Film and TV-Longshot

Long Shot

Alex came up with the idea for the department to do a Long Shot. This is a film which continues from start to finish without any cutting , just goes all the way through till the end of the script. Because the second years are doing film and tv unit, Alex gave every second year students lines to learn for the Long Shot and anyone else who is interested in being an extra have the opportunity to do this.
The Long Shot was a scene in a hospital showing different characters doing different things all at once. I played a police officer who spoke to a woman about her son who has been involved in a car crashed.
We had props, costume and a set and it looked brilliant when we watched it on the screen. The Long Shot was around the whole performing arts block and it looked a bit like Casualty.

Before we did the Long Shot, I had no idea about it before. It came as a shock to me when we started doing it because I thought I would not be able to handle it. It is very difficult and requires a lot of focus. If one person messes up the filming, then it has to be filmed over again from the start. This means that everyone had to be focused and off the book with their lines.

We did a few rehearsals before we did the actual shot. The Long Shot literally took the of the college day to be filmed. We started off with Alex showing us what to do, where to come in with the line and the accuracy and speed to need to deliver the lines with. I researched Longshot and the definition I found was that it is a wide shot that are often times still and it is the very first shot of a scene in a film. I also read that it is used to establish what is going to happen in the scene later on. Moving long shots follow a certain object or individual/s to tell the viewers that an interesting event is going to happen in that particular scene. I think watching it over again, it came to me that it was a moving Long Shot.

I learnt a lot from doing this shot. It showed me how focused and dedicated I could be when doing work. I first discovered a work ethic I actually thought I would never have. I think this course had made me work harder to complete a task. The Long Shot was a whole different experience for me. We were given a script a few days before and was told to learn and know the lines by the day. Also the fact of using props and costumes made it look so professional and I thought at a point that I was actually doing it professionally.