Preliminary Exercise

Continuity task: filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room, sitting down in a chair opposite another character with whom she/he exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180% rule.


We began our media lesson by being instructed on how to carry out our preliminary exercise in order to show to our future examiner the skills (or lack of) which we possess when filming. The basis for the exercise was that we had to include the 180 degree rule, as well as at least one shot-reverse-shot and a shot of someone bursting through a door and at least one pan. I worked in a group with Megan, Ally and Alastair and after reading the suggestions of ideas from the board, we decided to pick the 'Antiques Roadshow' theme, as we became fascinated by a metal pot.


The location we used for the exercise was outside of the Media Room, in a small area outside the main kitchens (which included a table much to our convenience). We set off to our task by collecting our Canon 550D camera along with our Manfrotto Tripod, as well as our single pot/urn/odd kettle/antique prop, and moving to the filming area. Once there, we bubbled our tripods and unsuccessfully fit our camera to the Tripod, meaning that we had to take most of our shots via our steady hands (which although was inconvenient, it still looked professional and worked in our exercise).


Myself and Alastair acted in the piece, bringing our unique and witty charisma to our roles as the Antiques Roadshow presenter and his angry subject who found out his 'pricey' artefact was only worth £15. (CLASSIC comedy) Megan and Ally were our camera operators and joint directors, and together we decided that the shot reverse shot could easily be done during a conversation between mine and Alastair's character as a means to displaying the emotion on our faces. We were also able to achieve the desired 'door shot' by having the first shot of the exercise being Alastair throwing the door open to greet my character, which fit into the narrative by serving the important purpose of introducing Alastair's character. Shots we used included shot reverse shot, midshots, a pan and an ECU of the 'Antique' vase, of which the mix of shot varieties helped make the exercise look more interesting to the viewer.


Generally, I was very pleased with how the exercise turned out as not only were we able to achieve the desired criteria, but we also worked as a team, each coming up with something that made the finished exercise look much more professional and less unwatchable. We were able to work as a team and get our work done quickly as we were all focused on finishing the project and making it look as good as possible.