Smile Post-Production Diary

For my post-production I have decided to use premier pro. Premier pro is an editing program that allows you to splice, edit and colour grade footage. As shown in the pre-production, the beginning of my footage will be using  the same colour grade. 

17th January - today I have started to edit my smile campaign video. I found the appropriate audio that I wanted. I gained my music from epidemic sound. Epidemic sound is a website where you give a monthly subscription and gain access to thousands of tracks and and sound effects. I decided to choose two audio clips. My first audio is very dull and deep. This will help with my editing as the audio conveys and reinforces the depressed mood that I wish to give off. My second audio clip is high pitched which conveys a happier tone. Audio is very important to a video as it helps tell the mood of a video and also the pace of clips. The audience unconsciously take in audio and it helps them tell the story to themselves. This is  why in some films and theatres, when the villain is introduced, they have a deep and dark toned music play. 

On premier pro I used the cutting tool by pressing (C) on the keyboard. This allowed me to
cut clips together to make sure the clips were blending well together and making a continuity edit. 

18th January -  Today I have been out recording some footage for the video and am now editing again. The editing process has been close to the same. The edits have consisted of making cuts where the music drops and making sure the same color grade is applied. However in the color grades, they needed to slowly fade away in order for the colors to change. My first outdoor shot begins with a blue tone as it is taken before sunrise. As the shots progress, the sky becomes warmer and shadows become more visible. I slowly decreased the intensity of clips in order to make it appear as if it was slowly fading. My final clip of the day was a long clip with a warm sky. In order to try and make the cut seem natural and reduce the amount of time jumping, I decided to let the clip roll longer than the rest. This allows the audience to take in the scene and understand that time has passed. By slowing down clip time, the audience are given a break from the quick clips. The audience are allowed to breath, similarly to in books when there will be a build up, chaos, then a small portion of tranquility before returning back to chaos. This break reduces the amount of confusion for the brain and lets the audience understand and reflect what has happened so far. 

The long clip also acts as a turning point in the story. This is one of the few long clips in the story. The clip is colorful, bright and longer than most. This has a detrimental effect on the audience. The audience are gathering a-lot of information from this clip. The target audience will relate to the beginning of the video by the fact that it is hard and miserable to get up early. By showing that at the beginning the audience quickly establish a mental but also physical connection to the character. The audience feel and emote with him. By making the image of a bright sky dwell on the screen, the audience soak in the view. They feel jealous. They feel like they are missing out on what the character is seeing. This image is at the center of the depressing to happy mood shift. The image displays the shift in emotion and from this point on the colors become more saturated than the rest. I also added an adjustment layer that slowly increases in saturation as time goes on. This allows for the video to slowly gain more color. In return this relates to the audience as being happier and helps show the transition from being sad, dark and dull to then being happy, bright and colorful.

During the same clip I decided to change to the next music track. By letting the track run longer, this gave a good opportunity for a good fade of the first clip and a good time to fade in the new track. This allows a more seamless transition and also allows for the reinforcement about the change in mood. I achieved this transition by using two constant gains on the beginning and end of the clips. A constant gain allows for the audio to either fade in or fade out, depending on which side it is placed on.

19th January - Today I completed the last part recording and have also edit it together. I began by putting my clips together with the second beat. After adding the clips and cutting to size I adjusted the exposure in the basic correction panel. The footage straight out of camera looked great in my opinion so I decided to not add a color grade. However editing the final part was different to the rest of the video. Due to the whole video being edited, so far, with hard cuts, I wanted to give the audience another sense of change within the character. I have already achieved this via color, brightness and audio. Therefore I think the next best way to show the emotional change could be through the edits themselves. By using a cross-dissolve the video clips blend together slowly and create a less harsh cut. I decided to use these as the audience will now feel like the character is in a state of happiness. The slow blend of clips show how the character feels like he is walking on air, there is no harsh or abrupt cuts but rather he is at a place of stillness and happiness. On the final two clips I make them longer than the rest. This is to show that this is the payoff. This is what the character got up to go and see. I had the character take off his headphones when at the lighthouse to show that he doesn't need music to relax anymore, rather that the tranquility of the coast gives him the relaxation he needs. I then used another cross-dissolve to be able to go into the final clip of the character walking forward, as a silhouette, towards the coast. This is the first time in the video that we see the sunrise and this is also the final clip. By doing this the audience have a well round and definitive idea of what the walk has done for the character and his overall mission. 

Now by pressing (T) on the keyboard I am able to bring up the text tool which allows me to type. I decided to use a "fancy" looking font in order to give a professional feeling but also with a fluid movement. I believe that by trying to use a font that has a fluid look to it, it implies a calmness and relaxation as to when it was written\ typed, which matches the emotions that the audience should be currently feeling. I again used a cross dissolve in order to blend them into the frame. From that I then use another cross dissolve to show the mind logo. After a few seconds I used a constant gain in order to let the the audio fade

Overall my main process when editing was to create a long term contrast. Although a lot of techniques are repeated, they slowly change in order to give a larger contrast.

For example the video starts with:

Hard cuts to show the sadness and dull process of a morning

Dark Blue tones to show the time of day but also to show the characters emotion

Slow paced music to show the lack of happiness and excitement that is going on

To then switch to:

cross-dissolves to show the tranquility of where he is

Warm bright tones to show the emotions and warmth that he receives at the end of his struggle.

Higher pitched and faster music to show the excitement and the change in emotion. 

Now in order to make sure my video works well with my audience, I need to screen it to the target audience and gain feedback on what they feel like works best.