Responsibilities:

There may be more than one student responsible for the editing. After discussions with the supervisor, scenes will be divided up amongst the editing team.

As a group we have decided the three main departments of editing after the initial timeline being constructed are: 

• Colour grading 

• Sound design and sound editing 

• Visual effects and graphics 

We have given ourselves tasks to complete a list of ideas that we can communicate with the director and to research how to put those ideas into practice (using practical examples to show to the director). 

This will be updated when the shot list is completed.

An editing timeline has also been completed so we have a structured response to the editing task. It outlines what is expected from each editor, when and who the data wrangler should give footage to (dependant on scene).

I have also created a concept for the film poster, which has been sent to Vedad. This poster influenced his version of the film poster.

I have also designed a logo for the taxi company featured in the film, 'Travel in Time'.

Sam (data wrangler) had been briefed and supplied with a document detailing which scenes go to which editor and on what days those scenes are scheduled to be filmed on.

We also had a discussion with the camera department and the equipment store to enquire about getting multiple c-fast cards for the Red Camera. This has been confirmed to be able to happen. The reasoning behind this decision is so that each card has certain scenes on it, making it easier to transfer data between those drives and each editor. A similar discussion was held between myself and Sam discussing using multiple SD cards for this same reason.

Having multiple cards used for storage also allows me to transfer data while filming is in progress, which in turn will create a faster turn around time for data wrangling and editing.

After the location scout, I used the footage from rehearsal to edit the first half of the test shoot into a rough film to showcase how the shots will flow into each other. For this, I used Davinci Resolve.

I digitalised my notes from both rehearsal dates in the form of a table.

I spent my time on Wednesday updating my shot and take tracker with the completed shot list. This will be used in production to keep track of shots and to note which takes were the best to use in the edit using an Asterix.

At 4pm a meeting was held on teams to check in on each department to make sure everyone was on track for the locations to be filmed on Thursday and Friday.

Overall, it was a good shooting day and we stayed within our call times.

After the shoot day, me and the Data wrangler met to transfer and organise footage aligned with our pre arranged editing plan.

During the production day I also organised footage into different folders and gave the footage to each member of the editing team as aligned with our pre arranged editing plan.

During filming I also kept my laptop open and transferring footage so it would be ready for when I needed it later in the day.

I was also there to advise as a VFX specialist on how we would make Grace and Noah disappear in shot. I made it clear that it was very important to have the camera be static, on a tripod and remaining in the same focus for the halves of the shot with and without the character. The actors left on screen in these moments had to remain completely still between the parts of the usable take so it looked like a smooth and seamless transition.

I also advised on what needed to be done to make the agents appear and disappear in the edit. The shot with and without those characters had to be exactly the same and completely static.

When home from shooting, I started creating a DRP file on Davinci resolve that had bins to organise footage in the editing software. I then put all the footage in those bins so that when we all came together to edit on Monday, I could merge our sections together and the other editors would be easily able to relink the footage to continue editing.

Robyn and Ben made a start on their specialised sections while I did final changes to the timeline for the first draft rough cut to fit with the VFX that were needed.

I spent my day creating the credits, trialling how best to make objects appear/disappear and researching how to fix some issues with the images and create certain effects I wanted.

I found the following videos and used these to research how to do certain things in davinci resolve:

https://youtu.be/fhjShuiLwSM?si=1oCxp_7a-2el9x2k

https://youtu.be/iIqxJCVVS04?si=8V4LTTpOP8upJtYX

https://youtube.com/shorts/eU55qevQF_k?si=6VgnjSdwMdSV4Bk1

https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/training

https://youtu.be/rAxcDYKdQ4M?si=STsf9yXhwV-Po83N

https://youtu.be/FvzlVK1IaU0?si=P43JSyCoWD8vvR42

https://youtu.be/eebFv3WXnhA?si=HlvI-TLa4Jb-e29a

Despite trying various methods, I could not remove the crosshair from one of the shots. I tried various methods using the editing page, the colour page and the fusion page, but none were able to fix this issue.

I used the advanced masking using the polygon tool in the fusion page for the shot where Noah disappears from the shot. I did this as there were no other ways to create this effect while not looking like two separate clips. I had to go though the clip by every keyframe to ensure Noah was fully removed from the shot.

I created the effect of having the monologue play on the old computer using an inverted polygon tool to remove the blank screen that needed replacing from the main shot and put this shot in Video 2. I resized and transformed the monologue video so it fit in the gap where the screen was removed, added a vignette and scanlines and put this clip in Video 1 so that it was only viable through the gap in the overlaying image. When this was done I created a compound clip with the two shots so they were now a complete shot that could be handled like regular video footage (so a zoom in or out could be added to add dynamitic to help the pace).

I created the hyper zoom effect as recommended by Vedad by following a tutorial on YouTube. I am proud of this effect and like how it turned out. I am going to keep this in mind for the future.

I exported the picture lock with all the VFX to be sent to the other editors so they could create a score and review their colour grade with the VFX added.

When these were finalised we merged the sound and colour grade into one timeline.

Robyn and I went through the film frame by frame to do a final check on the picture, making sure to remove any cine-lines and reframe images if equipment (such as the boom mic) were in shot.

We spent longer than we would have wanted to on this final day of editing and began the final export at 3pm, when the deadline was 4pm that day and the showing of the film was at 5pm.

Overall, I am very happy with the elements of the edit that fell under my responsibility.