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Author: Naomi Aurelia Setia
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Creative Critical Reflection
After Celline informed us that she was done with all the editing, we decided that we could start working on our voice overs and sound effects and splitting up the work. In order to do that however, we needed to list all the sound effects and voice overs necessary in a google document titled “List Of Sound Effects” where we could effectively see how much we needed to record and then consequently split up the job among us in a fair way.
So from this list, my workload would be to voice over 14 year old May’s Letters as well as record sound effects of backpack rustling, banging bottle as well as panting/heavy breathing by May. In truth, I have never done any sort of voice acting nor have I done any sound effects or have equipment to do them. So, in my opinion, although this was a straightforward task, I couldn’t bring myself to do it without thinking it might sound bad, especially with the lack of a proper (as I have only my iPhone mic) nor any sound absorbing space. That is until I realized I have quite a spacious closet, and I can do most of the recording there if possible to reduce any background sounds that might be picked up by my iPhone mic. However, I still made due with my iPhone mic as seen below.
Firstly, I started trying the voice over first as I thought that would be the easiest considering I already have a good enough sound absorbing space to record in.
From what I learnt for doing voiceovers was that I should not be embarrassed with expressing more emotion, especially since 14 year old May’s letters contains very emotional topics and even screaming in some parts. Luckily, I am able to do this in the privacy of my own closet in my own room, which enables me to become more expressive with my voice.
Once I was done voice acting as May, I decided to run down the list of sound effects that I needed to do. First would be the bottle banging sounds. Since May’s Dad (Yuwono) uses a glass beer bottle, I decided it would be best to also use a glass bottle of sorts. In this case, I decided to use a wine bottle that my parents had, however, I quickly ran into a problem. When I bang my bottle against my wooden desk, the sound is a bit too high pitched and the fact that it is glass is not distinguishable just through the audio. So, instead of just banging the bottle, I decided that I could combine that with the sound of tapping against its side, which gives a peculiar clink sound from the glass material. So, with the heft of the wine bottle as I slam it against my desk, I would also use a hard object like a pen, to make that clink sound simultaneously. Additionally, with sound effects as well as the following sound effects recorded, I needed more space to do the actions so I couldn’t record in my closet. This means the background noise is more audible but I realized the source of constant whirring to be from the air conditioner I had on. So throughout recording the sound effects, I had it turned off.
Moving on to the backpack rustling and taking out book noises, I used the following to record with and since these sound effects need to be timed correctly, I muted my laptop audio and recorded the sounds while looking at the video, a technique I’ve seen folly artists use.
I realized that the sounds clash into each other and they overlap, so it is hard for me to replicate all of them in one go whilst also pertaining the speed at which the sound was made in the video. So, I decided to split it up into different sections such as taking out first letter, taking out other letters, grabbing bag sounds, packing clothes and throwing pencils sounds.
If that was not complicated enough, I also needed to be careful with the materials that I chose for each sound effect. In the case of the throwing pencils sounds, I compared it to the original audio and realized that all the pens fall and make noise in unison; no additional clatter. Hence, I chose pens and markers that were light (made of plastic) and had a consistent shape i.e no retractable bullpens as they usually have handles which makes a different sound when dropped. For the pencil case, I also took out half of its contents to make it sound lighter as the pencil case in the clip also looks to be light. Additionally, for the taking out paper, I also folded the paper as mine was too thin and therefore made too much unnecessary noises when handles so by folding, it would make the paper thicker and less prone to crumpling.
Next, I recorded the sound effects for taking clothes and at first I decided to use my actual clothes but the fabric that they were made did not make too much sound which was a problem, primarily because the shot only focused on May packing/taking out the clothes, so the sound is supposed to be quite loud. For this reason, I chose to use my blanket as it had a comparatively louder rustling noise when rubbed together, without it sounding too heavy. With the decision in mind, I recorded the clothes sounds using my blanket while also keeping track of Madeleine’s movement in the video so the sound would match.
Overall, I really did underestimate this part of the post production process, as I did not realize it would be this tedious to make sound effects of the most mundane things like paper or clothes rustling, in fact I had to record several times before I finally choosing the best take. It is only through this activity that I realized how hard being a folly artist is, especially without proper equipment, and it only allows me to respect them more. So, every time I see a movie with scenes that have very clear sounding diegetic sounds, I can only imagine the effort and time folly artists put into just one scene.
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Choosing Reshoot Clips
After the reshoot day, we scheduled a Zoom meeting on the 10th of January to choose the best clips of the Reshoot for Celline to use and edit. While in the Zoom, we take out time to re-watch the clips and review which options might be the best, by observing factors like Madeleine’s facial expression all the way to camera movement speed and camera angles.
While we choose which was the best clips of the many reshoot takes we had, Celline would immediately download it and organize it to avoid potential mistakes such downloading the wrong clips.
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Reshoot Day
As per schedule, on the 8th of January, me and my teammates met up in Tiffany’s apartment at 8:00 a.m exactly. We did not waste any more time in the lobby as we immediately went up to Tiffany’s room to unpack our stuff and brief over the newly created storyboard that Celline had edited.
Afterwards, we would go and set up the props for May’s room, using the videos shot in the production stage in December to ensure continuity is held by keeping the props all in the same position. Clearly, it wouldn’t be exactly the same, but me made it just similar enough to pass, especially since most the props will be lost in the background of the shots.
Realizing we still have about an hour till Madeleine arrives, we also decided to set up our lightboxes and other shooting equipment as well as help Celline in setting up potential camera positions as well as trying out the newly purchased “FiLMiC Pro” on Tiffany’s Iphone to attempt a focus pull using a YouTube tutorial we found.
After we had set up all of the necessary equipment and props and properly reviewed the new storyboard Celline made, Madeleine would arrive on set and we also briefed to her again about our plan and how we wanted her to act in the newly added scenes. This is done in order to lessen the chances of any mistakes that end up forcing us to do another reshoot session which is time consuming as well as physically and mentally draining for, I assume, both us and Madeleine.
Once the discussion is understood by Madeleine, we get straight to putting the makeup on her, referring to our previous videos shot in December to ensure it would look as similar as possible. Luckily, I can simply use the template on the bruise location that I had drawn out in Make up &Â Effects. So, with this drawing, although we were not able to replicate it precisely just as we couldn’t with the set design, at least they would not be too different from the previous ones.
Once the process was done, we began our reshoot, referring to the google document we made with the title “Identifying Scenes which needs to be Reshot” that we had created the day before just for this occasion. The list of things below is so that we can use it to see our progress as well as see what scenes we are missing. We can also use this list to do the reshoot process in sequential order to avoid duplicate scenes.
Although the reshoot did take quite a while, it was still significantly shorter than the last time we shot out film opening; and thankfully for that. I am also glad to hear from Celline, through the Media Studies group chat we had together, that the reshoot scenes looked much better and were able to flow more consistently too.
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Preparation Before the Reshoot
Since it has been a few days after the last shooting, me and my teammates decided that it would be best to revise over the things that we need to bring again as there might be a possibility that we have forgotten. So, ahead of time, we would brief over this preparation in Zoom, more specifically, on the 7th of January or the day before the actually reshoot.
It would be in this Zoom meeting too that both Tiffany and Celline fill me in on any details that I did not quite understand when they had sent a text to me previously regarding which scenes needed to be reshoot. They also explained through an example video from Youtube to help me further understand visually just how they wanted the scenes to look. In my opinion, with these new reshoot decisions and adjustments, I feel as though our film opening would also improve in quality as it gives more scenes and shots that the audience may find more interesting than what the previous takes looked like.
Additionally, in this meeting, we also had the added discussion of what sound effects and voice overs needed to be done i.e slamming of alcohol bottle, May gasping, etc. We put all of these points into the same google documents, titled “Preparation before Reshooting”, with the list of things we needed to bring to the reshoot in our shared “Post Production” folder.
Before the meeting would end, we also established the time that we needed to arrive at for the reshoot day which was to be 2 hours before our actress Madeleine came at 8:00 a.m. as we needed to set up the same set design as well as put on the same makeup on Madeleine. We will also be informing her about which scenes we will reshoot as we prepare her with makeup as to fill in the blanks for her and allow her to better preform and act.
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Scenes to Reshoot & Reshoot Dates
Unfortunately, while Celline had been compiling the takes we had chosen in the previous post, she had said that on the 2nd of January she would realize that some scenes did not flow and transition into each other well. She would then quickly notify Tiffany, the Director, before notifying me after discussing amongst themselves which particular scenes should be reshoot 2 days after she had found out, so around the 4th of January I would have been notified.
Once I was notified through our group chat, they would immediately explain what the problem was and the specific scenes that were made to be reshot. Although I am only in charge of the creative aspects of the film opening, such as set design and costume design, I wished that I could have been able to help identify as well to contribute further into the project. Despite my feeling of incompetence, I trudged on and saw the positive side: I could help set up the set design again as well as assist them in the shooting process as I did previously.
So, with that in mind, me and my teammates would quickly set a schedule for the following week, on the 8th January to be more precise. We chose this specific date as it was 2 days before our school holidays end and school official starting again, a perfect time to do it as most people would already be home from any holiday trips that they have been on as they need to prepare for school whilst also not clashing with any of the school activities if we had set the reshoot date a few dates later. From what I had been informed, most the scenes that needed to be reshoot were the ones in the bedroom, where the only actress needed was May’s (Madeleine). With this new plan ahead, Tiffany would quickly ask in the group chat with the actress whether she could agree on the date and luckily she agreed. We also reminded her to bring and wear the clothes that I had chosen for in the previous shoot to keep the continuity of the film opening.
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Choosing Best Takes
On the 23rd of December, I had been informed by Tiffany that she had uploaded the videos taken on her phone of our film opening into the google drive that we had shared with each other. The google drive that was carefully split into 3 different folders with other sub-folders inside each. These 3 folders include: Pre-production, Production, and Post-production.
It will be in the “Post Production” folder that we will create a google document to note and choose which video uploaded in the “Production” folder will belong into the final film opening. In order to have a more thorough discussion, we decided to hold a zoom meeting together on the 2nd of January, 2022.
It is here that we discuss which takes we want to use as well as take additional notes on which time stamps would be best for Celline to edit and compile together. We discussed in the zoom for around 3 hours, and in the google document mentioned before we would note down important comments on what should be done in the editing later on to help Celline in making her video compiling process much easier and less tedious. I hope that, with this zoom meeting she will be able to find it easier to do her editing parts.
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#1 Shooting Location
On December 18th 2021, we met at Tiffany’s apartment as instructed in the timeline written in Meeting Casts & Setting Dates. Once we had arrived, as we met 30 minutes before our actress, Madeleine, came. I took this time to set up the set design in May’s supposed room using the many props that we all brought including dolls, candy wrappers, instant noodle cups, childishly printed blanket, etc. I also helped out my team in setting up the camera as well as go over our plan within these 30 minutes to ensure we would not be fumbling with which shots should be done, especially since Madeleine, a person outside our group, would come. We of course wouldn’t want to inconvenience her by discussing our plan mid shoot as that would appear unprofessional.
Once the set up was ready, at around 8:30, Madeleine would arrive and once she had shown her negative antigen test, we went straight to work on her makeup. I applied the knowledge from the research I had noted in Make up &Â Effects .
Once done, we immediately went straight to filming the bedroom scenes. However, since there were so many scenes involving May’s house, we would split it first to the scene where May’s parents were not involved. So this included the waking up scenes and the letter writing scenes.
It took longer than what I expected as some shots need to be redone multiple times before we were satisfied with the result and for me, just the shock of this alone and the fact that it took way longer than expected really threw me off guard, and it made me already stressed from the beginning. Despite this though, we still pushed on, especially since we had other locations to film at.
While we were shooting the last bits of the waking up scenes with Madeleine, Yuliana (Mom’s actress) and Yuwono (Dad’s actor) came at the same time on 10 a.m exactly. Due to the pandemic, we also asked them to do antigen tests to check their and our safety before we started filming with them. Once confirmed that they are both negative, we immediately started filming the scene of them fighting with each other in the living room. However, before that, we briefed with them again about their roles, how they should act and what they should say to each other, etc.
Firstly, we started to put makeup on both Yuliana and Yuwono, as well as retouch Madeleine’s existing makeup as it looks to have rubbed off. We used the same techniques as we did Madeleine however, we changed it for Yuliana and Yuwono as their bruises would be in different places. For the Dad (Yuwono), we would put makeup on the knuckles and eyes to show bruises and eyebags respectively and for the Mom (Yuliana), we simply put bruises scattered around her arms. Luckily for us, both the Mom and the Dad are minor side characters that only appear for less than a minute, so shooting their scenes did not take as long.
Once done shooting the parents’ scenes, we can finally move on to the scenes with all 3 characters together. This would mean it would take much longer to shoot, more precisely around 20-30 minutes long. Despite the Mom( Yuliana) and the Dad(Yuwono) supposedly hating each other, it’s also very surprising to see that behind the scenes they were very good and concerned for each other. This experience for me, although quite a small part, was very heartwarming as our actor and actress as able to pretend to fight one moment and then completely apologize to each other and even ask if they had scared or hurt the other. Moving on, once this scene was done, we dismissed them both and allowed them to go home whilst also reminding them to come back to shoot the night scene at around 5:45 pm.
While they went home, me and my teammates as well as Madeleine gave ourselves a short 10 minute break before we started on the letter writing and lift scene again.
After what felt like hours, as it has already been hours since 7:30, we finally were done with the bedroom scenes and we decided to go have our lunch together in the nearby Mall (Galaxy Mall) and went to eat together. Afterwards we would be able to take a well deserved break. Overall quite a hectic first shooting for the first location, and although I did feel stressed, I feel like we did manage our time quite well especially since we needed to fix our plan midway because of continuity problems.
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#2, 3, 4 Shooting Location
After our lunch in Galaxy Mall, it would be around 2:30 when we headed back to Tiffany’s apartment to go to the next location to film the outdoor scenes. For the following second location, it would be nearby as we would film in the neighborhood right across Tiffany’s apartment. So the drive there did not take too long. Below is the second location:
However, in the process of filming this, we realized we would need to go around the block to see other places that had a similar big roads for Madeleine to walk on but with different atmosphere’s and backgrounds. So it took us quite some time of driving around to finally stumble upon the third location, a location that needed to be close to the road but not too crowded with cars as that might be dangerous and not too crowded with people, especially in this period of the pandemic. Also, some of you may notice that our locations have changed from what has been written in Location Scouting . The second location written there was to be at Jl. Cimanuk, however, we realized that travelling there to film and then travelling all the way to the third location might not be a good idea as they are quite far apart, and we have taken a lot of time to redo and fix our filming mistakes. So we opted to used the neighborhood nearby which led us to eventually stumble upon this third location:
Lastly, for our fourth and final location, we needed to wait till the scheduled time of 5:45 pm to film. However, upon arrival at the initial Mundu Park plan, we realized just how incredibly crowded it was and we even concluded that this would throw off the atmosphere of the entire film opening as it is supposed to be an empty road. Additionally, we did not want to risk our actor’s and actress’ safety as they should be filming without masks and with such a crowd, I doubt it would be safe for them. Eventually, with the help of our actor Yuwono, who luckily was familiar with the area near Mundu Park, we could finally find our fourth location. Despite all the time we used, trying to find this new location, the sky still wasn’t dark enough for our liking and so we waited in the car for around 10 minutes until it did darken.
I could not expect the day to get more tiring until we encountered this last problem. We realized that the last location we were filming at had a lot of vehicles passing by that could potentially distract the audience from the contents of the scene of May’s Dad finding May. So, although it was already late at night, we still needed to wait even more to let the cars and motorcycles pass by before eventually filming.
So, my final thoughts of the day was that I was very tired, stressed and exhausted, which says a lot about how tired I am. However, in spite of that, we still managed to finish shooting the film opening all in one day, which made me very proud of both me and my group who worked really hard on fixing any unprecedented mistakes as well as making any fast decisions on the go. It truly was an exhausting but well worth day.
Naomi AS Level Media Studies 