Editing session №5

 I'll start this blog post by saying that it was a beautiful day today, it was warm and sunny and even though we faced obstacles during this session, they seemed like a small inconvenience rather than a huge issue:)) In the beginning of the session Adam was watching all our sequences and giving us feedback for us to improve our projects. This was crucially important, because today our sequence changed quite dramatically. Talking about the issues with our project, they were...

1. It objectively was too boring due to the fact that the whole "morning routine" took up 80% of the sequence with the last 20% being the actual action (flashback). Having received this piece of feedback, we as a group, started thinking about the parts we can cut out in order to shorten the morning routine and get straight into action as fast as possible. We got rid of the "stretching part" and went straight from Juls getting up from bed to taking her clothes and walking to the bathroom. Then we cut out the part where she washes her face and went from her entering the bathroom to taking the pill box and seeing that it's empty. Moreover, we were given advice to delete or change the mid shot of Juls taking the pill box and only keep the close up, because in the first shot it was obvious that the medication we used were just headache pills. Thus, we did just keep the close up and realised that it looks better this way, as it is not clear for the viewers what particular medication Juls was holding. All the following shots were already building up to the climax, which is why we didn't alter them to gradually build tension. As a result, we reduced the duration of our sequence from 2.13 to 1.44 minutes, enhanced its pace by shortening the "morning routine" part and ended up with a better version of our project.

2. The flashback part wasn't as impactful as it should. We were left with this piece of feedback and had to try figure out what we should change/add to make it more tense and ominous. After rewatching it a couple of times, we realised it was important to add more sound effects to it and create the desired atmosphere this way. We, first, edited the voice of the real mom in the flashback by making the sound delayed and, therefore, creating the echo which made the part look dreamy and unreal. Second, we added a heartbeat effect, which played all the way from the transition into the flashback till the end of the sequence. It isn't as noticeable in the beginning, however at the end, where anxious Juls and her fake mom are in one room and everything is silent, it stands out and intensifies the fear and terror of the main character. Moreover, we added a monotonous buzzing sound in the flashback part and a noise crescendo effect when Juls transitions to her subconscious. All these modification, undoubtedly, made the sequence more ominous and helped us achieve the desired ambiance for our video project.