In January I was messaged on facebook by an old friend that's studying at London College of Communication to be a fashion stylist. Her name is Jenya Shcherbyna, I had made a status asking for actors for my dissertation film when she messaged me asking if i would be interested in a collaboration and film a fashion video for her. I warned her that it was my first fashion film and that she had never done a fashion video either so it was new to both of us. Jenya told me she would need two videos done for her both at 4-5 minutes long maximum and would need it complete at the end of March.
She sent me a poem that highlighted the mood she was going for, as well as pictures of the location and what type of lighting she had in mind so i had an idea of what i was going to try and create.
From these images and the poem, i felt Jenya was trying to portray a strikingly lonely character that has a dark side that emotions depend on a type of weather. In the light/mood moodboard it is clear that there is a lot of dark in the images. I have already had some experience with my dissertation film where i was using light to depict the atmosphere and mood of the story, so this is a great opportunity to experiment and test some more but for someoneelses work.
I did a Light test in uni with a Arri 650w tungsten light lighting up a plastic model. I directed the light at the model from a 3/4 back light position to form a quarter rim light. I relied on the white wall on the opposite side to where the light was placed to add a fill light to the models dark side. I adjusted the barn doors on the light to control the amount of light spilled out into the room.
I then replaced the Arri light with a kino light, which is a lot softer and less intense than an Arri 650w light, as the 3/4 back light. The light, due to the manual switch that allows me to decrease the intensity of the light, was much easier to control and created a less dramatic feel to the model. However, the wall opposite the position of the kino light reflected less light, allowing the fill side of the model to be darker than what the Arri light produced.
I added more light onto the model by adding the Arri light with the Kino, but adjusting the Kino light to become the key light and placing the Arri light as the 3/4 backlight.
This lighting technique, that is carefully controlled, allows the model to stand out from the background.
I went down to London and met Jenya at the location which was in Chiswick, West London. I brought down with me 3x650 arri lights (one of which didn't work), a Canon DSRL 5D mark III with the standard 5D lens which was the EF 24-105mm f/4 and a tripod.
There was another photographer, hair stylist, make up artist, a model amongst other people - all of a sudden i felt out of my depth and nervous. They were running a couple of hours late, i was expecting to be able to film almost straight away, but as there was no real concept in the story, Jenya told me to film the model whilst she was being photographed. She was happy for the flashing of the lights to be caught on camer, however, she didn't want it to be a behind the scenes type of film.
I went around the different rooms of the house to capture the feel of the environment. The Arri lights were very intense therefore i was struggling to capture a dark, dramatic mood. It was getting dark pretty quickly and my lens wasn't capable enough of capturing the darker rooms so i used the photographers soft light to help with the lighting. I was grateful, worried sick, and annoyed at myself that i had chosen the wrong type of light. Perhaps the Kino would have suited me more as I would have had more control with the softer light.
To say i was nervous was an understatement, but i went along believing in myself that I could capture something great here.
It took me less than a week to edit the first draft. Jenya had sent me a choice of songs and where i was to choose what i felt worked. I went with a song by Frank Ocean featuring Andre 3000 called Pink Matter. The song helps portray the model as a lonely, emotional character that has a dreamy effect to it where i felt I could correlate the cinematography and the music.
song track - frank ocean ft. andre 3000
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8KoJQChzA8
After the first edit, Jenya asked for a different track, and then suggested instead to use an instrumental because the lyrics take over the footage in her opinion.
I ended up sending 3 rough edits in total due to the fact that she wasn't clear with what she was asking for. Finally she told me she wanted it to be two minutes, with the instrumental, told me what shots she didn't want rather than make me guess. Finally, a month later (the beginning of April) she hadn't mentioned anythnig to me so i asked her if it was okay and she replied that she hadn't looked at my final edit. I felt insulted but a little while later she told me it was perfect and she loved it. I didn't get half as much satisfaction as i was expecting once i had completed it. She had dragged it on for too long and I didn't feel appreciated.
In future, i will need to be more clear with communication. As we were both new to this, I'm not sure what she learnt from her experience collaborating with a filmmaker, but she didn't make my job very easy. It's my job to find out what my client wants before hand, but overall I was happy with how the video turned out.
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