The document discusses technologies used in creating a film project, including a compact camera for filming, a boom microphone for focused audio recording, free online music sources, Garageband for original music composition, portable studio lights for lighting issues, and Adobe Premier Elements for easy and accessible video editing. Key lessons were that portable lights could cause shadows or end up in shots, and that natural outdoor lighting worked well without issues.

1. 6. What have you learnt about
technologies from constructing
this product?
Log Book

2. Camera
• When filming our main piece we used a camera which
used a SD card as a memory storage. This allowed our
filming to be easily transferred into ‘Premier Elements’,
the programme used fro our main editing. The camera
worked well as it was compact and simple to use, this
meant that we were able to hold and store it easily. Had
we used a larger camera, our footage may have
appeared better, however it may have been increasingly
difficult for us to use as of its size and the decreased
simplicity of the device.
• The camera’s internal mike was good, however would
not have been sufficient for our whole 2 minutes of
filming, this is regardless to the amount of diegetic and
dialogue used throughout.

3. Sound
• For recording our sound we used a boom mike. This was originally
going to be placed on the stand with the camera, however we found
that this wouldn’t pick up the sound to the same degree that it would
had it been held on a pole. With the mike being on a boom pole, we
were able to decide which sounds we wanted to be heard clearer
than others.
• The use of a boom mike, allowed us to narrow our choice of sound
heard. It also allowed the quality to be improved and for background
noise to be less interfering.
• For our non-diegetic sound, we used websites such as ‘Microsoft
Clip art’ in order to place in our music. Had this been unable to us,
we would have had to use YouTube. However, we used this as well
to retrieve our main piece of music for our piece. To get this into our
piece we had to ask the owner before converting it into an mp3 file
so that we could place it into ‘Premier Elements’.
• When recording our sounds for the phone text tone, we used my
iPhone. This allowed us to record any sound we liked and simply
email it to ourselves before pasting the extract into the correct part
of our film.

4. Garageband
• We used Garageband by Apple in order to create our
own music for our piece. We originally created a piece of
music which portrayed the emotions of love and
romance, however this was only experimental and was
not used throughout the piece. One of the reasons being
because of the difficulties faced through exportation and
because we found other music which could be used
throughout the whole piece.
• Had we used this piece of music made in Garageband,
we would have had different pieces of music for different
scenes, interfering with the continuity. Therefore, music
found on the internet on the copyright free sites were
more suitable and easier to access.

5. Lighting
• When lighting our opening, we used the portable studio
lights. These were used in the office scene, as the
lighting which was already installed was too dim
causing the image to appear blurry and too dark. We
placed one of the lights up high in the corner of the
room, when doing this we had to be careful not too
burn our hands and not to create shadows.
• Shadows were our biggest issue as we struggled
finding the correct place to set-up the lighting due to
the shadows which formed. During the shoot in the
hotel room, we struggled on deciding whether or not to
use the lighting that we had managed to bring with us.
This was because of the image that appeared on the
camera screen. The image tended to be darker, so
more lighting was needed to compensate for the
cameras light reactors.

6. Lighting
• After shooting the whole of the hotel scene, we realised when
editing that the light had accidentally been in the scene the whole
time and was unable to be cropped out throughout the editing
process. This meant for a re-shoot. This was an obvious problem
found when using the portable studio lights – their bulk and size.
The size of them meant it was hard for us to place them around the
room and still prevent shadows. Sometimes a light from the front of
the scene and from the back was used in order to counter act and
get rid of any shadows. Of course, this prevented one issue –
shadows, but caused another – the lighting being in shot.
• When we were outside filming, we were only able to use natural
lighting. We initially thought that this would be an issue, however
this was resolved because when we played our filming back as the
lighting did not affect the shot resolution. Also, any shadows caused
were okay and acceptable as these would have been recognised as
natural shadows caused by a sunny day, rather than the ones inside
which would have been evidently artificially created.

7. Premier Elements
• When it came to editing our finished footage, we used ‘Premier
Elements’. This was suitable as it allowed us to access it at home
and school. The features on ‘Premier Elements’ are easy to use and
accessible. There are no complex procedures needed to be
completed in order to assemble the film or to change parts about it.
The timeline allows us to see the ordering of the film and to identify
whether or not certain parts of the opening need to be earlier or later
in the actual piece.
• There are also pre-set elements which can be used throughout the
film, this enables the opening two minutes to have fluidity and to not
have any breaks because of the various transitions available. Also,
through the editing software you are able to darken images down or
even enhance certain colours to make them stand out.
• Using ‘Premier’ we were able to position our credit titles on the fade-
to-blacks which were installed in between the various different
flashbacks throughout. There are also pre-set sounds on ‘Premier’,
however these were unsuitable for our production as none were
appropriate to the tone of each individual shot.