Class Feedback

Today we were given feedback from each member of the class after showing our video of our rough cut to everybody. I now understand what i need to do to change my film opening and make it better. The feedback i received was mostly positive, with some points about how i could improve my opening.

The class believed in summary that:

Font was too bland. Here I am going to use a Russian typeface which i have explained on my earlier posts below here, i simply used Arial to see what the whole idea would look like and to have some text in the rough cut, to judge what the text looked like on the pictures and what was the best place on the screen for them.

There were too many shots of the tanks. With hindsight i can now see that too many shots of tanks were used, and the focus should be more on the main character (the young girl) rather than the tanks. Perhaps one or two shots would be effective, as they establish the location and date, but more than this is unnecessary.

Shots were too fast and could be slower. I agree with this, and getting rid of some of the shots could benefit my film as i would have space to lengthen the shots appropriately and for the class to fully understand what is going on. I now realise that there were a little too many shots in the sequence.

Avoid using the same shot twice. I think this is good advice, and the shot of the tanks was used a bit too much.

We need some more focus on the main character. I agree with this, and getting rid of some tank shots but then adding stills of the young girl will help to shift the focus more onto her and her emotions, which should then help the audience establish her as the main character. I only have some footage of the young girl, so I will take some still shots of her from the footage and add this into the sequence.

The text on the screen needs dialogue. I agree with this, and am going to put dialogue on it, i just simply put the text on the screen for the rough cut so i know what order it is in and it also helps the audience understand the opening a bit more. The dialogue will be in Russian, with the text in English for subtitles.

The titles could be in Russian. This seems like a good idea, as at the start the title 'Russian Arts Council' suggests the film is in Russian, however i don't think all the titles should be in Russian, as this would be too complicated and not necessary if i am having Russian dialogue as well. I think that if the Title of the film was in Russian this would be effective, it could then fade to English or vice versa and this i think would be a good effect.

It needs a soundtrack. I did not have time to upload the rough cut with sound as i had not found the right track, but now i think i have found the perfect soundtrack for my film, with the music changes after the glass break picture, here the music will be more calm and relaxed, sounding a little melancholy to also symbolise the girl's feelings when she has to move from Germany. Also, i may remove the sound of the glass smash and just have the music when the screen smashes, but have the music change at this point, i think this may be more effective than the glass breaking sound effect.