Mise En Scene

Today in our Media lesson we focused on Mise En Scene.
Translated it means 'Setting of the Stage', so the general term is associated with what props, actors and scenery you place in your shot and where.

We discussed how colours would effect Mise en Scene (what tone they would give to the scene: Yellow - light/happy, Deep Blue - Sad/Cold), and we talked about what props and items would be in a room belonging to different groups of people in different time periods (to make them relatable).

• If I was thinking about Mise En Scene for my own film, I would have to think about many potential issues I may come across. For instance:  I would have to take into account who I would cast due to limited resources available to create a suitable mise en scene, so they would suit the setting I put them in.

•  I would have to make sure the colours of the props and walls featured in the shot were all complimentary, so I won't have a conflicting colour pallet where some areas are light and some our dark.

• I would have to consider the time period in which the scene is set so I do not add any props or scenery that wouldn't have been there.

• I would have to think about association which was featured in one of the clips we watched (the Duchess). The duke and Duchess were riding in their carriage along the streets of London from the Church (after getting married) to the Dukes house. The streets were packed with commoners and market stalls, and there wasn't enough space to contain all the people. When they reached the Dukes house, the courtyard was a huge open space, big enough to hold all the market goers but reserved only for about 10 people at a time. This shows the rich had excess all for them and I'd have to show something similar in my film.

Alexa and Priya's Prelim Task Evaluation

We decided to make use of the green screen in as interesting a way as possible, so we settled on discussing our prelim task internationally. We had the idea of using videos instead of pictures as the background (I wanted wolves in the snow and Priya wanted gentle ocean waves), but we couldn't figure out how to save the videos and insert them over our green-screen conversation. In which case, some research into applying wolf/wave related videos over green-screen will be required.

My Preliminary Task

Here is my first ever clip/video! I have included shot reverse shot, 180 rule and match on action to create my preliminary task.

Cinematic Techniques

The three principal shot techniques we covered today were:

Shot Reverse Shot - The Shot Reverse Shot is a technique where we see one character looking at/speaking to another in one shot, and in the next we see the first character being spoken to by the second. Both characters are in the same positions in each shot and are often seen over the shoulder of the other.


180* Rule - The 180* Rule involves placing an imaginary line called the axis across the shot from a bird's-eye view, which helps to clarify where the camera can move when filming two people from the side on (face to face). It's called 180* because once you've figured out the line you can only stay on one side, and so can only move the camera 180* around the subject you're filming. Since anyone observing a real conversation would tend to stand on one side of it for the duration, if the camera kept swaping it wouldn't look natural. 


Match on Action - A technique where the camera switches from one thing to another as long as the shots graphically match.

Media Studies Animation Lesson!

Today in our Media lesson we watched 3 videos, each showing an animation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy2hrrI5BKY    -   John Lewis 2013 home insurance ad.

The beginning of Chicken Run (Ginger in solitary confinement to Edwina being taken to the chop).

Wallace and Gromit, Curse of the Were Rabbit (Wallace opening the skylight to brainwash the rabbits to Hutch twitching in his cage).

Each one had different aspects of animation and I admired and would consider using myself eventually. For instance, in the Chicken Run clip, the sky continues to change colour as the day progresses. When a key character is shown with the sky behind them, the sun acts like a halo as if they are radiating light and shows they are innocent. When the evil Mrs Tweedy is shown, the sky has clouded over and the blue becomes dull and grey. I enjoyed this aspect of animation and I would use it to show how much time has passed in a single day without directly stating it.

In the John Lewis ad, I liked how as a lot of household objects made their way outside, they were positioned to mimic the movements of animals: the spoons standing up in the draw reminded me of meerkats, some of the books reminded me of birds and the rug that rolls itself up near the end gives me the image of the slug or a snake. These animals are as familiar as the objects found in the home, so the link is more entertaining as the furniture that is usually inanimate mimics the animals that would never be found in the home.

In Wallace and gromit, the use of the moonlight through the skylight gives everything a blue filter as well as shadow, so when the camera changes silhouettes of the rabbits and the machinery become larger and the wisps of brainwaves out of focus give it a very gothic feel, as if they are still on the move without the characters' consent.

Even though I couldn't find the right parts of two of the clips they still made enough of an impression to give me a few good, clear ideas of what I might take from this to create my own work.

First Post...

I thought I may as well post something... So this is my Media Studies AS Blog for class... The rest of my posts should explain themselves. x