Filming Blog

Today my group and I filmed every scene part of our commercial. In total we had six scenes to film. Out of those six scenes, I was in charge of the camera to film two of the scenes. Before I began to film, I acted as the director of each scene. I made sure the actors were in position and that the camera was on. I checked  the lighting and looked around at the setting to make sure everything was intact. Once I turned the camera on, I got everyone ready and then I pressed the recording button. At first the camera was not working. When I pressed the recording button it would not start recording. Eventually, after a few presses, it finally started.

The scenes that I filmed were the Nike slides scene and the Nike Air Force Ones scene. Both were outside on the senior patio. For the first scene, I had the actor, Jada, sit on one of the tables with her feet facing outward to show the Nike symbol. I pressed record and we began to film the scene. I started out with the camera zoomed in on the slides. Then, I slowly zoomed out and created a tilt and moved from her feet to the top of her body. After that, I did another tilt but this time it was a quick one, from the top of her body back down to her feet. Aside from zooming in on the symbol on the slides, I also zoomed in on the symbol on her jacket, seeing as it was also Nike. I made sure to include these tilt movements and slow zooming in and out to really demonstrate the message of the commercial. These tactics also help to emphasize the brand itself.

This scene took many times to film. We took about seven takes of it. When I reviewed each scene that I had previously recorded, I saw that there were plenty of things I could do differently with the camera to make it better each time. After the first take, I realized that I made the tilt movements to fast. The second and third take showed me that I had to make the zooming in and out more slow because a quick zoom in and out would not put emphasis on the brand logos. After a few of the takes I also realized that the scene would be more interactive if I added another person into it. I made another actor go into the scene along with the initial actor and play the role of someone having a conversation withy he actor wearing the brand. I decided that this conversation in the commercial would make the scene more appealing and interesting to the audience. The last thing I noted to revise while filming was starting and stopping the camera recording at the right times. I learned that I shouldn’t start too soon, because the actors my not be ready, and I shouldn’t stop it too late, because there will be unnecessary footage.