The document provides feedback and questions for critically reflecting on a web video production project. It prompts evaluation of how the production compares to expectations for the genre and research sources. It also asks about personal learning throughout the project, including new skills developed and areas for further improvement. Critiques of the video's content, technical quality, and achievement of goals are discussed. The need for better planning, especially of filming schedules, and use of production diaries is highlighted to improve future projects.

1. EVALUATION
Benjamin Wincup

2. Task 5: Evaluation U9 3.1, 3.2
Critically evaluate your web video against the expectations for a web series. Critically reflect on learning to inform
personal development.
Having identified key characteristics for your chosen product, reflect on how you have used those in your own
production.
Consider the context in which your work was produce and contrast that with the contexts of the existing products
that you research. Context is about who made, when, why, what they had to use…
Critically reflect on learning to inform personal development.
Using your production diary to help, reflect on your own personal learning during this project.
What new skills, techniques and ways of working have you used?
Have you pushed yourself or did you play too safe?
What else do you want to learn as a result of this experience?
How did the project go for you?
How can this be useful in the future?
*Critically evaluate is good, bad and comparison to wider media products.You can use theory here too.
Use screen shots. Use my feedback as well. If anyone has seen it and commented, think about adding that.

3. During my research stage, I did my best to look at several, contrasting sources such as a small
Re-enacting group in Norway called Frontkjemperne, Global Cycling Network and a short
documentary called Lookout. Surprisingly, all three sources had quite a few similarities, such as
cinematic still shots, voiceovers and talking heads. A few times, voice overs seemed to go over
cinematic shots, which I thought I could try and use in my final product. Potentially, one of the
weaknesses of my research was that I only used three sources. If I had maybe used more, my
project could’ve come out completely differently. One of the main issues was that the subject is
quite niche, which means that there isn’t a lot of similar projects.That was a hindrance and if
there were more videos to research, I absolutely could’ve had a better quality. Going forward, I’ll
most certainly aim to look at at least 5 similar products, and go back to my roots by looking at 3
pre-1990s products and 2 modern ones. I feel that this will help future projects as I can look at
the evolution of the topic of whatever project. I felt, at the start, that my planning was fairly
decent. I made three plans which I felt were all solid ideas. As production went on, those plans
sort of merged together until I thought I could probably make a moderately good video.That
didn’t go to plan, but that’s more down to my ineptitude with video cameras. One of the big
issues for my interview at the tactical immersion event was that I actually forgot my question
sheet, so I couldn’t ask the right ones. I ended up having to wing all three (originally five).This
definitely damaged my final product as I’d spent a whole morning figuring out the original
questions so that they were relevant to the theme. I’d also made a shot list, which I’ve not done
before. I feel as if the shot list is the only thing on this project that actually went well, which is
unfortunate.As I move on to my next project, I’ll definitely need to make a plan that I can stick
to, as not doing so is one of my major weaknesses and potentially one of the larger reasons this
unit came out as it did. I also forgot to book out a microphone as well as the camera, so there
was a major issue with wind blowing onto the camera’s mic. I had to do some editing in post,
which lead to a decline in the overall quality of the video and meant I had to insert subtitles.

4. My time management, as usual, wasn’t fantastic.This is because I didn’t lay out a base plan and
follow it. I had a rough guide, but that was about it. Unfortunately, due to the topic of my
project, I was only able to film on one weekend.This is because the re-enacting season was over
by November-December time, when the tactical immersion event took place.Therefore, I
couldn’t film over multiple weekends.This isn’t something that can be changed, but I could’ve
perhaps gone with a different idea that worked around the time of year. One of the huge pains
was that we only had a few hours of daylight to film in, so the whole thing was quite rushed. If
the project had come at a different time that worked around the re-enacting season, I believe
that I could’ve had a far superior project.The whole quality may have turned out much, much
better. Some of the interviews could’ve been shot indoors, thus completely cancelling out the
problem of wind on the microphone. From a technical viewpoint, my work is unimpressive and
uncreative. Aside from a little bit of camera trickery, the only thing positive from the technical
side was the high pass which managed to sort of save my audio.Without it, my footage would
be completely unusable and I would’ve had to make an entirely new project (a process which I
didn’t have time for). I also had to learn, within about 3 hours, how to add, edit and customise
closed captions so that my video was at least watchable. If I had maybe planned my production
outside of the filming, my project could’ve been more impressive technically. I could employ
various editing techniques, camera skills and maybe I could have a better title card. Maybe
animated.Viewing my project through a purely aesthetic standpoint, it is quite nice. I like that
there are some nice looking scenes, such as the still shot of the soldier on the machine gun with
the sun overhead. Another nice shot is when one of the soldiers is laying down with a sniper rifle
and searching for enemies.There are quite a few scenes with negative space that could almost
certainly be filled with extra information.The music used in the video isn’t appropriate to the
theme, and there’s a time-lapse that drags on for too long. Given more time; I would cut down
the time used in the time-lapse, find some more appropriate music like some classical Russian
composer and maybe find more time to film some cinematic shots of the surrounding area
without any people in the shot.

5. In the video about the Frontkjemperne re-enacting
group, there are several styles of shooting.There are still
cinematics, talking heads, silhouettes, first person shots
and various views of different activities including
sleeping, making food, shooting and building.This helps
to immerse the viewer into the world of re-enacting in an
effective way.The reason for this is that it is a
promotional video to advertise the group. It’s made to a
high quality, and clearly was made over a while.
My video, whilst retaining certain styles from the
Frontkjemperne promo, only has a small variety of shots.
I have a shot that’s focused on one of the soldiers, laying
in a small position called a scrape, footage of one of the
interviewees on a machine gun and a focused shot of
clearing a trench. I tried to go for a more aesthetic
experience, instead of an immersive one.This is because
the reason for making the video isn’t to advertise, but to
show what reenactors think.What they experience. I
tried my best to make the video to a high quality, but it
didn’t really come out exactly how I wanted it. I think that
there may be some kind of audience appeal, as it shows
re-enactors looking good in their uniforms, despite the
dodgy quality of the actual video. I didn’t really look at a
target audience necessarily, because re-enacting has
quite a varied demographic result. Predominantly white,
but there’s plenty of men and women aged between 10-
80 so it was difficult to find a specific target audience
inside that to use. Because of this, I tried to make it nice
for
re-enactors as a whole to watch.Overall, I think I partially
achieved my goal of educating and entertaining, as most
people seem to think re-enacting is just dressing up and
standing around on a display. Hopefully, people who
would watch the video would understand that the
community of reenactors is tight nit and it’s a very
diverse and unique group of people that do diverse and
unique activities.

6. TheGlobalCycling Network is a professional network
that features tutorials, news and testing videos for
cyclists around the world. Because they’re professional,
they have a budget to make a fancy, animated title card.
This is much better than a still card, as it hits the ”Flow”.
Viewers aren’t bored of a flat, non moving graphic, and
they’re not frustrated by an overly complex animation. It
runs directly along the flow line shown by
the red line on the graphic. Because of this, the
title is interesting enough that viewers will stay
around for the actual video.
My own title card is quite uninteresting as it
doesn’t have anything going on. It’s not
animated, doesn’t use many colours and the
font is moderately hard to read. I feel
that it drops into the ”Boredom” section of the graphic,
shown by the green line.There is the possibility to make
it interesting by perhaps animating some king of rustling,
as if the camouflage is actually concealing something.
The font could be easier to read and larger.And overall, I
feel as if the title card is one of the weaker point of the
project. I only spent a few minutes on it, as I didn’t want
to spend too much time focusing on something that was
only a few seconds long. Unfortunately, that was a major
oversight as it may have effected the overall outcome.
Unlike the GCN, I don’t have the budget to make a fancy,
animated title card, but if I did I think that my project
would be better as a whole.

7. Talking heads interview tend to have a very specific style
that’s quite easy to replicate. In the video “What It's Like
Working As a Fire Lookout: Lots of AloneTime” Shirley
Payne, a fire lookout, is interviewed about her job.The
set up is simple, there’s an establishing shot and then it
cuts to a still of her talking to someone behind the
camera.You don’t hear any questions, but she gives out
good, lengthy answers.This is because the questions are
set up so that the interviewee can talk more. She also
doesn’t look into the camera and instead looks at the
interviewer who is stood to the side of the camera.This
makes the audience the observers.
One of the bigger issues whilst trying to film my talk
heads interview was the location.As it was a tactical
immersion event, I had to film inside of a dug out
foxhole, which made things harder.Compared to the
other video, which probably had a fair bit of space and at
least two or three crew members, my set up was rather
basic. It was cramped and there was only me on the crew.
However, I think that despite all of that, the setup is
good.The main problem is the sound.The wind was
overwhelmingly strong which effected the quality of the
audio.The position of the camera works due to where the
interviewee and interviewer are. It makes the whole thing
a bit more personal and friendly, whereas the interview
with Shirley is quite impersonal. Contextually, my own
interview was about why Mark does re-enacting. His
answers really helped expand on that personal feeling
that’s in the interview. Especially when he talks about his
childhood making Airfix tanks.

8. The easiest way to fix a lot of my problems during production and post would be to make an
actual game plan that’s realistic and easy to follow. Without the plan, my work has been very
hectic and rushed. It’s been all over the place with things like not booking out a microphone.
That lead to the audio being rubbish in the interviews, that lead to using highpass, that lead to
having to put subtitles.The cascading effect because I forgot one piece of equipment put a
delay on the final rendering, which messed with production timing. Had I have actually made a
plan, I could’ve remembered to book out a microphone with a pop filter and my audio wouldn’t
have been so bad. I would’ve had more time to look at editing and perhaps filming more to
make my project much better.The time management would’ve been better with a plan too, as I
could’ve sorted what days are for shot gathering, what days are for editing and what days are
for coursework. Doing so would’ve made the quality of my work much better.
For my FMP, I know that there are certain things that need to be planned.Therefore, I will make
a concentrated effort to make an accurate plan.This plan will be written down onto a checklist
that I will use to track my progress.There will be an outline schedule that I’ll use, and within
each section of that, there will be a few more sections to divide and break up the tasks into
manageable chunks. I need to figure out and plan around when voice actors are available, when
there’s space in a studio, the equipment used, the location I record and sound effects I may
need, so those will all go inside part of the plan. I will need to plan my research so that I know
exactly what to be researching. I can also make sure the research is relevant if I plan it. I need to
plan when I write my diary, so that I can record how much work I’ve done in one day or one
week. And also need to plan how much production I’ll be doing inside and out of college.