Production Log: 06/12/13

I used the 'Cross Dissolve' effect to fade the 'One Rehearsal Pictures' Ident in at the beginning from black, and back out to black again after. This helped to replicate and parody the 30's 'Universal Pictures' Ident. I also used this to fade between shot 3.1 and shot 3.2; the shot of Marshal Mallow lighting the cigarette and the shot of him knocking his knee against the chest of drawers. I did this for two reasons. 1) Fading is a very conventional method used in Film Noir so I felt that it was necessary for me to use it at least one during the actual footage rather than just the film's ident, and 2) shot 3.1 is significantly darker than shot 3.2 so to have it immediately cut from one to the other didn't look right, and was, to me, a clear movie error. I used the 'Luma Waveform' to make sure that the black surrounding the Globe in the 'One Rehearsal Pictures' ident was completely black as before the background was ever so slightly noticeable. I also did this to make the parts of the walls of the alley that, Lotta was walking down, that the light didn't touch darker, and the parts that the light did touch lighter. This made the contrast of light and dark greater, and conventionally Film Noir. This also lit up the rain more and made it more clear; light shining on the rain is also very conventionally Film Noir.

I used the 'Brightness and Contrast' tool to make the opening sequence darker, as before hand it was noticeable that I filmed a screen. I also did this to make the shot of Mallow running through the tunnel, in the Montage sequence, darker as this emphasised the shadows greatly (as harsh shadows are conventional of Film Noir) Finally, there were many shots where I had to change the speed of the footage. The obvious one is the sped up shot of Mallow tidying his office, but I also had to change the speed of footage at various other points. For example, in the scene where Mallow is describing the way Lotta's looks, the camera zooms into her eyes when the narrator (Mallow) says "Her eyes were the kind of green that would make envy jealous..." the actress looks up towards the camera as the word "eyes" are said, as well as lifting up her eyebrows when the word "money" is mentioned. However despite the timing of this matching perfectly with the audio, the actress reacts by opening her mouth in shock before the narrator says "As for her breasts". This posed as an issue, however I was able to get around this issue by cutting the footage into two halves; the first half was from the beginning of Mallow's description of Lotta's appearance up until the description of her lips, and the second was from the end of the descriptions of her lips up until the end of the description of her breasts. For the latter, I slowed down the frame rate ever so slightly so that the actress reaction was in time with the audio, but not too much so that it is noticeably slower. The result was unnoticeable as the footage looked the same speed as before, despite the timing now being a few seconds slower.