Unit 21: Single-camera production

Tasks for unit:

Task one:

The single camera format involves the use of a one-camera set up, this involves a scene being shot using only one camera, following the actors or staying in one position. This is done with programmes such as 'The Office' and 'The peep show'. It creates a realistic tone to the programme through using various point-of-view shots. An example of a single camera format is the use one camera to film a conversation between 2 actors, first filming one actor’s side of the conversation then the same with the second. Later on editing it to create a fluid conversation. This means that when using a single camera format, the filming is often taken out of order. There is further analysis of single-camera setups on the following website.
Setup

Creation of single-camera drama

Example of single-camera format: Peep show.

Whereas the multi camera format uses a multiple amount of cameras and camera shots to produce a programme.
The first advantage of using a single camera format is that it is cheaper; there is only the need of one camera and fewer taping facilities. The second advantage is convenience, shooting can be arranged without the commitment of all the characters being on the set at the same time.
However it also has to be considered when limitations appear, such as space ect.

On the other hand, many directors choose to use multi-camera formats instead of the single version. This creates more camera shot options. Using multiple cameras can create a more fluid, natural scene, this is important with live interviews ect. It also saves time; it means that often there is only the need to shoot a scene once. So when it comes to live action and live programming to would be very advantageous, whereas the use of single camera format would be more useful when filming dramas and sitcoms.

Example of multi-camera format: Scrubs.

Task 2:

There are three different types of programme. They are Series, serial and single dramas. A series consists of between 6 and 2o programmes but usually lasts more than one series. Some examples of this are, Lost, Frasier and 24. These are usually related with the use of single camera format. A serial however is different; it is adapted from an event, story or book into a two/three part drama. An example of this is Wuthering Heights. A single drama is a one off programme between one and two hours long.

Analysis of linear v non-linear video.

The non-linear video sets a scene of being on edge. The edgy music is a signifier that connotes an eerie, uncomfortable position. You are not sure where the person is; it is edited in non chronological order. The meaning of this video isn't anchored. The camera shots and editing connote that maybe he has a mental health problem, or maybe just in a mood.

The linear video isn't much different in terms of content but the sequences and shots create a very different theme. The calm music creates a sense of ease for the viewer. The structure is in chronological order, which make it seem like the person is just on a daily walk. This makes you feel more comfortable.

A realist narrative is what we normally tend to see in programming, shows such as The Bill. It has realistic plot lines and stories. Anti-realist narrative is mainly related to sci-fi, with narratives that are fictional. Such as doctor Who or Star Trek.

An opening ending is where the story is left on a cliffhanger, usually related to a series or serial. Some examples of this are, lost, Eastender ect. Whereas, closed endings have a definite ending with no chance of another programme or series, they are very popular among films. Examples of this are, The Simpsons,War Of The Worlds, Titanic.

Task 3:

Patterns of narrative.

In War Of The Worlds, there is more than one goal. The aliens make the first goal; they are intent on destroying the human race. The second goal is made by the humans, they set out to destroy the aliens. There is a search to discover where the aliens have come from and how to destroy them, however there is also an emotional search for Ray to become closer with his children. The journey consists of Ray and his children getting to Boston to find the children's mother. On the way the group go on a journey of emotions where they reconnect. The climax happens when the aliens are killed by infection and the family is brought back together.

Programmes and films have a range of information. They mostly consist of restricted narrative, only introduced to the plot when the characters are. We don't know what is going to happen. Unrestricted narrative means that the audience receives extra information before the character, however this comes with a danger of the audience becoming bored with the plot.

Subjective narration, the way we see things can massively change the effect they have on us. The shot of the camera is the main factor in this. If the camera shots are 'point of view' and move around, this gives the audience the idea that we are seeing from characters prospective. We hear sounds that the character would hear, this is mental subjectivity. Whereas objective narration is the process of showing the external behavior of the characters.

Doctor Who:

This programme is a perfect example in demonstrating a fictional narrative. This is portrayed through sci-fi story lines, with the use of aliens and time travel as the main theme. The storyline of these series tend to be sequential but sometimes change into non-sequential episodes to create a different effect. It could be argued that the whole series is non-sequential as the Doctor is traveling through time, in a few episodes we see flashbacks to the past when the time lord empire still existed. However from the standpoint of him being the main character, we watch him grow older and regenerate. This means that most of Doctor Who is in chronological order. Also the story lines have a strong theme of anti-realist narrative, there is an endless freedom of characters and back stories that could be created through this. For example, the creation of the cybermen, a race of metal men with no emotions. However, because there is such freedom with this narrative, the storyline can also touch upon real events and time periods, such as the Doctor meeting Charles Dickens and Queen Victoria. This programme also has a restricted narrative, we are only given information as it is given out by the characters, however it could be said that we know the plot line of every episode as it does have the generic Todorovs's theory. Many of the episodes have closed ending, with the doctor defeating the evil aliens and returning to his tardis, although the series itself is open ended, with the narrative of the doctor continuing through time leaving it open for more series. From a viewers point of view, the programmes are restricted as we only know the same amount of information that the characters do. This adds an extra element of excitement and suspense. When using Propp's theory we find that in every episode, the Doctor is the hero, his side-kick is the helper and the alien/entity from a different time period is the villain. In addition, the human race tends to be the damsel-in-distress. All the episodes of Doctor Who contain the generic example of Todorov's theory, with the Doctor traveling to a new place being the equilibrium, the discovery of a alien or something evil being the disruption and the defeat of whatever evil is happening being the resolution. It is rare for this not to be the case in this programme.

Lost:

The series of Lost are very focused on creating at non linear, non sequential narrative. The programme is set on an island where strange occurrences happen and are explained throughout the series using flashbacks and non chronological scenes. This programme contains some realistic elements but as soon as such things as polar bears and mythic creatures turn up it changes into a anti-realist narrative. This programme has a repeated pattern of narrative, the main goal here is to discover the secrets of the island. However there are sub goals, such as Jack trying to win the heart of Kate. This leads to each episode having an investigation into finding out the secrets of the island and follows the journey the characters take to find this. lost has a subjective narrative with the characters point of view being seen in each episode, especially focusing on a different character. The programme has not yet reached many climaxes as many of the different strands of narrative still need to come to a conclusion. The use of multi-strand narrative is used a lot, each programme is a series shows a perspective from a different character. This leads to demonstrate subjective narration, there are shots in each episode to show their point of view of the island and the scene they are in, along with the sounds that they hear.

The nightmare before christmas:

This film was made in 1993 by Tim Burton. The narrative is linear and sequential; it is a story about a town purely devoted to the holiday of Halloween. The main character, jack, stumbling upon the town of Christmas and leading on to stealing it and Santa. In this film there is a generic pattern of narrative. The goal of this film is for Jack to make Christmas his own and for the town of Halloween to make their own type of presents for the world. The obvious investigation being the discovery of these new holidays, made by jack. However there is an emotional search for Jack when he looses his will for Halloween. The journey consists of the realisation and climax of Jack finding his passion for Christmas and realising that he should stick to his own holiday. The narrative is restricted as we only find out information as the characters do. When using Propp's theory we see that the characters aren't what we see in a generic film of this genre. The character of Jack switches from the hero to the villain throughout the film. He can be seen as a hero when he is the town’s head and when he saves Santa and sally. However he can be seen as the villain when he steals Santa and Christmas. The helpers in this film are the whole town, mainly the three evil children who steal Santa from his home. The damsel-in-distress being mainly sally and Santa, although Jack could be seen in this light at moments in the film when he struggles to find his true self. There is a closed ending when santa is rescued and goes on to the deliver the presents in time for christmas morning. It also ends on the level of Jack finding his passion for christmas again.

Task 4:

Analysis of single camera drama - Seven

The use of the single camera format has been used well in the drama 'Seven'. The first scene fades into to an establishing shot which sets the scene and gives the viewer a chance to take it in. The setting which is under a bridge gives the chance to create eerie shadows and a dark effect that is needed for this story line. This is done by using natural lighting from the background to create shadows on the puddle in the foreground. In this shot we also see the long shot of a women walking through the shot, followed by another long shot of two men getting out of a car, adding more information to the plot and gives the viewer more information. a mirror shot has been used in a puddle under the bridge, showing the mens movements. This is a really useful effect, the use of the puddle connotes to the viewer that murky, unhappy times could be ahead. The first close-up shot is of the women crying, this shot is great for showing a characters emotions. This is because we can see how the character is feeling at that moment in time without them having to speak, letting the target audience know exactly how she is feeling. After this, soft focus, tilted angled shots of the three characters are used. This comes with an establishment of a conversation between them. Followed by a sharp cut to a flashback using a black and white screen. these are used throughout the film, this is done to separate the scenes, making it more edgy and interesting. Also giving the viewer more information on the plot and what the characters are talking about. Without these flashback clips, the film may have become boring. There is a non-diegetic use of a heartbeat to signify the situation the characters are in, a desperate one. There is a shot panning under the bridge following the characters, this use of shot is useful when transitioning through a scene. A lot of jump cuts between shots, this creates a fast pace to the film which will keep the viewer on their toes. The use of fast editing at the end of the film is particularly effective and puts across the extremity of the characters emotions. Lighting also comes into consideration here, with a shadow effect created on the girls face to connote her fate to come.

Task 5:

There are various differences in technology available to modern audiences, the first of these are digital television. This gives viewers access to hundreds of channels, with most appealing to a different target audiences. Televisions have also become cheap and accessible which means a household can watch more than one channel. Many children now have their own televisions in their room. It is very different to twenty years ago when media had a less sprawling reach, with only 3 television channels to satisfy peoples entertainment needs and no internet for people to find information. Nowadays its has become increasingly hard for the main television channels to maintain their viewing numbers. The main modern technology, the internet, now means that you can watch what you want, when you want. With websites such as BBC iplayer, there is now the freedom to decide what content you wish to watch at anytime. There is also the luxury to access and download free music and films. Rupert Murdoch is quoted to have said about this subject that 'Everyday new technology is tearing down old ways of doing business, in the process it is driving us away from a mass media where news and entertainment was centrally controlled. And it is taking us to an exciting new world where consumers like you are determining what content you want, when you want it and how you want it'. An example of the change is that in 1992 an episode of The Only Fools And Horses got 20.1 viewers, whereas a recent episode of The popular ITV programme The X Factor only reached an audience of 10 million. This shows the extent of what digital television have done to mainstream viewing.

Task 6:

Media consumption:

Class A and B: This group of people make up a huge percentage of the British population with just over 12.8 million men put into this category. It is also said that around 60 percent of those men use the internet regularly with travel, sport and news being their favourite genre of website to access. Whereas the women in this category have been found to favour magazines (Hello, Elle, Cosmopolitan). As the people of this category have busy working lives, this generally effects the type of programming they watch. With the men swinging towards the sports channels and programmes with more substance. While the women tend to find time to watch late night programming when the kids have gone to bed, these include such channels as UKTV style, Living and programmes that focus on womens fashion. This demographic also tend to opt for a diverse genre of film viewing. They focus on french and Japanese filming to get a different interpretation of media.
Class c1 + Class c2: This demographic is very large, therefore can be extremely diverse. It is seen that as we move into this class we see a shift in social structure, we see that more woman are stay at home mums and we see men having middle to lower class jobs. This generally effects the media they like to consume. Programming such as The apprentice and Strictly Come Dancing is popular here and it is seen as middle class viewing but still appeals to a range ages. This class also seem to find digital channels more interesting, with a large percentage choosing to use Sky and Sky+ in their homes. Although the men in this group still tend to mainly view sports, they also find comedy, films and reality television appealing. It is also found that around half of men in this group listen to the radio daily, mainly concentrating on Radio 1 and Sportsnews. When it comes to the newspapers people of this category are most likely to read 'The Times' and 'The Daily Mail' with less political/economic news and more topical/entertainment news.
Class D and Class E: People of this class are most likely to choose the media of television over the internet, newpaper or radio as it is the easiest form of media to access. The main viewing times of this group tend to early mornings and evenings and more likely to stick to terrestrail, with with barguin hunt and Xfactor being popular. Entertainment magazine can become popular with men and women of this category though, mainly focusing on 'lads mags' and womens magazines with fitness tips and real-life stories such as 'OK'. When it comes to newspapers this group sway towards tabloids such as 'The Sun'. People of this group are also attracted to simple, slapstick comedy, which means that they are attracted to watching DVD's to cater to this. Some examples of this are 'Dude wheres my car' and 'The hangover'.

Section 2: Single-camera drama.

Task 7:

When making a single camera drama we have to use a range of equipment and software to produce it.When making our drama we will have to use a range of equipment to make sure we produce something of a good standard. Therefore we will be using a mixture of cameras, the DVX-100-B and a home video camera. We will be using a mixture because we won't always be able to access the DVX, this could be because we aren't in school when filming or someone else is using the camera. We intend to use the cameras of tripods most of the time, this will create steady shots we need to produce a professional look. However we won't use it for some scenes as we want to create a realistic tone to the drama. We are not going to use the microphone on the cameras to pick up the actors voice as it is not needed, instead we will use a a voice recorder to tape the experiences and feelings the actor has and insert it over the top of the scenes using garageband. We will also use garageband to create a music bed for the scenes.
When filming we will have an two actors as that is all we require, then we will have a director and a camera man, this will help us when we are filming each scene.
When we have filmed all we need, using natural lighting as we will not need any lighting effects, we will upload our footage onto imovie. Then we will begin to edit it, creating a non-linear effect. We can do this by editing the scenes down and changing them with quick transitions.

Task 8:

Treatment:

Objective: Our objective is to make a 3-5 minute film using single camera techniques, detailing the experiences of a paranoid teenage girl that lives in a lifestyle that is all about the perfect image, this causes depression and low self confidence leading to drug and drink related problems.

Setting: The surrounding area that the girl lives in, during the day and consisting of some scenes inside.

Time duration: 5 minutes (300 seconds)

Description: This will be a short 'thought provoking' drama based entirely on a teenage girl and her experiences dealing with emotions. The film will consist of edgy scenes (between 10 and 20 seconds each) using a non-linear, non-sequential narrative. When editing we will use fade transitions but mostly scene to scene transitions to create the more edgy effect. We will also use black outs to signify the dark times in her life. We will use of lot of 'point of view' shot and close ups to signify how the girl see' the world through her eyes and the experienes she has within it. We will also see how the girl overcomes the depressions she is in and do this using various close-ups and medium showing her new happy moods. An example of this will be to show that teen throwing the magazines, that have haunted her for years, away.

Remarks:

- Little of the teengers face will be shown, the drama will include mainly shots of the world around her. Thus creating a sense that we have entered her world when watching the drama.

- Some filming will be black and white to create a sense she is in a dream like state.

- Flashbacks will be used to explain how the past has made her the person she is in the present.

Proposed sequence sample of events:

1. Establishing shot images from magazines of women, switched between close-up shots of the teenager looking upset. We will have a non-diegetic music bed with a voice over of a fashion reporter describing the perfect image.

2. After this we will use shots of her in isolated situations, for example alone on a street corner with p-o-v shots demonstrating what she can see.

3. Then we move onto a quick transition to the teen in her bedroom, with closeups of her face, this will clearly demonstrate her emotions as she will be crying.

4. Next using a black an white effect moving into the next scene where we see close ups and medium shots of the teen using drugs, however this will be done in a tasteful way, not showing the most extreme side of drugs use.

5. We will then create a hallucinogenic like scene, varied moving shots and p-o-v shots. We will also use an effect from imovie to help create the atmosphere that the teen would be experienceing, putting across the message to the audience clearly.

6. After this will will demonstrate a coming down period from the drugs and a realisation about how she shouldnt need drugs or alcohol to be happy, we connote this wll the throwing away of the magazines.

7. The last scenes will involve her being outside, the teen will be meeting up with a boy. A medium shot will be used for this. Then we will see a close-up of them holding hands, then walking off into the distance, using a long shot.

Task 9:

We feel that there is no need to write a script for our production as there will be no speech involved in our drama and the treatment and storyboard are all that is needed to shoot and edit our scenes.

Task 10:

Task 11:

Evaluation:

Our purpose in producing this single camera drama was to gain and put into use the skills that are needed to produce this kind of film. Another purpose in gaining these skills was to produce a film to a high standard that would put a hard hitting message across to the viewer. After completing these tasks, I think we have completed this well. With the time we had to complete it and that the equipment provided I think we have acheived our purpose to a good standard.
After showing our completed single camera drama to an audience, we asked for some feedbacks. Their responces follow: They said that there is a wide range of well used angle shots that connote that depression and desperation of the girl. The use of the close-angle shots suggest that you are entering the world of the girl and are seeing it from her point of view. This makes the film more interesting to watch.
The audience got the preferred reading and found it thought provoking. As the primary target audience for this production was teenagers and young adults, I think showing the production to this kind of audience worked well in getting some responcive feedback.
In our drama, I think we gave across both a positive and negative message. First of all we demonstrated what the use of drugs and alcohol can cause, therefore deterring a viewer from taking advantage of these products. However, the message we put across was negative in the sense that the girl in the drama was going through a very traumatic experience and some people might find this viewing destressing.
Our drama only included the character of a white girl, we used the actress that was available to us and would have used an ethnic group if that was available to us. However the group thought that the use of this actress was most suitable. I feel that the did look realistic to the genre as we stuck to the edgy sinlge camera shots and hard hitting footage to create a film to keep to my genre.
I feel that throughout this production we worked as a team well to create solid single camera drama. I learned some new acting skills that will help me in the future, I also learnt how to work as a leader and in a group situation more easily with communiation and discussion. I feel that this experience will help me in the future with other projects.

Mr Jackson's comments.