FMP Evaluation

For my Final Major Project this year I decided to go with the idea of creating a promotional video for a company that is very close to my heart. I created this video for Unit 1 skate park. I have been going to Unit 1 skate park for over 7 years now and I have learnt a lot of skills in my time there from new tricks to massively improving my confidence when it comes to talking to people from my age range, older and younger people than me. I have a lot of memories at Unit 1 and I want the future generation to get the same enjoyment out of the skate park that I did. The reason that I decided to make a video about the lessons that the skate park offer is because I am a volunteer at the skate park and I teach the lessons and I can clearly see how the lessons can greatly improve the pupils confidence in and around the skate park. The children make lots of new friends and gain the ability to talk to older people as the majority of teachers are older than the students.

I feel as if the majority of my project was successful. I definitely think that I made the right decision as to create a promotional video about something that I love as I was excited to film it and make a professional video to help expand the skate parks client base. The rest of my ideas were not that strong and I do not believe that the outcomes of them ideas would've been as strong or effective as my final idea.

My FMP wix page started with me getting confirmation from the owner of the skate park (Kathy) to go ahead and complete the video. I received confirmation from her that I could do the video instantly and I screen shotted the text messages and put them on my page so that people can see that I have full permission from the skate park to go ahead and film the video.This was the most direct and simple way to get confirmation of permission to create the video, it may not be the most professional way as I have no signature but it is still proof of permission so it will be suitable.

I then created a blog post about the costs of the equipment and a list of all of the resources I would have needed to create the video. The list is very accurate to pricing and usage as I used 80% of thing in the list on the actual shoot. The only thing on the list that I did use is a H4N Zoom mic because I was not planning on using it as I was going to record the audio straight onto the JVC camera but I had a change of mind as I preferred to use my own camera as I am very comfortable with the way my camera works compared to the JVC. I didn't use all of the equipment in the list but it is good to have it in the list just in case I were to use it.

I then created a location scout of the skate park and the areas I would be filming. The location scout was very unprofessional as I just went on google street view and showed the outside of the skate parka and I got a random photo of the indoor skate park. My location scout could have been a lot more professional if I had gone to the skate park and actually taken some pictures myself so that I knew exactly where I was planning to set up interviews and record some B-Roll

Next I created a storyboard to show how I wanted to compile my video once I had filmed it. The storyboard was very short and very basic as I struggle to draw good pictures and I do not like story boarding as I feel as if it makes you plan the video before you film it which is something that I am not a fan of. I started filming at the skate park and you cannot plan what is going to happen at the skate park so I am very used to filming whatever I can and then putting it together in a order that I think looks good instead of trying to follow a script. The same goes for interviews, I try to let the subject say whatever they want to say instead of trying to put words into their mouths which can cause the subject look as if they are a robot and cannot speak their own words.

I then created a Risk Assessment form for recording my video in the skate park. The risk assessment consists of potential risks that may occur when recording at the skate park and the chance of those risks actually happening. My Risk assessment went well and I got it signed off first time by my Lecturer which shows that I have accounted for all of the risks possible and the chances of the risks occurring are minimal so I am safe to go and record the video.

Next I done a S.W.O.T analysis on my FMP idea. The reason I done this was to ensure that I had chosen the correct idea to create for my FMP. By doing this S.W.O.T analysis I could clearly see that this video idea would be successful as I have history of creating videos of this style I knew that it would be a safe video to create for my FMP as I would not be out of my comfort zone. There are very little threats and weaknesses for this video so I knew it would be the best idea to use this as my FMP idea.

After that I produced a large research document about all of the research that I had completed to get to the point I was at. I started by copying previous blog posts into the new post but I got lazy and then just started to add links to the previous blog posts. This is the quickest way for people to see all of my research in one place instead of having to look through all of my blog pages to try and find a certain blog post.

Next I created a proposal document that included a rationale, project concept, evaluation, bibliography and action plan. My proposal is a great way of showing someone what my idea for the project is with a clear outline of what I am trying to achieve with my idea. The action plan is also good as it helps me to easily see what I need to do and when it needs to be done by. The rationale is good as it shows people other reasons as to why I have chosen to create this type of video.

I then created a contingency plan to show some potential issues I may run into when filming/editing my video. I didn't have many things to write on my contingency plan as I thought that not much could go wrong but I should've known that something would've gone wrong if I was using equipment that I do not usually use, as you would've heard in my FMP Video. I did not expect there to be an issue with the equipment as I thought it would all be easy to use but I was wrong as I had a major problem with the lapel microphones. I planned for a few things to go wrong which I thought were likely to happen but they didn't which was good. The contingency plan would've been helpful if I were to need it.

Next I created some questions to ask the interviewees and some consent forms to hand out to parents at the skate park so that I have consent to film their children. I created a range of questions to ask the interviewees such as the owner, instructors and the pupils. The questions were very easy and I made sure that they were easily understandable as I wanted to ask some of the younger pupils the questions and I wanted them to understand the question easily. The consent forms were also very simple to make as I had a template from a previous consent form that I had made.

I also started to create some daily logs to show what I was getting up to in my time. I was talking about what I will be doing on the day, how it went and what I could've done better. These daily logs are going to help me to see what I have completed and how well I have completed it. If I run into an issue I can talk about it on my daily log and then talk about how I could've avoided the issue and how I can overcome the issue if I ever run into it again. The daily logs will be helpful in many ways as they will also allow me to see if I have done all of the work that I was supposed to do in the time frame that I had set myself in the action plan in my proposal.

Finally I will be evaluating my FMP Final video and how successful it was. I will begin by talking about what went well with the video. From what you have see above I believe that all of the research and planning side of this project went really well as I got everything done that I needed to get done in order for me to create the video that I wanted to create. I also believe that I done a good amount of research to back up my FMP idea. I feel as if I researched enough similar videos to get a good understanding of what my video should look like and who my video is aimed at. I also think that the visual side of the filming for the video went rather well, the clips that I did record look really nice because of the quality and techniques that I used. I didn't really have a plan for the video as I didn't create much of a storyboard but I knew what I wanted to record and I feel as if I did that. The outcome of the video is visually what I imagined. The majority of the footage that wasn't interview footage was filmed on the Ronin stabiliser which looks really cool in some situations. Such as the one below;

I think that this shot is nice as it starts with the awesome colours on the wall and turns to see the instructors talking to the pupils.

I also think that the closing shot to the video is really nice (above) as the framing is heavily based on the two subjects and you can see them connecting with a high five which shows that they are both having a good time. I feel as if this really portrays a strong emotional bond between the instructor and the pupil.

Next I will talk about what went wrong with this video and how it could've been fixed or improved;

The biggest and most frustrating issue with this video is the audio on the interview scenes. The reason that this issue occurred is because I didn't use a lapel mic. I took a lapel mic with me and tried it in the H4N Zoom mic to record the video externally and match it up with the visuals in post-production. But when it came to plugging the lapel receiver into the Zoom mic it didn't click in and that is why I thought that I couldn't hear or pick up any audio through the Zoom mic. I tried multiple times and I couldn't get it to work but I had no choice but to film on that day as it was my last chance to film before the deadline. I decided that I would have to use the Zoom mic on its own to record the voices as I didn't think that the lapel mic would work. So I set it next to the subjects as they were speaking so that I could hopefully pick up their voices but that didn't work either, instead it just picked up all of the atmos sound of the skate park instead which is very loud. But luckily I had set up my trusty Rode VideoMic up on top of my camera and it managed to pick up the subject talking better than the Zoom mic did so I had to use that audio which still wasn't great but it was the best audio that I could get on the day. It was only a few days later that I was helping a friend film his video that I made a discovery that would've completely changed the outcome of my FMP final video. We set up the lapel mic on his subject and couldn't hear them through the camera. He went and looked at the lapel box connected to the microphone and told me that it was muted. I couldn't believe it, there was a tiny little switch on the top of the box that could mute the mic. I didn't even know that you could mute a lapel mic but I do now. I went and got a zoom mic from the store and tested the lapel mic on the zoom mic and to my devastation it worked perfectly. My whole FMP final video was ruined by a tiny little switch on the top of the lapel box.

The only other thing that isn't great about the video is some of the Ronin clips are still shaky even though the whole point of the Ronin is to make the clips perfectly stable. The first shot of the video is filmed on the Ronin and is very bouncy and wobbly but it is still better than if I done it with my hands;

I should've redone this shot multiple times to ensure that at least one of them was smooth and stable.

I will now go on to talk about what I have learnt from this project. The first thing that I learnt is that I should spend more time ensuring that equipment works before I go to use it as it could cause a lot of problems in the future if I get to a shoot and I haven't tested my equipment. I must also make sure that I redo shots multiple times if there is a chance that they have not gone well on the first time. I have also learnt that I should do some more in depth research about some of the topics that I am hoping to include in my video.

When going into my next project I must make sure that I spend more time working on the quality of my work rather than how quickly I can get the video filmed and edited together.

On a closing not I would like to say that I think that my FMP Final video was very successful as I created a video that promotes the lessons that the skate park offers and I believe that the skate park will get some more customers because of this video. I feel as if my video can fit the 2 different target audiences that I set for my video because I think that kids will like it because there is some skate park action and for the adults there is some talking with some of the instructors and the owner so they can see that it is nice people running the skate park and teaching the lessons.

I think that this is still one of my best pieces of work that I have completed whilst in my time in college as it is effective and follows the idea that I had in my head the whole time I was planning my video.