The Hidden Evaluation

The original idea for The Hidden was a combination of two ideas. One was from me about a group of schoolchildren who solve a murder and the other was from Jacob, which was that all the characters in the drama would be inflicted with a mental disability, such as schizophrenia, split personality, anger problems etc. The crime drama we produced only addresses one of these, since only one of the characters is acknowledged as having any disability (schizophrenia, in this case). This character was the one which I played.

The audience expectation would probably have been for the drama to be about exactly this so it is very possible that it didn’t meet audience expectations, given that the original premise was not followed exactly. This may have been because the script was in two halves, both written by different people: the first half was written by me and the second by Jacob. It meant that the tone of the film would have changed within only a moment of dialogue.

The camera work was good, since it was mostly operated by people who weren’t in the scene, meaning that, instead of someone setting up the camera and leaving it, the cameraman could work out where the focus should be while the scene is happening. It was clear what types of shots would be used when. There is a part at the end of the first scene where there was supposed to be a long shot which panned around to show the disappearance of a character. This was important because it established a main character as a schizophrenic. Unfortunately, due to the spacing of the room, the shot didn’t work, since it didn’t get the right position in shot. If we were to do it again, we would probably have set the scene either in different positions or on a different set. The sound also didn’t go well, since we didn’t have a microphone to record the sound. This meant that the background noise occasionally drowned out the speech and was sometimes inconsistent with the following clip. It had to be edited so that the sounds flowed into each other. When we were filming inside, this was less of a problem, since we had no ambient noise to drown out the dialogue.

Using mise-en-scene when planning our shots, lighting was a key factor because the style of the film is supposed to be dark and claustrophobic to give an air of dread around the characters, one of which had lost his brother during the course of the film. This was achieved well in the flashback scene with the murder through uses of sound in different ways, such as making the audio go backwards at the point when my character was being beaten in the Geography block, meaning that it was disorienting and scary to the viewer. Also, the emphasis on music at the point when my character was murdered (through the silenced audio) meant that there was an ominous feeling to the scene. However, for some of the same reasons, the film could be seen as humourous in places, particularly in the scene involving Karne and Kieran’s characters, which was accompanied by quirky, comic music, making the scene into comic relief for the viewer.

In our group was Karne, Kieran, Daniel, Jacob and me. In terms of team work, it worked well. During pre-production, me and Jacob were writing the script while Karne and Kieran took location pictures and started on the storyboard. Jacob and I were assigned to be writers and Karne, Kieran and Jacob were responsible for the pictures and planning for the schedule and shots. Dan, being absent for some of the pre-production, helped Kieran and Karne when he was here. Once into shooting, Dan and I would alternate between who would be cameraman, since he was absent for some of the lessons. Jacob, Kieran and Karne were on camera for most scenes, so they stayed as actors for most of this part of the production. Dan was absent for some of the lessons so he had less input in pre-production. However, quite often during shooting, he would be behind the camera,

making sure it was focused and positioned properly. In post-production, we all worked individually for the editing, since we were all doing our own versions of the film.

While planning the episode, we had to take into account where everything would be filmed. For the scene’s set at the murder scene, we had to choose somewhere next to a high building, since the murdered person, in the script, was thrown out of a window first before being killed on the ground. We chose the geography building because it not only was high enough to facilitate that part of the story but also had quite a bit of open space next to it to allow for filming without interruption. The first scene, however, was to take place at someone’s house. We chose Jacob’s because we originally thought the lounge would be the right size. However we would probably have used a different set instead, because of the aforementioned cinematography problem above.

Most of the shots used in the episode were long or medium shots at eye level. However, exceptions were made in the case of the murder scene and one part of the investigation scenes. In the case of the former, we used a low angle POV shot to show what the victim could see before being murdered. The shot also involved sunlight obscuring our view of the murderer so that we couldn’t see his face. This meant that the mystery was kept for the remainder of the episode. This technique was used all the way through the scene, finding ways to obscure his face, such as wearing a hood over his face and always facing down. The latter also involved a close-up of my character as he is told that his brother (also played by me) has been killed to put more emphasis on the emotional impact on my character. Usually, a close-up is used to illustrate a dramatic point in the film because it emphasises the expression on the face of the actor, for dramatic effect. Notable examples include deductions in Sherlock and some character shots in Luther.

The trailer eventually involved using two images from a BBC trailer to make it seem more as if it were an actual BBC production. These included the Original British Drama ident seen at the beginning of most BBC drama trailers now. It also showed the BBC One ident at the end which had the title imposed over it. This gave it a more authentic feel and meant that it would seem more real.

The research was important because it helped me decide on what tone I wanted to strike for the show. Seeing the difference between Castle and Sherlock meant that I could decide on what style the show could be in. Life on Mars was the closest comparison to the dark, foreboding style which I tried to achieve and watching the case study was helpful for this.

The storyboard had very little impact on what we ended up doing for the shots, since we didn’t actually use it during

shooting. However, the script was helpful as being a basis for what the shots should be like, since we would usually read the script over and then decide the shots on the day. The script also was written as more of a basis

for the dialogue than a hard copy of exactly what was said. The schedule also wasn’t entirely stuck to during shooting, simply because it wasn’t possible to shoot the scenes in the order they were listed because we didn’t have the locations for some of them. This meant that they were filmed out of order.

The shooting was mostly quick and easy, with only one take required for most scenes. This is with the exception of the second scene, which was mainly due to either a technical problem or someone forgetting their lines. We rectified this problem by using the script as a prop (a report on the murder) and reading from that. As I said before, most of the angles and shots were decided on the day, using the location we had and quickly working out the best place for all of the shots.

Editing was easy but time consuming, since we had to go through all the clips we had and work out exactly what clips to use. I also had to edit the sound together so that all the ambient noise flowed evenly, otherwise the cuts would be too obvious. In both the episode and the trailer, all the music is original, composed specifically for this unit. It worked well for the most part, and probably took the most planning. It also meant that once the music had been composed, I couldn’t make any adjustments to the video afterwards otherwise it would be out of sync. With regards to the trailer titles, the BBC One ident was edited to have the title over the top of the trailer which it was taken from, without seeming to obvious that it had been edited.

I thought the outcome of the episode was good and it was in keeping with what I imagined while in pre-production, with the music and sound effects having a good influence on the feeling and atmosphere of the film. The trailer, I was less pleased with because I didn’t have as much time to do it in, so it feels rushed and the music isn’t as interesting as the episode. In terms of my contribution, I think it was good, since I wrote part of it and acted as two characters. It also felt like something I would probably have watched if it was actually on television (if it had a larger budget, of course) and I think the outcome was a good extrapolation of what was written in the script.

Peer feedback mainly praised the dramaticism of the trailer. It was noted that this was partly down to the self-composed music. Teacher feedback highlighted the use of dialogue and camera shots to illustrate the trailer’s goal but also gave a way to improve with sound, saying (correctly) that the sound is occasionally uneven and this could result in confusion to the audience.