Shooting update no.2

Today I shot the footage for the narrative sections of my music video with Ben and Elleah. On the whole this shoot was a success with only some minor difficulties along the way.

Location

• The locations that we used for the narrative scenes were my living room, my backdoor/bin area and some garages/street area by the back of my house.
• The scenes that took place in the garages/street area by the back of my house provided me with an edge backdrop and was perfect to show Ben's isolation and struggling moments.
• The one garage that we used was actually a lot more roughed up than the other ones which was perfect for the mise-en-scene of the shot as I was wanting to go for this edgy and slightly grimy looking location that would be where Ben would be breaking down.
• Surrounding the garages were various alley ways that made the location seem a bit more secluded and cut off from other people, which again I felt enhanced the themes of isolation and loneliness
• It may have been a better idea to shoot some of the footage on a duller day as when I've watched some of the  footage back there are continuity issues regarding the lighting in certain shots. The garages, unfortunately weren't tall enough to block the sun so it was mainly shining onto Ben quite a lot.
• However to combat this issue I may experiment by putting some of the footage into black and white to see if this lessens the brightness of the shots and generally fits better with the tone of the song. 
• The scenes that then took place in my living room, I felt, were very effective for the sort of mood/ tone that I was going for
• I left the room in its usual state so that it look lived in and more realistic that this would be the couples home
• One of the main problems that I had shooting in this location was being restricted in space to be able to move the camera as there wasn't much room between Elleah and Ben and the TV that the camera was placed in front of .
  
• We managed to find the right distance and angle for the camera to be aimed at though and apart from maybe issues with the lack of diversity within the shots this seemed to capture the shots well and I was happy with the composition.
• Outside in my back garden was also a challenge for being able to fit the actions into the shots.
• We had the problem that I was wanting to shoot the couple arguing in the doorway/ back kitchen area but it was quite a small area to be able to shoot so it was hard to see both Elleah and Ben and how frustrated they were getting.
• The best way that we found to get over this problem was to just keep shooting the footage over and over again, rehearsing what the couple were going to argue about and how they were going to interact with one another 

Props

• We didn't end up using many props for this part of the shoot but the props that we did use were vital for establishing the mise-en-scene and the tone of the shots
• The main bulk of the props were the empty/ unopened alcohol bottles that would be surrounding Ben throughout the first scene. I think that it would have been more effective and have given a bigger impact if we had managed to find more empty/ used bottles as this would have highlighted Ben's addiction as being more prominent that it perhaps comes across. Although the bottles that we did use were quite large so there is still that implication that he has drank a significant amount at this stage.
• We found that the Carling can became the most significant prop within the shoot and was the prop that Ben relied upon the most, which I quite liked as it demonstrated his dependency on alcohol when he was starting to struggle
• We also decided to include the fake drugs in the second street scene, I decided to do this to show that Ben felt his situation had become so dyer that that was his only option.
• I think that some of the shots with the 'drugs' could have been much more effectively done and maybe this is something that I will need to review in more detail when it comes to editing but I feel I could have afforded to be a little more adventurous in these shots.

Changes that were made

• One major change that had to be made to the shoot was do to with casting choices. Due to us having to film during the school day my chosen actor to play my 'drug dealer' wasn't available so we had to double up Elleah as both the girlfriend and the 'drug dealer'. To try and get around this issue we made sure that she was wearing significantly different costumes in the scenes where she was being the dealer compared to where she was playing the girlfriend. I'm hoping that because you don't see much of her face that this wont be too confusing for the audience, however once I have put together a rough cut I will aim to get some audience feedback and if it seems to confusing to distinguish between the characters then I will re-shoot that section. 
• Another big change that we made to the shoot was again to do with issues of casting but this time the problem effected the narrative more than just the mise-en-scene. I wasn't able to get hold of two actors who could play a random couple that would trigger Ben's jealousy and anger so instead we decided to re-focus that section of the video so that Ben would go to look on his phone each time and see a photo of him and Elleah or Elleah with another boy. I felt that this would trigger the same kind of emotions that would still make sense visually to the audience.