Journal #1 2013.10.17
The planning of the film is, I believe, a difficult yet exhilarating process as it
determines much of the actual product of the film. Our group spent a lot of time trying to
decide on a story, and in the end we found a story that everybody was able to contribute
towards. Although many people think that my job, as an editor, doesn’t have a huge part
in the preproduction process of the film, I do not think that it’s true. I believe that during
the preproduction of the film, coming up with the ideas and ironing out the details, the
editors have to decide on specific editorial choices, so that the editors can contribute to
the making of the film and not just during the postproduction. For our film, I was able to
make editorial choices after our group discussed about the overall plot.
One of the foremost and important parts of a film is the opening sequence, where
the setting of the film is established. For our film, the opening sequence of the film is also
extremely important due to because it helps establish the fact that our main character
(Ben) is in love with his neighbor as well as that he is an agoraphobic. Because we need
to show the daily routine of the protagonist, I am thinking of using a montage to quickly
show his daily life in a short period of time. The idea of a montage was largely influenced
by the work out scene of Travis in Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver, which I analyzed
during my IB Year 1; the montage shows Travis becoming more skilled and illustrates a
passage of time. Also, in the montage sequence, I decided to include several jump cuts in
the scene where the protagonist is on his online class as he sees the female protagonist
leaving for and coming back from school. Because the girl leaves her house for school
and returns during the later half of the day, I realized that we would need a jump cut that
would show a passage of time in the same scene. The jump cut will be similar to that of
Run Lola Run, as Lola runs for a certain amount of time and the lapse of time in evident.
Other than the opening sequence of the film, I made several editorial decisions for
the film overall. The biggest decision that will affect the mood of the film is the color
scheme of the film. After I watched Amelie, I was deeply affected by the color scheme of
the movie. I almost thought that without the green and red color palette, Jean would never
have been able to create such an exquisite world for Amelie. So, I wanted to make a
world for our characters, and decided to make a color scheme for our film. The color
inside the house will consist of mainly cold colors, such as black, blue and white, to
create an isolated “world” for the protagonist. However, outside the house, the color will
consist mostly of warm colors, such as red, orange, and yellow. This will not only show a
visual contrast between the inside world of our protagonist and the outside world, but
also pose an ironical situation as the protagonist will seemingly be “afraid” of the warm
and welcoming world and seclude to a cold and isolated world that most people are
“afraid” of. Furthermore, another editorial choice that I made was to use inner cutting for
the flashbacks, which will illustrate the reason why the protagonist is afraid of going
outside his house (the reason being that he had been bullied by a girl when he was a boy).
The flashbacks are a crucial part of our film, because it will depict the inner conflict of
the protagonist and give suspense as well as tension to our movie.
For the ending of the film, our group decided to make it a twist ending, so that not
only the audience, but also the protagonist realizes that the girl he falls in love with is
actually the girl that had bullied him and has been haunting him for his whole life. This
ending isn’t going to be a “thriller”, but it will simply portray an irony in life; that no
matter what happens in life, there are parts that are determined by the course of our fate.
So, in order to show the end the scene in a more matter of fact manner, I decided not to
use fancy editing techniques, and to use only a match cut that will imply that the girl that
had bullied the protagonist is actually the female protagonist. It will be much like the
match cut in the 2001: A Space Odyssey, where the bone and the space shuttle are
matched cut in a subtle manner to show a third meaning as well as the theme of the film.
Journal #2 2013.10.25
As an editor, I realized one of the most prominent issues would be in the
continuity of action. I would sit down to edit and sequence the footages, but realize that
the footages are “off” by one factor another. So, when I put the piece together, they
would look rough and the shots wouldn’t match. It’s one of the most frustrating things,
because then I would have to consider whether or not to take the footage out, even if it’s
an amazing shot. Grammar of the Edit, a book by Roy Thompson and Christopher Bowen,
talks specifically about the continuity in editing, which helped me a lot. They addressed
the fact that although the editor’s job is not to provide correct visual performances, it is
the editor’s job to make up for the deficiency in some way (79). They made points about
the various aspects of continuity that needs to be addressed in the editing process, which
are: Continuity of Content, Continuity of Movement, Continuity of Position, and
Continuity of Sound (but our film crew already consists of a sound designer, so I
wouldn’t be addressing this particular aspect of editing in my journal).
The continuity of content is actions performed on camera talent that must match
from one shot to the next (67). Roy Thompson and Christopher Bowen states that in order
to resolve this conflict, I would want to cut away to some other shot between the scenes
so that it would seem enough time had passed and that there was some change in action. I
only tried to think of how to match two scenes together without going around it, so I
found this very eye opening. If there were inconsistency I wouldn’t continue from, for
example, face to face, but in my case, I would insert footage of a bear between the two
scenes.
The continuity of movement is when the screen direction must be maintained as
you transition from one shot to the next, if the next shot still covers the same movement
of talent or objects (68). Roy Thompson and Christopher Bowen suggested that if the
continuity of movement is fragmented, I should insert a logical shot that will continue the
narrative and still provide a visual break from the discontinuity. This is a similar solution
as to that of the solution given in the continuity of content. If I decide to make a montage
in the first sequence, I would need to use some sort of logical shot to make it seem
smoother.
The continuity of position is a sense of place and its continuity (69). I would need
to have continuity of position especially when I’m editing a dialogue sequence. I’m
thinking of inserting some over the shoulders shot of the protagonist and the girl bully
fighting, and in order to make this happen, I would need to have a consistent editing.
This book showed that continuity and rhyme is most important than any other
fancy techniques, and I realized that in editing the basics is the most important quality of
all.
Journal #3 2013.11.01
As an editor, it’s not always easy to make the compromise between what
everybody envisions and what is actually possible. So, I did some research and found
many useful tips. Editing is often called the invisible art, in which it shouldn’t be
noticeable to the audience. I find this the most difficult task for editors, not only due to
the lack of skill in editing, but also due to the fact that footages might consist of
discontinuity.
Caleb Pike addresses these issues in his podcast, Shoot Like an Editor, and
provides solutions. He underscores the importance in collaboration with the director and
cinematographer during the production process as film is a collaborative effort and
advises the editor to monitor the shots while the cinematographer should provide
overlapping shots. Also, Pike talks about the importance of B-roll as it can provide a
visual break in an editing process where it has issues with the continuity of movement. In
my previous films that I had been assigned the role of editor, I had always been on set,
but never really took time to take a closer look at the shots the cinematographer was
shooting. This sometimes ended up in discontinuities between scenes, so that I had to
throw some of the really awesome shots out. The choice between holding onto the really
awesome shots and throwing them out for the sake of continuity really was a painstaking
dilemma. This time, I will use Pike’s advice and participate more actively in the
production stage, so that in the long run, the editing process will be easier for me.
Another useful tip I found was in the article: “What Does a Film Editor Do?”
written by Diane Dannenfeldt. A section of the article addresses the important elements
in the job description of a professional editor and orders the list of things editors do (or at
least should do) throughout the production of the film. As Pike had mentioned above,
Diane also mentions that the editor should “make visits to the locations during filming to
gain a sense of how the shooting is progressing”. I will be at the set full time, but
considering that editing is considered mostly as a product of post-production, it was
surprising to see how important it is to be collaborating in the production process as well.
I was looking up on ways to cut in the process of editing, when I stumbled onto an
article by Ron Dawson about film editing tips. It’s sometimes really hard to cut down
things and the line between “dragging” and “in-depth” seems blurry most of the time. I
remember having hard time cutting down the 10 hours worth of footage in my last
production to a mere 5 minute short film. I think it will be not much different this time
either, because we aren’t filming a feature length film. It’s really important to keep the
audience engaged and our group discussed about the montage and how it might become a
bit dragging when we see it as an end product. What if every shot in the montage seems
almost “beautiful” and it becomes too hard to cut down? What if the shortened version
seemed rushed? The article stated, however, that, “if you want to grow as a storyteller in
this medium, one of the most important things you can learn is the discipline of cutting
out anything and everything that is not absolutely needed to contribute to the story.” So,
this showed me that in the end, it’s not about the awesome shot that I shot, but it’s about
the story and the meaning I’m conveying to the audience.
Of the few tips he gave I found these helpful:
 Don’t Repeat: He advises editors that we shouldn’t repeat the same
shots that convey the same message over and over again, because
it makes the film dull. I think I do this sometimes out of no specific
reason, and it really made it hard to cut it down once it was part of
the sequence.
 Split it Up: Dawson says that we should split a single video into
multiple parts and only include the information that I feel is too
important to leave out.
This made me more aware of what I should be doing and what I shouldn’t
be doing so that I would be able to hit the time limit and cut down
excessive parts of my film.
Sources:
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http://dslrvideoshooter.com/shoot-like-an-editor-7-tips-that-will-make-you-amore-valuable-shooter/
http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/film-editor1.htm
http://daredreamermag.com/2011/04/05/film-editing-tips-theresa-reason-they-call-it-cutting/