For the trailer editing process we used a software called Adobe Premiere Pro. This software is commonly used in the professional industry so we thought that it was a suitable software to use for our film. It has exceptional colour grading tools, which are very useful in ensuring the film has a professional look to it. It also has very efficient tools for editing titles, which helped greatly and allowed the titles to look as good as possible. I think that one of the key successes to our film was the editing and it was down to this piece of software that we were able to edit successfully. Unfortunately, the computer that we were using with this software was very slow, so editing took a long time. To combat this, we selected all the clips that we intended on using and saved them in an MP4 format to make editing easier, however this did result in a loss of quality so for the key shots - where visual impact was imperative - we reinserted the original format of the files to retain the high quality to the shots. Editing was a very time consuming process.
We used the Panasonic SD90 to film our trailer. I have discussed this in a previous post, which should cover the basics of this camera. The main reasons for using it were that it filmed in HD and had a very good look to it. Admittedly, some of the footage was overexposed and obviously the footage was colour graded, but it did a decent job otherwise. Another fault that we found with this camera was that didn't give the user control over the focus, which prevented us from experimenting with different depths of field. I have learnt how to use the camera to it's highest potential and to avoid trying to do anything that highlights these negative points. We also used two other filming devices for shooting when the camera was out of power or the other side of the world. This same camera was also used for the recording of the narration. These were two Samsung Galaxy devices, chosen for their relative ease, though there was less quality to the footage - though only a select few of these shots were used.
Other than these two pieces of technology we didn't really use anything for the trailer. We opted out of using a tripod for a few reasons. Firstly, the look that we were going for worked better without a tripod, as it makes the audience feel like they are involved in the action. If it were filmed on a tripod then it would look too static and the audience would feel like they're observing the action, rather than getting into it. The second reason was that it was impractical to set up a tripod in many of the locations as we may have been told to stop filming as we were in public.
The only software used for the design of our posters and magazine covers was the free program Paint.NET. The program was selected for its lack of cost, its accessibility and range of functions as well as several years worth of experience with using it. Numerous effects were used, for instance colour grading and brightness/contrast, while a variety of free fonts were found online and used to make them the various titles and captions appeal more aesthetically. The magazine does not feature as much editing as the poster as the entire image is one photograph while the poster is composed of many layers and elements, with each of the character's being cut from separate images and the background featuring many dissolves between different textures and images in order to form a cohesive image.
The two online services that were instrumental in our work this year were Blogger and YouTube, which enabled us to document our progress through research, planning and evaluation and upload our finished trailer, respectively. Both hosts were chosen for their relative ease and reliability, as well as the fact their ownership (by Google) enabled us to share the same accounts across both services.