6.What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

At the beginning of the project I needed to do some research into the forms and conventions in different genres of films, this is where you tube became useful for viewing small clips of the genre films I wanted. I have also used the website to upload and stream my film opening and audience response on my blogger account. Although I have used the website to search for videos before, I have never had to deal with the upload side of the site.
To film my production I used a mini DV camcorder. Although I have never had to film every shot myself before as I am used to group work I have however used the cameras in previous projects for film studies. This experience meant I could use my time limit affectively as I did not need to learn the basics of the camera before filming. The most challenging part of the filming was the fact I worked alone, this meant I had to direct and film at the same time which is something I am not custom to. However I feel this has made me more aware and confident using the DV cameras and I can know understand that even simple cameras can prove to be testing.
When editing the shots I had filmed into a final production I used Premier Pro. This is another technology which I am familiar with through film studies. Again this independence away from the group has allowed me to explore the programme in more detail than I was used to. For this project the main thing I have learnt about the software is changing sound levels and cutting sound out of shots to add to others. When filming the sequence the weather conditions were not as good as I had hoped, meaning when playing the shots back the sound of the wind had been picked up very loudly over the initial shots of the two boys playing in the field. At the planning stage of the project I had intended to use a sound track which would compliment the almost montage of shots however when editing I released the sound of the wind had been picked up too greatly to even lessen the sound for the soundtrack. This is when I decided to completely reconsider sound at all for the beginning of the sequence so I changed all the individual levels for each clip. On reflection I feel this added to the feel of the almost dream like equilibrium as the boys played in their juvenile naivety. How ever the dialogue for the second half was important in the audiences understanding of the narrative. I decided to bring in the diegetic sound at the introduction of the title page. The sudden change in sound and appearance on screen was something which I found to be extremely effective, snapping the boys out of their complacency. This is where I had to experiment and further my knowledge of the software; I thought the point in which the sound should come in when the title did. To do this I had to take the sound clip from another clip of the sequence I had recorded and put this onto a different level on the time line, this is something I’d never had to do before.
For the majority of my project I have been using blogger.com which is something completely new to me; however after some guidance and the site easy to use layout I have been able to manage by blog accordingly.