Machinima Exercise 1

In this exercise, you'll look at 4 examples of machinima from 4 different perspectives. The overall goal of your group is to answer the following questions:

1. What was the filmmaker's goal?
2. How successful is the film at achieving that goal?
3. What techniques did you see that were particularly effective or worth emulating?
4. What weaknesses did you see that you'd like to avoid in your own production?

Each member of your team will be responsible for viewing the films from one of these perspectives:

• Emotion - What emotions were displayed? Was there an attempt to evoke an emotional response from the viewer? How was this done? How were color, music or sounds used to elicit emotion?
• Pace. Count the number of shots you see during the film. Calculate the rate per minute.
• Variability. How many of each type of shots were used? (closeups, medium shots, long shots). How much camera movement did you see (panning, zooming, dollying,) How many angles (looking down, looking up, looking straight)
• Voice. How was the quality of the narration? How many voices were heard? What do you notice about the quality of the dialog itself?

Here are the four films you'll be reviewing:

• The French Democracy
• The Dumb Man
• The Zoo Race
• Passage to Zhong Fu