Field of Snakes review

Prior to drafting this review I looked deeply into the construct of film reviews from various sources of paper-based articles and web-based articles. Following this I applied my findings by drafting a basic template using Pages.

I then chose the images I would use which would hopefully establish the films one without giving a way important plot points. I then continued to write a basic summary of the plot, followed by a minor evaluation from a third person perspective.

Once these were both completed I inserted the text and images into my template, editing some text to fit into the margins.

Here is my final film review for 'Field of Snakes'

I contemplated adding titles and social media links as a footer, but decided not to as it is not featured in the majority of reviews I have analysed.

Future reshoot problems

Although my I now consider my filming complete, if urgent re-shoots are needed I cannot film at Elk Meadows as the owners will not give me permission from now on. Fortunately, I am happy with the interior shots and are unlikely to reshoot them. The outdoors shots and filler shots can be changed as I have access to other locations which look similar, although in order to maintain good match-on-action I would have to reshoot entire scenes in some cases.

Field of Snakes poster (draft 3)

Final editing session

Over the course of this project, with the help of friends from my class, I have been able to edit the raw footage to create a cohesive story structured in the way I had initially intended. However, through discovering the capabilities of iMovie and various other editing softwares I have developed my ideas further and made slight adaptations to my initial plans.


Unfortunately some unplanned changes I've had to make are due to limitations and flaws with the technology I have been using. To counter these problems I should have tested the software and hardware that I would be using. My lack of understanding of the equipment led to needed re-shoots in order to fix lighting and audio problems which I had initially planned to fix in editing. Perhaps using software such as Adobe Premier as oppose to iMovie would have granted me better ability to fix some flaws.

Field of Snakes (draft 5)

Here is my final cut of Field of Snakes. I have reshot the opening scene and edited the rest of the footage to match. Slight adjustments have been made to the script and costume design as a response to feedback from crew as well as my class.

Password: media

Class feedback (FoS draft 4)

This screening was far more successful than the one prior. Classmates commented on how lighting had improved as well as pacing and audio. Most issues revolved around narrative problems between the first and second segments. I can improve on this as I plan on reshooting the first half in order to support the second half further.

Most notably, classmates identified both crime-thriller and western genre elements which is a great achievement as I am aiming for a hybrid genre of both crime-thriller and western.

Field of Snakes (draft 4)

With this draft I have reshot and re-editided the second half of my short film. With this draft I ensured that the light would stay the same throughout filming, so that the confrontation would appear to take place within 3-5 minutes.  For instance I put the blinds down so that if the light outside did change it would have a nullified effect on the interior lighting. This also resulted in the lighting being more natural so I would be able to apply filters without them looking too strong.

I also took more time preparing the placement of objects within each shot before and during shooting as I saw mise-en-scene as one of my weakest points in the first draft.

Unfortunately due to the cast not being very focused from he start, it took a while for steady filming to take place. Despite this, we managed to get each shot featured on the shot list with some extra filler shots.