UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

In true repetitive fashion plan A was too elaborate to be practical with other commitments, so here is plan B, scrambled together in 2 days. I figure it's neither my best, nor my worst work, but was happy to finish something, which is more than I manage for too many of the challenges. I have a pretty good idea of the shortcomings, but fire away your thoughts - you can be critical, I need to learn so I can do better in future.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Cool. Very informative. Not sure about the music. Bit too moody; or maybe grade the image to be dull, hard, gritty and harsh image to match the music. "The Book of Eli" Style (film).

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

This is an interesting use of the theme, something that is not only being repeated in your area but in so many regions in Australia & the USA. I didn't mind the music but I tend to prefer it at a lower level. I wonder if you could have included some visuals that directly referenced the VO - a shot of an empty car park or a set of work boots by a rubbish bin when you mention redundancies,maybe some empty shops or derelict houses as you talk about the privatisation of the SEC. I would also like to see closer shots of the plant, rusting equipment empty yards etc

just my two bobs worth.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Hi Andrew. Well this was a thought provoking piece. I can't really make any suggestions, to busy pondering over this. Another nice voice over. Thanks for sharing this.

Gordon

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Hi Andrew like the way you have made this into a short docu about us as a world continuing to repeat the same mistakes. Your comments hi-lite the problems of commenting on entries knowing full well the entrant put together an entry knowing of its weaknesses but needing to submit something. Therefore any comments I can give you would only be too well aware off.

As it stands I think this is a powerful entry, gets message across in a concise manner and in a time frame that keeps viewers attention the whole way through.

Well done

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Hi Andrew,

Nice to see you went outside of the regular "nature" films normally made for the uwol challenges, and dared make something different this round.
It is a strong story you deliver! We humans are good at repeating errors.
I don't have much to add to what has already been said.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Thanks for the feedback:
Mark - being in a rush I just had to pick the nearest-fit music I could find, very much an afterthought. I need to get better at finding the right music, but that starts with being more organised in the first place.
Paul - I think I dropped the music track about 20dB maybe a little more, but didn't labour over the levels, which doesn't account for the louder parts. And at times in the VO I went a bit softer - being in a rush, which also didn't help the relative levels. Definitely more shots would have helped - more variety and certain specific talking points. Some good suggestions - I did get one of some closed shops, but it was shakier than the rest of the footage, so I hated it and didn't use it. Getting closer shots would be nice, but I've heard security harass you pretty quickly if you start filming anywhere nearby.

I think to cover the topics more fully would take 10 to 15 minutes , as there is some back story, and that's not even touching on the asbestos issues. The mishandling of the mine fires, the current and likely future effects of large job losses. Then the follow on effects - 700+ job losses is the direct amount, not all the outsourced labour and services that depend on the station and workers. Plus temporary jobs for shuts (maintenance) all having a flow on effect into the wider community, that already has 15-20% unemployment.

My biggest gripe editing was how shaky the footage was even locked on the tripod - a lot of strong wind over those 2 days. And I spent far too long trying to get that hyperlapse to work, and I still couldn't get it smooth.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Try AudioJungle.net small fee like $20 for a standard license. Worth a look it cover most things and its part of the EnvatoMarket Group. You will find graphics too.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Andrew,
A fascinating story, very well told, and highlighting issues all of us face across the developed world!
I agree with most of the analysis above - Im sure theres nothing I could add that hasn't already been mentioned.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Andrew,

well that deserves a long form documentary!! i was captivated. great job.

was the end jumpy or was that my computer?

not much to say other than carry on with and take to tv.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Thanks Mark, I'll keep that in mind. And I'll have to read the fine print on the licence terms.

Paul it's definitely something happening across the globe - which needs leadership to manage the transition - if only we had some in our political system right now. Hopefully with more time I could do the story justice.

Dale the end was jumpy, I tried to smooth out my hyperlapse (130+ photos taken a small stride apart each, at semi regular time intervals) but it took way too long to get to that point with manual tracking points, so I slowed it down to give it more of a stop motion feel than just plain jittery. Will have to try and get it working better. I almost don't know where to start with a long form (I never finished the 2009 one), but I think having a focus on the people, and their stories from bearing the brunt of repeated bad decisions would make for a longer story worth telling.

Re: UWOL#41 - End of an Era by Andrew Hood
 

Thanks for sharing the deatils on how you achived the end shot. I want to have a go now. I forgot to ask, so Dale thanks for asking about it.

If tracking software fails to give good results. You could re-stablize the image one frame at a time. If you shot sigle image on DSLR at full resolution then you would have a 4K+ image. In Photoshop or Affinity Photo (Which I use and is very simular, but better + mega cheap) You can overlay each image. Use the power station as a fixed point that never changes size or shape much, due to the distance from the camera. You would half the opacity to get a gost fx. Each frame would be moved and rotated so all the power station images aligned. Then turned back to a solid image. etc etc.

Lot of work, but I'm sure you'll find the end result rewarding and knowledge again.