Teacher Central: Of Sand in the Engine and Democratic Votes
Online Production Meeting – Monday, 25th
Amidst a flurry of engagements both for Live Project 2 and Professional Studies, during our online production meeting, we attempted to finally get the script locked down. For this, we collectively needed to get some issues and changes sorted out first. As our producer had met with our client earlier that day, some changes and requests had been made that needed incorporating. These requests were:
Using a male and a female character
Creating three different videos (1. Plot Structure, 2. Characters, and 3. Setting)
Using the green screen for flexibility and
Incorporating moving shots for increased production value
Our producer incorporated these request in a list of action points and asked our opinion on that. Since the production meeting was still held online, despite prior issues, I tried to check the list off one by one to ensure that every request or issue was appropriately addressed:
I voiced that I was happy with the decision of going with two characters, and suggested that we could source the actors from the acting course.
In my role as an editor, I agreed that I could get this amount of editing done, IF I was provided with the basic scripts (and thus design) by Friday, to get the game going. However, I also advised to keep the amount of work realistic and put it up for debate.
With the green screen back into play and the option of an additional, accessible green screen, I offered to talk to our technical demonstrator about its size…
…and the applicability of moving shots therein.
However, I also added a couple of issues to the list that needed to be discussed immediately, which were:
The finalisation of the example story in the first script (IF we were still to use it)
The creation of the storyboard and my access to it as soon as possible
The booking of auditions and
The possibility of combining this with green screen test footage for practice edits
In response to that list, our producer wanted to keep the idea simple and remain with only one actor. Whilst both Adam and Lynley agreed to setting up a writer’s room over the course of the week to get the three scripts done, our producer disagreed and wanted to keep it at one video and one script. In regard to the implementation of moving shots, our director furthermore wanted to cancel out moving shots from the storyboard despite protest. He agreed, however, to the combination of audition footage and test shoots the following week.
Since we were already extremely behind our schedule at this time, I furthermore advised to finally settle on the actual techniques and workload and then stick to it unless futile. This I did for reasons of time management and conducting research in the hope that we would be able to catch up the time we lost. My request however, was repeatedly ignored, which I attributed to the nature of online production meetings as I already mentioned in last week’s blog ‘Issues of Communication – Why Online Production Meetings Might Be A Bad Idea’.
However, our producer had received the feedback he has asked for and we had made changes and concessions to the initial idea, which I marked down as a step forward in this production. Our producer wanted to implement the changes and report back to the client upon the decisions made during the meeting, agreeing to get the script and storyboard done for good.
Production Meeting on Friday, 1st
However, as it turned out, I was utterly wrong about it. By Friday, the script was not done yet. The storyboard, albeit being done, was sadly rather simple and hadn’t been forwarded to me, which I only learned on that day. And quite rightly then, our lecturer flagged up issues with the progress of the project and urged the crew to sort out impending issues.
Which is why I then called for a production meeting and established a democratic vote for the entirety of the project. Since most decisions hitherto ended up being stunted by a single person, I figured that a democratic vote would get us past this issue if that was to occur ever again. We immediately and collectively voted for that…
…and suddenly, things got going.
I then put forward the idea to write a new script that would encompass and incorporate three video ideas, which could then either be used separately or as one. With the right lesson plans to go along, I thought, we would then be able to ‘sell’ these videos to more than one level of students, thereby allowing for additional flexibility for the teachers using them.
We settled on this idea by a collective vote.
I then put forward to bring the video game idea back into play, making it the theme, concept, and style of the educational video. Since video games are a common denominator for the age group we are aiming at, I felt that we would be able to gather more interest in the resource and make it a creative challenge for us in regard to implementing the medium of video games in film.
We settled on this idea by a collective vote.
I pursued to lead this meeting as a mediator, in which we collectively brainstormed ideas, concepts, and finally, the structure. I then – with individual agreement – assigned tasks to everyone. Thus, Lynley set up a joint Google Docs account to allow for all scriptwriters to edit the same document and end the endless loop of drafts.
Adam created the more concrete story structure and collectively, we pitched in ideas for possible locations to use. Adam and Lynley then sat down and started writing the script, whilst Craig was tasked to come up with a rough lesson plan to go along with the script and to upload it onto Google docs for everyone to see by Monday.
Katie was tasked to collect atmos and research foley of the preliminary locations that we had agreed on in the meeting, to give her a head-start until the script was finalised. And finally, I was able to task myself with researching editing techniques that would pertain to video game style editing.
The Benefits of a Collective Vote
Adversely to how it sounds in my description, establishing a collective vote was an uncomfortable choice for me to make. Whilst the nature of my person loves to suggest and bounce off ideas without much of a thought, and whilst I sometimes tend to take the lead or help if I feel that nothing is moving forward, throughout the course and within work experience, I repeatedly learned that set hierarchy is a thing that has to be obeyed at all times and sometimes even no matter the circumstances.
Don’t get me wrong; I totally get the necessity and benefits of set hierarchy and compartmentalisation of responsibilities. It’s timesaving, efficient, and it’s the only really proven measure that gets things done in an environment in which many interferences can and will occur on a regular basis.
But because it had repeatedly been suggested to me to keep myself in the background, and that my ‘butting in’ is not always desired or cherished – even if it was quickly helping out someone in another department during my own ‘downtime’ – I thought that I should start adhering to that as quickly as possible.
The same, I felt, held true in the educational setting that we are in. Especially with the recent signing of specific learning agreements, I almost feared that I would take away important tasks and evidence from someone else if I butted in too much, which is why I felt that I would never start learning proper set hierarchy, if I did not leave certain tasks where they belong.
However, in this case, the change of pace and operation seemed to be the only way in which we could make this work. Either way, we’re on a better way now.
Let’s look forward to Monday. This time without an online production meeting.
References:
Cooper, J. (2017) Blog Post: The Top 10 Reasons to Vote [online] Image taken from: https://www.mymcmedia.org/blog-post-the-top-ten-reasons-to-vote/ [Accessed on 1 March 2019]
The LoveVote (2019) The LoveVote Homepage [online] Image taken from: https://www.thelovevote.org [Accessed on 1 March 2019]