Diary
15/11/2018
Today I opened up all of the survey results in a spreadsheet and went through and analyzed the results. It took me quite a while as I had over 170 responses and therefore needed to make sure the results that I talked about were representative of all of the results. I used the premade Google Forms graphs for the quantitative answers and listed the main points from the qualitative questions. Now I need to analyze three clips from Edgar Wright movies to talk about in my video essay.
Inform our own idea...
The people who watch all of these shows I have looked at are all different age groups. Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway is one of the shows with the broadest range of people watching, the reason this show is like this because of Ant & Dec and also the show has a big range of content.
The findings suggest that if we go with the Saturday evening, ITV, 7 pm as this is one of the most popular times for viewing TV as a family. At this time people will put the TV on and just watch whatever show is on. For the group, this shows us that we need to make sure that our show doesn't collide with a popular show as everyone would just watch the show. If we did have to show our show at the same time as a popular show we would have to make sure we were appealing to a different target audience.
Based on our idea we now need to research our target audience to find out what they would want from a show, we need to think of ways we can make our show different from others. We need to research what the shows we want to borrow ideas from do and how they are really successful. ​
Over the last couple of days, I have been starting to edit this project. I started by editing the individual charity scenes then worked at putting them together. I have begun colour correction and will focus on this towards the end of this editing process. This morning, I met with two tutors from college who watched the above edit and suggested things I should change. They suggested: the beginning as the transition from the opening to the first charity is very quick, cut down in interviews when the interviewee thinks of answers or pauses, fades in and out of interviews and shakes in pans. In the next few days I will go over the documentary and fix these issues.
Diary 24/5/18
As we are currently in the half term we are not in college but I have still spent some time working on this project. I have gone over the edit and fixed all of the problems I can see. I have exported it and will send it out to people within the target market too. I will then review the results and use the feedback to adapt the draft edit into a final one. I really enjoyed editing this project as it has allowed me to develop my editing skills further. In the upcoming days, I will write a diary which details all of the skills which I have used while editing this project.
Diary 31/5/18
I have created a survey which I have sent out to people within the target audience and also those who have professional media knowledge. I will review the results next week. Click here to see the survey
Below is some information about each of the editing techniques I have used within this project and why I have used them. This project has allowed me to showcase a big range of skills as the project consists of lots of different layers which are being combined.
Editing Techniques
I used the markers when syncing the clips from both of the cameras. I would find a common marker, usually a sentence whoever in the clip says, and then position the markers as close as possible.
When we were filming this some of the locations we were given were noisy it meant I had to try and remove the background noise. To do this I opened the audio clips in Adobe Audition and captured noise prints. This tool allowed me to remove a lot of background noise.
I used this tool quite a lot as with all the pans, I had filmed them really slow as this would allow me to speed them up. If I had filmed them too quick slowing them down would make the video jumpy.
I used the markers when syncing the clips from both of the cameras. I would find a common marker, usually a sentence whoever in the clip says, and then position the markers as close as possible.
Today was our first day back at college. This morning my tutor checked the work to check all is going well. After that, I started looking at my survey results which I will write up the evaluation of tomorrow. I then went through my edit timeline and screenshotted all of the different skills I have used. I then wrote how each skill was used and why it was helpful. I added them all to a gallery as it saves space and looks a lot nicer on the website. After this, I emailed back and forth with Keech to get some footage off of them for this project. They have given me some which I think I will overlay on the introduction as I think it will add a lot of production value.
Diary 4/6/18
For the first method of reviews of this project I sent out a survey to people within my target audience, these are the same people I sent the survey too at the beginning of this project. I just wanted to find out what they thought I didn't need to ask the usual basic start question like their age or gender as I had collected this once before.
Draft Edit Survey
For the first question, I asked what they thought of the opening scene. I did this because when showing the documentary to people the opening was the bit that most people commented on. The answers to this show that I should change it. I think I will add shots on top of the presenter talking. When thinking about the open, it would be the first thing people see so it needs to look professional.
Next, I asked them what they thought of the lower third titles (the text that appears on the person who is being intervi0ewed), This was completely, mixed half people liked them and the other half said to change it. Asking people around the class I have decided to leave them as I think they work well and are better than the original solution which was white text which you could barley see.
Thirdly, I asked them what they thought of the music within this project. One person said they liked it everyone else said either in some places or mostly. I will go over and sort out the audio as others have made comments of it being too loud in places.
Finally, I asked if there was anything else they thought I could add. This questions didn't end up being too helpful as most people said they couldn't think of anything. Someone suggested sound which I am already going to look at. Maybe when doing surveys like this in the future I should ask slightly more direct questions as this will mean I may get more helpful answers.
Tutor Feedback
After reviewing the survey results this morning I began to create a new introduction to the documentary, I did this because I had come to realize that the introduction is the first thing people see when they would watch this and it didn't look very professional, so I created a montage of clips and added some music and changed the first part of the intro to be a voice-over. Following this, I got the project looked at by another tutor and the media technician. Above you can see their notes for reference, but mainly the issues they found were things related to colour correction and music. I was slightly daunted by the number of things they had said could be changed at first but thinking about it now the changes have increased the production value by a lot. Other changes they suggested included: removing pauses in the interviews, fades that were too slow, audio cut errors and in places where the clips could be re-ordered to give the audience a lot more context. I then watched the documentary continuously until I couldn't find any more issues with it. Finally, I exported the documentary and sent it out to all of the charities. When I sent it to Keech I have asked them questions so it will act as a test screening for the project.
Diary 5/6/18
FINAL
EDIT
Charity
Comments
For my test screening, I sent the documentary to two charities and asked them some more detailed questions. Although these questions would give suggestions for changes these wouldn't take effect for the submitted documentary but they would with the version I will make public on my YouTube channel.
Do you think the documentary would persuade people to donate to charity?
Keech: Yes we believe it would. The documentary was very compelling and shows a wide breadth of charitable causes and the ways in which they need to be increasingly more creative to raise funds.
Tokko: Not sure if it would persuade people to donate to charity but the great thing your documentary does do is highlight the idea of giving to a local charity, and make people think about the benefits of donating.
Do you think it is informative?
Keech: Yes. The documentary clearly explains what each charity does, how much money they need and why it is important.
Tokko: I think the documentary is very informative and captures the story in a concise and positive way. Bringing out some very important themes and issues regarding funding
Do you think that the documentary represents the charities in a way which makes people want to learn more?
Keech: Yes we believe the documentary does spark an interest in wanting to learn more about local charities and what they do. What would work well would be to include links to each charity’s website or phone numbers as although the viewer might want to know more, currently there is no direct/straightforward way for them to do so.
Tokko: Yes this is a key factory of your documentary if gives people a taster of what the organization does in a positive light leaving people wanting to know more.
To the first question which asks if they thought the documentary would persuade people to donate, Keech said they thought it would as the documentary and compelling, however, Tokko didn't think it would make people donate but just highlights the benefits of donating. I feel like this is because Tokko is a charity which receives funding mainly from other organizations the individuals whereas Keech is completely opposite.
For the second question, I asked them if they thought the documentary was informative. Both said it was very informative which was one of our initial aims. I like how Tokko said "captures the story in a concise and positive way" I think that sums up the documentary really well.
Finally, I asked them if they thought the documentary represents the charities in a way which makes people want to learn more. Both charities said yes for this too. Keech suggested we added phone numbers/web links, web links are displayed within the credits (not sure if they have seen this) but I could add the website on the lower third titles, I am unsure about this because the documentary is more about supporting any charity and not being a promotional video. Tokko said viewers would want to find out more.
I was really pleased when all of the charities came back to us and were happy with the documentary, it felt like all the hard work had paid off. I think this test screening was helpful as I wanted more detailed answers from the charities themselves, from this I think I just need to add some links or logos throughout the documentary.