Studying Media: A Cinematographer's Blog

 Our sound editor spoke to the manager at the Barnes and Noble we're planning to film at, and got our presence approved! We could film at Barnes and Noble, with the exception that we didn't film staff or patrons, and we now had everything we needed to plan to meet to film! However, scheduling a meetup proved to be more than difficult. A lot of members in our group had prior engagements that interfered with our schedule, so we had to push back our film date (giving us much less time). I realize now in hindsight that setting an earlier date to film test shots would've been a much better alternative than the route we chose. During our planning period for our production, our school's Theater program was presenting In the Heights, which majority of our group (me, the director, and one of our actors included) were participating in. Rehearsals ran really late, and we had very little free time to schedule film dates with each other. Additionally, our editor was traveling for a ...

 We presented our project proposal to our teacher, and his feedback opened our eyes on how unprepared we were. It was only through his feedback that I learned how important thorough planning is for these particular projects. He expressed his concerns for our weak script, plot, shot list, and storyboard, as well as complications with the location we chose for our film. To start, our script read like "an advertisement for Barnes and Noble, not like a film" in his words, and in review we all understood what he meant. We were attempting to use the books in the store to hint towards the meaning behind the film (we would be filming in the romance section, having the characters look through various romance books), but our script didn't match our vision.  Additionally, our shot list was so short that it felt as if we didn't have a plot at all. Our film felt more like a simple interaction between an employee and a customer rather than two potential love interests.  Our "o...