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The complexities of cutting a film scene

July 30th, 2008 · 3 Comments · Production

So I finally was able to get my hands on the footage that was shot late last September that was to be the opening of my short fight video. My friend Steve, who owns a commercial-level HD Sony camera, accompanied me and my bike to a local 7-Eleven location. The movie opens with me coming out of the 7-Eleven and receiving a text on my phone. I flip it open and there’s an urgent message that spurs me to run to my bike, get on and quickly put on my helmet and gloves. Then I start up the bike and peel out onto the street and zoom off into the distance.

Well after about half an hour of editing I had a sequence from the footage that gave me a rough idea of what I want the final scene to look like. It also made me aware of a ton of things that I have to take into consideration when we shoot at the location again.

First and foremost was the sound. I could jack up the levels and hear insects chirping, which was great – but then that would be interrupted by cars whizzing by every now and then in the background. Rather than film later (this footage was captured between 11pm and 12am) and hope for less traffic, I’m going to loop the background insect noises on a seperate track so that when I cut between shots the ambient sounds remain constant. This also applies to the bike, when I start it up and zoom off. I’d like to cut to different angles during my drive out onto the road, and so to do so I’ll have to capture the sound of the bike alone and run that as a seprate audio track as well so the engine sound remains constant.

I also want to pull in tighter and shoot some quicker shots to lend a more urgent feel to me mounting, gearing up and riding off. Currently it just seems to take a bit too long from when I run to the bike to when I take off out the parking lot and down the road, during which the viewers will be like – “ho hum”.

Furthermore I definitely need an establishing shot of the 7-Eleven location to fade into and open the film; I’m thinking from across the street. I’ve also added a new element to the end of the scene – as I pull out into the sreet I cut off a car, which brakes into a skid and honks at me. My stunt partner Dizzle will be driving his MR2 convertible to pull off the quick stunt.

I have the edited footage, but it’s too raw for me to want to post it online.

Oh and last night during rehearsal I managed to punch myself in the chin when I took a fall to my arms an knees. I kept my arms crossed from a block the previous move and so when I landed on my elbows (yey bike jacket padding) my arm on top bounced up into my chin and cut my lip up a bit. All in the line of work 😛

And one other thing, tonight at the location Dizzle and I went through the opening fight sequence in the lobby area to see how our choreography moved us around the actual area we’ll be performing in. To our immense satisfaction the sequence filled the space perfectly, and we don’t have to worry about tweaking it to fit within the space allotted. Now we can just get down to perfecting it. w00t!

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3 Comments so far ↓

  • Tiff

    Sounds Awesome!! Can't wait to see it!!

    Tiff

  • Tiff

    Sounds Awesome!! Can't wait to see it!!

    Tiff

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