I think our final piece has come out a little better than I had originally expected. I like the whole concept of our idea and also the different tasks that each of our team members concentrated on made us work a lot better.
Hope you enjoy :) :
Thursday, 22 April 2010
Thursday, 15 April 2010
Evaluation.
In what way does your media project use, develop or challenge forms and conventions for real media products?
We chose an idea that wouldn’t be completely obvious to the viewer. The main idea was that we would make the woman in our piece very disorientated, vulnerable and a victim. Through this the audience would feel they were in the same position. The idea would then ensure that we got across the feel of it being a thriller due to the mystery. As well as having a woman victim in our piece, we needed a villain/antagonist to push forward the idea of a thriller once more. The original concept actually came from ‘Fargo 1996’ which only showed a car driving down a road and didn’t tell the viewer anything.
Another huge convention that we used to add to our ‘thriller’ was having the ‘crime’ at the core of the narrative. Having rape as the main subject in the film, the audience have something to concentrate on and their minds are glued to this idea.
By having so many quick and fast paced flashbacks it puts the audience’s mind in a state of confusion and they will want to know more. This can actually be seen in our project through the flashbacks and the long-winded walking. All of these things would set the atmosphere are dark and clustered.
All of these conventions add together and actually show extraordinary events happening in ordinary situations. It was just an ordinary girl at an ordinary college party, yet something terrible happened to her and her world was turned upside down. This is definitely shown in the opening sequence as seeing her walking home and slumping down when she gets there with her head down shows her psychological state is no-where near the norm. As well as this, right at the end of the sequence the woman victim is in danger. She answers the phone and has no idea who it is on the other end, therefore leaving her with a confused logic on how safe she really is.
Also some of the shots we used were definitely typical of a real media product. For example cutting from a close-up shot to a long shot, again, leaves the audience wondering what exactly is coming in the next shot. When we did a shot of our actress as long shot, we left the audience in suspense as they did not yet know why she was there, what she was wearing, or where she was.
The sound we used built up much suspense throughout the piece. Because we downloaded a drama packed sounds piece to go over our actress whilst she is walking, it makes it much more sinister and a lot darker. The music we used it also quite moody to set the opening sequence into a thriller mode, once again building the anticipation.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Due to the fact that we used just a woman and a man in our project, we didn’t particularly cover as many social groups as possible. The piece concentrated mainly on a woman as she walked through a field and had flashbacks of her night before. This could be seen as quite controversial. By using a woman as the main victim in our piece, it makes it seem as though we are trying to say that all women are vulnerable and defenceless. Yet, this is not the message we were trying to put across. Seeing as most thrillers these days are shown with women as the victims, we thought we would follow the trend. It seems that thrillers become more interesting when a helpless woman is in trouble at the start but then throughout the film they change and become a hero, or stronger.
This type of representation can be seen in the film Straw Dogs (1971). The woman in this film is a victim to rape. Yet, the third rape that she actually encounters, she turns round and actually enjoys it. This therefore makes her the bigger person and she is going against the terrible act that is being forced upon her.
What kind of media institute might distribute your media product and why?
I would distribute my film to Warp X. This is because Warp X as a distribution company makes sure that they help out the smaller producers rather than the huge films. They also work on a lower budget and as my team will not be well known film makers, it would be easier with this type of Distribution Company to get out film out into the world to make a bit of money and possible get quite popular. Also the fact that the company is set in Sheffield makes it a lot more simple to send over the piece as well as getting to if need be for such things as meetings or if something goes wrong. Also asking a distribution company to put a film of this genre out into the world could be quite controversial for them also. Yet, seeing as they are quite a small company and not as well known, this could be a good try out for the film.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for our media product would most likely be an older range of people. Because there is quite a lot of disturbed images and people within it, the certificate would have to be a 15. Therefore
The age group would be above 15, yet more likely towards the older teens to mid-twenties. The film probably is more presented towards creative, young, open-minded, digital and active members of society. Due to the film being quite disturbing and potentially upsetting for some audience members, it is more likely that the audience would be working-class people interested in film and more serious film types.
How did you attract/address your audience?
I tried to attract my audience by making sure that I was ambiguous and kept the suspense throughout the piece. By doing so the audience would watch the film wanting to know more and more with each scene they watched. I wanted to force the audience to ask questions about the film and then allow those questions to be unanswered until either the middle or the end of the film. We tried to achieve this by putting in clips of the night before which would make the audience wonder what had happened and the costume used would confuse the audience to the point of wanting to watch on and find out exactly what is happening.
Sam Willis – ‘Decent, just a little bit more editing needed doing. Otherwise I think it is an all-rounded good piece of work.’
Amie Pettitt – ‘Interesting story line and the music works well alongside it. Also a wide range of camera angles enhancing the performance of the film, quite good.’
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Due to never actually using technology to do with media before, the project was a big step with learning. Because we had to use Panasonic cameras throughout the project, I got used to using them and now actually know how to zoom, how to adjust colour and many other things. But basically, I just got an understanding of the way to use a camera and how to get the exact shots I wanted. Also as I have never used a tripod before it was another experience to get used to putting it to the right high and in the right stance throughout. As well as the filming equipment I also learnt a lot about the editing software, Adobe Premier, as this is what we were to use when edited our sequence. I now know how to use dissolves, black and white and many other things to do with the appearance of the piece, but also how to set the sound and how to make titles for a film.
I have also learnt how all of these technologies plus editing actually work together to construct meaning in visual text. The editing and semiotics really add to this meaning and allow myself to see how this small piece of film can bring across such a powerful message.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
I have learnt quite a lot during the time from the preliminary task to the full edited version. I learnt that a good location is the key to making the piece of work interesting and higher in marks. By having an uninteresting background the audience will be bored and not attracted to watching the film. I also learnt that I must make sure the film is in widescreen before I start filming, this is because during our preliminary we didn’t actually think about making the screen wide or small and ended up with our video being too small to see. I also learnt more how to work with the editing software seeing as I did not really concentrate on the editing, but the filming and directing, of our preliminary task. I was director of our final edit but felt that I worked with the editor, Rob, a lot more. I also learnt that working in a four was probably a bit too much and next time I will realise this and work in a smaller group.
We chose an idea that wouldn’t be completely obvious to the viewer. The main idea was that we would make the woman in our piece very disorientated, vulnerable and a victim. Through this the audience would feel they were in the same position. The idea would then ensure that we got across the feel of it being a thriller due to the mystery. As well as having a woman victim in our piece, we needed a villain/antagonist to push forward the idea of a thriller once more. The original concept actually came from ‘Fargo 1996’ which only showed a car driving down a road and didn’t tell the viewer anything.
Another huge convention that we used to add to our ‘thriller’ was having the ‘crime’ at the core of the narrative. Having rape as the main subject in the film, the audience have something to concentrate on and their minds are glued to this idea.
By having so many quick and fast paced flashbacks it puts the audience’s mind in a state of confusion and they will want to know more. This can actually be seen in our project through the flashbacks and the long-winded walking. All of these things would set the atmosphere are dark and clustered.
All of these conventions add together and actually show extraordinary events happening in ordinary situations. It was just an ordinary girl at an ordinary college party, yet something terrible happened to her and her world was turned upside down. This is definitely shown in the opening sequence as seeing her walking home and slumping down when she gets there with her head down shows her psychological state is no-where near the norm. As well as this, right at the end of the sequence the woman victim is in danger. She answers the phone and has no idea who it is on the other end, therefore leaving her with a confused logic on how safe she really is.
Also some of the shots we used were definitely typical of a real media product. For example cutting from a close-up shot to a long shot, again, leaves the audience wondering what exactly is coming in the next shot. When we did a shot of our actress as long shot, we left the audience in suspense as they did not yet know why she was there, what she was wearing, or where she was.
The sound we used built up much suspense throughout the piece. Because we downloaded a drama packed sounds piece to go over our actress whilst she is walking, it makes it much more sinister and a lot darker. The music we used it also quite moody to set the opening sequence into a thriller mode, once again building the anticipation.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Due to the fact that we used just a woman and a man in our project, we didn’t particularly cover as many social groups as possible. The piece concentrated mainly on a woman as she walked through a field and had flashbacks of her night before. This could be seen as quite controversial. By using a woman as the main victim in our piece, it makes it seem as though we are trying to say that all women are vulnerable and defenceless. Yet, this is not the message we were trying to put across. Seeing as most thrillers these days are shown with women as the victims, we thought we would follow the trend. It seems that thrillers become more interesting when a helpless woman is in trouble at the start but then throughout the film they change and become a hero, or stronger.
This type of representation can be seen in the film Straw Dogs (1971). The woman in this film is a victim to rape. Yet, the third rape that she actually encounters, she turns round and actually enjoys it. This therefore makes her the bigger person and she is going against the terrible act that is being forced upon her.
What kind of media institute might distribute your media product and why?
I would distribute my film to Warp X. This is because Warp X as a distribution company makes sure that they help out the smaller producers rather than the huge films. They also work on a lower budget and as my team will not be well known film makers, it would be easier with this type of Distribution Company to get out film out into the world to make a bit of money and possible get quite popular. Also the fact that the company is set in Sheffield makes it a lot more simple to send over the piece as well as getting to if need be for such things as meetings or if something goes wrong. Also asking a distribution company to put a film of this genre out into the world could be quite controversial for them also. Yet, seeing as they are quite a small company and not as well known, this could be a good try out for the film.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for our media product would most likely be an older range of people. Because there is quite a lot of disturbed images and people within it, the certificate would have to be a 15. Therefore
The age group would be above 15, yet more likely towards the older teens to mid-twenties. The film probably is more presented towards creative, young, open-minded, digital and active members of society. Due to the film being quite disturbing and potentially upsetting for some audience members, it is more likely that the audience would be working-class people interested in film and more serious film types.
How did you attract/address your audience?
I tried to attract my audience by making sure that I was ambiguous and kept the suspense throughout the piece. By doing so the audience would watch the film wanting to know more and more with each scene they watched. I wanted to force the audience to ask questions about the film and then allow those questions to be unanswered until either the middle or the end of the film. We tried to achieve this by putting in clips of the night before which would make the audience wonder what had happened and the costume used would confuse the audience to the point of wanting to watch on and find out exactly what is happening.
Sam Willis – ‘Decent, just a little bit more editing needed doing. Otherwise I think it is an all-rounded good piece of work.’
Amie Pettitt – ‘Interesting story line and the music works well alongside it. Also a wide range of camera angles enhancing the performance of the film, quite good.’
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Due to never actually using technology to do with media before, the project was a big step with learning. Because we had to use Panasonic cameras throughout the project, I got used to using them and now actually know how to zoom, how to adjust colour and many other things. But basically, I just got an understanding of the way to use a camera and how to get the exact shots I wanted. Also as I have never used a tripod before it was another experience to get used to putting it to the right high and in the right stance throughout. As well as the filming equipment I also learnt a lot about the editing software, Adobe Premier, as this is what we were to use when edited our sequence. I now know how to use dissolves, black and white and many other things to do with the appearance of the piece, but also how to set the sound and how to make titles for a film.
I have also learnt how all of these technologies plus editing actually work together to construct meaning in visual text. The editing and semiotics really add to this meaning and allow myself to see how this small piece of film can bring across such a powerful message.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
I have learnt quite a lot during the time from the preliminary task to the full edited version. I learnt that a good location is the key to making the piece of work interesting and higher in marks. By having an uninteresting background the audience will be bored and not attracted to watching the film. I also learnt that I must make sure the film is in widescreen before I start filming, this is because during our preliminary we didn’t actually think about making the screen wide or small and ended up with our video being too small to see. I also learnt more how to work with the editing software seeing as I did not really concentrate on the editing, but the filming and directing, of our preliminary task. I was director of our final edit but felt that I worked with the editor, Rob, a lot more. I also learnt that working in a four was probably a bit too much and next time I will realise this and work in a smaller group.
Editing re-film. 13/04/10
The lads have been concentrating on the editing and asking me and Sarah for our input as we all need to agree on what is being done.
We decided that we would put all of this new filming right at the end of the rest of our filming and Aidan said he didn't like the title of the film at the end of the sequence that Rob and I had done prior so we were going to need to change that too.
Aidan came up with the idea of the phone actually ringing as Ellie walked up the drive inside the house but she couldn't hear it and therefore did not answer it the first time. She would then get into the house and it would ring again and she would crawl to it. Therefore the sound of the phone was put into the scene of Ellie walking up the drive but in a quiet tone so that it sounded muffled as though it was in the house.
All of the scenes were then put together and the outcome has been rather good so far as the ending is now more rounded off and suspenseful.
We also did our titles again to match the rest of the other titles of our names in the sequence. These are now more matched to the actual sequence and look a lot better.
We decided that we would put all of this new filming right at the end of the rest of our filming and Aidan said he didn't like the title of the film at the end of the sequence that Rob and I had done prior so we were going to need to change that too.
Aidan came up with the idea of the phone actually ringing as Ellie walked up the drive inside the house but she couldn't hear it and therefore did not answer it the first time. She would then get into the house and it would ring again and she would crawl to it. Therefore the sound of the phone was put into the scene of Ellie walking up the drive but in a quiet tone so that it sounded muffled as though it was in the house.
All of the scenes were then put together and the outcome has been rather good so far as the ending is now more rounded off and suspenseful.
We also did our titles again to match the rest of the other titles of our names in the sequence. These are now more matched to the actual sequence and look a lot better.
Re-filming. 11/04/10
Due to the feedback that we got from other students on our draft piece, we realised that we needed to do a bit of re-filming and re-capturing. We were told that our flashbacks were too short and could be mis-understood.
Also Sarah had come up with a good idea for the ending as we had just sort of left that part out in our draft. This involved Ellie actually getting to the house and finding the phone off the hook as though someone had been in her house and then she would pick up the phone and would hear a voice on the other end breathing heavily.
This idea was gradually added to as Rob came up with the idea that the phone would be on the hook and Ellie would slide down as she got into the house in a sort of depressive lump.
We also needed to re-film the scene in which Ellie is sick and then swigs on the wine bottle as some of the viewers did not understand exactly what it represented. This was due to the fact that she did not 'gag' as much as possible and therefore nothing could be heard.
As the boys did not turn up til a little later, we decided to do the first scene without them and in the re-film we made sure that we could hear exactly what was going on. The only downfall was that there was some light coming through the bathroom window as it was a sunny day, but in the edit we will try and make it a bit darker.
Moving on, we filmed Ellie walking through the door from the outside so that we could cut from that, to her walking through the door on the inside. The boys then turned up and we did more shots of Ellie walking through the door on the inside and also slumping down to the floor before the phone rings. We had to do this scene a few times as we werren't too happy with the angles each time and Rob came up with the idea that she should put down her bag as she got through the door.
We then needed to film the phone as it rang, yet I thought we should do it from a range of shots and therefore thought we should do it through the staircase and from a separate angle of her crawling to the phone to pick it up.
After these were done we needed to film Ellie actually answering the phone, I had the idea of Aidan actually ringing the phone and breathing down it, but it could not be heard on the film and therefore we needed to do a voice over after we had the right shot of Ellie answering the phone and a close-up of the handset to ensure that when we came to editing we would be able to show the voice over.
Filming was then finished and all we needed to do was edit it all into the finale that we wanted.
Also Sarah had come up with a good idea for the ending as we had just sort of left that part out in our draft. This involved Ellie actually getting to the house and finding the phone off the hook as though someone had been in her house and then she would pick up the phone and would hear a voice on the other end breathing heavily.
This idea was gradually added to as Rob came up with the idea that the phone would be on the hook and Ellie would slide down as she got into the house in a sort of depressive lump.
We also needed to re-film the scene in which Ellie is sick and then swigs on the wine bottle as some of the viewers did not understand exactly what it represented. This was due to the fact that she did not 'gag' as much as possible and therefore nothing could be heard.
As the boys did not turn up til a little later, we decided to do the first scene without them and in the re-film we made sure that we could hear exactly what was going on. The only downfall was that there was some light coming through the bathroom window as it was a sunny day, but in the edit we will try and make it a bit darker.
Moving on, we filmed Ellie walking through the door from the outside so that we could cut from that, to her walking through the door on the inside. The boys then turned up and we did more shots of Ellie walking through the door on the inside and also slumping down to the floor before the phone rings. We had to do this scene a few times as we werren't too happy with the angles each time and Rob came up with the idea that she should put down her bag as she got through the door.
We then needed to film the phone as it rang, yet I thought we should do it from a range of shots and therefore thought we should do it through the staircase and from a separate angle of her crawling to the phone to pick it up.
After these were done we needed to film Ellie actually answering the phone, I had the idea of Aidan actually ringing the phone and breathing down it, but it could not be heard on the film and therefore we needed to do a voice over after we had the right shot of Ellie answering the phone and a close-up of the handset to ensure that when we came to editing we would be able to show the voice over.
Filming was then finished and all we needed to do was edit it all into the finale that we wanted.
Sunday, 21 March 2010
Final Edit First Draft
Our first edit wasn't as good as I had wanted it to be. We were in a bit of a rush with the sound and therefore it hasn't really given off the effect I wanted it to. I now realise that we need some sound when the girl is walking through the field. Something eery and edgy to make it seem as though she is in a dark and bad place. Hopefully this will make it seem more like a thriller rather than just a girl walking through a field.
I also think that our flashbacks might need to be longer as I asked someone who had watched it what they thought and they felt like they didn't know 100% what was going on and if I had actually asked them what was in the flashbacks, they wouldn't have known.
This isn't a good thing and therefore means we need to either blur the flashbacks to make them stand out a bit more, or make them a bit longer.
Saturday, 20 March 2010
Sound lesson.
Rob and Aidan have been looking for sound to go over our flashbacks for a while now and he finally came up with a good beat after his brother showed him how to mix it.
Once we had all listened to it and given our approval, we dove into putting the backing track to the flash backs.
We wanted to make sure that it sounded as though the music was coming from downstairs at the 'house party' and therefore wanted it to be slightly quiet and muffled.
There is one part of the music that Rob thought would be good to put behind the rape scene as it has a gunshot in it, so did.
Seeing as our deadline was the Friday we needed to make sure we had the sound in that was completely necessary, being the sound of the bass music on the flashbacks.
Once this was done we only now needed the titles.
We had already decided that Rob would be producer because he was pretty much in control of the editing, we just all put in our ideas and told him what we preferred to what we didn't and he knew how to work the programme. We also decided that I would be director because when on set I was in control of how everything was done and which shots needed to be taken and where about they needed to be. We decided that Aidan would be a co-producer seeing as he had been pretty close with Rob in the editing stages. And we finally chose Sarah to be our manager or research and planning seeing as she wrote up all of the storyboards and also did the shots list. Yet, we may change that to her being the manager of Screenplay.
The name of our production 'company' came from all of our first letters of first names. This then spelt out 'CARS' and this is therefore where our first title name came from. Putting 'Fast' in front of it just made it have a slightly better ring to it.
I also asked Rob if he could bring in the production title as though a car was coming onto the screen and then stopping. Everyone agreed with this idea and then Rob decided he wanted three racing stripes which then fade to make it relevant to our 'FAST CARS' title.
I then suggested that we have the same type of movement within our named titles to make it look as though our titles were also moving. Rob liked the idea of rolling titles but it seemed to me as though they were a bit too 'credit-like' and therefore having them 'crawl' to the left or right in sequence made them look a bit different to anything else. We chose a white colour font and capitals with the same font as in the production title to make it continuous and stand out from the scenes they would be on top of.
Once we had all listened to it and given our approval, we dove into putting the backing track to the flash backs.
We wanted to make sure that it sounded as though the music was coming from downstairs at the 'house party' and therefore wanted it to be slightly quiet and muffled.
There is one part of the music that Rob thought would be good to put behind the rape scene as it has a gunshot in it, so did.
Seeing as our deadline was the Friday we needed to make sure we had the sound in that was completely necessary, being the sound of the bass music on the flashbacks.
Once this was done we only now needed the titles.
We had already decided that Rob would be producer because he was pretty much in control of the editing, we just all put in our ideas and told him what we preferred to what we didn't and he knew how to work the programme. We also decided that I would be director because when on set I was in control of how everything was done and which shots needed to be taken and where about they needed to be. We decided that Aidan would be a co-producer seeing as he had been pretty close with Rob in the editing stages. And we finally chose Sarah to be our manager or research and planning seeing as she wrote up all of the storyboards and also did the shots list. Yet, we may change that to her being the manager of Screenplay.
The name of our production 'company' came from all of our first letters of first names. This then spelt out 'CARS' and this is therefore where our first title name came from. Putting 'Fast' in front of it just made it have a slightly better ring to it.
I also asked Rob if he could bring in the production title as though a car was coming onto the screen and then stopping. Everyone agreed with this idea and then Rob decided he wanted three racing stripes which then fade to make it relevant to our 'FAST CARS' title.
I then suggested that we have the same type of movement within our named titles to make it look as though our titles were also moving. Rob liked the idea of rolling titles but it seemed to me as though they were a bit too 'credit-like' and therefore having them 'crawl' to the left or right in sequence made them look a bit different to anything else. We chose a white colour font and capitals with the same font as in the production title to make it continuous and stand out from the scenes they would be on top of.
Monday, 15 March 2010
Sound lesson.
In our Thursday lesson we decided to move onto sound.
But seeing as we cant all do this and only had two headphones, Rob and Aidan look ed through some Youtube clips as Sarah and I looked through the examining criteria for our blogs.
By highlighting it I could see where I was going wrong and the fact that we had missed out our risk assessment and will have to go back and do it again.
But seeing as we cant all do this and only had two headphones, Rob and Aidan look ed through some Youtube clips as Sarah and I looked through the examining criteria for our blogs.
By highlighting it I could see where I was going wrong and the fact that we had missed out our risk assessment and will have to go back and do it again.
Second lesson of final piece editing.
Our second lesson of editing went quite well. Seeing as we had all of our filming now done, we could put all of our cuts and edits in to make it just how we wanted it.
We all sat round the computer, and seeing as Rob knows how to actually use the programme it was easier for him to just press the buttons as we all put in our opinions.
We knew that we wanted our flashbacks to be sudden and shocking and therefore needed to make sure that our dissolves and switches to the flashbacks portrayed this. We first tried dissolves and dips to black, but none of us really thought it was enough to get across the idea that the character was just thinking back to the night in hand and realising how bad it was as it all came back to her.
We then found a dip to white and thought that was better than the black as it gave more of a shocking effect. After putting these in where we wanted as Ellie walked through the fields and then thought of the night before, I didn't think it was a good idea for us to have the flashbacks and the real-time the same colour. So, instead I wanted it sort of a dark blue to make it murky and as though it stood out. Yet Rob told me we couldn't do that so we settled with black and white which made it stand out anyway.
After the lesson we still had a bit to do but were pleased with how far we got and just need to decide on a few more edits as to where they will go and also choose sound for the backing of the flashbacks.
We all sat round the computer, and seeing as Rob knows how to actually use the programme it was easier for him to just press the buttons as we all put in our opinions.
We knew that we wanted our flashbacks to be sudden and shocking and therefore needed to make sure that our dissolves and switches to the flashbacks portrayed this. We first tried dissolves and dips to black, but none of us really thought it was enough to get across the idea that the character was just thinking back to the night in hand and realising how bad it was as it all came back to her.
We then found a dip to white and thought that was better than the black as it gave more of a shocking effect. After putting these in where we wanted as Ellie walked through the fields and then thought of the night before, I didn't think it was a good idea for us to have the flashbacks and the real-time the same colour. So, instead I wanted it sort of a dark blue to make it murky and as though it stood out. Yet Rob told me we couldn't do that so we settled with black and white which made it stand out anyway.
After the lesson we still had a bit to do but were pleased with how far we got and just need to decide on a few more edits as to where they will go and also choose sound for the backing of the flashbacks.
Monday, 8 March 2010
Sunday final filming.
Today was the day in which we were to finish off our filming.
Because we decided that we didn't want to do all the filming in one day, we started again on the sunday night, also as we needed to make sure that no light was coming through the curtains to enable it to look as though it was a night time house party. We asked Jake Frost to be our rapist, and therefore had the whole cast at my house.
Before the rest of the cast/crew actually got to my house and it was only me, Elle (main actress) and Sarah and so we decided to do the first scene on our own. This was the scene of Ellie actually gagging in the sink and then taking a swig of her wine.
The rest of the crew/cast then turned up and we got on with the rest of the filming that we needed to do. We started with a shot of Ellie's feet and her holding her bottle of wine across the edge of the bed and then Jake's (our actor) feet moving in closer to Ellie's feet. We had to do this a couple of times to make absolutely sure that we had the right walk and got the right amount of footwork in the scene.
The next shot was going to be the one in which Ellie gets pushed onto the bed in a harsh way and then starts to scramble away as if she knows what is going to happen to her. This again took a few shots because most of the pushes weren't hard enough and we really needed to get the perfect shot.
The third shot was the one in which the rapist gets on top of the victim, Jake didn't really grasp how he had to do it properly the first time, but after a few shots we got what we needed.
Jake then needed to pull Ellie back to him and smother her with a pillow to get the effect of him trying to 'shut her up' this again took a few shots because we wanted it to be as harsh as possible to give a nasty effect. In the end we got it exactly how we wanted it, Ellie really struggling and Jake putting in a lot of force.
We then needed a shot of Ellie's tights being ripped because we had already shot her walking home in the morning and her tights are ripped all over, meaning there needed to be a reason for it. The tights were quite hard to rip and I had to do it with a key in the first place, so it made a bit difficult for Jake to rip them, but in the end we got there.
We then needed Ellie to take her tights off because we realised that rape wouldn't be able to occur if tights were on. So she took them off and Sarah hung them on a nearby stand to ensure that they were still seen by the audience in the next shot.
This shot was of Ellie then just lying on the bed, distraught and alone, whilst then panning towards Jake doing his trousers up and walking off scene. This only needed one shot as everyone said my pan was okay.
We then wanted a shot of Jake walking out of the door from one angle, behind him, and then another angle from Ellie's point of view lying on the bed, shot by Sarah.
In the end I was pretty happy with the work we did and am happy that we got a few more different shots than we did in our first day of shooting.
Because we decided that we didn't want to do all the filming in one day, we started again on the sunday night, also as we needed to make sure that no light was coming through the curtains to enable it to look as though it was a night time house party. We asked Jake Frost to be our rapist, and therefore had the whole cast at my house.
Before the rest of the cast/crew actually got to my house and it was only me, Elle (main actress) and Sarah and so we decided to do the first scene on our own. This was the scene of Ellie actually gagging in the sink and then taking a swig of her wine.
The rest of the crew/cast then turned up and we got on with the rest of the filming that we needed to do. We started with a shot of Ellie's feet and her holding her bottle of wine across the edge of the bed and then Jake's (our actor) feet moving in closer to Ellie's feet. We had to do this a couple of times to make absolutely sure that we had the right walk and got the right amount of footwork in the scene.
The next shot was going to be the one in which Ellie gets pushed onto the bed in a harsh way and then starts to scramble away as if she knows what is going to happen to her. This again took a few shots because most of the pushes weren't hard enough and we really needed to get the perfect shot.
The third shot was the one in which the rapist gets on top of the victim, Jake didn't really grasp how he had to do it properly the first time, but after a few shots we got what we needed.
Jake then needed to pull Ellie back to him and smother her with a pillow to get the effect of him trying to 'shut her up' this again took a few shots because we wanted it to be as harsh as possible to give a nasty effect. In the end we got it exactly how we wanted it, Ellie really struggling and Jake putting in a lot of force.
We then needed a shot of Ellie's tights being ripped because we had already shot her walking home in the morning and her tights are ripped all over, meaning there needed to be a reason for it. The tights were quite hard to rip and I had to do it with a key in the first place, so it made a bit difficult for Jake to rip them, but in the end we got there.
We then needed Ellie to take her tights off because we realised that rape wouldn't be able to occur if tights were on. So she took them off and Sarah hung them on a nearby stand to ensure that they were still seen by the audience in the next shot.
This shot was of Ellie then just lying on the bed, distraught and alone, whilst then panning towards Jake doing his trousers up and walking off scene. This only needed one shot as everyone said my pan was okay.
We then wanted a shot of Jake walking out of the door from one angle, behind him, and then another angle from Ellie's point of view lying on the bed, shot by Sarah.
In the end I was pretty happy with the work we did and am happy that we got a few more different shots than we did in our first day of shooting.
Wednesday, 3 March 2010
First lesson of final piece editing.
Seeing as we haven't actually filmed our entire piece yet, we didn't really know how much editing there was for us to do.
So we decided to capture what we had done off our tape anyway and therefore would be able to look at our work in detail to make sure that we had the right shots for the whole piece in the end and also to see where about we either wanted the 'flashbacks' to go and how they would fit in.
We knew that it wasn't going to take all four of us to do this so Aidan and Sarah decided to go back to Chilwell fields with the camera and shoot some shots of the fields on their own to maybe fit in a few fast edits of trees and an empty field to really portray the loneliness of the surroundings the girl will walk through.
This didn't go too well as it was a very bright day and there was a lot of gleam on the shots as well as it not being very continuous on from out 6am dark morning in the rest of the film. We still haven't decided whether or not to use these shots but when we come to capturing it may edit them to be a bit darker and then see how they fit in.
This then left Rob and myself to start the editing. We had a major problem with actually starting the software for about the first hour of the lesson and therefore just had to wait for it to load and had to try it on three different computers to actually get it to work. When we eventually got there, Sarah and Aidan had come back from their filming and decided to join in.
We realised that there were a few errors as in one of the shots you could see me, and other shots we had left a few seconds before our actress actually started in case of bad timing. This then meant we had to edit down the first second of a few shots and also had to cut out the actresses head in one shot of the close up of the houses to make sure that the audience couldn't see that she had actually stopped.
This all worked out well and now we just need to do some more filming and put together our whole piece.
So we decided to capture what we had done off our tape anyway and therefore would be able to look at our work in detail to make sure that we had the right shots for the whole piece in the end and also to see where about we either wanted the 'flashbacks' to go and how they would fit in.
We knew that it wasn't going to take all four of us to do this so Aidan and Sarah decided to go back to Chilwell fields with the camera and shoot some shots of the fields on their own to maybe fit in a few fast edits of trees and an empty field to really portray the loneliness of the surroundings the girl will walk through.
This didn't go too well as it was a very bright day and there was a lot of gleam on the shots as well as it not being very continuous on from out 6am dark morning in the rest of the film. We still haven't decided whether or not to use these shots but when we come to capturing it may edit them to be a bit darker and then see how they fit in.
This then left Rob and myself to start the editing. We had a major problem with actually starting the software for about the first hour of the lesson and therefore just had to wait for it to load and had to try it on three different computers to actually get it to work. When we eventually got there, Sarah and Aidan had come back from their filming and decided to join in.
We realised that there were a few errors as in one of the shots you could see me, and other shots we had left a few seconds before our actress actually started in case of bad timing. This then meant we had to edit down the first second of a few shots and also had to cut out the actresses head in one shot of the close up of the houses to make sure that the audience couldn't see that she had actually stopped.
This all worked out well and now we just need to do some more filming and put together our whole piece.
Sunday, 28 February 2010
First day of final piece filming.
Yesterday was our groups first day of filming for our final piece. Seeing as we had already decided we were going to film at Chilwell fields, that's where we met.
We needed the early morning due and feel for the scenes as our main character is supposed to be walking home from a party in the morning after the night before.
We got to the set at about six am to make sure everyone was there and see what it would look like to film at that time. It seemed that we didn't actually get round to filming until about 7am because when we turned the camera on earlier and got it into the position we wanted it, the lighting made it grainy and it still seemed a bit too dark.
So when we finally got to getting the right lighting, we started to film.
First of all though I needed to make sure that our main girl's costume was right and she needed a few minutes to get a little bit upset to allow her make-up to run that bit more and look a more authentic. By ripping different holes in her purple tights and doing a jacket and shoe swap, we finally got her to look just how we wanted.
Our first scene was of her walking across the bridge within the field, which went okay and didn't need re-taking. We then had another close-up shot of just her legs with her ripped tights. By then moving on we did quite well in getting a high-angle shot of her just walking around a corner, a low angle shot of her again walking and another close up shot of her face whilst she was walking.
I was watching over Rob as he did the camera work and Sarah made sure Ellie (our main actress) understood exactly what she was doing. I wanted to really make sure that all of our shots would be good enough to edit together and make good use of in joint with the flashback shots that we will soon film.
When we got off the field, Rob had the good idea of doing a close up shot of Ellie's high heels going through a puddle, giving the sequence a nice bit of effect, rather than just having the whole of her walking in each shot.
By then coming completely off the fields, I wanted a shot of Ellie walking across the road, hurrying. We did this shot but then Rob and Sarah came up with the idea of Rob standing in a bus shelter and Ellie running past him and him asking her if she was okay and her completely ignoring him. I really liked this idea too. After shooting that twice, we then needed a shot of Ellie on the pavement after the encounter looking more upset due to the fact that someone had just brought up how she was feeling.
After shooting all of that we then needed to get back to my house to shoot Ellie getting home and into her house. We all toyed with which shots would do the scene justice and decided in the end that we would have a long shot of her walking up the house's drive and then fumbling in her bag, which would then cut to a close up of her fumbling in her bag for her keys, then to a close up of the keys in the door being unlocked, then to someone coming up behind her and putting their hand on her shoulder and then finally to her turning round and seeing nothing.
The whole day was pretty successful, aside from the fact that I'm still not too sure if we got enough shots of every scene enough and might need to go back and see if we did it well enough to be able to put it together or not when we edit. Our next filming session (of the flashbacks) will be next Saturday when everyone can get together again.
We needed the early morning due and feel for the scenes as our main character is supposed to be walking home from a party in the morning after the night before.
We got to the set at about six am to make sure everyone was there and see what it would look like to film at that time. It seemed that we didn't actually get round to filming until about 7am because when we turned the camera on earlier and got it into the position we wanted it, the lighting made it grainy and it still seemed a bit too dark.
So when we finally got to getting the right lighting, we started to film.
First of all though I needed to make sure that our main girl's costume was right and she needed a few minutes to get a little bit upset to allow her make-up to run that bit more and look a more authentic. By ripping different holes in her purple tights and doing a jacket and shoe swap, we finally got her to look just how we wanted.
Our first scene was of her walking across the bridge within the field, which went okay and didn't need re-taking. We then had another close-up shot of just her legs with her ripped tights. By then moving on we did quite well in getting a high-angle shot of her just walking around a corner, a low angle shot of her again walking and another close up shot of her face whilst she was walking.
I was watching over Rob as he did the camera work and Sarah made sure Ellie (our main actress) understood exactly what she was doing. I wanted to really make sure that all of our shots would be good enough to edit together and make good use of in joint with the flashback shots that we will soon film.
When we got off the field, Rob had the good idea of doing a close up shot of Ellie's high heels going through a puddle, giving the sequence a nice bit of effect, rather than just having the whole of her walking in each shot.
By then coming completely off the fields, I wanted a shot of Ellie walking across the road, hurrying. We did this shot but then Rob and Sarah came up with the idea of Rob standing in a bus shelter and Ellie running past him and him asking her if she was okay and her completely ignoring him. I really liked this idea too. After shooting that twice, we then needed a shot of Ellie on the pavement after the encounter looking more upset due to the fact that someone had just brought up how she was feeling.
After shooting all of that we then needed to get back to my house to shoot Ellie getting home and into her house. We all toyed with which shots would do the scene justice and decided in the end that we would have a long shot of her walking up the house's drive and then fumbling in her bag, which would then cut to a close up of her fumbling in her bag for her keys, then to a close up of the keys in the door being unlocked, then to someone coming up behind her and putting their hand on her shoulder and then finally to her turning round and seeing nothing.
The whole day was pretty successful, aside from the fact that I'm still not too sure if we got enough shots of every scene enough and might need to go back and see if we did it well enough to be able to put it together or not when we edit. Our next filming session (of the flashbacks) will be next Saturday when everyone can get together again.
Thursday, 25 February 2010
Shots planning.
Sarah made sure that we were completely ready for Saturday by having a complete plan or which shots are going in which order. This will really help us keep to a rota and make sure we get absolutely ever shot in during our filming.
Field Shots
1. Across the bridge, long shot of girl walking towards bridge.
2. Close up of girls legs walking across the bridge.
3. Long low angle shot of girl walking (down path)
4. Side close up of girl crying, still walking down path, near gap leading to next field.
5. Close up on ripped tights straight on, girl walking to camera.
6. Low angle long side shot panning as girl walks, showing street.
7. Girl walks past camera to front door, camera pans.
8. Mid shot of girl at her door, side mid-shot.
9. Close up of girl fumbling in her bag.
10. Hand held camera walking up behind girl.
11. Close up of girls head and shoulder, hand comes up behind her.
12. Close up of her turning around.
13. Pan, eye level, empty street.
Flashback Shots
1. Girl with bottle, drinking. Mid-shot side.
2. Girl feet to right of frame, guys feet come in from left side.
3. Girl being pushed onto bed, Mid-shot from side.
4. Girl lying down, guys crawls up and heads out of shot, Mid-shot of bodies.
5. Close up of her leg, guy rips tights. Hand slides in from top of frame.
6. Long shot eyeline match of door closing.
Field Shots
1. Across the bridge, long shot of girl walking towards bridge.
2. Close up of girls legs walking across the bridge.
3. Long low angle shot of girl walking (down path)
4. Side close up of girl crying, still walking down path, near gap leading to next field.
5. Close up on ripped tights straight on, girl walking to camera.
6. Low angle long side shot panning as girl walks, showing street.
7. Girl walks past camera to front door, camera pans.
8. Mid shot of girl at her door, side mid-shot.
9. Close up of girl fumbling in her bag.
10. Hand held camera walking up behind girl.
11. Close up of girls head and shoulder, hand comes up behind her.
12. Close up of her turning around.
13. Pan, eye level, empty street.
Flashback Shots
1. Girl with bottle, drinking. Mid-shot side.
2. Girl feet to right of frame, guys feet come in from left side.
3. Girl being pushed onto bed, Mid-shot from side.
4. Girl lying down, guys crawls up and heads out of shot, Mid-shot of bodies.
5. Close up of her leg, guy rips tights. Hand slides in from top of frame.
6. Long shot eyeline match of door closing.
Tuesday, 23 February 2010
First day of piece filming.
Today we realised that we actually had to start filming.
Because we hadn't actually got round to finding out whether or not our actors were able to do the film, or even made a plan of when we were going to film, it seemed we didn't have much to do.
In the end we decided that we would start filming on Saturday in the morning, as this was a time we could all do and the leading actress was up for it as well.
When we had all of that sorted we tried to figure out if there was any filming we could do without our actors. Yet, seeing as our main character is in 17 out of 19 shots, we had a bit of a set back.
After deliberating we all decided that we would go to Chilwell fields and take a few template shots of how the main girl would walk down the paths of the field and also had to make sure that the tripod would be set up properly with all the mud that surrounds the ground. It all worked out fine and we carried on walking down Chilwell fields and got to my house. Because we needed to have a shot of the front door, we decided that we would take some more template shots of me walking towards the door to see how it worked out. It went fine.
Aidan also took some pictures of my bedroom, as this was the place in which the raping would be. He also took pictures of the costume that I had chosen for the young girl. We didn't have the clothing of the rapist so will have to do that at another point.
Because we hadn't actually got round to finding out whether or not our actors were able to do the film, or even made a plan of when we were going to film, it seemed we didn't have much to do.
In the end we decided that we would start filming on Saturday in the morning, as this was a time we could all do and the leading actress was up for it as well.
When we had all of that sorted we tried to figure out if there was any filming we could do without our actors. Yet, seeing as our main character is in 17 out of 19 shots, we had a bit of a set back.
After deliberating we all decided that we would go to Chilwell fields and take a few template shots of how the main girl would walk down the paths of the field and also had to make sure that the tripod would be set up properly with all the mud that surrounds the ground. It all worked out fine and we carried on walking down Chilwell fields and got to my house. Because we needed to have a shot of the front door, we decided that we would take some more template shots of me walking towards the door to see how it worked out. It went fine.
Aidan also took some pictures of my bedroom, as this was the place in which the raping would be. He also took pictures of the costume that I had chosen for the young girl. We didn't have the clothing of the rapist so will have to do that at another point.
Questionnaire
Another part of our planning would be the questionnaire. Sarah asked 10 individual college students what they though would make a great thriller, and here are the answers:
1. Do you prefer fast pace or slow for a thriller?
Fast – 4
Slow –6
2. Would you prefer lots of dialogue or less
Lots of dialogue - 3
Not so much - 7
3. Would you prefer a loud soundtrack behind the film?
Yes – 6
No - 4
4. Male or Female lead?
Male – 2
Female – 8
5. Would you prefer a large or small cast?
Large –3
Small –7
6. Would you have a mostly dark or light environment?
Dark –9
Light – 1
7. Which font do you prefer for opening credits?
Century Gothic - 1
Monotype Corsiva - 8
Papyrus -
Segoe Script - 1
Trebuchet MS -
8. Do you prefer opening titles to be?
Bold - 2
Underlined - 1
Italic - 5
Mix - 2
9. Where would you prefer it to be set?
Forest - 2
House -
Town – 1
Field - 3
Abandoned places – 4
10. How long would you prefer each credit to be on?
3 Seconds - 6
5 Seconds - 3
5+ Seconds - 1
Using this information, our film ideally should look like this:
1. Do you prefer fast pace or slow for a thriller?
Fast – 4
Slow –6
2. Would you prefer lots of dialogue or less
Lots of dialogue - 3
Not so much - 7
3. Would you prefer a loud soundtrack behind the film?
Yes – 6
No - 4
4. Male or Female lead?
Male – 2
Female – 8
5. Would you prefer a large or small cast?
Large –3
Small –7
6. Would you have a mostly dark or light environment?
Dark –9
Light – 1
7. Which font do you prefer for opening credits?
Century Gothic - 1
Monotype Corsiva - 8
Papyrus -
Segoe Script - 1
Trebuchet MS -
8. Do you prefer opening titles to be?
Bold - 2
Underlined - 1
Italic - 5
Mix - 2
9. Where would you prefer it to be set?
Forest - 2
House -
Town – 1
Field - 3
Abandoned places – 4
10. How long would you prefer each credit to be on?
3 Seconds - 6
5 Seconds - 3
5+ Seconds - 1
Using this information, our film ideally should look like this:
Sunday, 21 February 2010
More research
Characters
As our film is based around one woman being raped, it is more than likely that she does not have any control of what is going to happen throughout the film and is very vulnerable. There are many films around that portray the same thing we are trying to. For example: 'Last house on the left'
Last house on the left
The main girl in the story is completely vulnerable. There seems there is nothing she can do to get away from the thrilling mass murderer that seems to be after her. The people around her also pretty vulnerable (her friends) and cannot do anything to help her. This is exactly the same thing that we are trying to capture in our film and want to make sure that the girl is just as helpless as the one in this movie.
Also the killer in 'The last house on the left' seems to be pretty dark, dangerous and disturbed. This is also the exact same thing that we are looking for in our film as we want our rapist to be unknown yet to have make such an effect on the young girl that there is no going back for her. Just as there isn't for Mary (Monica Potter).
As our film is based around one woman being raped, it is more than likely that she does not have any control of what is going to happen throughout the film and is very vulnerable. There are many films around that portray the same thing we are trying to. For example: 'Last house on the left'
Last house on the left
The main girl in the story is completely vulnerable. There seems there is nothing she can do to get away from the thrilling mass murderer that seems to be after her. The people around her also pretty vulnerable (her friends) and cannot do anything to help her. This is exactly the same thing that we are trying to capture in our film and want to make sure that the girl is just as helpless as the one in this movie.
Also the killer in 'The last house on the left' seems to be pretty dark, dangerous and disturbed. This is also the exact same thing that we are looking for in our film as we want our rapist to be unknown yet to have make such an effect on the young girl that there is no going back for her. Just as there isn't for Mary (Monica Potter).
Saturday, 20 February 2010
Costume, location, props and actors.
I have been assigned the role of choosing the costumes for our film.
Sarah has been put on props and Aidan and Rob have been assigned location.
Seeing as the film is supposed to be a thriller and quite dark and ominous, it seems as though we will need to put our characters in clothing that stand out as sad/disturbed.
Main character: Teenage (16/17) girl. Medium height, curvy.
- A short tight body con skirt.
- A tight blank vest top.
- Black fish net tights?
- Coloured high heels?
- White Handbag.
- Blue layered thin jacket.
- Make-up: Pale face with with smudged dark red lipstick, black mascara smudged around eyes and a few streams down the face with a slight hint of coloured eye shadow.
We wanted this costume and make-up to make sure that the young girl looks like she has just been to a party, yet at the same time looks as though she has had a rough night the night before. By having ripped tights it looks as though the young girl has been in some sort of trouble and by matching this with running make-up and a pale face, she will look upset and scared.
Elle Pemberton - 17.
Elle is a part of an acting group named Rama and therefore I thought she would be a good actress for our piece. She has been a friend of mine for a while and I knew I could trust and rely on her. Also, her experience was a great advantage for us.
Rapist: Older guy (19/20). Medium height, slight muscle.
- Dark skinny-ish jeans.
- Green t-shirt.
- Large Nike trainers.
- Longish dark hair.
Jake Frost - 17.
Jake is doing A level Drama at George Spencer College. Because he also has experience and is a good friend of mine, Rob's and Aidan's it was easy for us to be able to rely on him and also to be able to easily ask him to help us out.
Location
Aidan and Rob went out during the lesson last week and took pictures of Chilwell fields (where the main character will walk after she has been raped) to see which route would be best for us to film on.
Also in this lesson, Sarah put together a storyboard that Rob could put together a video with the shots in it:
Chilwell fields is the best place for us to film our actress walking home because it is murky and muddy and therefore matches the mood. The girl is supposed to have been messed about and feel terrible which is how the surroundings will look as they have little grass and look as though they haven't been tended to in a while.
Props
We also need just a few props for our film. There aren't very many because it isn't the props that actually explains how the film works out, it's more the answers.
Therefore we will only need:
- Keys: for when Ellie will open her front door to get home and feels a hand on her shoulder.
- Bottle: for when Ellie takes a swig in a flashback to show the audience that she had been drinking and could be quite drunk.
- Bag: for Ellie to search through to find her keys when she gets to her front door and also just generally because teenagers carry handbags.
- Tights: not just costume as it is a prop for one of the scenes in the piece when Ellie takes her tights off just after she has been raped.
Sarah has been put on props and Aidan and Rob have been assigned location.
Seeing as the film is supposed to be a thriller and quite dark and ominous, it seems as though we will need to put our characters in clothing that stand out as sad/disturbed.
Main character: Teenage (16/17) girl. Medium height, curvy.
- A short tight body con skirt.
- A tight blank vest top.
- Black fish net tights?
- Coloured high heels?
- White Handbag.
- Blue layered thin jacket.
- Make-up: Pale face with with smudged dark red lipstick, black mascara smudged around eyes and a few streams down the face with a slight hint of coloured eye shadow.
We wanted this costume and make-up to make sure that the young girl looks like she has just been to a party, yet at the same time looks as though she has had a rough night the night before. By having ripped tights it looks as though the young girl has been in some sort of trouble and by matching this with running make-up and a pale face, she will look upset and scared.
Elle Pemberton - 17.
Elle is a part of an acting group named Rama and therefore I thought she would be a good actress for our piece. She has been a friend of mine for a while and I knew I could trust and rely on her. Also, her experience was a great advantage for us.
Rapist: Older guy (19/20). Medium height, slight muscle.
- Dark skinny-ish jeans.
- Green t-shirt.
- Large Nike trainers.
- Longish dark hair.
Jake Frost - 17.
Jake is doing A level Drama at George Spencer College. Because he also has experience and is a good friend of mine, Rob's and Aidan's it was easy for us to be able to rely on him and also to be able to easily ask him to help us out.
Location
Aidan and Rob went out during the lesson last week and took pictures of Chilwell fields (where the main character will walk after she has been raped) to see which route would be best for us to film on.
Also in this lesson, Sarah put together a storyboard that Rob could put together a video with the shots in it:
Chilwell fields is the best place for us to film our actress walking home because it is murky and muddy and therefore matches the mood. The girl is supposed to have been messed about and feel terrible which is how the surroundings will look as they have little grass and look as though they haven't been tended to in a while.
Props
We also need just a few props for our film. There aren't very many because it isn't the props that actually explains how the film works out, it's more the answers.
Therefore we will only need:
- Keys: for when Ellie will open her front door to get home and feels a hand on her shoulder.
- Bottle: for when Ellie takes a swig in a flashback to show the audience that she had been drinking and could be quite drunk.
- Bag: for Ellie to search through to find her keys when she gets to her front door and also just generally because teenagers carry handbags.
- Tights: not just costume as it is a prop for one of the scenes in the piece when Ellie takes her tights off just after she has been raped.
Friday, 12 February 2010
Analysing Opening Sequences
Panic Room Opening Sequence
Editing
The cuts from each title to the next give the audience a feel of how the film is going to be jumpy and sly from the start. By cutting slowly from one tiotle to another in a different place makes the audience understand that the film is going to carry a lot of suspense throughout.
Also the edits of different parts of NYC allow the audience to get different aspects of the city and show them exactly where the film is going to be based. These edits do not only include the buildings in the city but also the sidewalks and the traffic which allows the audience to really get the feel of the big busy city.
Also by editing the titles into big blocked fonts which stand out make it obvious to the audience that the film is not going to be a happy one and it is quite serious, catching the audience's attention.
Also the edit from the director's title to the trees in NYC make the audience want to read on as they have no idea where the camera and storyline is going.
Mise-en-scene
The only real location that can be scene throughout the opening sequence of panic room is New York and its buildings alongside its huge amount of traffic. This allows the audience to place in their mind where exactly the main location for the film will be. Which, in this case, is New York City.
We can also see when the camera is concentrated on the two women right at the end of the sequence that they are both wearing quite upper class clothing and their movement is quick and aggitated which allows the audience to realise that they must be in a rush and must also be quite well off. The coat one of the women is wearing has fur on it and therefore represents someone that could potentially have a lot of money or at least know someone else with a lot of money.
Camera
The camera pans on a few of the opening sequence titles creates quite a sly and eery atmosphere. By coming in from one side it makes the audience want to read the title even more as they can only see half of the words on the screen and therefore make them more interested.
Also when the opening titles are over, the camera goes straight into a shot of the trees which then tilts down to two women walking through the crowded streets of NYC. By tilting slowly downwards, it creates a tiny bit of suspense for the audience and grabs their attention as they want to see who is talking and what they are doing.
Sound
The sound is the biggest part in the opening sequence. Because the music is so slow and sinister, it seems like something is going to happen that will shock or surprise the audience. It also really keeps the audience's mind intact as it makes them want to know why the music is so slow and dark, what is going to happen that makes it that way?
Also after the last title sequence we hear a woman talking, yet the audience cannot see who she is or what she looks like. This then means the audience is inatct and wonders what they are talking about and what is going to happen next.
No Country for Old Men Opening Sequence
Editing
The only real editing that can be shown in the opening sequence of No Country for Old Men is from one scenic picture to another. The edits are fast after allowing the audience to look at the location for around 5 seconds. By doing so it allows the start of the film to grasp a slow yet twisted and slightly fast-paced feel.
The audience can also tell from the straight cut to the gas tank from the criminal that this must have something to do with the crime he has committed.
Mise-en-scene
As can be seen from the pictures of the location over and over again, the film is obviously going to be set in some sort of hot, desert country. This can be told by the balls of yarn and the yellow-ish sandy ground. The location also looks quite run down due to the barbwire fences and just one electricity source. Also when the road is seen and there is only one car (the police car) on the road, it allows the audience to see that there really is no people for miles around.
The costumes used in the first sequence also allows the audience to see that the man getting arrested is just a normal man, and leads us on to wonder why he is being arrested if he doesn't really look like a criminal.
The props used (being the gas tank) also confuses the audience into wanting to watch on as they want to know why that sort of prop would be being used and how it relates to the story.
Camera
Throughout the sequence the camera doesn't really move too much. It is obviously giving the audience a feel of a slow paced film in which the camera likes to concentrate on one thing at a time. From seeing the camera movements in the first sequence the audience can tell that the film is not going to be a fast-paced action film.
Yet, when the criminal is being placed into the car, a medium-shot is used so that the audience can tell the criminal is deemed to be a white male. This makes them wonder more why such an ordinary looking man would be in such trouble.
Also the close-up on the gas tank leans the audience more into wondering why the gas tank would be there and what it has to do with the rest of the storyline.
Sound
The only sound actually used throughout the sequence is the one of the male voice. Because the voice is so slow and deep it allows the audience to feel slightly vulnerable. The voice takes over the scenes and makes the audience feel much smaller as they cannot see who is actually talking and do not yet know the damage this voice could cause. By overlapping this voice with the scenic pictures, it makes the audience very confused to where exactly the film is going and why these two things are being merged together, hence making them want to watch on. Also the things the voice talks of are dark and misunderstood. Without having any background to why this person is saying these things, the audience want to know more about why, where and how.
Editing
The cuts from each title to the next give the audience a feel of how the film is going to be jumpy and sly from the start. By cutting slowly from one tiotle to another in a different place makes the audience understand that the film is going to carry a lot of suspense throughout.
Also the edits of different parts of NYC allow the audience to get different aspects of the city and show them exactly where the film is going to be based. These edits do not only include the buildings in the city but also the sidewalks and the traffic which allows the audience to really get the feel of the big busy city.
Also by editing the titles into big blocked fonts which stand out make it obvious to the audience that the film is not going to be a happy one and it is quite serious, catching the audience's attention.
Also the edit from the director's title to the trees in NYC make the audience want to read on as they have no idea where the camera and storyline is going.
Mise-en-scene
The only real location that can be scene throughout the opening sequence of panic room is New York and its buildings alongside its huge amount of traffic. This allows the audience to place in their mind where exactly the main location for the film will be. Which, in this case, is New York City.
We can also see when the camera is concentrated on the two women right at the end of the sequence that they are both wearing quite upper class clothing and their movement is quick and aggitated which allows the audience to realise that they must be in a rush and must also be quite well off. The coat one of the women is wearing has fur on it and therefore represents someone that could potentially have a lot of money or at least know someone else with a lot of money.
Camera
The camera pans on a few of the opening sequence titles creates quite a sly and eery atmosphere. By coming in from one side it makes the audience want to read the title even more as they can only see half of the words on the screen and therefore make them more interested.
Also when the opening titles are over, the camera goes straight into a shot of the trees which then tilts down to two women walking through the crowded streets of NYC. By tilting slowly downwards, it creates a tiny bit of suspense for the audience and grabs their attention as they want to see who is talking and what they are doing.
Sound
The sound is the biggest part in the opening sequence. Because the music is so slow and sinister, it seems like something is going to happen that will shock or surprise the audience. It also really keeps the audience's mind intact as it makes them want to know why the music is so slow and dark, what is going to happen that makes it that way?
Also after the last title sequence we hear a woman talking, yet the audience cannot see who she is or what she looks like. This then means the audience is inatct and wonders what they are talking about and what is going to happen next.
No Country for Old Men Opening Sequence
Editing
The only real editing that can be shown in the opening sequence of No Country for Old Men is from one scenic picture to another. The edits are fast after allowing the audience to look at the location for around 5 seconds. By doing so it allows the start of the film to grasp a slow yet twisted and slightly fast-paced feel.
The audience can also tell from the straight cut to the gas tank from the criminal that this must have something to do with the crime he has committed.
Mise-en-scene
As can be seen from the pictures of the location over and over again, the film is obviously going to be set in some sort of hot, desert country. This can be told by the balls of yarn and the yellow-ish sandy ground. The location also looks quite run down due to the barbwire fences and just one electricity source. Also when the road is seen and there is only one car (the police car) on the road, it allows the audience to see that there really is no people for miles around.
The costumes used in the first sequence also allows the audience to see that the man getting arrested is just a normal man, and leads us on to wonder why he is being arrested if he doesn't really look like a criminal.
The props used (being the gas tank) also confuses the audience into wanting to watch on as they want to know why that sort of prop would be being used and how it relates to the story.
Camera
Throughout the sequence the camera doesn't really move too much. It is obviously giving the audience a feel of a slow paced film in which the camera likes to concentrate on one thing at a time. From seeing the camera movements in the first sequence the audience can tell that the film is not going to be a fast-paced action film.
Yet, when the criminal is being placed into the car, a medium-shot is used so that the audience can tell the criminal is deemed to be a white male. This makes them wonder more why such an ordinary looking man would be in such trouble.
Also the close-up on the gas tank leans the audience more into wondering why the gas tank would be there and what it has to do with the rest of the storyline.
Sound
The only sound actually used throughout the sequence is the one of the male voice. Because the voice is so slow and deep it allows the audience to feel slightly vulnerable. The voice takes over the scenes and makes the audience feel much smaller as they cannot see who is actually talking and do not yet know the damage this voice could cause. By overlapping this voice with the scenic pictures, it makes the audience very confused to where exactly the film is going and why these two things are being merged together, hence making them want to watch on. Also the things the voice talks of are dark and misunderstood. Without having any background to why this person is saying these things, the audience want to know more about why, where and how.
Thursday, 11 February 2010
Choosing groups - 9/2/10
Today's lesson involved us all choosing the groups we wanted to be in when filming and editing our first piece of real Media AS coursework.
I knew I had to chose well as Media is a course I really want to do well in.
Because Sarah and I had worked so closely and very well in our preliminary work, we decided that we were going to work together again. As well as Sarah I already knew when starting the course that I wanted to work with both Rob Mills and Aidan Foster as we are good friends anyway.
Once we had got into our groups and again discussed exactly what sort of mood and feelings that are involved with a thriller film, we needed to get on with storyboarding.
Sarah firstly had the idea of a young teenager in a house party drinking and having a good time with her friends then turning ugly. I did like this idea but couldn't really see how we were going to get around setting a party up and the idea of it all just sort of confused me. I still wanted the idea of a teenage thriller, and alcohol possibly being the base of the thrill in the film, but wasn't sure what.
I then thought about the idea of rape. We all agreed on this and started to think of ideas of how to add it into our thriller. After much deliberation we decided that we would have a girl walking in the night time down chilwell fields (near our college) looking tired with ripped tights and messed up hair, crying. She would then have flashbacks every few minutes to what had happened previously. Yet, because the flashbacks would be so short and snappy... the audience would only get a small realisation of what was really happening.
Our teacher then discussed our plans with us. It turned out that it wouldn't be the best idea for us to film in the night time as the outlines of the characters would not be as crisp as they would be in day light.
Rob then came up with the idea that we shot the night time scenes in the early morning (around 5am) to make it look as though the young girl was coming home from a party that she had been raped at. This sounded good to me and we all agreed.
We then started on the storyboard, yet hadn't actually drawn any pictures so realised we needed to start again in the next lesson.
I knew I had to chose well as Media is a course I really want to do well in.
Because Sarah and I had worked so closely and very well in our preliminary work, we decided that we were going to work together again. As well as Sarah I already knew when starting the course that I wanted to work with both Rob Mills and Aidan Foster as we are good friends anyway.
Once we had got into our groups and again discussed exactly what sort of mood and feelings that are involved with a thriller film, we needed to get on with storyboarding.
Sarah firstly had the idea of a young teenager in a house party drinking and having a good time with her friends then turning ugly. I did like this idea but couldn't really see how we were going to get around setting a party up and the idea of it all just sort of confused me. I still wanted the idea of a teenage thriller, and alcohol possibly being the base of the thrill in the film, but wasn't sure what.
I then thought about the idea of rape. We all agreed on this and started to think of ideas of how to add it into our thriller. After much deliberation we decided that we would have a girl walking in the night time down chilwell fields (near our college) looking tired with ripped tights and messed up hair, crying. She would then have flashbacks every few minutes to what had happened previously. Yet, because the flashbacks would be so short and snappy... the audience would only get a small realisation of what was really happening.
Our teacher then discussed our plans with us. It turned out that it wouldn't be the best idea for us to film in the night time as the outlines of the characters would not be as crisp as they would be in day light.
Rob then came up with the idea that we shot the night time scenes in the early morning (around 5am) to make it look as though the young girl was coming home from a party that she had been raped at. This sounded good to me and we all agreed.
We then started on the storyboard, yet hadn't actually drawn any pictures so realised we needed to start again in the next lesson.
First real coursework lesson - 4/2/10
This lesson was just basically based around what a Thriller really is.
We came up with a few ideas, like the fact that it involves tension and a storyline that will really grab the audience's attention with even maybe a few twists and turns throughout.
We watched a few opening sequences of thrillers which really allowed me to think about how I was going to try and capture the attention of the audience, because the first part of a film is where it is done.
We then watched the opening sequence of the film 'Usual Suspects' which really put across suspense and made me want to know exactly what it going on and allowed me to realise that was what I was going to try and do.
We came up with a few ideas, like the fact that it involves tension and a storyline that will really grab the audience's attention with even maybe a few twists and turns throughout.
We watched a few opening sequences of thrillers which really allowed me to think about how I was going to try and capture the attention of the audience, because the first part of a film is where it is done.
We then watched the opening sequence of the film 'Usual Suspects' which really put across suspense and made me want to know exactly what it going on and allowed me to realise that was what I was going to try and do.
First day of editing - 28/1/09
I was actually absent for our Thursday lesson and therefore was not able to join the group for our first session of Editing.
Yet, when I got back and attended the lesson on 2/2/10 it seemed Ashley and Sarah has put a lot of the editing together already. Ashley had decided it would be a good idea to put our piece in black and white to make it look more authentic and spooky, which I definitely agreed with and carried forward with the rest of our work.
Sarah had named all of our clips and deleted the ones she knew we weren't going to want to put in to make sure we didn't get confused. This definitely helped me when I got back as I knew which clip was which and where they were going to go. I then looked through Ashley's work as he had put the beginning scenes together and then looked through Sarah's as she had put the ending together. They both looked great but a few scene's were missing and a few were still in colour so we needed to balance it out and make sure all the scenes were put in the right places.
I didn't really know how to use the editing software as it was my first go with it, but after watching Sarah plow through, I got the hang of it.
We then copied and pasted Ashley's work into Sarah's work to fit them together and complete our piece. It took a while because it seemed that some of the scenes kept going missing and we didn't know why. Yet, after much fiddling around with getting the right scenes in the right places, we had a finished 46 second film.
I then realised I hadn't actually listened to the piece and needed to figure out if there was anything wrong with how it sounded. It turned out that there was. In a few of the scenes you could hear where Sarah was clicking the 'stop recording' button and it really irritated the scene. By editing out the sound from the scene we then had no sound which didn't matter too much to us because we weren't looking for the sound to make the film seem scary, we just wanted the scenes to do that. Some of the scenes, however, did have shuffling noises that made it seem slightly unprofessional, but we've learnt from that and know that we should probably put sound in it to cover that. Also there was a bit of Ashley speaking in one of the scenes so we had to edit that out by making the scene a bit shorter.
In the end we put our file onto AVI and saved it to our servers to make sure we didn't lose anything we had done. By doing this we then copied the URL from the video onto Sarah's Youtube account.
I am pretty proud of what we have done because I think we put in a bit more effort and attention to detail than we had to and actually went a bit further out than others. We probably could've put some sound over the film to make it a bit darker and to leave the ambient sound out, but it didn't matter too much.
We also forgot to change our settings to widescreen filming and therefore our Youtube video is a lot smaller on the screen than what we had planned. But we have learnt from all this and I hope to make it better in the real thing.
Yet, when I got back and attended the lesson on 2/2/10 it seemed Ashley and Sarah has put a lot of the editing together already. Ashley had decided it would be a good idea to put our piece in black and white to make it look more authentic and spooky, which I definitely agreed with and carried forward with the rest of our work.
Sarah had named all of our clips and deleted the ones she knew we weren't going to want to put in to make sure we didn't get confused. This definitely helped me when I got back as I knew which clip was which and where they were going to go. I then looked through Ashley's work as he had put the beginning scenes together and then looked through Sarah's as she had put the ending together. They both looked great but a few scene's were missing and a few were still in colour so we needed to balance it out and make sure all the scenes were put in the right places.
I didn't really know how to use the editing software as it was my first go with it, but after watching Sarah plow through, I got the hang of it.
We then copied and pasted Ashley's work into Sarah's work to fit them together and complete our piece. It took a while because it seemed that some of the scenes kept going missing and we didn't know why. Yet, after much fiddling around with getting the right scenes in the right places, we had a finished 46 second film.
I then realised I hadn't actually listened to the piece and needed to figure out if there was anything wrong with how it sounded. It turned out that there was. In a few of the scenes you could hear where Sarah was clicking the 'stop recording' button and it really irritated the scene. By editing out the sound from the scene we then had no sound which didn't matter too much to us because we weren't looking for the sound to make the film seem scary, we just wanted the scenes to do that. Some of the scenes, however, did have shuffling noises that made it seem slightly unprofessional, but we've learnt from that and know that we should probably put sound in it to cover that. Also there was a bit of Ashley speaking in one of the scenes so we had to edit that out by making the scene a bit shorter.
In the end we put our file onto AVI and saved it to our servers to make sure we didn't lose anything we had done. By doing this we then copied the URL from the video onto Sarah's Youtube account.
I am pretty proud of what we have done because I think we put in a bit more effort and attention to detail than we had to and actually went a bit further out than others. We probably could've put some sound over the film to make it a bit darker and to leave the ambient sound out, but it didn't matter too much.
We also forgot to change our settings to widescreen filming and therefore our Youtube video is a lot smaller on the screen than what we had planned. But we have learnt from all this and I hope to make it better in the real thing.
Tuesday, 26 January 2010
Finshing off filming - 26/01/10
Today was pretty successful too. We had slight problems at the start of the two hour lesson due to the fact that the camera just seem to keep failing on us. We first thought that we had deleted everything and would have to start again, which frustrated us all...But with a bit of help from our teacher and by resetting the camera twice and finally actually moving onto an entirely different camera, we got down to business.
Firstly me and Sarah realised we needed a few props, so went and got the cap that Ashley needed, being the pizza man, and the paint that we would later use as fake blood when Ashley was stabbed. We also tried to find a black piece of material to go over our own-made sofa (made from chairs and sofa blocks)to try and make it more authentic-looking, but after going to the drama department and finding they were in exam, we just carried on without it.
After setting up the sofa and the artificial light as we had the week before to make it look spooky and try not to let the lighting gleam onto the camera (yet this wasn't very successful so we just left it in the end), we could get down to filming our next scenes. We needed to go over the scene's that had me sitting our sofa half-way through the mini-film because I didn't love the scenes we had taken last week and wanted to make sure they were just right. This took a few takes because someone kept making me laugh or I started chewing my chewing gum as a nervous reaction. Haha. After we had got the clip of me just sitting on the sofa (as Ashley's point of view when he walked into the room) we needed to get a shot of Ashley actually walking towards me and then another over-shoulder shot to then allow me to say my first line which was 'Finally' - which brought the thought of me having to wait for a while and whilst we were still in the same shot, Ashley said his first line, being: 'That will be £10.99 please'.
After those shots had been taken, we needed a shot from over my shoulder to allow me to then stand up and say my next line, being: 'Sure' and then pull out some money to give to Ashley. This took a few shots again as the camera was either not placed in the position we wanted it, or I stood in the way of Ashley being able to be seen in the shot. We eventually got the shot in the end and then thought we really needed a better shot to really establish the fact that I handed the money over to Ashley. So this meant we needed a shot of me handing it over. This took a few goes again as the camera was either too high or low, but in the end we got it how we wanted it.
After that we had to try and find a suitable piece of equipment to be in place of a knife so that I could stab Ashley for the finale. We were going to use a spoon and try not to actually shoot any close-ups on it, but in the end found a pair of scissors that were perfect for the feel we were going for. Sarah then did a close-up on the pair of scissors in my pocket and zoomed out to get a bigger picture for the full effect which worked great.
We then went onto another small scene in which I pull the scissors out of my pocket slowly and push forward, but not yet into Ashley, this only took one shot. Next we did the stabbing shot. This took a few goes as the camera was not in the right place to actually get the effect of the scissors going into Ashley's side, but in the end we got a mid-shot and a close-up of it and it looked great.
We then needed to get the fake blood (paint) onto Ashley's shirt and therefore just poured a lot of it onto his t-shirt where the scissors were supposed to have gone in and all over his hands to make it look like he was trying to save himself.
We then got a shot of Ashley staggering about a bit clutching the scissors in his hand (they were really supposed to be in his flesh). This only took one shot which was good and got us going faster. Ashley was then filmed dropping straight to the floor and still holding the scissors in his body.
When he was on the floor, we filmed him grabbing onto my leg to get the 'save me' effect, which needed to be taped twice as we thought the first one was a bit weedy. The penultimate shot was of me then pulling the scissors from Ashley's 'flesh' and then walking over him to make it look as though I wasn't bothered and that bit more scary.
Our final shot was of Ashley's full body from toe to head lying on the floor. Except, when we got to his stomach the camera actually ran out of battery and therefore we couldn't actually finish all the way up to his head and probably won't use this shot for our final finished piece.
Firstly me and Sarah realised we needed a few props, so went and got the cap that Ashley needed, being the pizza man, and the paint that we would later use as fake blood when Ashley was stabbed. We also tried to find a black piece of material to go over our own-made sofa (made from chairs and sofa blocks)to try and make it more authentic-looking, but after going to the drama department and finding they were in exam, we just carried on without it.
After setting up the sofa and the artificial light as we had the week before to make it look spooky and try not to let the lighting gleam onto the camera (yet this wasn't very successful so we just left it in the end), we could get down to filming our next scenes. We needed to go over the scene's that had me sitting our sofa half-way through the mini-film because I didn't love the scenes we had taken last week and wanted to make sure they were just right. This took a few takes because someone kept making me laugh or I started chewing my chewing gum as a nervous reaction. Haha. After we had got the clip of me just sitting on the sofa (as Ashley's point of view when he walked into the room) we needed to get a shot of Ashley actually walking towards me and then another over-shoulder shot to then allow me to say my first line which was 'Finally' - which brought the thought of me having to wait for a while and whilst we were still in the same shot, Ashley said his first line, being: 'That will be £10.99 please'.
After those shots had been taken, we needed a shot from over my shoulder to allow me to then stand up and say my next line, being: 'Sure' and then pull out some money to give to Ashley. This took a few shots again as the camera was either not placed in the position we wanted it, or I stood in the way of Ashley being able to be seen in the shot. We eventually got the shot in the end and then thought we really needed a better shot to really establish the fact that I handed the money over to Ashley. So this meant we needed a shot of me handing it over. This took a few goes again as the camera was either too high or low, but in the end we got it how we wanted it.
After that we had to try and find a suitable piece of equipment to be in place of a knife so that I could stab Ashley for the finale. We were going to use a spoon and try not to actually shoot any close-ups on it, but in the end found a pair of scissors that were perfect for the feel we were going for. Sarah then did a close-up on the pair of scissors in my pocket and zoomed out to get a bigger picture for the full effect which worked great.
We then went onto another small scene in which I pull the scissors out of my pocket slowly and push forward, but not yet into Ashley, this only took one shot. Next we did the stabbing shot. This took a few goes as the camera was not in the right place to actually get the effect of the scissors going into Ashley's side, but in the end we got a mid-shot and a close-up of it and it looked great.
We then needed to get the fake blood (paint) onto Ashley's shirt and therefore just poured a lot of it onto his t-shirt where the scissors were supposed to have gone in and all over his hands to make it look like he was trying to save himself.
We then got a shot of Ashley staggering about a bit clutching the scissors in his hand (they were really supposed to be in his flesh). This only took one shot which was good and got us going faster. Ashley was then filmed dropping straight to the floor and still holding the scissors in his body.
When he was on the floor, we filmed him grabbing onto my leg to get the 'save me' effect, which needed to be taped twice as we thought the first one was a bit weedy. The penultimate shot was of me then pulling the scissors from Ashley's 'flesh' and then walking over him to make it look as though I wasn't bothered and that bit more scary.
Our final shot was of Ashley's full body from toe to head lying on the floor. Except, when we got to his stomach the camera actually ran out of battery and therefore we couldn't actually finish all the way up to his head and probably won't use this shot for our final finished piece.
Thursday, 21 January 2010
Planning.
As a group we firstly had the idea that we would do a thriller, to make it scary and entice the audience.
We then had the idea that we would have a person come to the door and walk in to a person on a sofa in a dark room. After they had walked in they would see a briefcase and look inside it to something a little less scary than how the scenes had already been. I did like this idea but I didn't really want the film to end happily, I though it would be ruined and wanted to go out with a bang.
Ashley then came up with the idea that we should have someone delivering a pizza. I liked this idea as it had reasoning behind the person actually coming to the house and we could end it badly if we wanted, which in the end we decided to do. We decided that a pizza man would walk to the door of a house in the evening and then walk in to a woman that looked quite scary and at the end of the scene the pizza man would end up being stabbed and would eventually die. We then wrote up our ideas onto the storyboards and I was very eager to start filming so did a quick sketch with the ideas for the dialogue and which shots to take from Sarah. We then had all our ideas and started filming, which can be seen in my next blog.
First Day of Filming on Preliminary.
Today was pretty successful in the way of filming. As we were in the Media Block, we had to try and use the surroundings as best we could. We had already had the idea of making our short film slightly scary and therefore knew we wanted our lighting to be dark/gloomy.
As the room we wanted to use was in use at the time, we tried our first shot in a different place, yet the lighting wasn't as we wanted it and as we knew we were going to be in the other room for the rest of the filming, we knew that the first four shots of Ashley's feet walking towards the door would be useless, and they didn't really have the lighting or the angle we wanted as it wasn't spooky enough.
We then moved to the room we had originally wanted, yet the hall way was too dark leading up to the door and we wanted a 'street light' sort of effect to make it look as though the pizza guy was coming towards the door to make a delivery in the evening. We then set up an artificial light and had to get a extension lead to make sure our light was in the right place.
All through the filming I was checking to see if the angles were right to make sure that we got the angles and the lighting was as I wanted it to be and how it would look best, to bring the effect of a scary film. I also held the artificial light as we filmed Ashley walking towards the door so that it was high enough to be presumed as a street light. This worked really well and by making sure we had no other shadows in the background, aside from Ashley's, allowed it to look pretty good.
We then took just one shot of Ashley's face so that we could go on further to get an eyeline shot with the wedge in the door. I wasn't too pleased with this shot, but knew that if we carried on we would be able to get more done and come back to the shot later and make it look slightly better. We then did the eyeline match of the wedge and slowly filmed down to the floor where the wedge was in the door. I was quite happy with this shot, yet it probably could have been slower and we shall edit it when we get to the editing stage.
Before we got to the 'inside room' shots, we needed to get a shot of Ashley's hand pushing open the door slowly and as if there was something scary inside.
This worked out well and only needed one shot.
We then went inside and had to set up the sofa that the 'inside room' shots would be based around. When this had been done, we needed to get in the eyeline view in which I would be sitting in after we had got our last shot of Ashley. By setting up the camera on the tripod in front of the 'sofa', it made sure that would look as though I was watching Ashley when he walked through the door. The shot took about 4 times to do as we thought he was going a bit fast through the door and wanted the affect of being confused by the wedge in the door and the dark room behind the door. In one fot he shorts we also cut Ahsley's head off and I wasn't pleased with that so the final shot was the one that we agreed on and in the end really matched what we wanted and how the film was going to be set out.
We then needed to try and set up the room to look slightly dimmed but the light had to conentrate on me and make me look sort of scary in order to allow the viewer to see what Ashley was seeing and really question what was going to happen next. We then achieved this by putting the artificial light at the side of the room through an extra door and the light shone onto the area that I was sitting in, which highlighted me more than it did the room around me, meaning I was definitely the main point which is what we had wanted to produce. I then tried to get into a position in which I would look evil and though I was going to do something terrible. I got into a position but Sarah then decided it would be better if we were then to zoom into my face to make sure the audience could get a feel of how the rest of the scene was going to go...
This worked out pretty well but at this point the camera was running out of battery and we therefore needed to stop filming.
All in all the day was very productive and we should soon by well on our way with the editing stages.
As the room we wanted to use was in use at the time, we tried our first shot in a different place, yet the lighting wasn't as we wanted it and as we knew we were going to be in the other room for the rest of the filming, we knew that the first four shots of Ashley's feet walking towards the door would be useless, and they didn't really have the lighting or the angle we wanted as it wasn't spooky enough.
We then moved to the room we had originally wanted, yet the hall way was too dark leading up to the door and we wanted a 'street light' sort of effect to make it look as though the pizza guy was coming towards the door to make a delivery in the evening. We then set up an artificial light and had to get a extension lead to make sure our light was in the right place.
All through the filming I was checking to see if the angles were right to make sure that we got the angles and the lighting was as I wanted it to be and how it would look best, to bring the effect of a scary film. I also held the artificial light as we filmed Ashley walking towards the door so that it was high enough to be presumed as a street light. This worked really well and by making sure we had no other shadows in the background, aside from Ashley's, allowed it to look pretty good.
We then took just one shot of Ashley's face so that we could go on further to get an eyeline shot with the wedge in the door. I wasn't too pleased with this shot, but knew that if we carried on we would be able to get more done and come back to the shot later and make it look slightly better. We then did the eyeline match of the wedge and slowly filmed down to the floor where the wedge was in the door. I was quite happy with this shot, yet it probably could have been slower and we shall edit it when we get to the editing stage.
Before we got to the 'inside room' shots, we needed to get a shot of Ashley's hand pushing open the door slowly and as if there was something scary inside.
This worked out well and only needed one shot.
We then went inside and had to set up the sofa that the 'inside room' shots would be based around. When this had been done, we needed to get in the eyeline view in which I would be sitting in after we had got our last shot of Ashley. By setting up the camera on the tripod in front of the 'sofa', it made sure that would look as though I was watching Ashley when he walked through the door. The shot took about 4 times to do as we thought he was going a bit fast through the door and wanted the affect of being confused by the wedge in the door and the dark room behind the door. In one fot he shorts we also cut Ahsley's head off and I wasn't pleased with that so the final shot was the one that we agreed on and in the end really matched what we wanted and how the film was going to be set out.
We then needed to try and set up the room to look slightly dimmed but the light had to conentrate on me and make me look sort of scary in order to allow the viewer to see what Ashley was seeing and really question what was going to happen next. We then achieved this by putting the artificial light at the side of the room through an extra door and the light shone onto the area that I was sitting in, which highlighted me more than it did the room around me, meaning I was definitely the main point which is what we had wanted to produce. I then tried to get into a position in which I would look evil and though I was going to do something terrible. I got into a position but Sarah then decided it would be better if we were then to zoom into my face to make sure the audience could get a feel of how the rest of the scene was going to go...
This worked out pretty well but at this point the camera was running out of battery and we therefore needed to stop filming.
All in all the day was very productive and we should soon by well on our way with the editing stages.
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