AV evaluation of "Music...my language"

The production group Ususal Suspects has recently finished a four minute documentary called "Music ...my language". It features 15-16 year old kids, with a troubled past, in Stone Soup studios performing the arts of multimedia.
Initially we were goig to make the documentary on Nottingham's history of crime. But, being students, nobody was willing to inform us or give us any interviews. So we needed to come up with a more fesable idea. Something where both sides could gain something.
Stone soup project is a government owned multimedia school. It allows kids who have had previous troubles with schools, family and crime, to produce music and films at a relatively professional level.
At the start we had to buil a raport with the kids and get authorisation from their parents and the agency to film them. Once we had their confidence and had a better understanding of the subject. We had a much better idea of where this project was going, what we could get out of it. The idea was to hear thi kids honest opinions.
Once we had shot all our interviews and fills, we started editing the lot. This is when we realised the amount of relevant footage we had to the topic and the more we learnt from them.
In the end, the documentary structured itself naratively and finalised itself to be quite an emotive piece as well as an honest and informative one.
I have learnt much from this experience but would have liked to have more input in the post production.

Le cheval

I particularly enjoyed this 90 second short film for several reasons.
First of all for its photographical brilliance. The vast open field lanscapes gave a feeling of immensity and natural power. The choioce of french naration over black and white film takes you back to the old rustic french countryside for a feel of comfort and romance i have a personal attachment to. The poetry in this short is intense but tinted with a splash of comedy as the subject is a bit mad to think he is a cow. Yet it is such a beautiful idea to be a horse, symbole of freedom and strengh. For some reason, i felt sorry for him being a cow in the end. Probably because cows only serve man as food, they live to die. The composition of the shots are really interesting as they reflect the pase of the film. The long shots and the poetic tone of the narator complimented each other and the piano soundtrack was the cherry on the top and really brought everything together.

stills film seminar 22/01/07

Tod's animations was petty original. I saw death killing someone, who'ssoul came out form his mouth in the form of an egg. the egg cracks and outcome an eyeball which can be a metaphore for a point of view or identity. this eye then grouped itself to many other eyes which all together form an image of a puppy. i guess you could see it as the dog being a pictue of heven or hell by that matter. composition was taken into acount quite well: zoomsin and outs to tell the story...

Henry's sickend garden was at first seen without sound so quite hard to understand what was trying to be told or understood. but a certain still was adopted. black and white stills of a ungroomed garden with hooded characters in it. then we saw it with sound which was a sound track in a sort or heavy metal band style which gave it its rugged style to it. so you could say that the sound suited the type of shots.