Mahsa - Progress Report #6

Last Thursday was supposed to be our last day for shooting, but sadly one of our interviews was spoiled due to miscommunication. We'll have to reschedule for Tuesday, even though we didn't plan on shooting that day. Thankfully the one we successfully finished went very well, and we got plenty of material we could use. I think at this point the worst problem we might encounter is having too much good footage, and therefore fighting to keep our favorites. Five minutes doesn't seem like a lot when we have over 8 hours of footage! Though I'm sure when we get down to cutting and cropping, it'll help everything go smoothly.

Today, Jeremy, Andy and I are meeting to do some editing on the footage we already have. We're hoping to get a decent starting point, a good opening, and hopefully a helpful skeleton for the rest of the project. We already have a great idea for how to end it, but that might change as we rifle back through the footage we have!

Andy_Blog#6

Today we all met up at the church to shoot 2 interviews but we were only able to get 1, due to some mis-communication. Although, we will return next week and capture what we need. Therefore improvised, and have the kids tell us tell us what each of there "bigger dream" was on camera. We thought it would come in handy while we edit the footage.

Since I checked out a Canon Rebel T1i for the weekend I might as well use it at the church and take some photos of the place, kids, mentors, and the team at work.

JBlog

Yesterday, Monday the 15th of March, Andy and I went to the church and shot a B-roll day. We challenged ourselves with camera angles and shots that would raise the production value of the video. I also wanted specific shots that I had a couple of the children do for me. i.e. foot tapping, and pencil tapping (close up). We also reviewed the interview footage to dictate shots we need to have like John (mentor) working with some of the kids. We only shot 1 tape but we chose all of our shots very carefully which gives us a lot of options during the editing process.

We were also able to shoot the kids during their recess in which we hadn't been able to do in previous visits because of time restraints. I decided to shoot at a higher shutter speed (250) because of the sunny day which gave us very crisp images.

Blog #5 Amanda

Everything is right on schedule! We are almost done shooting everything we need which I'm excited for. Thursday marks our last day of shooting. We will finish up with interviewing Robin and Carlin as well as any students/mentors we missed before. Jeremy and Andy shot a bunch of b-roll yesterday and we interviewed Jo last Thursday. We got a lot of footage, covered all our bases and have a lot of great soundbites to pull. I'm almost worried we have too much footage! I am excited to start editing it down though. I think its going to look great once we are done!

~Amanda

Mahsa - Progress Report #5

Our last shoot was on Thursday, where we spent a good two hours interviewing Jo. As expected, we got great material from her for narrating purposes as well as interview footage. She did a great job of answering the questions, and even expanding on them, which allowed for great stories about the mentors and kids that we didn’t expect. We did initially encounter problems with the equipment, and figuring out how to set up the cameras and the lights in Jo’s office to get the best image and composition, but we pulled through in the end! At this point our group is fairly comfortable as far as communicating with each other, so we have no problem suggesting different takes or ways of going about the shooting/interviewing and that makes for a great work environment.

Our next step is to get footage of two more staff members at Stepping Up, perhaps a few more interviews, but we seem to be pretty much done with shooting. We’ll be off to the editing soon! At this point we’re ready to get cracking after Spring Break. I’m really excited about how smoothly the gears seem to be rolling, and I hope I didn’t just jinx our group by saying that!

Andy_Interviewed Jo & B-Roll...#5

>Thursday, March 11, 2010
Last week we were able to interview Jo inside her office. We started setting up our equipment right away, like Jeremy mentioned it took us a good 30-40 minutes to set everything correctly. The reason why we spend so much time setting up is because, we want good if not great outcome. In comparison to the classroom we usually interviewed in, Jo's office was a little bit smaller. Therefore, we had to make minor adjustments with our lighting.

>Today...Monday, March 15, 2010
On our furlough day, Jeremy and I met at the Worship Center today and got a lot of good shots. Our shots consist of "dutch angles, pans, rack focuses, b-roll, and more." One of our main goals were to get some footage of John mentoring a student. We wanted to get some footage of Robyn and a student too, but she left before we got the chance to do so.

With the way things are going and everyone's collaboration in the group. I feel confident about our project. Everyone in the group is very understanding and gets a long fine.

Lights, Camera, Action

Today our group had the privilege of interviewing Jo in her office at the Escondido library. To be honest, I am glad we did this interview toward the end of our shooting because I feel that our group is really becoming comfortable with everything associated with preparing and executing a good looking shot/scene. We spent about 30-40 minutes tweaking lights and framing, but it was time well spent because the interview turned out great in my opinion. To date we have between 6-8 hours of footage (mostly interviews) that we will dig through to find the best sound bytes that contribute to the main theme of the video.

I feel we could be almost done shooting by spring break and can start rough edits as soon as next week (depending on schedules).

Im posting a smidgen so yall can see :) There is a 2nd camera but its not captured yet.

-Jeremy

Mahsa - Progress Report #4

We were able to shoot Tuesday and Thursday last week, so we got a lot of footage of the kids as well as the mentors. We got some footage of a Taekwondo instructor that came in on Thursday, which is the program's slow day, to give the kids exercise as well as help build good values (the instructor really emphasized respect). The children really seemed to enjoy it, and we got some great interviews afterward with the kids telling us about it.

A big brick wall we seem to be hitting, for both the kids and the mentors, is getting everyone to respond in complete sentences. The mentors need to be reminded now and then, but the kids don't always seem to understand what we're asking of them. We tried suggesting the fill-in-the-blank method, repeat-after-me method, and answer-the-question-in-your-own-words... Every kid responded differently, so we had a round robin of methods. They're also all understandably nervous, so we've tried different ways of getting them accustomed to the cameras and lights. We might need to bring a few kids/mentors back for second interviews! Nevertheless, we did get awesome material that just needs to be put through the editing-machine. Our equipment is working great though, I'm ecstatic that we're not having any issues as far as that part goes!

Amanda_Blog #4

So far everything is going great! We have a real rhythm going. We only have Carlin, Robin and Jo left to shoot which we plan on doing on Thursday this week. Jo said we could shoot in her office which is really cool. We also want to shoot Robin and Carlin with some of the kids to break up the feeling of it being just an "interview." Plus, I think it will greatly add to the feel we want. I look forward to seeing what comes of it. I know last week we got some great stuff from the kids and from John too. I can't wait to see how that turns out. So far so good. I have a great team :)

Andy_Shooting: Day 1...#4

The first day of shooting went well. We were able to set up our equipment in the second room "#11". There were no technical difficulties or anything. The only problem I remember was, we had a hard time getting the kids to respond in complete sentences. We brought in 1 mentor and 2 kids at a time. Some of the kids and even mentors were either too nervous or shy. We try to come up with solutions such as letting the mentors get interviewed first while the kids were observing. This helped a tiny bit. We also tried other interviewing methods.

Vlog01

Success!

-Jeremy

Shooting: Day 1

So far, so good. We will review the footage and discuss what needs to be addressed in terms of shots and interview Q/A. I was able to capture one of the interviews with one of the mentors. I notice that we might need a bit more emotion or enthusiasm from our interviewees. I haven't reviewed all of the footage but at our next team meeting we will go over it and tighten any loose ends. I did a quick edit of the interview I captured so we can see as a team if what we are doing is working. All editing concepts will be done as a team. -Jeremy

ps. video would not upload. tried mpeg4(h.264), mov(h.264)

Blog #3

I realize I am late to post this but I wanted to wait until after our day of shooting to post. It might have been better to do it beforehand (note to self).

Anyways, today was our first day of shooting and we learned a lot on the spot. It took us a little bit of time to get the lighting right (after the first two subjects we interviewed) but I like to consider today as a test run. We got some really good morsels but there is still much to be done. I did the interviewing and learned how to ask the kids questions in a way to get a complete sentence. It took some practice and not every kid is the same (which would make it easier but far less fun!). We are going to shoot again on Thursday and focus on interviews. We got some good b-roll footage of the area and the kids working (but we still need more).

Our project is addressing the need to invest in our future. It goes so far beyond giving back because its a good thing to do but giving back because the youth of today are going to be the leaders of tomorrow and we are dependent on them to be the best they can be in every area. One of the things I really liked today was interviewing Brian who is 7 and doing fractions and multiplication! I didn't learn that stuff until 3rd grade!!! I think people need to see the difference that this program makes and what a great tool it is for the kids. I think as a side note, a website would be really great for this program. Its hard to look up Stepping Up online and know what its about because there isn't much literature (or video) and I'm glad to be a part of helping it grow.

~Amanda

Mahsa - Progress Report #3

According to my teammates (I couldn't make the last meeting we had), we might be rethinking the documentary kid-focused feel of the project. The problem at the moment, if it could be called one, is settling on the outline of what we actually want to do. Even after several meetings, we're a bit uneasy about the end look. Today we'll be shooting at the Church, getting some B-roll of the kids and hopefully some interviews. I think the plan at this point is to get neutral footage we could use in any way we wanted, whether it's the documentary feel or more of a scripted setting.

Andy_Meeting inside "Holy Grounds"...#3

We met up with Jo at the Church inside the "Holy Grounds", and we agreed to steer the video to focus more on mentors than kids this time around. The group and I are all excited to start shooting already. We already told Jo that we will be coming in Tuesday, March 2nd to conduct interviews and capture other shots as well. By the way, Holy Grounds is a cafe within the Worship Center.

I called VPA 239 Checkout last Friday to reserve for myself to check out equipment today. I was able to get all the equipment I thought we needed, such as the DVX 100B, tripod, Shotgun mic, wireless lav mic, and the light kit. Jeremy, Mahsa, and I will be there early at 2pm to set up the equipment before the kids arrive. Amanda will join us a little after 2pm.

I have tapes laying around at home and some batteries. I will go ahead and take them with me tomorrow, because we have to be prepared. Again we are all excited to start filming and have some footage to start editing.

-Andy Phonhsongkham