would seem realistic once we piece together the footage during the editing process.  

After we filmed the flashback scene in Nina's garden, we took a train to Patrick's house. The majority of our day consisted of filming there because his house is adorned with oriental ornaments and elaborate furniture. 

We all took turns filming different scenes, Jasmine filmed the dinner scene to showcase the tension between the siblings, James filmed the tattoo scene, I filmed the bowing scene where Chandler and James bow to Francois to establish power and authority, while Chandler filmed the flashback karate scene.







Unfortunately, Francois had to leave early and Marcus arrived after he left so we had to schedule another day to film Francois.

Other than the bowing scene, I was tasked to draw the tattoo on Chantelle's back so we bought some permanent markers from the 99p store and I Google searched some images of existing tree tattoos for inspiration so it stays relevant to 'The Bonsai Tree'.

A lot of the tattoos were accentuated with Kanji - Japanese writing so I decided to include some. The Japanese characters on her left side say 'Loyalty' (I used Google Translate to copy the characters) which is a key theme in our trailer. 

To establish tension and conflict between the two siblings, we arranged to film a scene where a negotiation between Kaya and Kazuo goes wrong during the start of a dinner. Kaya slams her glass of water while saying "NO!" as an act of defiance.

VLOG: 3rd Day Filming // Enemy pursuit scene

ACTORS

• Kaya Maki - Chantelle Anonuevo
• Enemy 1 - Daniel Windele

SCENES

• Chantelle raising a gun to the camera
• Chantelle running from Daniel and kicking him down

SHOT LIST:

• Low angle shot
• Perspective shot 
• Tracking shot (running)

Today James was behind the camera filming our female protagonist Chantelle. We realised that there needed to be more action scenes so we asked Daniel to be the enemy pursuing our female protagonist.

We weren't happy with the perspective shots from inside the room because we could not get enough light so we decided to go outside. Jasmine assisted James with the lens settings because James wanted to experiment with the focus. We wanted to know whether a shallow focus or a deep focus on the gun would be more effective.

In the end we decided to go with the deep focus because it creates a sense of mystery: the person holding the gun is unrecognizable until the last second when their face and the gun come into focus. 

Daniel's staircase scene was not in the original storyboard but taking on the advice of our teachers, we needed more characters so we added a villain. 

In the next scene we will be filming the flashback scene of the main protagonists and the initiation/tattoo scene as well as the dinner table scene.