4. Evaluation:

I felt that the positive aspects of the production were when I decided on my ideas and through talking to people and thinking about the restrictions in terms of time, money, capabilities and talent, I was able to come up with a refined concept and design. When we were filming we had a lot of fun- it was the first time I had ever used video on my camera and so this was both challenging and exciting. I enjoyed directing and seeing the vision I had in my head come to life through film.

My concept changed over the first few weeks of pre production tasks, along with having some of the plans change due to actors not being able to continue with the process. There were various setbacks or obstacles to overcome, such as the changing of actors, the weather- especially when it snowed, but this ended up being good as just after this the weather the sky was dark and this was what I wanted. Most of the good filming was done in the lower light, earlier on in the day and helped with the darker mood. In my contingency plan, the idea was that if the weather was not quite what I wanted for shooting I would reschedule the filming, or do paperwork in the time I couldn't film. It was difficult having to rely on someone else, as sometimes the actor was busy and it felt as if she couldn't make time to follow through with the project, but I got the footage I needed and I was pleased with how she took my direction and had comments about the concept and how she wanted to play the role. In the end I felt that this was good, as it meant I had to work with what I had got- which was plenty of good coverage of the shots, and made me choose to change the concept slightly. I think this helped to make it more understandable and a more manageable task.

Things that could have been done better would be starting with a more simple idea, as each part of the process took a considerable amount of time, and it is important to make sure the filming is done in plenty of time and the editing also. Some of this I couldn't help- with the weather conditions and the talent/ acting difficulties- changing actors, not having her there when I needed her- these things were out of my control. Some of this frustrated me as I needed to rely on someone else. A strategy to improve this would be perhaps to use a different actor next time, and to make sure that I get my planning done in the first few weeks so that I could focus more on filming and allow more time for any issues that may arise. I felt that I did handle these obstacles however, and have produced a product that I am proud of; in terms of actually creating an opening to watch and following through with my concept.

I have had fun in doing this production- it has certainly taught me a lot, and I have learnt new things by myself; through the use of editing programmes, importing audio and visual files, learning how to put music in and to get the file from a project into a film file and onto a disk, for example. I feel that I have worked well within the boundaries of money, time, capabilities and technology to make this opening.