Sunday, 26 April 2009
Evalutation
Our film follows a set theme, due to the fact that we based our ideas and the film tone from conventional films such as Minority Report, In Bruges and the Bourne Identity. You could say that it is slightly film noir. Not many action / thrillers have an element of thought. Taking for example “Quantum of Solace” there is not a frame in the film that lasts for more the 2 seconds.
Universal a film production, promotion and distribution company, they are one of the biggest film distribution names out there.
Even having their name coming up shows that the film has essentially a certificate of approval as to being a good film. This is due to the popularity of the company. However, we believe that due to the way we want to break away from main stream films, I would also aim the film at an Art House Company. It would be shown on smaller Art house cinemas and some cinema chains.
We are aiming the audience as teenagers and above – mainly towards males in their 20’s however also appealing to the females as having just more than a gung ho type of film.
The beginning of our film is an enigma – e.g. we hide the doctor’s face from you – the gun shot sound at the end of the sequence snaps to black before you can see what actually happened. The idea was to attract the audience by keeping them guessing and wanting to find out how the main character got there in the first place and who shot who?
We designed the film with a sophisticated young audience in mind. We created several enigmas in order to get the audience to delve into the film and want to see more. The beginning titles of the film are what we would use to also advertise our film. Not scripting the titles was the key, as it made the audience look at what was going on throughout the clip, we designed the film with more thought in mind and how the audience would be able to make the links we put out through our simple use of mise en scene and editing.
HD camera’s are an innovation in film making – allowing a low budget film to look crisp and high end. The programs used to create the film go to show that is all about the post production work. Editing and Sound are the two key elements in our film.
Using Garageband to create our music was my favourite bit. Using sampled sound to create all emulate all the emotion and intensity like a professional film does became extremely easy.
The main programme we built our film on was Final Cut Express, being visually accessible meant that you could see where all your clips were and where you were editing. There is now a very thin line to which films are low budget or professionally made due the accessibility of the programmes we used.
All of my skills have increased tenfold. Being able to look at a shot and see exactly what’s good and bad about it and whether it fits has been the main skill I have developed as well as directing in general. Looking back at my preliminary task I realize how amateur it was in comparison to our full product.
Planning, filming and learning certain rules on filming certain shots. One rule being not to pan unless you have either a good tripod or maintain the same speed, also not to zoom in- unless that is the desired effect. Our product was all down to the theory, mise en scene, sound, cinematography and editing. Being able to put in links and suggest certain ideas to the audience without having to point them out was our forte in this piece.
However looking back on the preliminary task we have nowhere near as much time as I had for the main product. Being able to see the shot in your mind and then capture it on a camera for me was difficult to deal with, being low budget and only having access to certain resources never gave you the shot you imagined. But gave you the determination to get it as close as possible.
Watch HERE
The viewer is left to absorb the momentum and feeling of the film without necessarily understanding the storyline. In this film we rely on the fact that our audience has essentially seen the same storylines before. So our establishing titles of our film lack dialogue. Which is where we challenge the conventions of other films and the ‘path’ that every film follows, we want the audience to make the connections to the characters and storyline without us having to explain ourselves.
Our media film represents no social groups to mention. Only basing the fact that the characters in the film are part of the popular and stylised dark side of spy organisations. We created the lack of social groups by mainly using black coats, and jeans - all minimalistic clothes.
Like Bond and The Recruit
So there are no giveaways of ethnicity. Only class and status are seen. E.g. We see the main character in tracksuit bottoms and a white grubby top, showing his lack of status to the Doctor in a smart white lab coat. The clothing the characters do wear resemble middle to upper class types of people.
Universal a film production, promotion and distribution company, they are one of the biggest film distribution names out there.
Even having their name coming up shows that the film has essentially a certificate of approval as to being a good film. This is due to the popularity of the company. However, we believe that due to the way we want to break away from main stream films, I would also aim the film at an Art House Company. It would be shown on smaller Art house cinemas and some cinema chains.
We are aiming the audience as teenagers and above – mainly towards males in their 20’s however also appealing to the females as having just more than a gung ho type of film.
The beginning of our film is an enigma – e.g. we hide the doctor’s face from you – the gun shot sound at the end of the sequence snaps to black before you can see what actually happened. The idea was to attract the audience by keeping them guessing and wanting to find out how the main character got there in the first place and who shot who?
We designed the film with a sophisticated young audience in mind. We created several enigmas in order to get the audience to delve into the film and want to see more. The beginning titles of the film are what we would use to also advertise our film. Not scripting the titles was the key, as it made the audience look at what was going on throughout the clip, we designed the film with more thought in mind and how the audience would be able to make the links we put out through our simple use of mise en scene and editing.
HD camera’s are an innovation in film making – allowing a low budget film to look crisp and high end. The programs used to create the film go to show that is all about the post production work. Editing and Sound are the two key elements in our film.
Using Garageband to create our music was my favourite bit. Using sampled sound to create all emulate all the emotion and intensity like a professional film does became extremely easy.
The main programme we built our film on was Final Cut Express, being visually accessible meant that you could see where all your clips were and where you were editing. There is now a very thin line to which films are low budget or professionally made due the accessibility of the programmes we used.
All of my skills have increased tenfold. Being able to look at a shot and see exactly what’s good and bad about it and whether it fits has been the main skill I have developed as well as directing in general. Looking back at my preliminary task I realize how amateur it was in comparison to our full product.
Planning, filming and learning certain rules on filming certain shots. One rule being not to pan unless you have either a good tripod or maintain the same speed, also not to zoom in- unless that is the desired effect. Our product was all down to the theory, mise en scene, sound, cinematography and editing. Being able to put in links and suggest certain ideas to the audience without having to point them out was our forte in this piece.
However looking back on the preliminary task we have nowhere near as much time as I had for the main product. Being able to see the shot in your mind and then capture it on a camera for me was difficult to deal with, being low budget and only having access to certain resources never gave you the shot you imagined. But gave you the determination to get it as close as possible.
Thursday, 23 April 2009
Filming in HD ,Sound, Editing, Credits, Blogging, IDVD and whatever else i can fit into one blog.
FILMING IN HD
Was the best! Its incredible how much memory you use simply filming 1 or 2 minutes of film. It meant that come editing and the final product it gave you so much better quality to add the effects you wanted and it looking professional (ish).
SOUND
The sound in our piece is the most crucial as it creates the feeling we are trying to portray, from the ambiance and institutional sounds in the opening scene. To the "trippy" dream sequence.
All of the sound in our piece was created in Garage Band a program on the Apple Mac that lets you create music through adding sound samples and effects together.
We also used a website called http://ccmixter.org/ which provided free un-copyrighted music samples.
The sound for us was the easiest part, I really enjoyed creating the sounds effects and making the music to our film.
EDITING
Using a program only available on Macs called Final Cut Express - this was the best program I have ever worked with and enjoyed working with for the simple reason it has everything we needed and our ideas were not confined due to the quality of the program.
The simple challenge was trying to interpret all the technicality of transferring your film to the computer. It was just a case of getting to know the program.
Were we shined the most with our editing is the dream sequence which was so much fun doing.
Thankfully there were no problems with the incompatibility of music and film clips.
CREDITS
Using live type was a little bit of a pain, as it was needlessly complicated and slow. However when we got the text font that we wanted and it made the film all that more better. Its so important to get the right effect and font - it literally makes or breaks your film.
BLOGGING
Has been lots of fun to use! I find it great, like a public diary. And always getting some challenging feedback about your views is always great. As a communication medium it is a great way of posting whatever you feel like posting. Embedding video, pictures and links to websites means that it completely changes the way you write. And it illustrates your points and views. Accessibility of your work on the internet is something I will dearly miss!
iDVD and the DVD.
Unfortunately i was ill whilst Jerome and Bobbi used this program. But from what I saw it was incredibly easy to use. With one problem being the fact that you can only chose from a sample of DVD menus. Desiging the DVD menu's also seemed relatively esay to do and making the outtakes and directors commentary took a matter of mintues. Creating the background music playing in menu scene was given to me and just ripped out the best of the apple samples and stuck them together creating a sampled Drum'n'Bass song.
Was the best! Its incredible how much memory you use simply filming 1 or 2 minutes of film. It meant that come editing and the final product it gave you so much better quality to add the effects you wanted and it looking professional (ish).
SOUND
The sound in our piece is the most crucial as it creates the feeling we are trying to portray, from the ambiance and institutional sounds in the opening scene. To the "trippy" dream sequence.
All of the sound in our piece was created in Garage Band a program on the Apple Mac that lets you create music through adding sound samples and effects together.
We also used a website called http://ccmixter.org/ which provided free un-copyrighted music samples.
The sound for us was the easiest part, I really enjoyed creating the sounds effects and making the music to our film.
EDITING
Using a program only available on Macs called Final Cut Express - this was the best program I have ever worked with and enjoyed working with for the simple reason it has everything we needed and our ideas were not confined due to the quality of the program.
The simple challenge was trying to interpret all the technicality of transferring your film to the computer. It was just a case of getting to know the program.
Were we shined the most with our editing is the dream sequence which was so much fun doing.
Thankfully there were no problems with the incompatibility of music and film clips.
CREDITS
Using live type was a little bit of a pain, as it was needlessly complicated and slow. However when we got the text font that we wanted and it made the film all that more better. Its so important to get the right effect and font - it literally makes or breaks your film.
BLOGGING
Has been lots of fun to use! I find it great, like a public diary. And always getting some challenging feedback about your views is always great. As a communication medium it is a great way of posting whatever you feel like posting. Embedding video, pictures and links to websites means that it completely changes the way you write. And it illustrates your points and views. Accessibility of your work on the internet is something I will dearly miss!
iDVD and the DVD.
Unfortunately i was ill whilst Jerome and Bobbi used this program. But from what I saw it was incredibly easy to use. With one problem being the fact that you can only chose from a sample of DVD menus. Desiging the DVD menu's also seemed relatively esay to do and making the outtakes and directors commentary took a matter of mintues. Creating the background music playing in menu scene was given to me and just ripped out the best of the apple samples and stuck them together creating a sampled Drum'n'Bass song.
Characters ,Costume and Props
In our scene we used all of us.
the Doctor played by Bobbi
the Agent played by Me (James)
the Victim played by Jerome
The Agent
We wanted to make the Agent look professional, but also dressing inconspicuously and not standing out. Almost Jason Bourne looking:
And this is what the Agent looked like our film:
So as you can see we want the Audience to pick up that he is an Agent and all the clothes he wears blends in. Jeans, White Trainers, Black Coat, Hooded Top. Jeans, White Trainers, Black Coat, Hooded Top.
The gun you see in the right hand picture is a replica colt.45
. Know for its accuracy, it seemed to fit the part of an Agent / Assassin rather well.
In the prison we wanted the prisoner to look drained in ill fitted clothes. So I wore black track suit bottoms with a grubby white top.
The Doctor
We needed the Audience to pick up that she was a doctor straight away, but wanted to question her profession.
So giving her a white lab coat, black belt, tights and shoes made her look like a cliche doctor.
Showing Bobbi inject the main character with the syringe also highlights this.
The Victim
.
We dressed the Victim as a cliche shady looking spy with a black trench coat and black army boots. We gave the Victim a brief case to create an enigma to what was inside it and if there was a link between him being killed and the brief case
the Doctor played by Bobbi
the Agent played by Me (James)
the Victim played by Jerome
The Agent
We wanted to make the Agent look professional, but also dressing inconspicuously and not standing out. Almost Jason Bourne looking:
And this is what the Agent looked like our film:
So as you can see we want the Audience to pick up that he is an Agent and all the clothes he wears blends in. Jeans, White Trainers, Black Coat, Hooded Top. Jeans, White Trainers, Black Coat, Hooded Top.
The gun you see in the right hand picture is a replica colt.45
. Know for its accuracy, it seemed to fit the part of an Agent / Assassin rather well.In the prison we wanted the prisoner to look drained in ill fitted clothes. So I wore black track suit bottoms with a grubby white top.
The Doctor
We needed the Audience to pick up that she was a doctor straight away, but wanted to question her profession.
So giving her a white lab coat, black belt, tights and shoes made her look like a cliche doctor.Showing Bobbi inject the main character with the syringe also highlights this.
The Victim
.
We dressed the Victim as a cliche shady looking spy with a black trench coat and black army boots. We gave the Victim a brief case to create an enigma to what was inside it and if there was a link between him being killed and the brief case
SETTING
So these were the Locations we shot in - SET
This was our opening shot - next to our school chapel
This was the dark / grimy / secretive entrance to this institution through mise en scene we wanted the audience to pick up that this wasn't a nice place.
The corridor entrance to the holding cell of our main character. Again making the shots more noir and artsy really helped giving the audience the institutional feel that this shot has. The grimyness contrasts with the previous shot. Providing juxstapostion and showing how secret this institution is.
The holding cell of our character. Juxaposed agian with the previous shot. Showing that the instution does not look after their prisoners and also presents an even darker under tone to the film's opening.
This is the canal - and as was used in the dream sequence to show the killing taking place. Looking a lot like In Bruges but with a much more film noir undertone. It blends in with the previous scenes very well. And the snow gives a much more dreamier atmosphere.
Were the killing takes place - under the bridge, public and grimy looking the graffiti really makes this shot.
This was our opening shot - next to our school chapel
This was the dark / grimy / secretive entrance to this institution through mise en scene we wanted the audience to pick up that this wasn't a nice place.
The corridor entrance to the holding cell of our main character. Again making the shots more noir and artsy really helped giving the audience the institutional feel that this shot has. The grimyness contrasts with the previous shot. Providing juxstapostion and showing how secret this institution is.
The holding cell of our character. Juxaposed agian with the previous shot. Showing that the instution does not look after their prisoners and also presents an even darker under tone to the film's opening.
This is the canal - and as was used in the dream sequence to show the killing taking place. Looking a lot like In Bruges but with a much more film noir undertone. It blends in with the previous scenes very well. And the snow gives a much more dreamier atmosphere.
Were the killing takes place - under the bridge, public and grimy looking the graffiti really makes this shot.
Changes and "Compromises"
We came up with the name Compromised as it fitted with the Story and fitted with how we actually filmed the whole sequence.
I thought of this story mainly inspired by films like Minority Report, The Jacket and to obtain a more artsy style to the film In Bruges.
So at first Jerome, Bobbi and I based our ideas around this story / blurb that I wrote. Planning to meet up every Saturday at mine to shoot our film and also get to the local station to shoot there as well. That was the plan. What happened is that due to our hectic lives in school and being the socialites, part-time workers and driving learners we all were. This, was one thing that we could not seem to do. We also realized that me shooting Jerome with a gun at a train station didn't seem like a great idea.
So we had to "Compromise" and go back to where we were going to shoot our film. Then before we even sat down to think, Snow Week had arrived. Meaning that we were further separated of thinking how to rejig our sets - but still maintaining the storyline.
The idea was put forward that we'd shoot in school. Looking around our school and the surrounding areas we did find could really compliment our film and the snow and canal shot I believed really gave it an artistic effect.
I thought of this story mainly inspired by films like Minority Report, The Jacket and to obtain a more artsy style to the film In Bruges.
So at first Jerome, Bobbi and I based our ideas around this story / blurb that I wrote. Planning to meet up every Saturday at mine to shoot our film and also get to the local station to shoot there as well. That was the plan. What happened is that due to our hectic lives in school and being the socialites, part-time workers and driving learners we all were. This, was one thing that we could not seem to do. We also realized that me shooting Jerome with a gun at a train station didn't seem like a great idea.
So we had to "Compromise" and go back to where we were going to shoot our film. Then before we even sat down to think, Snow Week had arrived. Meaning that we were further separated of thinking how to rejig our sets - but still maintaining the storyline.
The idea was put forward that we'd shoot in school. Looking around our school and the surrounding areas we did find could really compliment our film and the snow and canal shot I believed really gave it an artistic effect.
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