Zachary Willard Film/Blender

The Importance of Audio It's pretty easy to understand why audio is an important part of film. Thats why having good audio is an essential piece of crafting a professional product. One of the easiest ways to tell if something is amateur is to listen to the audio. Lots of the time there will be lots of background noise or hissing. This can be caused by a few different things. There is also a big misconception that this can be fixed later on. More often than not that is not the case. If you get bad audio on location your hopes of fixing it are slim. However, I'm going to discuss the different ways of recording audio as well as solutions to improve quality. Microphones There are many different forms of microphones out there but I will discuss the most commonly used microphones. The first microphone on the list is the shotgun microphone (seen in the photo below). These tend to be long, fragile, and expensive. This falls under the condenser microphone category. The qual...

What makes the Film Look? There are a number of things involved in producing video that appears to be a movie. However, these days the first thing people think about is the letterbox format the film is displayed in. The problem is that online creators go about replicating this effect the wrong way. The following video goes into this more in-depth, but I'll summarize the main issues. Most film cameras shoot 16:9 aspect ratio because most screens (computer, TV, and phones) are 16:9. However, the aspect ratio that we have become familiar with for movies thanks to cinemascope (more on that later) is 2.35:1. In order to achieve this 2.35:1 ratio people have been adding black bars at the top and bottom of their footage. What this does is cover up the footage, which if done to create 2.35:1 ratio, removes 25% of the previous footage! The following video depicts this in greater detail. Cinemascope Cinemascope was a patented way of creating what we now know as widescreen. 21st Cen...

Pre-Production For this upcoming production I decided to partner up with Andrew. I wanted to be able to focus on the role of the cinematographer and VFX artist. As the cinematographer I worked with Andrew on the storyboard. One of the investigations that I did was on lighting which also further educated me in the art of cinematography. I also helped come up with the concept for the film although Andrew did almost all of the writing. With the cinematographer role I was mostly focused on the use of lighting for my blender digital set. This is because I had complete free reign over the lighting for the set since it was done on a computer. The other thing is when working with science fiction color in lighting is key. For my blender project every light that I used was a color. There was not a single white light used to light the scene. As the VFX artist I had to perform every job. Since I was starting from scratch I looked at concept art online for the sci-fi look I was trying to achieve....

What is Subtext? Subtext is an underlying and often distinct theme within a piece of work. In film there are many ways to add subtext. The most common and notable way to create subtext is with visual elements. The following video shows ways that a film can incorporate subtext visually. Subtext can also be added into a film in the writing process. Keeping a theme as you write is essential to producing a film that is coherent and orderly in structure. One way a text can include meaning is discussed in Roland Barthes system of meaning. Roland Barthes Five Codes of Meaning Barthes identifies five different kinds of semiotic elements that are common to all texts. He gathers these signifiers into five codes: Hermeneutic, Proairetic, Semantic, Symbolic, and Cultural. The Hermeneutic Code contains anything in the text that is mysterious or unexplained, usually leading to questions which the reader needs answered. Using this code allows for the writer to keep the audi...

What is Photorealism? Photorealism is a term that is used in reference to a piece of 3D art which appears to be as real as a photograph. Photorealism is important for film because CGI is being used more and more. If something doesn't look real than it can bring the audience out of the story. The point of film is to share a story with the audience. That story can make people feel things or make them think things. Either way, the audience can't be impacted by the film if it doesn't seem genuine. Most people give CGI a bad rap saying that it is ruining film. I however disagree because I think people only notice the bad CGI. The following video talks about the does and don'ts of CGI and why it should be used.  How do you create photorealistic CGI? There are many steps to creating a realistic looking piece of CG work. In the following work there are many things that go into making the render appear to be a real photo. I'm going to be going through the essentia...

Tristan We had watched Tristan's film The Forgotten in class and I was really impressed. What impressed me most about his film is the amount that he filmed by himself. I have tried to film sequences of a project by myself before and it is a very strenuous and time consuming process. I was also impressed by the use of editing when Dean is trying to reach his friends to hangout. The way the sequence is cut together allowed for me to see how hard Dean was trying and failing to connect with people. This was probably the most emotionally felt sequence in the entire film. Something that I learned from seeing Tristans presentation was how to utilize practice footage. This is a concept where you go to a location maybe alone or with a stand-in and you test shots. After hearing about this I will use this when I am planning my own films. It is very helpful and efficient to know exactly where you want the camera to be on location. If I used practice shots I wouldn't have had to s...

Why Music? Music is an essential part of film. It can be used to set the tone for a scene or to drive the action. When used correctly in conjunction with visuals, music can transform the emotional experience of a film. Some of the most memorable moments of a film are because of the score. Film scores can be used to build tension, fear, or any emotion. For this investigation I will be learning about how to create a film score. The Psychological Effect of Music In Film 1 during our study of film history we discussed what is known as the Kuleshov effect. The Kuleshov effect is an analysis of how the audiences interpretation of an image changes in relation to the next image. So if you have a man with a neutral face and you cut to a hamburger and back to the man he looks hungry. Similarly, music creates a tone for the visuals presented to the audience. This tone is what allows the audience to understand the emotions they are intended to be feeling while viewing the film. A grea...

Lighting Lighting is one of the most essential principals of filmmaking. There is a quite daunting variety of ways to light a scene. The different aspects of lighting vary from brightness, color, temperature, white balance, soft/hard, direction, and more. There are many ways lighting can be used to better communicate understanding of a scene. For instance, lighting is one of the key components in creating the tone of a film. If you look at a comedy film the lighting is always balanced and light in tone. On the contrary, for a dramatic film the lighting will be darker and less balanced. There might be hard shadows cast across the background to amplify and enlarge reality. The human face will be lit different ways to portray the characters emotion. All of these decisions lead to a better, more meaningful and developed film. The Cinematographer's Role The role of the cinematographer is to decide what to do with the lighting. The cinematographer, or director of photography...

Production - What I learned Through the shooting of this film I learned a lot about how to balance time while producing quality content. Although this project is different than most because it was shot all in one day the basic principals are still present. The basic principals of balancing time and quality are to remain flexible, experiment, and know when to call it. Flexibility is absolutely essential to creating content that is conjoined with its surroundings. One such problem that occurs that requires flexibility is a change in location, missing prop, or shot that isn't working. Sometimes you might have a scene mapped out in your head based on your presumed location. However, when you arrive on set the location might be slightly altered. Being able to adapt to these slight alterations are what makes the film retain flow. The audience should think that it was planned that way from the start. If there is no adaption to the new situation it will be pretty clear. The audience wil...

Exploration of Ideas For my research posts throughout the first marking period I have carefully selected topics to study. The main topic I studied was the writing process. My first investigation was on hooking the audience at the beginning of the film through writing. I analyzed the beginnings of three films that are of differing genres. I did this in order to see if there was a consistent pattern. The main consistency no matter what was beginning in the midst of an action. The start of the film is never at the start of the journey. For Pulp Fiction the film starts in the middle of a conversation. For Indiana Jones the film starts with Indiana already arriving at the destination of one of his expeditions. For the Matrix, the film starts with the agents chasing after Trinity. The Matrix is the most differentiated because the main character is not even in the hook. This investigation was key in writing the hook to my film. For my film I hooked the audience by showing two men dumping a...

VFX are everywhere Most people think sci-fi when they think CGI or VFX. However, VFX can apply to any and all genres of filmmaking. Once you know what to look for VFX can be seen everywhere. The video below is a VFX breakdown of a crime genre show, Mindhunter,  that takes place in the very early 80's. When I watched this video my mind was blown by the amount of completely unsuspecting VFX shots. These are referred to as invisible effects. The intention of these effects is that you never no that they were there. Unlike a spaceship or superhero flying these effects are replications of real things. For instance in the Mindhunter VFX breakdown many elements are composited in to enhance the composition. Elements that are attributed to that era such as cars, signs, and buildings can be composited into frame. Sometimes these objects are real and sometimes they are completely digital. VFX Core Concepts For this investigation I will be looking into VFX since I plan on doing a sci...

Why use Story Structure? The structure you use as a foundation for your script is key in creating a narrative that flows and excites. Most beginning writers make the mistake of ignoring story structure completely. However, if you ignore story structure your film will likely suffer from seeming aimless or boring. Story structure is a great tool for pacing your film at a rate that keeps your audience interested. Structure is also a way of making sure your audience doesn't get confused. Story structure does this by laying out events in a familiar fashion. For this investigation I will be learning how to utilize story structure, two types of story structure, and when to deviate from the provided structure. Structure - Three Act Structure The three act structure is the most common structure for telling film narrative. The only downside to using this structure is it doesn't tie everything together like the next two. An example of a film that uses this structure is Mad M...