Hardware

To film our teaser trailer we used a Canon digital video camcorder MD101. Before we began to shoot we inserted a DV tape into the camcorder which is what our footage was recorded onto. Before we began to shoot we rewound the DV tape to ensure we didn't record over any previous footage we'd recorded. Also before we shot we held a piece of white paper in front of the camcorder to ensure the tone was appropriate.

The camcorder had a zoom which we used but we did try physically moving the camcorder nearer to the object in question to get a clearer image when it was at all possible. We used a tripod to get more steady shots than if we were to hold the camcorder ourselves. Using the tripod also helped us to film tracking shots more easily by moving the camcorder while attached to the tripod. However one problem that we did encounter was that for the tracking shot in the woods we used a new tripod which was stiff so the camcorder didn't move with ease so the shot was a bit shaky so we had to edit and cut it carefully.

From previous experience last year filming our AS coursework we realised the importance of ensuring that the camcorder battery was fully charged to avoid the problems if the camcorder was to run out of battery. One improvement this year is that every camcorder now comes with a spare battery so this is never a problem. Another improvement this year is that we had the option to use a boom mike however we decided not to use it as we had no diegetic sounds in our trailer.

One new piece of equipment that we used this year was a sound recorder. We used this to record the voice over and soundtrack for our trailer. The quality of the sound was very good and the recorder was very easy to use. It also uploaded onto our teaser trailer with ease. This was done by opening the audio recording in ITunes then 'dragging' it into IMovie to put over our footage.

It was an easy process to upload our footage onto IMovie. All we had to do was click the 'import' option on IMovie and the computer did the rest. However one negative aspect is that it can take a while to upload your footage.