Upload
I shot the same short scene many times, some times by paragraph on the script, others getting through the entire scene. Because I had so many videos, it took a while to upload everything to the editing platform my class is using, WeVideo (click here to read a blog post about how much I LOVE WeVideo). Once the upload was complete, I was ready to get started on figuring out how in the world I would age the video to look 55 years old.
Visuals
The first thing I had to do was figure out the order of the script and arrange the videos I liked best to follow the script in chronological order in my timeline. This background video (a sort of "prop" video) has no camera movement, making it easier to choose which videos to use and how to arrange them.
Matching the dialogue was one of the hardest parts of editing this clip because for every cut between paragraphs I had to go frame-by-frame to ensure the mouth picked up exactly in the position it was in the previous cut. After a lot of revisions, the dialogue flowed seamlessly through the scene.
The hardest part of the editing process of this clip was aging it. The first thing that came to my mind was the color. Color first became widely used in the 60s; however, it wasn't until 1965 that it was announced that over half of all network prime-time programming would be broadcasted in color, this became known as the "color transition of 1965". This "color transition" grew the color TV market, as they became more accessible to consumers. Yet after reviewing some taping from phycological experiments of the 60s and 70s, I concluded that color video wasn't widely used in the field. I decided to lower all the saturation of the video, increase the contrast a little and slightly lower the brightness. Which resulted in this look:
Screen Capture from WeVideo.com
After I was satisfied with the look of the color, I encountered my next problem... The quality. The video camera I used to film it has a high quality that wouldn't be the standard in the 60s; especially not in a self-tapping. I decided to search for similar recording from the 60s and early 70s, including the tapings from the Standford Prison Experiment.
Harlow's Attachment Study
The Standford Prison Experiment
At first, I didn't know how to approach it, but looking at old videos and broadcasts it became evident that a constant feature in all of them was either little scratches (caused by the film and dust) or static interruption if done by broadcasting. I first tried to add scratches but they weren't evident so I decided that I would fold the video with transmission static instead. In order to achieve this effect, I used public domain footage of white noise from which I removed the color black entirely leaving that space to be filled by the video (the same type of process used when working with a green screen). I then figured out that if the video had static noise then it should completely block the screen at times [I'll provide an explanation to the decision of using static noise in the context of the story at the end of the post]. In the end, I'm satisfied with the result! You can watch the clip at the end of the blog post!
Screen Capture from WeVideo
Sound Mixing
Since the video is a prop I decided to mute all it's sound, while this also got rid of the accent problem, it created a new one in which I have to figure out how I'll be able to set up the background story for the experiment revival in 2017. I'll be shooting the 2017 shots for the first time tomorrow So I have to think quickly! I want to find a solution which makes since technique wise but also story-wise.
How the video fits into the narrative
This section is important to me because I have tried to pay very close attention to detail in the story and in the prop making. In order for transmission static to make since I decided that the debriefing was actually being transmitted over a secure connection to the university computer which was recording a copy of it by storing it on a computer-aided storage film which could not record audio and which could be securely stored in a controlled environment ( a video library). This was because filming the debriefing would mean that it would be stored via film, meaning it could be ruined by an unwanted change in temperature in the storage where the rest of the file was being kept. This means that the file was accessible in the University's film storage in the library, but to protected simply wouldn't have been logged in the system (like it's slot number doesn't exist). This also explains why -in my storyboard- the 2017 experimenter has the video recording paying in the background before he's given the Y7Y file, which taken directly from the storage to him (because the video wasn't with the file and he would have had access to it before he had aces to the file.) I WILL TALK MORE ABOUT THIS IN MY NEXT BLOG POST! I'm waiting for a response to something!
You can read more about the color transition of 1965 here:
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