Evaluation

Initially, I was excited about what I wanted to do for this project. I was in a weird position where I felt like I could do everything and yet nothing came to mind. It was also difficult due to the fact it had to be autobiographical. It’s easy to keep things locked up in a vault, so to be able to talk about one’s life and portray in such a visual medium like film, is not an easy task. I had thought of a few different ideas (intro ideas) before landing on what felt to be the most personal and unique.

My idea was to take photos of the area in which I grew up (the play parks, the pubs, the shops…). Except instead of using the digital camera I normally use I thought id use something more personal than that, my 35mm camera.

In terms of preproduction, I needed to know what I had to shoot. I interviewed my mum about the places that she use to take me to when I was younger and gave me a healthy chunk of places, I had recorded this interview and it had actually made the final film.

I planned out a detailed enough map on a route I wanted to take and also stalked the specific locations on google maps to try and get a rough idea of compositions. In terms of production, I looked at a few iPhone films on youtube and try to find behind-the-scenes clips or advice on how to make the shots look more cinematic.

Production was split over two main days. Day one was following me around as I took the photos and day two was developing.

For the day of production, I had one of my classmates film me as I walked around the locations and took photos. We walked all around Isleworth and up into Twickenham before heading to Richmond in time to catch an incredible sunset.

The second day of production was focused on me developing my film however all the footage from this day was ultimately scrapped due to it not feeling particularly natural or important.

In post-production, my main focus was making it aesthetically pleasing. I played a lot with aspect ratio but I wasn't happy with it so I kept it at the standard 1920x1080 ratio. I added a 35mm grain overlay to make the look of the film a little more worn-in and cinematic. I also added some colour grading to the shots as the original footage looked rather flat and grey. By the end of the first cut, I felt that something was definitely missing from it.

For the second cut, I added the voice-over of my mum as well as added some background music, Now That It’s Over by Bbbrendan (a non-copyright song I found on Soundcloud), and it already looked a million times better. I just did some more adjustments such as cutting some scenes and adding others and it eventually came out looking very good in my opinion.

If I were to do the project again I think I’d probably just film more. I watch youtube videos from channels such as Grainydays and Willem Verbeeck and they’re just so much more detailed and nuanced and richer than mine. They weren’t filming on smartphones but that doesn't excuse a boring film. I do think the music added something special though. I would 100% do my best to introduce myself and the project a bit more and add a few voiceovers of my own. I think I would also try and dissect the photos a bit. Because I have opinions about every photo I take and it is relevant to the film. But I did like making it. It was very therapeutic to talk about what i love and I think I made good use of angles and composition by framing the shots specifically to capture the best of a particular setting.