First Day of Filming

 

    Our first day of filming was a few days ago, on the 26th of February. It was actually really fun, despite the fact that we were filming a relatively important project for class. We even went out to eat after filming, to celebrate our first day. First thing we had to do beforehand was find a location for us to film the main components of our film opening. Jacob and I had both went to two separate libraries, considering that the main parts of our film would be shot in an "office-like" area, and a library study room is perfect for that. The library that I went to was relatively small, so instead we decided to go with the library that Jacob found, which was the Miramar Library and Education Center. So, on our first day of filming, we had two main "objectives" that we wanted to complete. 

    First, we wanted to make a first attempt at filming our establishing shot, because honestly, that was the part of the film that was going to be the most exciting for us to film out of the entire film opening. This was because we would be able to use a mix of a pan/aerial shot in order to get an establishing shot that was aesthetically pleasing and cool. We drove around for a while, looking for a police station that would best fit the idea for the establishing shot that we had. We went to two different police stations, one in Miramar and one in Pembroke Pines. Both were relatively large, but the only thing that stopped us from using the one in Miramar was the fact that it had no sign that stated it was a police station. We ended up choosing the Pembroke Pines police station, so we took a first attempt at filming an establishing shot. Visually, the scene looked good, and we were able to get the pan except for some moments where the wind pushed the camera slightly. However, the audio wasn't great, as the wind would constantly be all we would hear in the shot. We have a few attempts at this, but we are most likely going to need to reshoot it on another day that the wind is not as strong and we can get a more effective shot. 

The two police stations we visited^ (we ended up choosing the second one). 

    Secondly, we wanted to film some of the key components of our main shots. From our script, we knew that the two major components we aspired to film was the interrogations of each character and the main "argument" scene. As stated before, we had planned the library room that we were going to film at, so we met up there to film. This was harder for us to film, mainly because we kept laughing at each other when trying to film our more "serious" scenes, since this was the first day and attempt at us doing this. Visually, these scenes were a bit wonky, because either somebody was laughing, someone got cut out of frame, our one of us just wasn't pleased with how our scene went. We tried to mainly include over-the-shoulder shots, medium shots, and low-angle in our filming process. Audio was actually really good, mainly because the library rooms were quiet so we had no disturbances, and the lighting was good too. Our shots were okay for the most part, but we still want to reshoot a few of them later on.    

Our location for filming^

    So for the future, aka our second day of filming, we need to reshoot one or two interrogation scenes, the large "argument" scene, and also a part of our beginning/establishing shot that features a cop car (because we have to still find a date that we can meet up with a police officer to film that works for both us and the police officer).