Christmas homework - SWOT task

Christmas homework - blog AUDIT - Esther

SWOT Analysis of Blog's Strengths and Weaknesses - JAN

Because the image sucks, here it is in TEXT FORM:

Strengths
- Lots of location posts
- Clear range of presentational tools
- Great analysis of similar products, genres, sequences, etc.
- Solid evidence of storyboarding, scheduling, and other production planning

Weaknesses
- We haven't cut together our evidence of filming posts yet
- Not enough soundscape work

Threats
- Time management. Some posts get away from me because of poor organisation of time.
- Sometimes I struggle to find a good place to start with any given blog task.

Opportunities
- I enjoy writing, and I feel that the evaluation stages of the coursework will provide lots of opportunities to do so.
- In the editing stages, we will make lots of progress on our soundscape, which has been a noted weakness of our work so far.

Blog Audit - JAN

Because the image sucks, here it is in TEXT FORM:

Research into similar products 
- Purpose of Title Sequence
- What Makes a Good Title Sequence?
- Analyse 2 Title Sequences
- 4 Different Types of Film Openings
- What is a Genre?
- Audience Profiles
- Titles of a Favourite Film
- Target Audience Task 2
- Genre Shortlist
- Genre, Audience, and the British Box Office
- Genre of Film
- Target Audience Member Profile
- Institutional Task

Organised use of actors, locations, props, and costumes
- Half-Term HW - Part 3 PROPS
- Half-Term HW - Part 2 COSTUMES
- PLANNING - Half-Term Homework - Locations
- Props/Costumes
- Risk Assessment
- Location Planning
- ALL OF THE LOCATION POSTS EVER
- Production Schedule
- Aims for Wednesday, 2nd of December

Work on shot lists, layouts, drafting, scripting and/or storyboarding
- Remake activity: Shot List
- 6 Minute Idea Task
- Individual Ideas/Title Sequence Outline
- 3 Sample Sounds
- Idea outline video of ICARUS
- Type of Sequence
- Sound Design
- Storyboard 1st Draft
- Storyboard final
- Filming 25/11/2015
- Test Shots
- Filming 1/12/2015

Presentation of Ideas
- Not every post has one name, as often we worked as a group
- Used a FAIRLY diverse range of presentational tools. A lot of text posts, prezis, emazes, and images.
- The weakest area is costume, but I'm not really sure what more we can say about this.

Evaluation of the Rough Cut - JAN

Rough cut evaluation

EVALUATING THE ROUGH CUT

ICARUS Rough Cut 11/12/15

What we still need to do

• We still need to film more shots to add to our draft. We are filming at Greenwhich foot tunnel on Friday the 4th December and will be filming at Chestnuts primary school one day next week
• We also need to re-film some of the shots we have already shot due to issues such as lighting
• Add our sound effects (this will be done in editing)
• Add a soundtrack (again this will be done in editing)

Title Sequence as of 02/12/2015 - best viewed muted

Filming 1/12/15

On the First of December we will be returning to Chestnuts Primary School for our second day of shooting, and aim to complete all of the remaining shots that need this location.

PLANNING - Aims for Wednesday, 2nd of December

• Our group has decided to return to Chestnuts Primary School on Tuesday, 1st of December to complete shooting all of the necessary shots there. 
• We plan to leave for the location at 14:45-15:00, and hope to arrive at the location at 15:35. 
• We will leave at 18:00.
• On the 2nd of December, we will review our footage and cut together a rough sequence, leaving gaps for the few remaining shots in different locations.

PLANNNG - Test Shots (TO BE FIXED)

The main aim of the practice shots was to be able to get a good level of quality out of our footage in low-light. I think this was successful straight away, but the first shots weren't very interestingly lit, with the light shining directly at Esther. To remedy this, we had some shots were the light hit from above, casting a sinister shadow, which was much more in tune with the aim of the film. We are happy with the results and feel more confident with implementing this into our actual production.

Filming 25/11/2015 - Esther

Today we will be filming all the shots in red

Shot 1 - Wide establishing shot - abandoned room, a layer of dust covering everything
Shot 2 - Close up - candles, one lit and flickering, camera focused on it, others in the background.
Shot 3 - Low close up - girls shoes walking steadily
Shot 4 - Wide shot - Girl walking steadily, candle in one hand and matchbox in the other
Shot 5 -Wide walking shot - Male assassin striding down a nondescript corridor
Shot 6 - Tracking shot - Girl walking over to candles and placing the one in her hand on the floor
Shot 7 - Cut in - male assassin torso, at an angle
Shot 8 - Extreme close up - match being lit, lingering on flame
Shot 9 - Wide shot - Girl bending over the candles, lighting them and blowing the match out
Shot 10 - Low angle shot - Male assassin striding down corridor
Shot 11 - Angled over candle shot - Girl pulls knees to chest and rests her chin on them, candles front of shot. Pull focus from candles to girl
Shot 12 - Worms eye view - Male assassin climbing stairs
Shot 13 - Wide shot - Girl watching candles, loud bang
Shot 14  - Extreme close up on eye, pupils dilating
Shot 15 - Mid close up - Girl rises quickly and begins blowing out the candles. Her bag falls of her shoulders
Shot 16 - Close up tracking shot - Girl rushing, throwing everything clumsily back into the bag
Shot 17 - Suddenly a black screen, no fade in. Silence
Shot 18 - Fade into tracking shot - from bag still on floor to remaining candle. Stay on candle in wide shot - Man's feet walk into shot over to the candle and begins bending down.
Shot 19 - Close up tracking shot - Man brings candle to face and blows the candle out. Smoke lingers on black screen, outline of candle still visible

Pitch feedback - Storyboard final - Esther

The feedback we received said that our storyboard wasn't long enough to give us 2 minutes worth of title sequence.

To fix this we will be adding in some more shots, and integrating them into our old storyboard. The results are below.

Storyboard by Slidely Slideshow


Shot 1 - Wide establishing shot - abandoned room, a layer of dust covering everything
Shot 2 - Close up - candles, one lit and flickering, camera focused on it, others in the background.
Shot 3 - Low close up - girls shoes walking steadily
Shot 4 - Wide shot - Girl walking steadily, candle in one hand and matchbox in the other
Shot 5 -Wide walking shot - Male assassin striding down a nondescript corridor
Shot 6 - Tracking shot - Girl walking over to candles and placing the one in her hand on the floor
Shot 7 - Cut in - male assassin torso, at an angle
Shot 8 - Extreme close up - match being lit, lingering on flame
Shot 9 - Wide shot - Girl bending over the candles, lighting them and blowing the match out
Shot 10 - Low angle shot - Male assassin striding down corridor
Shot 11 - Angled over candle shot - Girl pulls knees to chest and rests her chin on them, candles front of shot. Pull focus from candles to girl
Shot 12 - Worms eye view - Male assassin climbing stairs
Shot 13 - Wide shot - Girl watching candles, loud bang
Shot 14  - Extreme close up on eye, pupils dilating
Shot 15 - Mid close up - Girl rises quickly and begins blowing out the candles. Her bag falls of her shoulders
Shot 16 - Close up tracking shot - Girl rushing, throwing everything clumsily back into the bag
Shot 17 - Suddenly a black screen, no fade in. Silence
Shot 18 - Fade into tracking shot - from bag still on floor to remaining candle. Stay on candle in wide shot - Man's feet walk into shot over to the candle and begins bending down.
Shot 19 - Close up tracking shot - Man brings candle to face and blows the candle out.Smoke lingers on black screen, outline of candle still visible

Pitch Feedback

Pitch prezi

Production schedule

Storyboard 1st Draft - Esther

Sound Design (Faris) PITCH PLANNING

Diegetic and Non-Diegetic

There will be both diegetic and non-diegetic sound in the film, The breathing of the character will be diegetic. The footsteps, items dropping, doors shutting close, floors creaking and things of that nature will be non-diegetic. 

Influence

Title sequences like Gone Girl have influence me a lot because it tells the story by not giving to much away. The soundtrack and non-diegetic sound gives the viewer this uneasy feeling that makes them question what the hell is about to happen. This effect is what I'll be trying to recreate, I'll be trying to make the viewer question everything that is going onscreen, look for clues to piece together to help them understand the movie better. I'll achieve this by laying sound in top of sound, for example have the sound of the clock ticking whilst also having the sound of something dropping playing. 

Soundscape

Institutional Task (Faris) PITCH PLANNING

Production Type 

We are going to go with a mainstream production and distribution company,  We decided this due to our genre being thriller, a lot of thriller films are mainstream like Gone Girl, Psycho, Taken, Memento and Black Swan. They were all made by a well know production company and distributed by a company that understood the audience they were trying to attract. 

What we went with

We are going with 20th century fox as they have a track record of backing many movies within the thriller genre. Another reason we picked them was for their ability to reach a larger audience , if we went with an independent film distribution company they wouldn't have similar type of funding that we'd prefer as our films aim distribution wise is to reach as large of an audience as possible.

Other Companies

Other similar companies would be Lions Gate, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayoer(MGM),Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures and Warner Bros. These are all big distribution companies who know exactly how to attract a certain type of audience for a specific type of film.

Lions Gate: The hunger game series, Warm Bodies, Step up and John Wick

MGM: skyfall, The pink panther and Hannibal 

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures: Frozen, Inside out, The Avengers and Wall-E

Warner Bros: Mad Max, The Harry Potter series, Inception and The Matrix

Issue

The only issue with these big companies is they will require a lot of on screen time during the title sequence which will limit us on how much we can put in it ourselves. By that I mean we will get less time to hints towards what the movie is about and less time for credits.

                                                           

The Type of Title Sequence - Jan

Chestnuts Primary School - Location 1 - Callum

After 6 long years, I returned to Chestnuts Primary School.

As you saw before, I had contacted the Headteacher originally about using the Second Floor Hall as a backup location.

So I went and the very nice office lady, Tara, showed me around:

Unfortunately, there was a problem with this setting: It was obviously, and unavoidably a Primary School. However well we organised the scene, it was going to have the feel of a School.

However, Tara came to the rescue. She suggested the Basement - out of the way of the children, isolated, ancient, dark, large, and easily reorganised. So I went down and took some photos:

Having conferred with Esther (Location Manager), we have come to the conclusion that this is the best option for our setting. Not only is it convenient, it also fits the type of Title Sequence we want to make. Tara said that we can used it any time Monday to Friday from 9AM till 6PM, as long as we inform the Site Manager. There is the safety issue of the low ceilings (an issue for Faris and I), and bumps in the ground like this:

But as long as we are careful, no accidents should occur. 

Location 1: 

Chestnuts Primary School

Black Boy Lane

South Tottenham

N15 3AS

LOCATION SUMMARY (Pitch Planning) - Esther

Main location

Original location

Originally, we wanted to use The Bussey Building Warehouse Space.

However, we were informed that this would not be available for us to use

Back up

Our back up location was Bruce castle in Tottenham 

We have contacted them

and heard this back

However, since as of today, 16/11/15, we have not yet heard any more from Bruce castle, so have had to make other plans.

Second back up - current location we will use

Our second back up is Chestnuts Primary School

We have confirmation that we can use part of the school

Callum has visited this site and it is perfect for our first location, so this is the one we will use. See Callum's post for more information

Location 2

Original

Our location of choice is Essex Road station

Issues include not being able to use a tripod - only a fig rig. It is also a fairly busy station, so we would have to go out of rush hour.

Although it would probably be fine, we need a back up location



Back up
Our back up location is the Greenwich foot tunnel

Location 1 Backup - Chestnuts Primary School - Callum

Because I got political connections everywhere, I was able to get the Headteacher of my Primary School's number, and so I got in contact with her about using the 2nd Floor Hall:

I'm going to go in tomorrow to organise dates and outline our plan.

Location 1 Backup 2 (Pitch Planning) - Esther

We need an alternative back up, incase we cannot use Bruce Castle. Online I found a warehouse available for filming, and have emailed the company responsible for it.

http://www.filmoffice.co.uk/hackney/bare-brick-warehouse.aspx

Target Audience Member Profile - Callum and Jan

Idea for Title Sequence

Recently, I was watching the TV, and came across an advert which I thought we could take aspects from for our title sequence. It's the 2015 advert for the Audi R8:

I really like the use of the extreme close up on the eyes, where the pupils dilate and contract. I believe we can do this by focusing light on our actor. Hopefully this will be beneficial to our title sequence.

Location 1 - Continued (Pitch planning) - Esther

Unfortunately we received the information that we could not use our original location we had wished to use. 

We have also contacted  Bruce Castle in Tottenham, and are hopeful that we shall hear positive news soon.

Location 1 Backup Progress (Pitch Planning) - Callum

Location 2 Back Up (Pitch Planning) - Esther

Our backup for our second location is the Greenwich foot tunnel.

This also would create an excellent atmosphere, and we could film with no issues.

Risk Assessment (reconsidered) - Callum

Location 1 Back-Up

As a group, we are also looking for an alternative location: Bruce Castle in Tottenham. We've emailed the museum services and Haringey council to get permission to use it, and hope to hear back soon.