Seminar 7

At the start of this seminar we discussed various editing techniques that may be useful for us in our other projects. First of all, I asked how you could mask something on Media Composer, for example a light or plug socket on a black background. To do this what you need to do is add an extra video layer and above the video you want to mask, create 2 add edits at the start and end of it (on the new video layer) and then drag the Spot Colour Effect under Effects- Image. Then use one of the shape tools to highlight the area you want covering, then turn down the contrast to you get the desired effect. You can also use this same tool to increase the brightness of a certain area by turning up the gamma under Luma Adjust/ Luma Range.

After looking at some useful techniques, we analysed the editing within a scene in The Servant where the characters Tony and Vera are in the kitchen surrounded by a lot of sexual tension.

As you can see there are clips in this montage from the kitchen scene with Tony and Vera.
The sound in this scene is very powerful as it is almost all silent apart from the movement of the characters, and an overlaying beat that mimics heart rate throughout. This starts off as being a constant drip from the tap that starts off quiet and slowly but then increases in volume and speed until an abrupt crescendo where it stops briefly, but is then carried on by the telephone. This use of sound is very effective at building up tension and making the audience empathise with the characters whilst getting drawn in to their emotions. The cuts in this scene are very slow which contrasts with the sound, this is because they are more focused on the performance that the individuals give and how they convey their emotions through their actions.
The second scene we analysed was from The English Patient (1996) where the character Hana is reading a book to Cout Laszlo de Almasy about 'Candaules tells Gyges...' a story from Herodotus.

The editing in this scene inter-cuts between two scenes, one from real-time and another from memory. This is shown by a long cross dissolve between the real life scene, into the memory as it shows the Count as being younger and not ill. This is an effective way in which you can transport a narrative between the past and the present with the use of voice over and with a split edit, where something from an incoming scene is on the outgoing one. The use of music within this scene is also very effective at building tension, as there is an impending sense of doom with a low humming sound throughout which is only broken half way through when one of the other characters in the memory scene tells a joke.

In the second half of the seminar, we looked at our Night Journey Fine Cuts. Myself and Jay went first as I had to continue editing for my groups narrative strand project. The feedback we received was for the most part positive, although there were some obvious errors which we hadn't addressed. Chris like the music we had chosen and how it built tension as well as how it released it, especially in accordance to the pacing of our voice over. The selection of our voice over was also very strong however, he said that we needed to find a clearer narrative, especially in the second half of the film, as what we had done made all the pacing and tension building up to that point seem pointless. The ebb and flow of some of the voice over needed some work as well, especially to build empathy with the character of the non-cannibal. That said, all in all he thought it was a good piece and especially liked the sound design we had done, and that overall so far, it would be a mid 2:1.
We have discussed Chris' feedback and we have decided that if it doesn't impend our progress with the next brief, we will apply it to our film and make the necessary changes to get the grade up to a first using the best of our abilities.