Jurassic Park jelly scene remake

Jelly Scene Remake

Overview

Our task was to recreate the jelly scene (Jurassic Park 1993) in which two sibling's meal was interrupted by a bloodthirsty velociraptor.

Props and Mise-en-scene

Dinosaurs

The velociraptor, which served as an antagonist of this minute-long clip, was replaced by a masked man because our time and skills in creating an actual velociraptor was limited.

We actually also experimented with the shadow of the velociraptor too. Because it is quite infamous and remarkable, we decided to keep the shadow instead of the velociraptor just walking in-screen. The shadow casted by the actor through the blinders was an interesting alternative. (Shown on the picture above)

Foodstuff

the start of the scene, the two kids were enjoying a lavishing banquet. Of course it was not possible for us to prepare a whole feast for this scene, so we just made decent-looking meals out of clay.

Settings

We tried to recreate everything shot by shot, but soon discorvered that this was very hard to do as there were obvious differences in settings and timing, so we focused more on conveying meaning effectively.

location of tables

table

This area had plenty of space and a window so we could pull off the trick with the shadow through the blinders.

“kitchen” area

kitchen window area

Final product

Camera: Dorothy
Actors (in order of appearance): Mia, Vedaant, Hugh
Editing: Dorothy

Evaluation

1

Find three shots you are most proud of and match the clip well. Explain why you think the shot is successful.

The first shot where the camera pans from the plates of food to the character eating is one of my most proud shots. The sound and images on screen also match that of the original clip and this shot took many tries to get the smoothness of the camera movement. The actors' movements are also very well timed which is what made this shot look very good.

I really am proud of this one of the light coming in screen and the antagonist revealing himself from the darkness. It matches so well with the music and the footsteps of the velociraptor from the original clip. The light shone through the door window contrasts the darkness of both the room and the actor's wardrobe, which makes this reveal fantastic.

In this shot, the slow push into the character's face is very effective as it conveys the realization and fear at the moment the antagonist is seen. Even though in the original clip the jelly was shaking, the sound still ended up working well with the peas falling out of the spoon. The pushing in was also very smooth and there was no jagged or any sudden camera movement which I am proud of.

2

Pick at least one shot you think could have been improved and explain why

I think this shot could be improved because the rack focus was slightly awkward, and this was only noticed when I was editing the videos so we could not reshoot it.

3

What part of the clip are you most proud of and why

I like the first part of the clip, it was really hard to shoot and we did a lot of shoot for a clip less than 5 seconds long, but in the end the result turned out well and it is very effective in recreating the original

4

What was the most difficult part to film and why? How did you overcome the difficulties?

I think the first shot was also the hardest to shoot because of the way the camera should smoothly slide to the right place. It also took a lot of effort for me to adjust the focusing to the precise place in a short span of time.

5

Did you learn anything new from the process?

Adjusting focus is very important and hard — encountered the same problem in many shots — first shot, rack focus shot and running shot