Post 10: Job Roles Research.

In preparation for our short film project, we need to have the knowledge and understanding of key job roles, so as a group we can decide what jobs will be designated to who. This too will help us to work together as a group, to get the best possible outcome we can achieve. We found these main job roles and departments from the Skill set website. I will briefly discuss what they involve.

http://www.skillset.org/film/jobs/direction/  This is the website we each got the information from.

Direction

Direction, or the Director has the main role and responsibility over the creative vision and style they have for the film; they know how they want the film to look, so they should be the ones overlooking the film, to achieve their ideas. They have a few supporters to help, and these include a number of assistant directors and their role is to ensure that the director's ambition is achieved throughout the filming process. The skills included in this role would include organisation, time management and logical skills in order to keep everything in line throughout this period. Another role under this title would be Script Supervisor. This person's role would be to check the continuity and edit ability of each scene, as thee director will be concentrating on many other aspects of the film. The smallest role under this, is the runner; here the person's job is to carry out a wide range of general support duties, which basically means making sure everyone else is happy, and carrying out small jobs which don't need a massive degree in.

This job role would be best suited to the script writer, as they know the script better than anyone else, and know how they want the film to look like, what messages to put across and the tone of the film. They would have to sit down with each of the other roles in the group, in order to help them understand how they want to film to look like.

Camera

Camera work can be very informative when creating cinematography, as it can show many different things; creating something beautiful, can show the audience more about a character or a location. This can sometimes be more informative than dialogue, therefore the camera is very important. The director of photography (DoP) can choose the shot composition, camera movement and the lighting and shading in such a way that together they can create a unique style signature for a film. This role involves a lot of thought, preparation and hard work, as even moving and operating the camera can be tricky, especially when they have to concentrate too on whats happening on the screen and ways to enhance or detract this. They also have to work with extreme care while on set, as the equipment is very expensive and delicate; therefore only highly trained and skilled persons would operate these on a film set.  

Here, this role has some flexibility when composing the shots in the scenes, as they know what camera angles and shots work and what don't, or they could put their input as to how they think the scene would be portrayed better using different style camera work, which can differ from what the director originally wanted.

Lighting

The lighting too is another key element in the film crew. The use of lighting can create different atmospheres, tones and meanings towards a certain aspect or character; getting this wrong could send out a wrong message or meaning. It can also make the actors look right for the individual role they are playing. There is also the added though as to whether artificial lighting would be needed in order to create these effects, and how they will be placed. They take into account natural lighting too, which can either help or interfere what they are doing.

This job has a constant role, as they have to make sure that the lighting is the way the producer wants throughput the film, and that the emotion desired is achieved. They too need to make sure the tone of the atmosphere the director wanted is created through out the production, checking that there is also no 'hiccups' in this department.

Production Sound

There are many roles included in 'Sound Production', including production sound mixers, boom operators, sound assistants and sound trainees. There is such an emphasis on sound, as much of the story and emotion form the script is told through the sound and from the dialogue. This is a very complex job, as they deal with many situations such as unwanted noises, or the interruptions by the misplacing the microphones. This can be difficult, as the director usually wants the script read on set, and if all this unwanted noise creeps in, this makes it more complex to achieve the best possible outcome.

When in our production groups, Sound Production can be mixed with lighting, as they have similar roles; constantly checking that what the director wants is created, and that this flows with the film but also that there are no continuity errors while these elements are going on. In film, the art department takes care of the look of the sets. In order for the setting to be believable and convincing for the audience, a great deal of work has to be put into it, and that is why it is the department with the largest number of members. The reason being, that they need a largest range of artistic ability in order to be able to create the realistic feel to the set; imagination plays a big part in this, along side a great deal of work, as they do not always have a real life comparison to create their setting. The sets are rarely left by change for the film makers, and by creating the sets, they are able to make the best environment for their film.

Art Department

This role is vital; if this is done wrong, it may not be believable or convincing for the audience. They also need to take their initiative and their imagination in this role, in order to create what the producer wants.

From all of these roles, there are many overlays. For example, the director is linked to all of them. This is inevitable, as the director is the one that knows what he wants to get out of the film and how it will end up looking, so in line with each other role, they can discuss what would be the best suited way in order to carry this out. The director also has to let them know what his in vision of the film will be in order for them to create this. 

As mentioned before, Lighting and Art Department would be put together in our production groups, as there is a limited number of students in our group. They would help with the constant checking during the set of filming.

This is difficult to put them all into different groups and put some together, as there is usually a large amount of people on the set, and we only have to work with what we have, which is about four people. However, working together and sharing the roles, we can get the job done sufficiently. In order to do this, we have decided that the main four job roles that we need to fulfill would be the director, a camera man/woman, lighting with sound and the art department. We can split the roles between us, by all having a share in the work and sharing them evenly with each of us, so no one has more work than another person.

There can be many difficulties here, as we all have to have a share, and with all other work loads, this may be a challenge doing the work on time. Another problem could be if one of us is ill on a day of filming, or during coursework time period, as this can bring the rest of the group down temporarily. There is also the idea that there could be clashes in the job roles, in that two people may want the same role, or they may dislike the roles they have been given.