Composition Techniques

Composition techniques are used in both photography and cinematography.  The four main composition techniques are rule of thirds, framing, unusual angles, and  leading lines. They are important because without them, the audience would get bored watching a video with the same angle. Even if you have a great video, without using any composition techniques it wouldn't be as interesting as if you did have them.

Rule of thirds is a widely used composition technique. When using rule of thirds, you align your subject on the outside thirds of an imaginary grid. Framing is when you use your surroundings to frame a subject and draw attention to it. Unusual angles are used to create interest; they add excitement by taking a shot from a different perspective. Leading lines are used to draw focus to a subject by using natural lines bring the viewer's eyes to look at what you are trying to show. 

Three Shot Sequence

A sequence is is a series of clips that are related with different angles that shows the action of something happening. When you sequence, you show action by using four different types of angles: wide, medium, close, and extreme close. Sequencing is important because with out it, the viewers would be confused as to what is happening. If you watched a video with no sequencing, it would be boring to watch and you would lose interest quickly.

One of our assignments in GT was to create a three to four shot sequence of a simple action. My group (Kaylee and Zoey) create a sequence of a girl opening a door. Our first shot was a wide shot of a girl walking towards the door. The next shot was a medium of the girl about to open the door. Finally, there was a close shot of the girl opening the door.

Practice Story Reflection

Yesterday, our team faced very high- pressure situations in trying to finish our Practice Story. Our task was to create a video. My teammates were Zoey and Kaylee. Our video was about a girl that loves teamwork and we interviewed her and showed footage of her demonstrating teamwork. On the first day of filming, we got exactly what we needed: a good interview, but on the second day we weren't sure what to film so we wasted time figuring out what to film so we did not have much footage. Then, we planned what we wanted to film so we could do it the next day during advisory.

After we got what we needed for our B- Roll, we started to edit our video. Our team worked pretty well together. We split up the work: one person was editing while the other two finished our transcriptions. Next, we recorded our our transitions that would make the video go more smoothly and understandable. Since we were all pretty hard- working and no one was really slacking off, we had no arguments and got a lot done.

Even though, we filmed again and thought we had enough footage, we soon realized we did not have enough. A lot of our time was used to figure out what we were going to show. Deciding that our team did not have enough footage, we used the computer camera to film. The rest of the period consisted of deciding what to put where and making our video make sense. Despite our efforts, we ran out of time and had to turn in our assignment a few minutes late. 

If we could do this again, we would plan out what we were going to do before we do it because it makes everything easier to accomplish. If possible, we would work a little bit faster and maybe even go in before or after class to work on our video. Overall, I think our team did pretty well and we were a good team that worked together and split up the work evenly.