Sunday 20th January : Millwall Park and Mudchute station

We decided to film on Sunday because I and Mumina imagine that there would be less people on this day. We first filmed more performance around 1pm of a long shot and close up of me which took us less than 30 minutes. I also told Mumina to use my Canon camera and take more pictures of the landscape and surroundings of the performance setting as well as take photos of me posing for our digipak/advert. Our next step was to film me running down the streets towards Mudchute station to make it seem as if I was chasing after Agata - she then arrived around 2:30pm and decided to film My and Agata's part. During our fiming at the station, we heard an announcement that was towards us that we had to show permission that we could film - otherwise we had to leave straight away. We tried looking for help and called the DLR service, however they were not available during weekends. Therefore we had to leave straight away and plan another day to finish the rest of the scene.

by Julius Conmigo

Filming Schedule 2

I had to create a new filming schedule as part 2 of our filming. I wanted to keep things separate and organised as possible as I didn't want everything in one whole schedule. Furthermore, we wasn't sure of the exact days we were filming since Mumina has work and Agata is sometimes busy.

UPDATE –

20/1/13 - We wasn’t able to go to Agata’s house because her parents were there and they had guests over, therefore we had to book another day.

27/1/13 – We have to film at Mudchute station again because we didn’t have permission to film last time, and we were unaware of it. This time we called up the DLR Services and they said we could. 27^th of January is probably the last day we need to film.

By Julius Conmigo

First Draft of Music Video

This is our first draft of our Music Video. There are still a lot of changes I and Mumina need to do. However the music video is almost complete, we just need to add the remaining footages and film the rest of the narrative, which is not a lot. Altough with the first draft, there are a few seconds of the music video of where it will turn black - this is because we haven't added the narrative which still needed to be filmed or added. We couldn't add a lot of performances, because it will clash with the storyline and timing, therefore we left it blank. There are slight changes that I and Mumina will take into consideration. For example, instead of showing the Cancer Letter that the audience are suppose to see at the end of the video, we plan not to, and keep the mystery of what actually happened. Although as an audience we know that she is dead, but keeps us wondering of how she died.

by Julius Conmigo

Friday 18th January : Agata's Letter

I and Agata decided to film on this day as she was free and since this scene was of only Agata writing the letter I didn't have to ask Mumina to come along and because she had work on this day. The main problem with this scene was that the wind was blowing strong on that day so the camera slightly moves, however is not that obvious. Everything worked perfectly and I was able to add in a close up of the notebook and a tear drop falls down. Before we wasn't able to do this because we didn't have eye drops and I had to purchase one in order to make it work. On this scene, you can also see that we went to Canary Wharf again. This is because I thought of the idea having Agata writing the letter at the same place that the two characters were together and remind her how happy they were. Agata  looks at the same spot, and she has her own flashback. On the same day I also filmed Agata, sending the mail off, luckily I found a post-box near-by the same scene so I didn't have to worry and waste time going back close to where I live in Westferry and film from there.

by Julius Conmigo

Friday 18th January: Using Final Cut Express

When uploading pictures, they would be first uploaded through iMovie. The footage is then later on copied to Final Cut Express where the clips are then edited and added effects, transitions etc.

After importing these clips onto Final Cut Express, I noticed straight away that there were more than 200 clips. This was a problem that can be avoided, luckily, through the use of 'Bins'. These bins act like folders and allow me to place any clips or other components within Final Cut Express, that will separate them making it easier to locate certain objects.

Therefore I separated these clips depending on which scene/place it was taken. For example, one of the scene is where I run after Agata - my main actress, from my house to the station. So I made an obvious and simple title for it and called it 'Running after Agata'. This making my job a lot easier and finding various clips stored away in the right bins.

Moreover, to further organised my clips in a professional way and make it easier for I and Mumina to deduce which clip is to be used or not. Within the event bins, I made three more separate bins. These are 'Used', 'Maybe' and 'Deleted' bins. I did this because I thought it would be a lot easier to find which clips we were using, since we filmed multiple times of the same shots and/or angles. 'Used' bins are the clips we are going to use, 'Maybe' are clips that we are likely to use, in case we needed more footage and the 'Deleted' bin is where we thrashed away the clips that we thought were not good enough and had problems such as blurs or they were just simply practice shoots.

However before throwing the clips into these certain bins, I first watched the clip throughout the end and decided whether it will be of used or not. I then labelled these rushes depending which clip it was, for example this clip was called ' Moving back to camera - 3 '. It was called this because I was picking up the letter and move back to the camera for when it will fade to black. I also named it three, as it is a multiple shot and the third time it was filmed. This makes it easier to track how many shots were taken of the same one.

This is another example, this is a 'Deleted' bin for 'Running After Agata' I had four or five of the same clips, located on the left picture. I had to put them in the delete bin so I would know that these clips are trashed. The picture on the right shows the 'Used' bins, these are the clips I am going to used and named them as well.

By Julius Conmigo

Thursday 17th January : Re-Filming

After watching the clips from my house of me picking up the letter sent by Agata and 'Running after her'. Me and Mumina decided that this scene was to be filmed again. Due to the fact that the quality was very poor, as the HD Camera used was having slight problems. The HD Camera was not focused enough onto me and the resolution seemed extremely fuzzy or pixelated. In other cases, if we were to use lights, the whole screen seems too bright and unnatural or without lights it would look fuzzy and the quality wouldn't look good more or less.

If you look at the first two pictures ( The top and the center image ) the quality looks rather low, and seemingly fuzzy. The lighting was the main problem here and in the footage I looked extremely de-saturated.
We asked the Media Department for the Nikon camera, and the results were surprising as the footage came out 10x better than the HD Camera. However there was another slight problem. The Nikon camera, for some odd reason, was not able to focus up close no matter how much we tried to zoom it in close from a far direction, it will always come out blurry. Although I and Mumina were happy that the overall footage came out perfectly fine.

If you look at the third picture ( The very bottom ) the footage came out in high quality, it has that sheen and good lighting on it, unlike the other two. During this part, we were able to film the entire scene, but only having a few changes and slight problems. I had to change my clothes as well as it looked too formal and seemed as if I was going to college.

By Julius Conmigo

December 12th January : School Art Room

When we filmed at the school art room we had to ask for permission from one of the teachers and booked it a week before, so we were given a room that was not occupied. Although we decided to do it after school, as we thought it would have been easier for Me, Mumina and Agata, since there wouldn't be any people whatsoever. We decided to film at 3:00pm exactly when school ends. Furthermore since Agata and I had to paint - I asked one of the art teachers for 2 yeasels, we got 1 big canvas and a small one from inside the art class and put paper on top of them, we we could paint over it. We filmed over 50 shots, as I thought it would be a good idea to put in abstract shots of the art room. It took us roughly 2 hours to film the whole scene.

Thursday 13th December : Performance at Millwallk Park

Mumina and I went back to Millwall Park at 13th of December to film more performances, and this time we came as early as possible. We asked permission from our teacher if we could skip the lesson because we only had Media Studies during Thursdays and we would be free the whole day. Fortunately she let us. We both went around the times of 10 am, this is due to the fact that we would have more time before it gets dark. We filmed the previous shots before because this time the lighting was much better. We filmed about one or two of the same footages, again to see which parts has better ones. We also filmed it in different angles and in different places. Once of the shots was a tracking shot which looked really good, although there are parts that need to be cut out, because I had no strap for the guitar so I had to hold it throughout the whole song while I was walking. We filmed for about 3-4 hours, therefore we had a lot of footage and completed the performance.  

Wednesday 9th January: Cable Car TO Canary Wharf

Our original idea to our music video was to have, Me and Agata to go on a Emirates Cable Car located at the O2 Arena. However I and Mumina thought that this would be a huge hassle and there were many disadvantages since it would be time as well as money consuming. The reason for this is because we want to get as much multiple footage as we can and we want the footage to look good. However the cable car will cost £2 per ride, back and forth and the ride usually takes no less than 5 minutes. Setting up equipment was another disadvantage, the cable car doesn't seem spacious enough and there would be a possibility that we would ride with other people, it could been hand held but we believe the ride would move a lot, making the camera and footage shaking all the time. It was the perfect idea but unfortunately it would take us a fortune as there are three of us. However we already had a back-up plan involved which was not a big worry. Our second idea was to have some sort of 'Date-Night' with Agata and Me at Canary Wharf. We thought it would look really romantic during the night, but the best thing about it was it looked more romantic with the Christmas lights involved, and we happened to find boats illuminating rainbow lights which made the footage looked really decent.

Sunday 9th December: Performance at Millwall Park

Our second filming occurred at Millwall Park. on 9th of December. When we first started filming the weather was extremely cold, so we had to take pre-cautions by taking a 2-3 minute break just to get some warmth. This was because I was not allowed to wear any warm clothing when doing the performance as I had to look in the right clothing when strumming the guitar as I wanted to imitate a Bruno Mars look. We had done some filming, although we had to stop after 2 hours because the weather became really damp and gloomy, and the lighting became really dull and dark. Although we did catch nice footage of the sky.

Friday 7th December :Graveyard Scene

Our first scene was at the Graveyard of St Anne's Church located between Limehouse and Westferry. Before having access to this place, I had to call up the Reverend of the church, a week prior to entering the premises. Luckily the Reverend said 'Yes'. Proof is on on my previous blog post called "Emailing the Reverend". Although one condition was to show a letter from the school saying Me and Mumina were allowed. On the day, again before entering we contacted the Reverend through phone, so we could show him the letter of permission. However, it was so fortunate and nice of him to say just to go in the area and film for as long as we wanted. We first filmed abstract shots and continued filming for the actual film. We had to becareful of where we stepped as we did not want to break anything. We left our equipment at a safe area before filming a 'gravestone of Agata'. It took us almost 3 hours to film the entire scene, however we still left one bit which is where I cry. We are going back in the future to film this short bit.