Reflective Analysis on ‘The Adulterous Nature of Brandon Lorenzo’ (752 words)

For my reflective analysis on my photographic storyboard, I am going to discuss the camera angles and framing used on my images, what I wanted from the photographs and the overall effect that it had on them.
Shot 1 is a medium/close up shot showing a ‘happy’ couple. This type of shot was used because I wanted the facial expressions to be portrayed to the viewer as well as showing the close proxemics between the two characters. A close up shot alone would have purely just shown the emotion. Shot 3 is a very similar image in terms of what I wanted to achieve, however, I could execute a close up shot as the proxemics in this image are more obvious with more intimate emotion in facial expression. The viewer would not have needed to see any more detail to understand what was going on for example.
Shot 7 is more interesting. It is as if this part of the storyboard has ‘jumped out’ for the pure purpose of the viewer. The image shows a male with both females behind him either side. Realistically this shot would not have happened, but it helps the viewer to gain more of an understanding that the male is torn between the two women. When taking the photograph, the male was asked to step forward and the females to step backwards to ensure that the male looks more in focus and is the main aspect of the image. This is because I wanted the male to be portrayed as the dominant, main character that was in control of the situation, with the two women just following. Shot 13 further influences that the male is ‘torn between two women’, this again is a close up of both females but the image has been edited to make it look like it has literally been ‘torn’.
In my storyboard, I have used two over the shoulder shots; shot 6 and shot 21. This is slightly different to a subjective point of view shot in that we are not actually looking from the perspective of the characters, but we are still able to see what they see. Shot 6 was used to give further meaning to shot 5 in terms of revealing to the viewer the sneaky antics of the male character influencing them to feel some sort of negative emotion towards him, however, shot 21 shows the male character in a different light, with him being more vulnerable. Using an over the shoulder shot here brings the viewer as close as possible to the character, and may possibly trigger some sort of emotion that they had not felt earlier on.
Shot 4 is also quite an interesting photograph. The camera is positioned slightly above the characters; a high angle shot. This type of shot will automatically make characters more subordinate, and ‘out of control’. This is a connotation that what has just happened has gone ‘beyond control’, and that they have no power over this anymore. A medium/long shot was used with shot 4. The facial expressions were not very important to me at this time; I was more focused on again showing the proxemics – which is noticeable different to any other of the shots in terms of them being further apart, and the setting. The setting plays a major part in this image. This again gives the viewer more of an obvious understanding of the actual narrative.
Finally in shot 2, 4 and 14, the male character has been purposely positioned with his back towards the camera. This is a again a connotation to show his arrogance and ignorance.
After listening to some feedback from people that have viewed my storyboard, they generally think that it is a story that is easy to follow and clear to understand. If I had to re-do this storyboard, I would however, perhaps experiment slightly more with a wider range of camera angles. I could have possibly used a Dutch tilt and I would have implemented some more long shots and used low angles. In shot 22, I would have also zoomed in slightly and moved above the character somewhat more, to give the distinct impression that I have used a bird’s eye view shot. At the moment, this is not that obvious.
Overall, I have used a mixture of camera angles throughout my storyboard including medium shots, long shots, over the shoulder shots, close ups and a few others. These together have helped to create quite a successful narrative and storyboard.