Rough Cuts Continued

March 9, 2026

Last week our team had to pause our work on the film because I was away at a competition. However, now that we are back in class, we resumed editing and continued working on cutting the film down to meet the time requirement. By the end of class, we were able to reduce the length so that it is now only about 15 seconds over the limit.

To help shorten the film, we decided to remove some of the establishing shots at the beginning. We still wanted to keep a small portion of these shots so the audience can understand where the family’s home is located and get a sense of the setting. Keeping a brief establishing moment allows viewers to orient themselves without taking up too much time.

During this editing session, we also learned how to speed up certain parts of the film. We applied this technique to the shots showing Anastasia’s awards on her dresser. To do this, we used the rate stretch tool, which allowed us to shorten the clip while still showing the important visual details. This helped us save time without completely removing the scene which develops Anastasia as a character.

Before we continue cutting more footage, our team plans to add the credits to the film. Adding the credits first will allow us to see the full runtime and determine where we may still need to make adjustments, particularly in the opening. We are planning to incorporate the credits into the opening scene while Lisa and Anastasia begin their conversation so that they appear naturally within the film rather than as a separate section.

Overall, this round of revisions helped us get much closer to our time goal while still keeping the important storytelling elements in place. Our next step will be adding the credits and making any final adjustments to ensure the film flows smoothly and stays within the required time.