Chess Film: Filming Day Two

On day two of filming, our main focus was the shots featuring our main character. As the director, my goal for day two was to finish our film. We ended up completing all shots except for our closing. As a group, we wanted to explore different ways to use the tripod, so that our shots would differ from those taken on day one. 

Shot #1: This setup was used for a close-up of our main character's face. The purpose of this close-up was to show the character's emotions while playing the chess game. This way the audience will assume our main character has an opponent. 

Shot #2: For this setup, we shortened the front two legs and extended the back leg so the tripod could stand steadily on the table. This setup was used for our opening shot, which introduces our main character. 

Shot #3: This setup required the most creativity, as we were using another object for assistance. We adjusted the angle at which the phone was tilted for awhile, and once we found the angle we liked, we realized it didn't work with the tripod's legs. I wanted to find a way to still use this angle, since my group liked it. My solution was to use the chess box as something that will prop up the tripod's legs and it worked perfectly. The box brought the tripod exactly where we wanted it and created stability for the shot. 

Why shot #3? 

This shot wasn't originally planned on our shot list because we had a different vision in mind. Originally, we wanted to film a long shot and use the bush next to this table as a way to conceal who our main character was playing with. However, once we set up the tripod we realized that we had overestimated the size of the bush. In order to hide our main character's opponent, the shot would have had way too much open space, making it ineffective. So, we decided to do another shot that was closer up. However, it needed to be different from shots #1 and #2 (shown above), which is why, once we found the angle we liked, I was determined to do everything possible to execute it.