New Hollywood (New Wave), sometimes referred to as the "American New Wave", refers to a period in American film history from the mid-to-late 1960s (Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate) to the early 1980s (Heaven's Gate, One from the Heart) when a new generation of young filmmakers came to prominence in United States, influencing the types of films produced
These two paragraphs from a blog post (A History of American New Wave Cinema) will be useful to me when I'm writing my essay on the American New Wave Cinema from 1967-1969. Within these two paragraphs there's information that can be used to draw from when writing about the revolution in cinema started by American New Wave. 1950s and 60s New York provided the crucible for a loose assortment of
filmmakers who between them helped give birth to modern independent
American cinema. sharing some characteristics and values og the French New Wave, although it was not directly influenced by it.
Also from the same blog post the first paragraph goes into some detail about the audiences and the themes behind the films. The second is more about the filmmakers and the films themselves.
A list of all the films made between 1966-1982 that fit into the genre of New Wave, including Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, and Taxi Driver.
New Wave Characteristics:
Mise-en-scene of shot focuses on realism of character
I feel that this clip shows a good example of the 'pull focus' technique. Although a little shakey due to the fact this was hand held and currently still unsure of all the options available on Premiere Pro. The clip is also on the shorter side, and I would have liked for it to have been longer; however the other clip I shot was overexposed making it look unprofessional. The length and exposure of future clips are aspects I will focus on perfecting in order to make my work a higher standard. This second video is the clip I chose not to add onto the one above, as it is overexposed and even shorter; as well as not displaying the pull focus as clearly as the guitar clip above.
For a small documentary it could be assumed that there is a limited time frame as well as a limited budget, so the lighting equipment and setup needs to be reasonably priced and easily portable. The three point lighting setup could be used in this situation as it is the basic lighting setup for lighting a person on camera as it uses each light to accentuate the predominant features.
Although the three point setup is perfect for this situation of a documentary it isn't the most portable setup available. A camera light could be more suitable for mobility. 'Talking Head' Style Interview 'Talking head' is the term used for the style of interview where only the head and shoulders of the interviewee are visable to the camera; it is mainly used in reality TV shows and documentary style shows. A reality TV show that uses this technique is Keeping Up With The Kardashians, it's a show with a combination of documentary style footage as well as talkin head interviews. And like all other techniques for filming it requires a certain set up. The backdrop must give a slight indication to the type of person the interviewee is; in the case of the Kardashians the backdrop is clean and simple and in the recent seasons it's had a slight marble pattern which is very 'in' much like the Kardashians. Although it is considered that to have natural lighting is quite significant, in KUWTK there is no natural lighting it is all done with studio lighting that is most likely to be the three point setup; like described in the video above there are three lights in this set up, the key light, the fill light and the back light; and they all work together, complimenting each other to give the perfect lighting.
Night Time Shoot
Night photography is more than possible on a DSLR camera but there is some preperation needed because if you were to just 'point and shoot' the photos would either come out blurred or have lost all atmosphere.
The camera needs to be perfectly stable for night photography. In some scenarios it might be necessary to hold the camera (sporting events), but majority of night shoots the camera needs a steady platform, like a tripod or any other flat, sturdy surface. With night shooting unwanted lights could be a distraction in the final piece. One technique that could be used is an on camera flash although it could lower the quality of the final outcome and make it come across as unprofessional. Another is off camera flash, this is more convenient for night shoots as it gives greater control of the quality of light given. In night shoots the camera settings are crucial to how the lighting will effect the final outcome, it's important they are set correctly in order to get the best quality as possible.
The meaning of a scene is created through a variety of textual and contextual techniques.
This scene from Dennis Hopper's 1969 film Easy Rider shows the LSD trip of the four characters of the scene. LSD became popular in the 60s by individuals like psychologist Timothy Leary who used it to encourage American students to 'turn on, tune in, and drop out'. In this scene begins with a midshot that establishes the characters involved but not revealing too much of the location. The characters are shown as disinterested and with a lack of enthusiasm just by looking at their body language. The Aloofness could be taken as a representation of how their regular daily life is, which could be why they are taking drugs, to add excitement into their life. This idea is supported by the low-key lighting that casts a dull undertone throughout the scene.
Once the group have taken the pills things start to speed up just a little, by the jerky jump cuts from the low angle of the building back to the group back to the building and back to the group shows there is something starting to happen, this could be a reflection of their mind as the drugs slowly start to take over from the inside. As well as the jump cuts showing the mental state of the group slowly deteriorating; the use of canted angles also show how the foursome are not in a sober state of mind as these angles are frequently used when the character themselves isn't quite sane, such technique is often associated with the Joker because of his psychopathic and sociopathic tendencies (depening on the actor). Although the technique isn't used to show the same state it still gives the same effect of a situation being as it should be.
The dialogue spoken by the characters right through the scene is barely audible due to the repetitive noise, similar to a train on tracks, that overlaps throughout thus somewhat drowning out the dialogue meaning the audience is never fully certain of what is happening during the acid trip, much like the group on said trip. I feel the scene not being fully audible and the speech overlapping gives a believable feel to the scene as I can only imagine the effect LSD would have on your mind during a trip and not being able to hear properly and everything being muffled and overlapped could be a realistic guess.
Although the lighting choices adds to the mundane atmosphere of the group, it wasn't all intentional, as a can of film was opened before it had been developed causing the odd colouring/lighting in this scene of the film. However it looks like an intentional accident as the consequence of the ordeal benefits the overall look and atmosphere of the scene. The dull colouring and lighting lasts through the trip, showing that although the group are being reckless by taking LSD their lives are still just as boring as before they've just added a little helping hand for a short amount of time.
Modern films are so precisely edited that appears to be one piece of film played as one even though it is many different pieces of film cut and edited together to create the finished film. Although much like everything else it didn't beging this way in the early days of film making, editing was rough and would be noticable and near to unwatchable for audiences of today. Early Editing
Editing in the early days of film wasn't like editing today. The first public screening of a film in December 1895, 'Workers Leaving theLumière Factory' by the Lumière brothers was fascinating to it's audience of the time because content didn't matter to them. Georges Méliès saw potential in what the Lumière brothers had presented and took it upon himself to use moving image in his performaces. As he was filming moving traffic his camera jammed, so that when he watched his back a bus was replaced with a hearse, creating the jump cut; later leading to the fade in/out, overlap dissolve, as well as stop motion. Méliès' work pushed the medium from single action shots to a narrative storytelling tool, although he never moved the camera it was stationary, giving the view that would be if the audience was to have the perfect seat in a theatre. Edwin S. Porter (head of production for Edison Production) was heavily influenced by Méliès.
Edwin S. Porter's 1903 film Life of an American Fireman is roughly 6 minutes long and created by Porter taking footage from the vast Edison library spliced and edited with staged shots to create a fictional narative. Porter was still in the tableau mentality when making this film. However in this film he used temporal overlaps, shots with overlapping actions to show the audience the same action from two different perspectives. Moviola Invented in 1924 by Iwan Serrurier, the Moviola is a machine that allowed film editors to view their work while working on it, making it more practical and a less time consuming task. the Moviola also allowed the editors to individually study each shot, thus allowing them to determine the best point to cut the shot more precisely. Few high-profile filmmakers still use the Moviola; Michael Kahn, received an Academy Award for his work on Steven Spielberg's Munich, which he used a Moviola to edit. The vertical Moviolas were the standard in film editing in the US until the 1970s when horizontal flatbed editors became more popular, like the Steenbeck flatbed editor. Flatbed editors are made up of rolls and plates. Like the Moviola, flatbed editing machines allow the editors to view their work in progress, and when they find the perfect place they're able to mark on both the sound and image roll as to where to cut making the overall editing and film much more precise and accurate.
Linear Editing Linear video editing is a post production process of selecting, arranging and modifying images and sound in an ordered sequence.
Non-Linear Editing
Non-linear editing allows access to any frame in a digital video clip regardless of the sequence of the the clip. The freedom of access to any frame allows for fades, transitions and other effects, that can't be achieved with linear editing, to be included easily.
Offline and Online Editing Offline editing is a rought cut that is available to the director or producer for approval. This process is often done with relatively inexpensive equipment using low resolution copies of original footage. At this point of editing a number of changes are typically made. Online editing is a post-production proces in the final stage of video productin. For the msot part, online editing has been repalced by video editing software that's operated on non-linear editing systems. The Digital Era As technology as a whole progresses it's given that the way video and audio is edited also progresses, the digital era is the beginning of modern technology taking its hold on the editing industry. The CMX-600 was a joint project between CBS and Memorex. The system stored the video on compure discs, this provided instant access to picture and sound, and the ability to make and see changes in real time. EditDroid was a computerised analogue non-linear editing (NLE) system, a laser disc based system that relies on laser disc players and a database system that queued clips in the most efficient way. Avid is a company that specialises in video and audio production, specifically digital non-linear editing. Created in 1987 and now Avid is used in the television and video industry. Modern Editing Platforms In today's modern society technology is now a focal point of nearly everything, so it's no surprise that editing technology has progressed even further since the digital era what is used today. Final Cut is a series of NLE software progrmas developed by Macromedia at first and later by Apple inc. The software allows users to log and transfer video onto a hard drive where it can be edited, processed and output to variety of formats, and used to create loved films like 500 Days of Summer and 300. Adobe Premiere Pro is a tiemline based software that supports high resolution editing, with 5.1 surround sound avaiable. In a professional market Premiere Pro has advantages of multiple sequence support, high bit-depth rendering, multicamera editing as well as others; which is probably why it was chosen to edit big Hollywood films like Avatar, Gone Girl and Deadpool.
