Group Recce Evaluation

What is the point of a recce?

The point of conducting a recce is to firstly test out the location to see whether it is a suitable place to shoot and if it is safe and practical to film. Secondly, a recce can also be used for getting used to filming different shots and being able to use the camera's with confidence. This is what we did for our trip to Wilderness woods as it allowed us to shoot in a suitable location and allow us to gain confidence about using the camera's.

What did you learn about the process of film making on the recce?The group learnt a few things about the process of film making from our recce such as time keeping can be difficult because even with a large amount of time, we still found ourselves running out of time due to the fact that we had so many shots that we wanted to try out. Furthermore, there were some factors during filming that we were not capable of controlling such as the weather. On our day at wilderness woods, the weather was only a small problem with the wind, however on some other recce's we may have to plan around the weather in case it affects our filming.

Did you try out any shots that didn't work?There were a couple of shots we attempted which did not go as planned. The first was a big extreme close-up of a maggot which we found on a bench. Despite zooming in a large amount, we still found it difficult to keep the camera still as well as keep it in focus whilst filming something so small which was moving at the same time. The second shot that did no work was the high-angled shot which was difficult because to get the camera high enough above someone standing proved to be quite a challenge, especially when trying to keep the camera still at the same time.

What ideas were the most successful?
One of our most successful ideas was a medium long shot where each of us appeared into the shot separately after each other doing different actions. This was quite tricky to begin with, but then we worked out how to remotely control the camera and so we could film the whole group at the same time. However, this particular idea became more successful after editing as we were able to fade ourselves in and then out giving it a ghostly feel. Another idea which was successful was filming small waterfalls in the stream which looked particularly impressive in HD and the big close-ups came out very well during editing.

How did this exercise generate ideas for your opening?
This exercise generated a few new ideas in the group for our opening such as the use of shadow which turned out to be very successful as it creates mystery and suspense. We are now definately looking at using more shadows in our opening as a result. In addition, the use of blur and going in and out of focus was another idea we picked up, especially after learning how to control it manually, was a very interesting technique that we picked up. This is definately an effect we will try using in our opening.

What will you do next in terms of your own locations?
In terms of our next locations we will be looking again for woods where lighting can be used effectively. As well as this a good location for us would be a building of some sort which we could use in our openeing to have a character run into and watch a videotape back.