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Wednesday, 31 March 2010
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Making the Final piece - The diary
Diary of filming for our final project
Day One: by Niall
Today was the first day we filmed for our opening sequence of a mockumentary, we had all of our costumes and equipment ready, and had completed a story board that we would use as a plan, in order to achieve a series of different shots and portray the conventions of a mockumentary. We also had a script with us and and two actors who we chose to play the character; the scientist. We had two actors as we couldn't decide on which look was better for our final piece in the planning process, therefore we filmed both and would then use small clips of both interviews or simply cut one interview completely, depending on the rest of our footage. We set up our camera and tripod in a room with a white backdrop, knowing we wanted the interview clips to take place with a clear plain backdrop, this was to focus all attention on to the character and also convey a typical interview lay out. Following the script we filmed the interview that we needed, knowing we would later cut down on the amount of footage and edit small parts of the interview together. James and Alex directed the actors, making sure they looked into the camera, a convention of a mockumentary. Whilst kate filmed, occasionally zooming in and out throughout the interview. She did so as this camera work was suited to our genre, being a mockumentary, and was a convention we had seen in opening sequence of other mockumentaries. I read the part of the interviewer who was not in the shot but my voice was purposely included in the shot, being another convention of a mockumentary, like in the opening sequence to the movie; 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' where the interviewer can not be seen but is heard. The Scientist/interview filming was very successful and as a group we were pleased with the footage and felt confident about filming the rest of out opening sequence to a mockumentary.
Day Two: By Alex
Today we would go out and film footage of Whipps cross Hospital, capturing the hospitals signs, to establish the setting of the interviews in our final piece. Thanks to previous research, my group knew that whips cross did in fact have a rehabilitation centre and we planned to film a shot of a sign with this title, we would also use the hospitals main entrance sign as we thought this would make it clear to an audience where the mockumentary was taking place. We have seen the use of signs, to establish setting and character in some of the mocumentaries we watched as part of our research like in 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' where a still image of the sign reads 'Welcome to Mount Rose Minnesota'. We also captured footage of us walking around the hospital and outside which was not in our plan or story board, but we thought it would be a nice effect if we had spare time in our final piece, and we had seen footage of the camera crew and interviewer in other mockumentaries like 'LIVE!'. Although it was a long day of filming we knew these few shots were crucial to the mockumentray and were satisfied once we had what we needed.
Day Three: By James
The plan for today was to shoot all the remaining interview footage, knowing we could film all of this in one location, for this we would need to complete the characters; the Harry Potter cast and The hulk. As me, Alex and Niall were all actors in todays filming, playing the Harry Potter cast, Kate would then have to do most of the filming. We again kept to the script and managed to create many little clips as one on going take became impossible when we couldn't stop laughing. However this actually worked really well, only making it easier in the editing process as we would not have to cut as much, when creating small interview clips to make our opening sequence choppy like a real opening sequence we had already seen. which was in the style of a mockumentary; the Disney movie 'The Incredibles'. Kate made sure the camera work was still in the style of a mockumentary, zooming in and out whilst interviewing and also deliberately shaking the camera, like in the interview with the hulk where the character attacks the camera.
Day four: By Kate
The final day we decided we would film at South Woodford Library, knowing there were small platforms and roofs we could use to film the action shots of the spiderman character we also filmed the Hulk on local streets. This part of our filming was important as it was our chance to involve a variety of different camera shots, where as our previous footage had consisted of the same interview layout, Shots used included medium, over the shoulder, and low angle, particularly in the part where spiderman jumps of the building, this was also to make the height look higher, as we could only use reasonable jump heights due to obvious heath and safety reasons. The camera work and sound in the clips we filmed today were all very natural and slightly amateur looking carrying out conventions of a mockumentary. We also used an over the shoulder shot to convey the shop worker, played by myself, staring out the widow look at the hulk character , i then notice the camera filming, as all characters are aware of camera's in mockumentaries, as seen in 'This is Spinal Tap'. Once we finished filming we were then ready to start the editing process where we would cut and place our footage effectively to make an opening sequence to a mockumentary.
Drop Dead Gorgeous
Drop Dead Gorgeous is a mockumentary that follows a teen beauty pageant in America. The opening sequence consists of typical conventions like the written introduction that sets the time and place. The character also showed
Awareness to the camera and the lay out was in interview format, with a title introducing the characters. These are all useful conventions of a mockumentary that establish the genre of the film from the beginning; we plan to use conventions like these in our opening sequence to convey a mockumentary. The non-diegetic music that plays in the background is very patriotic and represents the pageant as being a typical American occurrence. The camera movements are typical of a mockumentary as they are shaky and sometimes out of focus. For example when the character is adjusting her hair the camera zooms out and focuses on her to add realism. The sub-title comes up
showing her name and profession so that the audience know her the character is and her importance to the story. We cam also her the interviewers voice showing that the interview is in progress, this is very typical of a mockumentary because it adds realism to the interview. There are tracking shots of the public acting naturally
And although they acknowledge the camera they do not change their behavior. This represents that it is in fact real life and not scripted conveying the style of a documentary even though mockumentary's are in fact scripted and pretend to be based on fact.
Opening sequence to a Sci-Fi/Action
Opening sequence to a Sci-Fi/Action
The film ‘Watchmen’ could be described as an action/ sci-fi movie, an adaptation of the comic book with a brilliant opening sequence. With the song "The Times They Are A-Changin” Written and Performed by Dylan playing in the background, an audience are exposed to a series of slow motion clips and effective still images all consisting of action and themes that overall create a back story, setting up the whole movie for audience who may have read or may not have read the comic book the movie has been adapted from. The songs lyrics and the paste of the many cross cut clips make it obvious to viewers that they are in fact representing a long period of time passing. Known as montage editing. Credits for the film appear in the opening sequence and text in newspapers and on TV screens is used to convey the time setting, for an example on the small TV it reads ‘Vietnam war escalates’. The costume, makeup and unrealistic settings like the Moon and space are all conventions often seen In Sci-fi movies. The explosives and use of flashing lights contrasted with black outs are also conventions of action and Sci-Fi movies, seen from the opening sequence, establishing the genre of the movie.
Scream - The opening sequence
Scream - The opening sequence ...
Scream is very clearly a horror film. It is set for a specific target audience which are people who like horror films. As the film is about to begin the title “Scream” appears in a dripping red colour, this is to represent blood but the colour also represents danger which is the key factor in the opening scene. The scene is set at a house which appears to be quite cosy and safe which we can see with the bright lighting and the warm atmosphere. The opening shot is a close up of a phone ringing to highlight that there is some significance in it. We are introduced to a young woman wearing white showing that she is good and pure, the victim, alone in the house locking the doors showing that the house is safe and secure. She also puts some popcorn on the stove to cook which is cooking nicely reflecting the mood. She pulls a knife out of the knife rack as she is talking about scary films to the stranger on the phone representing a danger that is approaching. The mood changes within a second as the stranger on the phone tells the woman he wants to “know who [he’s] looking at”. At this moment tense non-diegetic music starts playing in the background building up to the danger and tension. The popcorn has grown in stature now and is bigger showing how the tension and danger is also rising. While she runs through the house looking all the doors the non-diegetic music raises in volume to show the rise in danger. The camera also tracks her movements most likely by the use of a dolly. Another typical shot for a horror is the P.O.V shot used to show the outside of the house through the characters eyes, accompanied by scary music it really builds the tension up. The thumping non-diegetic sounds are representative of a heart beat as the situation is escalating. The mist outside adds more tension and confusion has it shields our view along with the characters of what is outside. The camera slowly zooms in on the woman while she is on the phone cowering behind the T.V to show how weak and isolated she is. When she runs back into the kitchen it is filled with smoke and the popcorn is on fire showing the situation has escalated over the top and is getting more and more dangerous. The chair through the window has shown how the barrier between the outside and inside is broken. There are shadows in the house which makes it seem that the danger from outside is creeping into the house. The woman is now holding the phone and a knife as her only protection showing how serious the situation has gotten. The mask of the killer adds to the suspense and danger and the confusion of the audience as well as the woman. The quick zoom followed by the loud clash of lightning at the end represents the quickness of which the killer killed and the extremely evil circumstances in which he has done so. That is why Scream is a good horror film because it uses typical codes and conventions to easily identify its genre as a horror film.
Thursday, 25 March 2010
Monday, 22 March 2010
Storyboard
This is our first draft of our storyboard. We put more than one type of shot on a square which should not have been done and the description of the shots and the sound inside of the shot was not very detailed.
This is our final draft of our storyboard and it is a lot more detailed with better and more precise drawings and the text that accompanied it was of better quality and contained more information relevant to the shot.
Our storyboard was successful as we were able to do our project in chronological order to our storyboard; this was good as we were able to keep to plan.
Conventions of a thriller :)
This film poster shows conventions of a thriller as it shows the character looking through a pair of binoculars and there is a frightened looking girl with a mysterious, dark figure behind her.
Conventions of a comedy
This film poster shows the conventions of a comedy as it shows a man smartly dressed in a suit but still wearing a work belt containing tools which contrasts with each other. There is also an arc in the background filled with animals which is humorous because it is a very unusual thing to see.
Conventions of an action
This film poster clearly shows the conventions of an action film as it shows the main characters holding guns in a very threatening manor.
Monday, 15 March 2010
Evaluation
Before we started creating our opening sequence, we studied the conventions of Mockumentaries, watching full movies and opening sequences of movies such as; ‘live!’, ‘Drop Dead Gorgeous’, ‘Borat’ , ‘Surf’s Up’, and others. This research gave us a final list of conventions that featured more than once in mockumentaries becoming features that we would include in our final piece. An example of this, is the convention that is ‘interview form’, which we decided to use in our opening sequence, portraying clearly the genre of our film. We used this for many characters, interviewing the scientist, the Hulk character, and the harry potter cast. We developed our idea when we remembered the opening sequence of the film ‘The Incredibles’, which was in the style of a mockumentary, and in interview form. This Opening sequence also included titles of the characters, we liked this idea and witnessed it again in the mockumentary; ‘Drop Dead Gorgeous’ and therefore considered it a convention we would use for our final project.
Our product represents particular social groups by portraying the mentally ill as humorous or entertaining. As seen when the Hulk character walks down the street with his shopping bags. This is quite a negative representation as it gives the impression that these people are viewed as different than the rest of society due to their abnormalities. It represents a fictional syndrome which particularly is seen in males, like the Hulk character and the Harry Potter cast, this suggests that mostly males suffer from this psychological problem.
The kinds of Media institutions that might distribute our product are; Pathe Pictures, Coffee films and Entertainment films this is because they are based in the UK/Europe and are independent film distributors. Due to our low budget it was essential for us to find an independent Media Institution that targeted a niche audience as we are targeting a young audience from Britain. We didn’t want a mass Media institution to distribute our product as we are using basic cameras and technological equipment.
Another kind of media institution that would distribute our opening sequence is New Line Cinema; this is because they distributed the mockumentary “Drop Dead Gorgeous”. New Line cinema is an American film industry and is one of the major film studios, and if they were to distribute our opening sequence we would have a larger budget and would be able to use the latest technology in the film industry. Due to our niche audience it would be more beneficial for an independent media institution such as the “Pathe and Motion Picture”
The audience for our opening sequence is teenagers; this is because the humour in the opening sequence would be more appealing for this age group. The age certificate we have on are opening sequence is 15, this is because in the there is mature humour, which young children may no understand. For instance when the Hulk gets angry at the camera and picks it up, this may scare younger children instead of make them laugh. In the actual film we would have some explicit language like swearing.
We attracted our audience by advertising to this particular audience in many different ways. We advertised our product on the internet, we particularly advertised on websites such as Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and YouTube, this is because our research showed that over 90% of teenagers have at least on these; and that they regularly use it.
From constructing the opening sequence the technological elements we learnt were, how to do effective editing and how to incorporate continuity editing into are opening sequences, so that all the different shots show a chronological coherence. We did continuity editing by including editing techniques such as match on action and non-diegetic sounds, which allowed us to smooth out the different clips. We also learnt how to extract sound from different clips, and add music to our opening sequence. This allowed us to have narration over the scenes so that the audience know what is happening for instance when the scientist speaks over the next clip so we know who he is talking about. During our construction of the opening sequence we learnt how to use the video camera and different camera techniques and shots such as zooming in and out and how to do shot reverse shot as in the scene with the scientist interview where we zoom in to add realism and convey a seriousness about his sentence.
Looking back at the prelim task, we have learnt more camera shots and techniques, which allowed us to be more adventurous with our work. This is because we incorporated more camera shots, such as an establishing shot at the beginning so that the audience know where the film took place, where our establishing shot was of "Whipps Cross Hospital" it allowed viewers to recognize that the film was taking place in a hospital. We learnt how to extract sound and move sound into a different shot of the opening sequence, which enhanced our work as it helped with the continuity and made our film fit the time limit. More aspects that we learnt were, how to put text in to our work for example when we wrote the candidate names and numbers. We learnt different editing techniques that improved our work as we were able to use more quick cuts, and we learnt how to split scenes so that we didn’t lose any clips during our editing. Looking back at the prelim task, it helped us think of new ways of filming as we had more ideas, we also became more comfortable using the editing tools and more comfortable using the video camera.
And this is an evaluation from our peers:
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