what are archives:

Archives are a way to hold documents, images, videos, recording and more. Archives in photography are where many old, historical images are held, often in libraries or museums. Many of the images help us to understand to this day what things were like back then and how photography has evolved. The Société Jersiaise archives is an educational charity and is known for having over 15,000 images of portraits of named people as well as images of the island including even bay, the valleys and more. Not only does it hold older images but also newer image that will be held for the future and for memories. It is an important cultural heritage value that Jersey is lucky to have. They have be producing and documenting things from archeology, geology, ecology and economy, to community, architecture and culture for the past 150 years through the form of photographic material. The archives hope to provide a way to reflect on the past life and events through their multiple collections.

artist zoom in: Percival Dunham

Percival Dunham was a photographer journalist since 1911, and photographed events such as the Jersey Battle of Flowers and the grounding of the roebuck at St Brelade’s Bay. He left Jersey in 1914 to serve in 503 Siege Battery of the Royal Garrison Artillery during World War 1. As little is known about him, it is assumed that he moved to the island in the latter half of 1911. After the war he moved back to Jersey and lived here until his death in 1961. On the 7th of April an exhibition was opened at the Jersey Art Centre featuring a large number of his images collected from the Société Jersiaise archives. Overall Dunham produced a remarkable amount of images of Jersey all over the island about life before and after the Great War. It is said that Dunham’s style of images was ahead of his time which is why they were so greatly impactful.

image analysis:

conclusion:

To conclude, I think that archives are more than just gatekeeping old photos or documents but a way of holding the history of Jersey and knowledge that can be passed on to understand it. Not only do these photos show us how the Island was back then but they also hold deep stories that are very meaningful to many people and can show us how Jersey has evolved and developed since. I also believe that history in involved in everyones lives whether its to do with family, traditions or architecture etc. Within many of the photos that the Société Jersiaise archives hold we can see these aspects throughout. this makes the images more sentimental and hold greater meaning. Some of what the images capture is still on the island to this day showing its importance to Jersey and how islanders treasure it.

I believe that this photoshoot outcome was overall positive. We got many images of Elizabeth Castle relating to the Nazi Occupation. However, I do believe that we could have done with some more images and also recorded some videos to include in the film.

Lightroom:

To edit all of our photos, we used Lightroom where we could enhance all of the features to create a mood within each image. We also used Lightroom to resize the images for adobe premiere.

Adobe Premiere:

Premiere Pro is designed for a video editor’s post-production workflow. It’s equipped with a suite of powerful editing tools for content creators and filmmakers to organize and edit video files as well as to enhance and fine-tune audio and image quality.

Due to out short film only being still images, I started by importing all of the final edits into Adobe Premiere Pro. II created sub folders for my images so it would be easier to find my images.

When importing all of the images into Adobe Premiere, each image was zoomed in, therefore we had to scale every image to the right size. we could also use the scale to crop out part of the image we do not want in the short film.

I created transitions between each image to allow all the photos to flow together. I did this by adding key frames. I opened up the top bar and on each image a would add four key frames. The first two would be on a inclining angle where as the last two would be on a declining angle, this creates a fade between each frame.

Adobe Audition:

Adobe Audition:

On Adobe Audition we played around with sounds and started creating the audio for our short film.

During the lesson where we were being taught how to use adobe audition, we learnt how to cancel out background noise and add in sound effects. the audio was collected from our visit to Elizabeth castle. My aim is to enhance the audio to make it clear while ensuring it fits in with the Nazi Occupation theme.

Using the ‘multitrack’ feature I began to layer different sounds including ambiances and SFX to create a suitable audio file for the short film.

Using the sound bar I was able to adjust the volume of the clip allowing the sound to slowly get louder or quieter and could be faded in/out. This meant that there were no harsh transitions between sounds.

Once i was happy with the audio I had created I needed to import it for the film but first had to comprise all the sounds into one. I did this by going FILE>EXPORT>MULTITRACK MIXDOWN>ENTIRE SESSION and then save it as a file ready to export it onto the film.

I uploaded the footage, images and audio that my group and Sam had taken on the Elizabeth Castle trip into Adobe Premiere Pro. My focus for this was on the video editing and the sound editing would be done by someone else in the group

I started to organise the video clips into my timeline, removing the audio and stabilising the footage using the warp stabiliser effect in the editor. To start the film, I used a clip I shot before we set off for the castle that was shot to be an establishing shot, although I plan to reshoot this before I finish editing as the camera is too unstable to achieve a clean look. I had this clip fade in from from black to smoothly start the film.

I put together a sequence of the trip on the amphibious bus travelling through the sea before we arrived at the castle gate, which then moves onto a shot of the coast, one of the peak of the castle and the Union Jack flag raised up on a pole. The next segment features one of the ‘British Army’ soldiers working for the castle giving a demonstration on how to operate a 19th Century musket.

This next part of the timeline shows more of the same as the soldier gives the demonstration, however, I also placed clips of the soldier giving a demonstration with one of the castle’s cannons intersecting with these clips to create a build-up as they prepare to fire, before the tension is released with four clips of the weapons firing on different occasions – two of the cannon and musket firing respectively. I used editing techniques such as speed ramping to slow down and speed up the footage and different moments when the musket fires for the first time – slowing down just as it fires, speeding back up after the smoke has mostly cleared. For the cannon’s first shot, I recorded it using the slow-motion camera on my phone, which ended up sacrificing some of the video quality so I could be a safe distance away from the shockwave zone.

I then segued the narrative toward the small war museum in the courtyard, that displays the various artillery used in WWII and in the castle throughout the years, before moving back to more panning shots of different areas and viewpoints of the castle, including staircases, old living quarters, and a view of the coast before slowly fading back to black.

For the sound design of the film, we plan to compose a relatively basic score that creates a sense of adventure across the entire project, focusing more on the ambient sound and a voiceover to provide more context to the shots of the soldier and the museum. We plan to try and rely more on our own sounds that we recorded whilst at the castle, instead of what’s been given to us through Sam’s sound library.