Editing Blog: Visual Effects

    

Shot with zoom blur effect

Simple visual effects can add a lot to the quality of a film. To add visual effects, I simply opened the effects sub-menu on the edit page. I will not be using the fusion page for these effects, since I will not be making any custom effects for this project. I instead used a combination of the default effects that I could find in the menu, and adjusted the parameters of each of the effects to my liking. To apply an effect, I simply drag the effect from the sub-menu onto a shot in the editing interface. I then open the inspector and navigate to the effects tab on the shot. From there I am able to enable/disable effects, as well as configure the settings for each. One effect that I used was the camera shake effect. As things start to get increasingly paranormal, I used a subtle screen shake to emphasize the unstable nature of the scene. The screen shake isn’t particularly noticeable when first viewing the film, but it adds a lot to the tension of the scene. As the tension reaches its climax, the screen shake increases in intensity to reflect this. Another effect I implemented was the directional and zoom blur effect. The blur effect serves a similar role to the screen shake effect, in that it emphasizes the unstable nature of the scene. It also represents the disorientated and confused state of the main character. I also used a light flicker effect to further increase tension. We had already had the idea of flickering lights when we were storyboarding the opening sequence, however actually flickering the lights on set is impractical. I therefore added the flickering effect in editing, particularly towards the end of the sequence. The flickering starts at a low speed and intensity and then rapidly intensifies in the final shot. Overall, the purpose of these visual effects is to increase tension and emphasize the paranormal events that are occurring. 

    I made some other modifications to certain shots as well. I decided change one of the shots in the kitchen into a Dutch angle, to further emphasize instability. I did this through the inspector, by first zooming into the shot and then tilting it. I also had to crop in the shot where the actor gets up to go to the bathroom. This was because we had filmed the shots out of order, and broke continuity as a result with the notebook. In the previous shot we had shown the notebook with the ominous message, and the proceeding shot had the notebook blank. I therefore had to crop into the shot, to hide the fact that the notebook was blank.  

Shot where I had to crop in to maintain continuity