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Monday 16th-Friday 20th: This week were introduced to our task in which we had to evaluate our final teaser trailer. There are four questions:
Monday 23rd- Friday 27th November: This week I began writing the script for my evaluation. I knew what to talk about, but I struggled to put it down on paper. By the end of the week I had done a first draft and decided that it was worth filming. I asked one of my friends (who I knew could talk for the world), he said yes and I promptly told him to suit up. I knew how I could film on screen and also how to record the sound so that it sounded good. My biggest problem was the artificial lighting. I had to use two lamps and the room lights, and the effect of this was that it created shadows. But in the end of the day, there was not much to do about it, and the main focus is on what you are saying. I filmed with the microphone and the application to record my face at the same time, to help produce a clear voice. This also meant that when I edited I would have to sync up the voice to the video. This did not create any problems. At this point in time, the footage looked good and was flowing nicely. Monday 30th November-Friday 4th December: This week my focus was on clarifying the script, completing the full draft and filming the main parts. Once I had done the script, I then went on to film my sections of speaking, it didn't take too much takes.However, with the amount I had to say I would get a little lost half way through! Once I had done this, I would put them in my USB and wait to get into school to start editing. Final Cut Pro really helped with syncing the voice the the on-screen video. This is because it shows you sound waves and so I could match up the voice. I also recorded the voice twice in case there were any problems, so syncing was no issue. The only slight problem was that sometimes the recording itself lagged out, and so whilst it may not look it, it's all synced. By the end of the week I was pretty much done on the footage aspect. It was now onto editing and choosing the clips I wanted to feature alongside my dialogue. I also filmed the last scenes of the interview in this week, which helped prevent me from just talking to the screen for along time but also to change the pace, and help meet the format. Monday 7th December- Friday 11th December: Now that I had done my filming, I wanted to start clearing up the editing so I could upload it this Friday. I put together everything I had and it was looking good. I watched it over a couple of times to help see if there were any issues, and I noticed two. In particular, the two were to help add to what I was saying. So I filmed these two small, short paragraphs and added them into the timeline. This past week I found and downloaded clips that I thought helped coincide with what I was saying. I then shortened them when I wasn't able to edit so they were ready to put into the timeline straight away. Once I was able to put them in, I kept watching it to see if there were any errors and by the Friday's lesson, it was ready to be uploaded.
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This whole month has been about us focusing on our magazine covers and poster for "The Enigma". We started off by each looking at a professional film poster and a film magazine cover. In my case, I looked at Ben Affleck's Entertainment Weekly covers inspiration and this was extremely helpful. This was because I could tell a lot through the poster such as how important the picture is, text font and styles but also what's included. Ben Affleck was out of character in a relaxed picture which is something I immediately wanted to follow. When posing for the picture of the magazine cover, I decided to have a similar pose of me smiling whilst sorting out my tie. Therefore, I wanted to implement some of it's conventions and layout. I came up with the name of "Visual Magazine" because I felt it represents the arty side to British cinema. It also is synonymous of film because how film is of course a visual art form. The word also sounds premium and adds to the connotations of the premium product we are aiming. In addition to this, for the poster I analysed Fatal Attraction from 1987. This was because we had an extremely similar narrative and are a part of the same genre (thriller).From the poster I could tell how vibrant it was with it's purple and red colour scheme really showing a contrast between the characters. Similarly,the colour scheme adds a contrast to what is the dark and twisted narrative. The divide in the middle helps show how there's something not right between the two characters. I helped work on the magazine cover with Tyra and Fabian. At the beginning me and Tyra decided what to say and where things should be positioned. We looked at the Ben Affleck cover for inspiration and Empire's Skyfall for the colour scheme.I edited it at home for the beginning stages and then in class with Tyra. Fabian really helped smarten it up and make it look more professional and the end result is really pleasing.
Monday 19th:This is our last week, and needless to say we have a lot of stuff to sort out. We have decided to film our final scenes tomorrow at Tyra's house. I have collected a checklist from my teacher and I feel that one issue that we need to sort out is making the story easier to understand. In addition to this, we need to establish Fabian's character, The Enigma slightly more. Today I also filmed a short sequence where I am tied up and we see the Engima with a knife. I filmed and aimed to film three different shots- one medium shot of the bag being taken off my head and seeing the Enigma with a knife, an extreme close-up of my bruised face and a shot of a knife with blood dropping on my feet. I was really happy with the shots I filmed, apart from one because the camera was slightly covered by a thumb and also the lighting could be improved.
Tuesday 20th: Today we all met at Tyra's house with the intention of filming several scenes ; the Enigma stroking Shivani's hair whilst she is sleeping, someone standing outside a door (filming the silhouette/shadow), the burning of my picture and me and Shviani's character happy. I thought that some of the final shots looked great and I feel that we do have many great angles captured through our teaser so far. What we really need to focus on now is establishing the story. Wednesday 21st: Today we edited our footage, I looked for a royalty free soundtrack and Mr Williamson looked at our footage- he seemed to be bemused by the story,thought some of our angles were good. The main things I gathered from our discussion is that we need to show Fabian's character more. Also, I am going to do some more narration to really help clarify the story. Thursday 22nd: I tried to find time to edit,but throughout the day another group was editing and I was unable to do so. However, I spent my lunch time and some time after school searching for a soundtrack. I was able to find a song that I thought fit the end of the teaser trailer called The Complex. Friday 23rd: Today was our last day, and a very busy one. We had a lot of editing to do and we finished it in the end. I am happy it due to the fact that for what it's worth we completed the task and had some interesting angles and a unique story. I feel that it would be suitable for our audience and the feedback I have received has been positive. Obviously, there are things I can change such as a few editing (particularly the transitions), the music and particularly when it should dip. However, for the most part it;s tense and creates an auroa of mystery as to who is the Enigma and what does he exactly want. I've learnt a lot from this process and that's the best thing to take out of it. Monday 12th: Today I wanted to see what my film thought of the song and the voice over. I decided during the weekend that I wanted to do the voiceover again because I thought I sounded a tad depressed! I think the group liked the song, however after doing research and finding out that Fallullah is a part of Sony, I think it's close to impossible that we would be granted permission to use the song let alone for them to even bother replying to the email. In this session myself and Tyra did 45min of editing and then swaped with Shivani and Fabian for the remaining part of the lesson. I then focused myself to look for music. Our teacher then looked at what we had so far and thought that we had to change the story again as it didn't make much sense to him. So we did.
Wednesday 14th: Today all four members of our group edited, discussing ideas,especially about where we believed the idents should go. Tyra found a instrumental piece that had a similar start to Fallullah's 'Wicked Game'. I then suggested that if I could find a vocal piece/acapella we could put it on top and form a song very similar to what we wanted. With music, it's about searching until you find one where you are pleased and not finding one that is satisfactory. After school, myself and my group went out to film in the evening. We filmed 3 main shots- with a particular focus on the montage at the end. The beginning of the teaser trailer is to establish characters and their motivations-the rest is to help maintain the excitement. The sequences involved the kidnapping, a short dialogue between myself and Shivani and then Shviani's character fighting back against the Enigma. Monday 5th October: Today we had planned to film the shrink scene between the Enigma and a counselor. We planned to film it in the Sixth Form center due to the good lighting but also the fact that the room looks and feels like a room that would be used for counselling sessions. But to do this sequence we needed an actual teacher because otherwise it would look pretty strange with a student. As a result, I set out to find a teacher who was willing to star in our film and the first teacher I asked was more than happy to help, which was fantastic! I filmed the short sequence which involved using a dolly to move the camera closer towards the counsellor. I am happy with the result of the shot and I believe this shot will allow us to explore and tell the audience a bit about this character.
Tuesday 6th October: Today, myself and two others in my group were able to film a short shot that involved me kidnaping Shivani's character. However, I was just filling up for Fabian, who was shooting the shot, it wasn't necessarily my character doing the kidnapping. Wednesday 7th October: I wasn't in this session, my group did some editing during the lessons today. Friday 9th October:Today I was focusing on finding music, which I am finding extremely tough. This is mainly due to the fact that it has to be copyright free and I have a great song in mind (Fallulah's Wicked Game- Chris Isaak's cover). Music is a massive part in making a film trailer standing out and consequently I am trying to find a vocal song that fits the tone of the film, which Wicked Games does. However, getting permission is another challenge in itself and without it our project could get taken down Youtube and we could face getting a zero. I also did my voice-over and put it on top and will show my group in Monday's lesson. Monday 28th: Today we as a group aimed to film two sequences, the cafe meeting my character and Fabians character, The Engima as well as re-film the bedroom scene at Tyra's house because the previous footage was blurry. First off we meet after lunch and tried to find a cafe. I went to speak to the manager and at first she said no, before other employees allowing us inside. The cafe was the ideal place I had in mind, not necessarily secluded and it also had good natural lighting. We used several different camera angles which was great, all of which creating the mystery of who is the Enigmas as we didn't show his face as he was covered by a large hood. I am very happy with the footage especially the varied camera angles. Fabian, Shviani and Tyra all took turns in filming. We then moved to Tyra's house and filmed the short sequence of me on a laptop- something that will be cut down at the beginning of the trailer. As of right now, we have the foundation, the middle, but we are missing the fillers-the random short sequences that randomly pop up and show a bit more about the story and different locations. We also have to sort out the ending scene, something we are currently thinking about now. I am thinking of having this scene as dramatic and having it cross cut with the meeting scene towards the end of the trailer.
Wednesday 30th September: After reviewing our cafe footage, I was quite pleased with it. However, one overlaying problem was our idea. Today was about sorting out our idea because our media teachers criticized and didn't seem to understand it. As a result, myself and the others in my group spent a long time discussing several ideas, all revolving around a mystery/thriller. The main criticism was that characters motivations or actions don't make to much sense. Consequently, we needed the Engima to have a different motive as opposed to being just bullied by these characters in the past but also think about what the protagonists would have to do for the Engima. I thought of the idea that if the Engima was obsessed with the Shivani's character it would give the Engima a strong motivation and could also allow us to add the thriller elements. We had to decide then and so we went with it. Friday 2nd October: I wrote a few ideas on a shot list about things we could show in our trailer. As a group we came up with the idea that we start of by having Shviani's character kidnapped in a 2sec shot that would immediately give the tone of the film away. I then thought doing it in this order:
“You”
From this I tried to convey that this is still a mystery and that it will hopefully not give away not too much information nut keep it tense. It also goes in with line with current trailers where they either start of slow (or try and catch your attention straight away) and introduce the characters and hint at the story before the pace builds up and it gets intense. This is in line with our questionnaire results. Monday 21st: Today I was primarly focused on finding royalty free soundtracks. It's quite hard I was looking for something quite tense and something that builds up (pacing-wise). However, I noticed that a lot of the music I found was orchestral and triumphant- something that wouldn't have fitted the story or tone of the film. I looked at websites such as Incompetech, Bensound and Purple Planet and have found parts of tracks that I like.
Wednesday 23rd: Today was an inset and so we did not get much done at all. Friday 25th: Today was quite a signifcant day as we decided to go outside and film at Tyra's house. The sequence was shot by Fabian, Tyra and Shivani and it was of me on a laptop. We intended for this to be an introduction to the character without giving to much information away and his motives. We are hoping to film a sequence that is filmed all on screen of my character meeting the Enigma. For next week: Hopefully have the majority of filming done. Start editing what we have. Find soundtrack. Monday 14th: On Sunday the 13th of September I filmed a few short sequences in my garage of a scene involving my character being attacked by a person hiding in the shadows. This character is in fact his best friend who has set him up. It was a spontaneous thing to do, I didn't have a script. I wanted to show this rough draft to my group and then film it again on Tuesday.I liked the idea that this could be the final sequences shown in the film as a tense ending.
Wednesday 16th: Yesterday I filmed the sequences again aiming to go for better lighting and smoother sequences. My idea is for this to be edited in a style that this could go on as as monologue/ conversation is going on. This conversation would be with the main character and the enigma. Instead of having a face to face meeting I was thinking of thinking of having a back to face meeting where the main protagonist would be looking at the back of the the Enigma as he is looking away. We have two main sequences left to film, the meeting scene and the scene where the Enigma catches the attention of the main protagonist. Friday 18th: Today Fabian and Shivani edited the clips that we have already and before they made the title which I feel is really good for our film The colour scheme and design really captures the feel and tone for the film. Myself and Tyra looked for mysterious and tense royalty free music. Monday 7th: Today was our first day back after the summer holiday. I had filmed a few short sequences whilst abroad. These sequences consited of my character (who as of right now is known as character 2 and the best friend of character 1)getting a letter from somoene which says "you need my help". This was interesting and fun to shoot and I really like the mystery element I am going for. As a group we have decided to change our film idea slightly to make the film seem simpler and make it just less complicated as it would be extremely hard to film and show all our ideas in 40-50 seconds. I am writing the script and longline as well as working on the pitch and am aiming to have done it by Friday.
Wednesday 9th: Today I was predominantly focused on sorting out the story and completing the script. I have done a first draft of it and I am happy with it. I think the story is much simpler and easier to explain to the audience in the short time we have. Friday 11th: Today I was finishing off the pitch and script. As I mentioned before, it's much easier now and having shown it to other people without explaining the story, they had seemed to understood what was happening. With the original idea and script it would have been too much to show in around 40 seconds. I also was updated my weebly page, putting on the questionnaire results and brainstorm from the others in my group. For next week: Start filming Finish any research that should have been completed beforehand Fix the story so it's ready to film Do the storyboard for the trailer We didn't have much too do over the holidays as we still had to find out who was carrying it on after we got our exam results. When I went away I decided to film some short sequences using an iPhone and a monopod which helps stabilise the image. The iPhone was ideal size wise and for mobility. The quality is also brilliant as it has optic stabilisation which helps with the tracking shots I was going for. Also, it films in 1080p at 60 fps. We have decided to slightly change the story and instead are going for the antagonist to be the bullied victim of the protagonists from the past. It gives him a motive and makes him slightly more relatable. The twist of the story would be this and it would ultimately be shown in the final quarter of the film.
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December 2015
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