Cut Away & Flash Backs

I had the Raw First Draft finish using the conversation as the main drive structure for the cuts. I was not sure where to go from here.

Thinking that one of the main components are flashbacks. I needed to edit in a way to connect the story within the conversation with the shots. To have an underlying message that the Actor is a killer even though the conversation in "normal" that there is something more lurking behind.

it was decided that the killing will be left open to the audience while in the filming a third actor was used as the victim. The audience can decide whether the second actor will be the next victim.

I start putting together what was considered the first flashbacks. With the killer washing up his hands. Using multiple shots that were filmed. I cut together a scene of him washing the blood from his hands. The Sound here was recorded well and I was able to use overlay running water to make the cuts smoother. For the last shot of the sink, it was not filmed while the lights were set up. However, I decided that it assist in creating a mood to this scene and keeping it in was more important that it looking visually the same as the rest of the shots. It added to the passage of time. that the light was turned off and then killing had left the sink. But the shot alone felt not enough to convey this feeling, i add the sound effect of water drops to add to the atmosphere. I think it came together well and an excellent start to help me visualise an atmosphere and emotion to recreate throughout the edit.

Screenshot of FCPX workflow.

I thought about finding a way to aid the transition for the cut of the flashbacks. I took inspiration from David Fincher, Fight Club. How the Scenes flashback scenes were created using sound and multiple jarring jump cuts of the same scene to show that these were flashbacks of reality. An aspect of reality as if life flashing before someone's eyes. I looked at the conversation and search for a position that felt naturally the best position to start a cutaway for a flashback. I remembered from the dailies there was a scene with one of the actors felt flustered while shotting and asked to stop recording however the DOP continued to record. This really assists me in creating the clips and I was able to use jump cuts that were synced to a glitch sound effect to add to the atmosphere. I added sound to build up to the scene this aided the effect to not be a jarring jump out of nowhere.

Having completed that effect I started to put together the second section of clips that will be used for another flashback. I will continue using this way to cut from the flashbacks and but back to the conversation.

This would be placed in the midst of the conversation. bridging the First flashback and the end scene of the killing.

In the last scene which shows the killer killing a victim, the hammer scene fillmed with shadow. i felt the actors' movement was slow.

Here is the original take.

I had decided to add speed ramps to give the movement some speed to really feel the hitting adding realism to the hits. If i had time i would have added some blood splatter VFX. but in the time scale thought it was sufficient speeding up the movement and adding hitting and crunching sounds.

the final speed effect:

The edit of the killer scene looks like this with sound effects added. I also added a door opening scene to give the effect he victim is placed in a container room.

Now that most of the flashback are completed i can start to work on the on creating pacing and emotion within the conversation.