Week Four - Rough Cut Feedback (21/02/12)

In today's session, we were showing our rough cuts of our film, Night Journey. To begin with, the main Mac in the room that was hooked up to the projector wasn't working correctly so we had discussions about the schedule for the next of the semester and also about choices for next year and the importance of our elective modules. I found all of this information very helpful and gave me more of an insight into the workload next year and what I may want to do.

Once the Mac was working correctly, we started looking at the rough cuts. Whilst other people were getting their feedback, I noted down parts of it that might come in useful in mine and Lewis' project. The feedback that I noted down was:

• NEVER loop an atmos track. Always make sure that you record enough so that you don't have to loop it and don't have to use the same piece twice. Looping the track can cause a clicking noise that can get very irritating
• Choose the music in films carefully, don't just choose it because it sounds good, make your choice based on characterisation and the tone of the scene/film
• Establish who the protagonist as early as you can
• Dream sequence
• Echo voices
• Possible blurry edges?
• Isolation
• Show the empty corridors and empty compartments to show the isolation of the two characters
• NEVER have more than one ending
• Pauses in the dialogue when using voiceover is esential, it gives the audience time to process what has been said

After watching various people's rough cuts, Lewis and myself showed ours. I was very happy with the positive feedback that we received which was:

• The voiceover at the beginning of the film was very strong and the timing was done well
• We had a great characterisation of the victim
• The dream sequence was a bit too sudden, consider slowly moving into the dream and maybe adding an effect to the footage to make it look like a dream
• The opening point-of-view shot was too busy, consider removing
• The opening sequence where we see the man standing at the platform was used well but consider extending the length of the shot
• The opening sequence possibly had too many different shots, consider removing a few and extending existing shots so the audience have time to breath and get to grips with what is happening
• The music at the beginning of the film works well. Watch through the film plenty of times to make sure all of the music works
• The crossfade from the corridor to the compartment following the script very strictly, consider changing it
• The point-of-view shot we used at the end when the three characters are looking in the cabin was too high to be from their point-of-view, change this shot to suit the height of the characters

I am very happy with the feedback that we received and I am looking forward to taking the feedback into account and getting on with the fine cut of the film.