Filming

The filming of the documentary began well. Firstly we gathered props in the local store ASDA as shown in the images below. These props included a pumpkin, a spider’s web with spiders and a black rose. Next we started filming in Liscard and captured eight vox pop interviews. These interviews were successful as we got a good response and detailed answers.

The next step in this process was the filming of the carving of the pumpkin. This took a long time as we had to prepare the area taking into consideration health and safety. We paused the camera several times in order to neaten up the pumpkin. This was done in a blue peter ‘this was what I made earlier’ fashion.

The following filming session included the presenter figure. This was difficult because he hadn’t learnt his lines. This proved to be unsuccessful due to the wind and the fact that he was obviously reading. It was also made difficult by the weather as the rain was on and off. The presenter has later been scraped and only the voice over used.

Interviewing the vicar Ian Smith was successful as the mise en scene was correct and his answers were what we wanted. The only constraints with this interview was that his children made noise in the other room but we re-filmed were necessary.

The second interview was with the sociologist from weatherhead. Originally it had been planned to film a professor from Edge Hill University however he was unavailable when we needed him. The interview with Mr Quinn was decent because he gave interesting responses however je had a slight stammer. We hope to edit this to make it less obvious. There was also background noise from the school but it was the only available time in which to film him. Unfortunately we discovered this interview had been taped over the original vox pops. This was annoying but meant that we had to re-film them later that week.

These newer vox pops were awful due to the lack of willing participants. The people who did do this gave very little in their answers. Later on we decided to change the location for filming this in order to get a variety of participants of all different ages and areas. We also managed to find people in fancy dress which we liked. While in Liverpool we also filmed the cut aways of shop headings.

On Halloween night itself I filmed two children with the permission of their parents, trick or treating. The children where very good and did exactly what was asking of them.

The next session of filming was at Earlston cemetery. There we got shots of the church and of the angels and gravestones. These will be used as cut aways from the vicar when he talks about the churches view and the saints being anyone who has died and that is a believer.

My contribution towards the filming I feel was large having attended every session organised. I also took an active role in setting up scenes and even planning the content of each setting. Mainly during the actual filming I set up and used to camera. To conclude the filming was successful bar the incident of filming over the original vox pops.