Re-Filming Blog: Choppiness Reversed

  Once I had one class period to try to edit the entire video, my group and I noticed that the scenes looked choppy. Scenes that could have been combined were instead cut into multiple different scenes. I suggested that we choose a day to re-film  many of our scenes and make the video more cohesive. My teammates agreed so we had to determine a day to redo these takes. The best day that worked for everyone was the upcoming Sunday. Even though the scenes needed to take place while it was dark outside, I figured that filming during the day would be okay as long as the lighting within the house was appropriate. I made sure, prior to filming, that the camera was charged so that I wouldn't have to use the extension cord this day. Amy and Aitan arrived and I ensured that everything was in place to immediately get started. I had noticed in our film that only the first couple of takes needed to be re-done and other segments as well. This meant that nothing needed to be filmed in the dining room so that was one less room that I needed to clean.
   In order to fix the choppiness issue, I knew that many of the separate scenes could be merged into one. For example, at the very beginning of the movie, there were three separate scenes that all used the same camera angle yet it was obvious to notice that they were filmed individually. I fixed this by telling Amy to showcase each of the actions seen in the scenes into one take. This was completed successfully and I moved on to another similar issue with the following scenes. As I was filming, I also wanted to include every required angle that our film didn't already have. For example, a tilt was never made so I decided to incorporate one where Amy was standing up from her chair. We then moved to the hallway to fix some shots where the lighting had looked bad. Last time, a flashlight was used to show Amy walking but it was too noticeable on video. Since the sun wasn't totally down yet, I used this to my advantage and left one curtain slightly open and without shutters. This allowed for little sunlight to seep in and make the scene still look spooky and realistic. Once Amy and Aitan left and the sun began to set, I went outside with the camera and tripod to film an establishing shot with a pan shot, which we also had not included.