Video & Sound Production - Exercises

23 April 2025 - 18 July 2025 // Week 1 - Week 9

Racheal Tan Tze Rou // 0381005

Video & Sound Production // Bachelor of Design (Hons) // Creative Media 

Exercises

---

MODULE INFORMATION BOOKLET

---

LECTURES

Week 1 

Mr. Martin reminded us that the provided readings and videos are preparation for Week 2 activities. We need to understand shot size, camera angle, and composition to practise shooting.

Shot size: How much of the scene is shown in a frame.
• Close‑up: Emphasises emotions or details.
• Wide shot: Establishes setting and context.
Camera angle: The camera’s position relative to the subject.
• High angle: Makes the subject seem vulnerable or powerless.
• Low angle: Makes the subject appear dominant or powerful.
Composition: How elements are arranged within the frame—placement of subjects, use of colour and lighting, balance, and symmetry.

• Creates visual interest, guides the viewer’s eye, and conveys mood or meaning.

Together, these elements are essential tools of visual storytelling to communicate ideas and emotions effectively.

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Mr. Martin explained that the filmmaking process is divided into three main stages: pre‑production, production, and post‑production.

• Pre‑production is the planning stage, where tasks such as scriptwriting, storyboarding, casting, location scouting, set and costume design, and crew hiring are carried out.

• Production is when the actual filming happens, following all the plans made earlier. It involves coordinating the team, managing schedules, and capturing all the required footage.

• Post‑production is when the raw footage is shaped into the final film through editing, adding sound effects and music, color grading, and visual effects.

Mr. Martin also explained the key roles in a production crew:

• Director (oversees the creative vision and actors’ performances),

• Producer (manages finances, logistics, and schedules),

• Cinematographer/DP (controls the visual aesthetic with cameras and lighting),

• Production Designer (handles sets, props, and costumes),

• Sound Designer (manages dialogue, sound effects, and music), and

• Editor (assembles footage into a cohesive story).
  He reminded us that many other supporting roles, like grips, gaffers, and makeup artists—also contribute to a smooth production.

Week 5

What is Mise en Scène?

“Mise en scène” is a French term meaning “placing on stage.”

In film, theatre, and visual storytelling, it refers to everything within the frame and how these elements are arranged to convey mood, meaning, emotion, and narrative.

Key Components of Mise en Scène

• Setting & Location – The physical environment and time period where the scene takes place.
• Props & Objects – Items in the frame that can symbolize themes or advance the plot.
• Costume & Makeup – Show personality, status, or psychology of characters.
• Lighting – Guides focus, sets mood (e.g., high contrast for tension).
• Composition & Framing – Placement of actors/objects and camera angles to show relationships or power dynamics.
• Performance & Acting – Facial expressions, body language, and movement.
• Color Palette – Colors in set, costumes, and lighting that evoke emotion or symbolism.
• Spatial Relationships – Distance and arrangement between characters/objects to indicate intimacy, conflict, or hierarchy.

Week 6

---

TUTORIAL & PRACTICAL

Exercises:

• Editing Exercise 1
• Shooting Exercise 
• Editing Exercise 2
• Storyboard Exercise
• VFX Exercise

Week 1

Editing Exercise 1

In our first week, we were tasked to edit two advertisement videos: Mints and Doritos.

For Mints, the clips were already named in sequence, so all we needed to do was import them into Premiere Pro, and export.

Figure 2.1.1 ; Mints footages ; Week 1

Figure 2.1.2 ; Mints; Week 1

For Doritos, we had to download the raw footages, import them into Premiere Pro, and arrange the sequence ourselves before exporting.

Figure 2.2.1 ; Doritos footages ; Week 1

Figure 2.2.2 ; Doritos ; Week 1 

Week 2

Shooting exercise 1

During shooting, my camera automatically used HDR, which caused exposure issues during editing. To fix this, I adjusted the color setup to Direct Rec.709 and set the output color space to Rec.709. After making these adjustments, I added text to name each shot.

Figure 3.1.1 ; Adjusting color setup ; Week 2

Figure 3.1.2 ; color setup adjusted ; Week 2 

Figure 3.1.3 ; Link to YouTube ; Week 2

Editing Exercise 2 : Lalin

Figure 3.2.1 ; Process of editing Lalin ; Week 2

This week, I also created a rough edit of Lalin, where I added text graphics and applied transform effects for the text messages.

Figure 3.2.2 ; Link to YouTube ; Week 2

Week 3

Figure 4.1.1 ; before adjusting ; Week 3

Figure ; 4.1.2 ; adjusting color setup ; Week 3

This week’s shooting process was similar to last week. I again adjusted the color settings to Rec.709 to maintain consistency. After importing the footage, I labeled and named each shot with text tool

Figure 4.2 ; Link to YouTube ; Week 3

Week 4

Storyboard exercise

This week, we practiced drawing a storyboard based on the story given in the slides. 

Figure 5.1 ; Storyboard Exercise ; Week 4

Week 9

VFX Exercise

In this week, we learned how to edit the vfx using roto brush tool. We also did color grading for this vfx exercise 

Figure 6.1.1 ; Roto brush tool ; Week 9

Figure 6.1.2 ; Layer Transform (Position&Scale) ; Week 9

Figure 6.1.3 ; Color grading ; Week 9

Figure 6.2 ; VFX Exercise ; Week 9

---

REFLECTION

These exercises were quite fun and really helped me get more comfortable with editing. At first, I felt a bit unsure, but as I started arranging the sequences and playing around with text graphics and transform effects, I felt more confident and creative. It was satisfying to see the rough cuts slowly come together, and it made me excited to keep improving my editing skills.