FLM225 — Film Studio 2 — Reflection
This has been a brilliant trimester for expanding my understanding and appreciation for film. All film, not just documentary. While docos have been the primary focus, my awareness of what makes a good film, fictional or not, has been greatly expanded as a result of my time spent in this class.
I had an idea for a film that I have been planning on pitching for this class almost since the beginning of my degree. I had a concept and the full backing and support of my subject, which was to be the Sister City Association of Upland, California and Mildura, Victoria. When I was visiting Upland last October I raised the idea of a film to raise awareness of the link and hopefully try to resuscitate interest in the student exchange program that I was involved in during high school. I filmed plenty of detail of the city, did a full tour of the landmarks and historical locations relevant to the sister city link, interviewed the mayor about what he thought of the relationship and my plan was to do the same in Mildura and then link the two together and introduce the potential of starting the exchange program again.


Unfortunately, after the first few weeks of studying the documentary modes with Steve, and I learned more about what it takes to make a documentary engaging for an audience, it became clearer to me that I didn’t have a strong enough narrative to hold a film together and maintain audience interest, outside of the immediate people involved. It was disappointing but it is still a project that I will continue with, as the group are really keen to use it in their promotional campaigns.
In my time at SAE I have had a strong focus on producing projects. I’ve done a couple of music videos, and a short film in trimester 3 that I also wrote so reflecting on this trimester I am really quite content that it turned out the way it did. I was becoming concerned that I wasn’t going to attain enough experience in actual physical skills to be useful in the industry so to be able to focus so intently on sound recording and editing has been a huge positive for my development as a filmmaking practitioner.
I never knew I would love sound recording so much, I’d almost forgotten how much fun it was to be on set and involved in the actual production, rather than running around organising things and filling out paperwork.

Our tutorial on the F8 recorder was hugely beneficial to me. It was only brief and I would’ve loved to have much more but I’ve learnt from doing and my first real attempt at this process was the Market documentary exercise, which we did on Clare’s Bears and Wares, and I was very happy with the results. I was and am still disappointed with the quality of sound that has come out of Lucy’s film, the majority of which stems from my inexperience with the actual machine itself. And my lack of understanding of the dynamics and intricacies involved in recording sound in live locations. The fridge was left on sometimes, there was a heater that we only discovered late in the shoot, trams moving past, lapels scratching on clothing. All of which I am aware of now, it’s just unfortunate that it had such a negative impact on Celebrating Abilities in post-production. Since this shoot, I have been fortunate enough to have worked on a couple of other projects as a sound recordist and I am improving each time. I assisted Monique during her interview with Austin in his bedroom as Syaheed was sick. I worked on an external project for the Embassy of Finland, as a producer but also as a sound recordist on some of the shoot days. All of this experience culminated in me being the sound recordist on a short film, and while it is certainly not perfect I am quite proud of how it sounds.


Editing the film Austin was also a massive chance for me to gain real experience and learn skills that I could potentially use in the industry and collaborating with Monique and Mollie during this process was about as positive as it can get. Mon knew what she wanted from the very beginning, recommending other documentary series for me to watch so that I understood the style she was aiming for, and also how she wanted the audience to feel when the film was over and I think we were able to achieve this in the end. The film went through several iterations, with a lot more re-shoots than I think was expected but each one extremely beneficial to the final product. The constant push we received from our lecturer to keep going and to continue trying to raise the level of the film pushed us to the edge, but it was a necessary push and I think the film is much stronger for it so I am extremely grateful for this.
My skills as an editor have improved markedly, I keep learning something new each time I turn Premier Pro on and my ability to tell a story through the cut gets better every day and if I had produced my own documentary I wouldn’t have been able to experience any of these. I am so grateful that it turned out this way, and that I have learnt more this trimester than throughout all of the previous trimesters combined.