What has inspired me this week?

Over the weekend I attended the MDT Film/Game Jam - an optional 48 hours where you work in a small team to produce either a short film or game. The product must be inspired in way or another by a single word that is given to the teams at the start of the Jam. This time the word was "blue".

I found myself in a team of six, all of us knew each other from our Moving Image Production module. It was clear that we going to make a short film. We started by discussing what type of films people usually enjoy making. Four out of six answered that they preferred making horror films, so that was the genre we went with.

We spent a few hours bouncing ideas around, such as making a Black Mirror-esque psychological horror or making a slasher film. I suggested that we make a found footage film that takes elements from genres. Our team decided that this was the most feasible option.

We were inspired by The Blair Witch Project, arguably the most famous Found Footage film. We decided that, like in Blair Witch, we would show a character's decent into insanity and have characters killed off one by one, leaving the camera operator to monologue at the end.

I assumed the role of camera operator. For this I took inspiration from The Office US's and Cloverfield's style of camera work. This style is perfect for a very grounded and fast-paced narrative, as it ensures that the camera is always focused on key elements of a scene.

As the film progresses the camera movement becomes more rapid and erratic to match the tone the scenes. I have watched Cloverfield many times and consider it to be one of the best films in the Found Footage genre, and it is clear that towards the end of our film I have mimicked the camera work that is used in Cloverfield.

Cloverfield was also a big inspiration for me when I was editing the film. This editing style makes scenes much tighter and focused, which was good because my team wanted to keep the runtime as short as possible.

After we had finished the main shoot and I had spent a long night in the editing suite putting the footage together, I trudged home for some well-earned sleep. When I woke, I couldn't help but feel like we could add more. I remembered a YouTube video I had watched many years ago by Corridor Digital that utilises some awesome portal effects.

I watched the video again and thought, "Maybe I could try that in After Effects." So that day we shot the final scene of the film and I spent yet another long night in the edit suite learning how to use After Affects.

I think our end result is pretty good, considering we filmed all but the final scene in under six hours. I spent a few more days after the Film/Game Jam polishing up the VFX. I didn't know how to use After Effects properly before the Jam, so I'm glad that I learnt something new. Hopefully one day I'll be able to make as good visual effects as Corridor Digital.