We decided to shoot our film in a classroom. As the room featured a door that was very effective and the actress could be shot in different levels and angles. We used the close-up of the actresses hand on the door handle which could be used later on to create suspense. Daniella was the "director". And she would shout 'stand-by' for every one's attention on cast. And signalled the actresses in by shouting "Action!"
I participated in the camera work and shot many of sences, exploring different angles and levels to shoot. When to use zoom and when to follow the actresses or not.
Lighting
We use 2 blond lights that created a more kind of theatrical effective imagery on the actresses figures to highlight and sharpen their facial expressions.
This effect was important to the scene as it created an edgy suspenseful scene. The artificial blond light gave that kind of strong eery atmoshpere to the actresses and props.
Filming
We did set the camera up correctly. We used the tripod, unlocked and locked the nuts as necessary. We also hand-held the camera, for the majority of the time to give a more realistic and nervous effect to the audience's view.
We did remember to use the white balance, we adjusted it when were inside the darkened room and outside in the natural light. We did have to remind the camera-man not to film a shot in front of the blonds lights as it would create an unexplained shadow and create an error in a shot.
We used appropriate angles to the shot. Upward view shot and downward view shot on the actress - this gave feeling on superiority or inferiority on a character. We used an over-shoulder shot to emphasise we are on that characters side and viewing their point of view as if the audience were that person.
We took make close-ups on parts of the body, such as hands and feet twitching nervously to create an anxious atmosphere. We abided by the 180 degree rule.
I have learnt the basics of the camera functioning. And tried to apply them to the use of shooting scenes. We have adapted the way a camera should be used when shooting a preferred scene. So our script gave a sense of suspense, and therefore we zoomed in on Extreme close-ups of the eyes, hands and feet and close-ups on the face. Long-shots were used so the audience could establish the location and medium-shot was used to emphasise an importance on a characters speech.
