A Second Glance

 Have you ever looked at something a hundred times and its been the same but then you decide to look at it in a different light and suddenly it's like you've never seen it before. That's how it was for me watching one of my favorite shows Dawson's Creek.

It's always fascinated me about the human body, that when one of your senses is disabled the other four are heightened. Like when a person becomes blind and their hearing becomes so excellent they can hear paper fall and hit the floor 20 feet away. That's how my eyes felt when it was completely silent and I focused my eyes and I saw things I'd never seen and realized things I'd never even considered. Dawson's Creek is a critically acclaimed show, especially for its dialogue and seriously didactic writing, considering the actors are all 15 when the show starts. Needless to say, the filming becomes increasingly important. The episode I watched was Season 5 episode 4 The Long Goodbye. In this episode, the audiences is in the aftermath of the protagonists father's death. The first few scenes were particularly interesting to me because without the sound your eyes are searching for information from the camera. It is akin to looking through a dirty window. you have to squint your eyes and focus real hard to get what's going on.


When the opening scene takes place it sweeps the town giving the shot to desired people bustling in the environment around it. Lots of asymmetrical balance with the extras in contrast in the cape cod like town. Until it lands on a couple in a Medium Close up walking towards the  deceased restaurant. They are happy and bubbly until their faces go sour and their eyes meander towards the yellow sign on the door that reads " CLOSED.... Death in the family." The look space given gives the illusion that we the audience are inside the restaurant looking at them through the glass door reading the sign. The couples momentum and sense of direction to go into the restaurant was compensated when the frame back step deeper into the restaurant on the other side of the door and also by moving the camera vertically then pointing it down as if your eyes were acting  paralleled with the couples, demonstrating lead room for the couple to stop turn around and leave.


Another couple formal accents that became apparent were during a conversational fight between two ex lovers when she is standing on a dock and he elevated on the edge of a boat docked at port. Due to the fact that the two are engaging in conversation the camera leaves plenty of headroom on both subjects so as to not distract from facial expression and conversation.
Again the shot size here was very important because in order to keep flow of the conversation the camera had to tennis its way between the actors. When placed on the girl it was a close up  but from a up ward angle so as if to give emphasis to her looking up at her ex. Which was opposite for the male taking part. He had a medium close up and had a down ward angle so as to show him looking down at her. The rule of thirds also is prevalent at the end of their conversation when he walks away and the camera forces the girls face towards the right side showing her whole profile and longing look of anguish while sweeping towards a fade-out.

These things were just apparent in the first 20 minutes.


When I looked at the TV film it was apparent that it was an old movie being pillar-boxed for the new TV  I have an HD TV and this movie is from the nineties so the necessary adjustments had to be made. That's how it was for me watching one of my favorite Mark Wahlberg films "Rockstar."
It was clear that the aspect ratio of 4:3 was trying to be maintained, it was demonstrated by two black pillars on the right and left.