Process Evaluation of Ultra Short Film

Software Applications

The software applications is the editing software that was used for the post production of the short film. It is a digital, online platform where footage can be manipulated in various ways.

The software application that i used to edit with was Final Cut X, this particular application can only be used on Apple products, however it is one of the leading editing software's. Final Cut really allowed me to use more advanced settings in terms of colour grading and sound.

This software application has really allowed me to create a narrative with a high technical standard. Ive been able to use many different elements and tools from the software and create a film that was both narratively and technically strong.

Hardware

The hardware is the physical piece of equipment that is used to store and use software applications. Hardware, for editing, can range from an iMac, PC, or a laptop and even in some cases a tablet.

For our project we used an Apple iMac as our hardware, this allowed us to use Final Cut X  and to edit our projects on.

In terms of our ultra short film, using an Apple iMac meant the whole of post-production was easier. It is a very accessible system which allowed me to transfer the files easily from the SD card to the mac and from the mac to the editing software.

High definition/Standard Definition

Standard definition and high definition is the resolution that the footage has been filmed in and the resolution that the film gets edited in. The difference between standard definition and high definition also is the frame rate at which the footage is shot in, e.g. 25 fps, 60 fps. 

My ultra short film was filmed in high definition in 1080p at 25fps, i then further edited the film also in 1080p and 25fps.

The effect that HD has on my film is to get the best quality possible for the audience, they need to see a clear picture and have crisp audio to listen to. However in my case i rendered in 720p instead of 1080p, whilst this still is a HD file and not as a big of a file it doesn't have the same quality as a 1080p file. 

Tapes

Tapes are the types of storage for the footage, e.g. a SD card. It is a piece of hardware that stores all of the footage, visual and audio, and can further transfer it onto the iMac for editing.

I used an SD card, as my storage of tapes, as they was easily accessible for the compatibility between the camera to uploading it on to the editing software.

We used an SD card for our tapes, because it was the only piece of hardware that was compatible with the camera. It was also very easy for us to use as we could just slot it into the camera and then slot it into the iMac, with minimal problems.

Hard Disc

The hard disk is the hardrive of the computer, it is where everything is stored and uploaded too. This piece of hardware is where everything is saved, from the raw footage to the Final Cut file and the rendered video file.

For our ultra short film as we used the iMac's hard drive, we used the local hard drive storage. The macs hard drive is 1tb in size and stored all of my raw footage, audio edited file and the final .m4v file.

As we used a local hard drive which is an internal hard drive, as opposed to an external hard drive it becomes slightly more reliable but it is just easier and quicker to use. When using an internal, local hard drive everything is easily accessible, in comparison ton external hard drive which requires more cables etc. 

Data transfer rates

Data transfer rates is the speed in which the footage is uploaded to the hard drive. It is the time it takes for all of the raw footage files to transfer on to the mac, with different types of tapes taking longer then others to upload.

As we used an ultra 10 speed SD card, the data transfer rate was 90mb/s which is particularly fast. 90mb/s means that it took 1 second for 90mb of footage files to upload to the Mac.

This in effect just speeds up the process of uploading footage, it meant that i could start my editing and my preparation for editing quicker because the data transfer rate was fast. Some SD cards are not as fast which meant others would have had to wait a longer time for their footage to upload but it was quicker for me.

Exporting productions

Exporting productions effectively is rendering the ultra short film, it is the final stage of post-production and is where we chose what file format and what quality we want our film to be.

My ultra short film was rendered in HD quality which was 720p at 25fps. This meant that the file was reasonably small and meant that the rendering time was quick as well as the upload time to YouTube was also very short. Whilst it was not the highest quality i could have chosen it was the most suitable for the time period that i had.

By rendering in 720p it meant that the file size was small which was ideal for my situation. I needed a file that was HD quality but also it was something that could be uploaded anywhere very easily and quickly. If i did have more time I would have chosen to render in 1080p at the very least to improve the quality but that would have taken more time.  

File types

File types are the different formats that files can come in eg, .mov, .mp4, .m4v etc. These file types can also mean that only some platforms can open and watch them.

The file type that i exported my ultra short film in was .m4v. This file format is compatible with most platforms, it can be viewed by PC and by mac which is ideal for distribution, it also was accessible for YouTube too.

I chose to render in .m4v because it was accessible for many platforms, in some cases such as .mov files whilst they all work for apple, there can be problems when trying to access them with some PC software's. By choosing .m4v it allowed me to be quick with uploading and also i could transfer the file across many different platforms which is what i needed for this project.

Compression

Compression is the final stage of post-production, it is where the Final Cut file is rendered and compressed down into a smaller file. It renders the file into the desired resolution e.g. 1080p, and creates a file thats accessible to watch. 

I compressed and rendered my ultra short film into a 720p .M4V file which was a 312mb file. However when the file is uploaded to YouTube the file is then compressed again to make it compatible with YouTube. 

Whilst I compressed my file down to 720p .M4V it meant that it was quick to render and quick to upload. However this meant that i did loose some image quality and .M4V is not particularly compatible with every device, it would have been better to render in a .MP4 file. Furthermore, when YouTube has processed the video, the file again further loses some quality.