After watching back my two drafts and talking to some fellow students about it, we've all arrived at the conclusion that my film is missing some kind of twist toward the end, and as a whole it could be seen as quite predictable. Because of this, I've decided that the film would benefit more from an extra scene that created some kind of twist for the audience to think about. My plan was to do that piece of extra filming with my actress, Heidi, tonight, but due to circumstances beyond my control this can no longer happen. The scene we were going to film involved Tom coming to find Clare's dead body, and therefore meaning she had been killed by someone else other than Tom which would confuse the audience. Instead, I am going to shoot a quick scene of Clare's laptop sitting on her bed receiving constant messages from Tom telling her not to leave and that he couldn't make it. This will then make an audience wonder whether or not that was actually Tom who killed Clare and add a twist at the end of my production.
By changing the end of my film slightly, it means that the first draft I did for my magazine review no longer works because in the review I've mentioned how the film is quite predictable with the ending. Because of this, I now plan to compose a second draft for my magazine review that brings in this new scene.
Reflective Comment:
I think that adding this scene into my film will help boost it up in terms with the grade due to the development of the plot. Although I would like to film Heidi (Clare) down the alleyway again, this is not possible right now so I will use the messages coming through on the laptop as a substitute for this.
Showing posts with label Planning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Planning. Show all posts
Thursday, 23 February 2017
Tuesday, 20 December 2016
Initial Footage/Test Footage
Below is a video I uploaded to Vimeo from iMovie. It is some initial footage I did with Heidi playing the role of Clare. The purpose of this filming was to give her some practise with the role and to see how she felt playing it. Overall, this small amount of footage fits together well and I think it went really well. There are some black outs during it where some footage is missing, but as this was only test footage it isn't really too much of a problem.
Reflective Comment:
This test footage was very useful as it gave both me and Heidi some practise with our roles. For me, it allowed me time to get used to the phone I am filming with and also the tripod positioning in my room. For Heidi, it gave her some practise with acting and gave me confidence that she can perform as the character of Clare well. Full filming will be completed soon, with a date soon to be set.
Reflective Comment:
This test footage was very useful as it gave both me and Heidi some practise with our roles. For me, it allowed me time to get used to the phone I am filming with and also the tripod positioning in my room. For Heidi, it gave her some practise with acting and gave me confidence that she can perform as the character of Clare well. Full filming will be completed soon, with a date soon to be set.
Tuesday, 13 December 2016
My Characters
As the filming phase of my production gets closer, I've decided to do a post on who will play the role of my characters, and why I've decided to use them.
Heidi Cooke as Clare (main character):
Heidi is playing the main role of Clare. Although Clare is the main character, throughout the film she does not actually say too much, because most of her conversations are had online and her quietness helps build her character. Because of this, the role of this part doesn't represent too much of a challenge as the main aspects relate to staying serious throughout rather than having long conversations with people. Heidi agreed to play this character and we plan to do some test footage soon to make sure she is capable of playing Clare.
Mandy Coe (my mum) as Clare's Mum:
My Mum is playing the role of Clare's Mum. To make this character as realistic as possible, I had to use someone of a suitable age. Using one of my friends would have worked but would not have made much sense as they wouldn't look old enough to act as Clare's Mum. Because of this, I spoke to Mum about the role and she agreed to take on the character. More speech is involved with Clare's Mum's role, so like with Heidi I plan to do some test footage to give my Mum practise and mainly to ensure she is capable of becoming this character the way I need her to.
Me as Tom/Murderer:
Tom's character is not very prevalent throughout my film. He is seen once in his bedroom with a hood covering his face and on his laptop talking to Clare. He is also seen at the end running over to Clare's dead body. Because of his little prevalence, I didn't see the point in finding someone to cast as him, due to the fact they would only be needed for very small amounts of filming. I've decided to act as this role, and to also play the murderer who stabs Clare in the alley. During the scenes I'm in, I'm going to use members of my family to help operate the tripod and camera in the correct way to ensure that the scene still works well even without me in control of the camera.
Reflective Comment:
This post moves me closer to my filming phase now I have came to a decision on who will be my actors and why. I think that I cast the right people for these roles, and even if I didn't the test footage I plan to do will help me understand whether or not I need to consider re-casting at all. Also, if my role as Tom and the murderer does not work I have people on standby who can step in if needed. I think this post was done well with the right amount of detail as to why these people are playing the roles in my production. To improve, I could have possibly included some test footage within this post but I plan to do a separate one containing this.
Heidi Cooke as Clare (main character):
Heidi is playing the main role of Clare. Although Clare is the main character, throughout the film she does not actually say too much, because most of her conversations are had online and her quietness helps build her character. Because of this, the role of this part doesn't represent too much of a challenge as the main aspects relate to staying serious throughout rather than having long conversations with people. Heidi agreed to play this character and we plan to do some test footage soon to make sure she is capable of playing Clare.
Mandy Coe (my mum) as Clare's Mum:
My Mum is playing the role of Clare's Mum. To make this character as realistic as possible, I had to use someone of a suitable age. Using one of my friends would have worked but would not have made much sense as they wouldn't look old enough to act as Clare's Mum. Because of this, I spoke to Mum about the role and she agreed to take on the character. More speech is involved with Clare's Mum's role, so like with Heidi I plan to do some test footage to give my Mum practise and mainly to ensure she is capable of becoming this character the way I need her to.
Me as Tom/Murderer:
Tom's character is not very prevalent throughout my film. He is seen once in his bedroom with a hood covering his face and on his laptop talking to Clare. He is also seen at the end running over to Clare's dead body. Because of his little prevalence, I didn't see the point in finding someone to cast as him, due to the fact they would only be needed for very small amounts of filming. I've decided to act as this role, and to also play the murderer who stabs Clare in the alley. During the scenes I'm in, I'm going to use members of my family to help operate the tripod and camera in the correct way to ensure that the scene still works well even without me in control of the camera.
Reflective Comment:
This post moves me closer to my filming phase now I have came to a decision on who will be my actors and why. I think that I cast the right people for these roles, and even if I didn't the test footage I plan to do will help me understand whether or not I need to consider re-casting at all. Also, if my role as Tom and the murderer does not work I have people on standby who can step in if needed. I think this post was done well with the right amount of detail as to why these people are playing the roles in my production. To improve, I could have possibly included some test footage within this post but I plan to do a separate one containing this.
Monday, 12 December 2016
Lighting Experiments
My bedroom is where most of my production will be filmed, so I decided to experiment with some lighting. I only have one lamp that I can use to do this, so this is the key light in terms of three point lighting. I couldn't change the brightness of this light, so instead I changed the angle at which it points into the scene. Below, you can see a slide share with three different pictures with the lamp at three different angles. In my production, my main character will be laying on the bed on the laptop.
The first picture in this slide share shows the lamp shining onto the scene in full view, lighting up pretty much everything. Considering the theme of my film, this type of lighting is not suitable as it doesn't create much of a dark sinister atmosphere. The second picture is more darker which looks better, but the third is the lighting I've decided to go with. To create this, I turned the light of the lamp so it was facing more of the wall, meaning that a small glimpse shines only on where my actress will lay. Because she will be on the bed, no visible shadows are created so I do not need a fill light. The darkness in her room can also relate to pathetic fallacy to represent her mood and help create the scene.
Reflective Comment:
The experiment was very good and needed in preparation for my filming. Experimenting with lighting at different angels and with different levels of brightness has helped me to create and visualise how this scene will unfold. I plan to begin filming soon and create this scene in this lighting. Test footage is planned to best posted soon to see how this goes.
The first picture in this slide share shows the lamp shining onto the scene in full view, lighting up pretty much everything. Considering the theme of my film, this type of lighting is not suitable as it doesn't create much of a dark sinister atmosphere. The second picture is more darker which looks better, but the third is the lighting I've decided to go with. To create this, I turned the light of the lamp so it was facing more of the wall, meaning that a small glimpse shines only on where my actress will lay. Because she will be on the bed, no visible shadows are created so I do not need a fill light. The darkness in her room can also relate to pathetic fallacy to represent her mood and help create the scene.
Reflective Comment:
The experiment was very good and needed in preparation for my filming. Experimenting with lighting at different angels and with different levels of brightness has helped me to create and visualise how this scene will unfold. I plan to begin filming soon and create this scene in this lighting. Test footage is planned to best posted soon to see how this goes.
Thursday, 1 December 2016
Risk Assessment
I am planning to film soon, and so I've decided to carry out a risk assessment on any possible hazards:
Reflective Comment:
This post was something that I needed to do before I can actually get around to filming, and although there aren't many hazards, it was still very needed. As you can see, I covered all of the main things I could think off. Most of my production is filmed inside my house, so the risks are very low, and the small amount of filming I do outside still doesn't present much of a risk.
Wednesday, 23 November 2016
Equipment List
Below is a slideshow of the short equipment list for my filming process:
Reflective Comment:
I don't have that much equipment needed for my filming process, but this post was still necessary for me. I think that I covered each area of the equipment well and talked about why I'm using it over another piece of equipment or software, and I also talked about how I'd found a way around the problem with a tripod for an iPhone.
Reflective Comment:
I don't have that much equipment needed for my filming process, but this post was still necessary for me. I think that I covered each area of the equipment well and talked about why I'm using it over another piece of equipment or software, and I also talked about how I'd found a way around the problem with a tripod for an iPhone.
Tuesday, 22 November 2016
Film Magazine Review In Depth Analysis
After analysing film posters in more depth, I decided that I should do the same with my other ancillary task of a film magazine review. To do this, I create a slideshow just as before, which is embedded below using Google Slides (please view in full screen)
Reflective Comment:
This post has helped me gain more of an understanding of what a film magazine review should include, and how they should be written. An obvious improvement of the slideshow would be to anaylse more magazine reviews, but each of them have different layouts with the same conventions, so I felt it would be more beneficial to anaylse one in depth with the text, and talk about how mine will be designed.
Reflective Comment:
This post has helped me gain more of an understanding of what a film magazine review should include, and how they should be written. An obvious improvement of the slideshow would be to anaylse more magazine reviews, but each of them have different layouts with the same conventions, so I felt it would be more beneficial to anaylse one in depth with the text, and talk about how mine will be designed.
Monday, 21 November 2016
Film Poster In Depth Analysis
To ensure that I focus on my ancillary tasks as well as my main task, I decided to create a slideshow looking at film posters in more depth, and considering how mine will look. Embedded below is the slideshow I made through Google Slides.
Reflective Comment:
It is important for me to focus on my ancillary tasks as well as my main production, and so this post helped me move forward in the development of ideas for my film poster. It also helped make my blog more interactive by having a different form of software embedded on my blog. To make this slideshow better, I could have looked at even more films. However, I think that the 3 I picked were good as they are all of a different genre and anaylsing more films didn't seem necessary.
Reflective Comment:
It is important for me to focus on my ancillary tasks as well as my main production, and so this post helped me move forward in the development of ideas for my film poster. It also helped make my blog more interactive by having a different form of software embedded on my blog. To make this slideshow better, I could have looked at even more films. However, I think that the 3 I picked were good as they are all of a different genre and anaylsing more films didn't seem necessary.
Friday, 18 November 2016
Props
For the filming of my production, there will be certain props that I need to help enhance the realism of my film. Below, I've embedded an Emaze I did that goes through each prop I will need and talks about what they represent and how they will help the overall quality of my film (please put full screen):
Reflective Comment:
Going through the props I need for my production brings me a step closer to being ready to film. Using Emaze to do this has also helped make my blog more interactive. I analysed the main props well and talked about semiotics and what they represent. To make this presentation better, I could have gone into more detail on the last slide about general props, but I think that it was best to just cover the main ones I need with the most detail.
Reflective Comment:
Going through the props I need for my production brings me a step closer to being ready to film. Using Emaze to do this has also helped make my blog more interactive. I analysed the main props well and talked about semiotics and what they represent. To make this presentation better, I could have gone into more detail on the last slide about general props, but I think that it was best to just cover the main ones I need with the most detail.
Tuesday, 8 November 2016
Costumes
When it comes to filming, I need to make sure that I have sorted all of the necessary costumes that my actors will need to play their roles successfully. As you can see from my character development (here), I only have 3 main characters, and a side character of a police officer who appears briefly at the end. Below I have looked at these characters and talked about the costumes I will use for them with pictures for examples.
- Clare: Because of Clare's character, I won't really need any specific costumes for her, and will quite easily be able to use clothes that I or my actor already owns. To show her lack of effort with herself, I'm just going to dress her like a typical messy teenager in basic trousers and an over sized hoodie. This will show that she is not really bothered about what she looks like and has no intention to make any effort. The image below is from Google Images, and gives some sort of idea into how I imagine my main character looking. Black isn't the essential colour for her, I simply just want her to look quite messy and also quite confined. In relation to semiotics, that symbolises her as being trapped and sealing herself out from everyone else.
- Tom: This character's costume isn't too vital as he won't actually be seen much. However I want to portray him to be just like Clare and symbolise him as being trapped and attempting to shut everyone else out. I think that wearing hoodies as clothes helps show this because wearing your hood up over your face comes across as wanting to hide yourself from everyone else. As you can see from my script (here), Tom is seen during the film on his laptop with his hood up, so again like Clare I will dress this character in similar clothes. Having both of these characters wearing similar clothes and representing the same thing will help the audience understand why Clare trusts him so easily. An image below from Google helps me to visualise this character. Like Clare's costume, these clothes will be easy to get a hold of and won't require any new purchases.
- Clare's Mum: This character is seen at the start of the film sitting on her sofa, and at the end of the film when she is being told about Clare's death. For both of these scenes I plan to have her in the same clothes, simply to show her lack of effort with herself. I want the clothes she wears to be extremely scruffy and old, and to portray her as being a bad Mum as much as possible. I think that having her wearing something simple like a dressing gown will work, because it will show that when Clare gets home from school at '16:00', her Mum still hasn't made the effort to get dressed. The idea is that Clare's Mum really does not care about her, and hasn't really made any effort to bring her up, hence why she see's nothing wrong with meeting up with a stranger through the internet. The dressing gown below is an example of what she will wear.
- Police Officer: At the end of the film, a police officer will come to Clare's door to tell her Mum about her daughters death. To make this scene appear as realistic as possible, the costume here is very important. I'm going to get someone older to play this role, and will look more at this in my next post on actors. For the costume itself, I will dress the actor in a suit which they will hopefully already own. The suit will be black trousers, white shirt with a black tie. Then, in order to make it clear to the audience that this person is a policeman, I'm going to use a police officers hat. The general conventions of an officer telling a family member someone has died is the idea of them holding their hat in their whilst they knock on the door. My Dad is a police officer, and is looking into getting hold of a hat I can use for this one scene. I'm awaiting permission.
Reflective Comment:
The planning is coming along well for my production with the script, location, and costumes now all been thought about. I think I did this post very well and talked in depth about each character and what I want their costumes to represent. To make this better, I could have shown my actual actors in their costumes, but I haven't quite sorted this out yet. My next post will be about my actors, and will include profiles of who I've decided to use and why.
Thursday, 3 November 2016
Script Writing
I've decided that the next logical step is to write a script for my film so when I talk to my actors about their roles I can go through exactly what they need to say. I was going to use a website called Celtx to do this, but I can't quite figure out how to use it for free instead of needing to pay. Because of this, I'm just going to write it onto a word document and print it out. The pictures of my printed script can be seen below. One of my other A Levels is Creative Writing, which means I am very familiar with the layout and structure of a script:
As you can see, in the script I included the speech that happens in the chat room, because without them the script may have been a bit bare. I think that the script itself is very good and goes through the film well, outlining what happens and what is said. I may come back to it and add parts or remove them when it comes to filming if some parts seem too short or too long.
Reflective Comment:
Completing the script was something I'm very glad I've gotten done. This may be a first draft or the finished version, depending on how the filming goes when using this script. I think its structured well and includes general conventions that a script would have (INT. EXT.). To make this script better, I could have included more details in the descriptive part, however I think the amount I included was good and covers the main areas of the film well and successfully. I think this script will be good for my production.
Wednesday, 2 November 2016
Possible Locations
My film plot can be seen by clicking here.
By familiarising yourself with this plot, you will probably realise that their aren't a large number of locations used. I'm going to use my house to show Clare on her laptop, which is easy for me. When it comes to her meeting up with Tom in the woods, I'm going to struggle with the lighting as I do want it to be dark to create a more sinister atmosphere, but due to the lack of lights in the actual woods it is probably going to be very hard to achieve and do well. Because of this, the location I may use could be an alleyway with a street lamp in it. This would mean the lighting would be easier because the actual area of filming would be lit up. I'm going to visit both of the locations in the dark and assess which one would be better for me. Below, you can see pictures of my the woods (Mousehold) which I obtained form Google Maps, and a possible alley way that I went out and took myself, in case the lighting in the woods fails.
I honestly think that I will end up adjusting my plot and using the alleyway as a meet up point for Clare and Tom instead of the woods, simply because the lighting will be much better and will make the quality of my film a lot better. The woods is probably a better idea in terms of location and would work in the daylight, however I think that a murder scene in the daylight wouldn't create the same fear and tension as it would in the dark. I will decide later, but the alley will most probably be used. Looking at the idea of semiotics (the study of signs and symbols that create meaning), I can relate the locations to this study. For example, the location of an alley way in the dark represents the idea of danger and lack of safety. Also, an alley way in the dark is usually seen as being quite scary and somewhere that people wouldn't want to go. This can also help build my character as it represent her naivety and the lack of understanding she has of danger due to the lack of care her Mum has shown her over here life.
Reflective Comment:
I've known in my head where the locations of my film were going for a while so it was good to get these ideas into a post. I think that having two possible locations for the murder scene of my film is actually a good thing because it gives me the variety and freedom of choice to decide which one works better in terms of the atmosphere and lighting. To improve this task I could have actually gone out to take some photos of the woods in Mousehold. However, I couldn't see the point in making the journey when I can get the images through the internet, and I did go out to the alleyway and use my iPhone to take the pictures.
By familiarising yourself with this plot, you will probably realise that their aren't a large number of locations used. I'm going to use my house to show Clare on her laptop, which is easy for me. When it comes to her meeting up with Tom in the woods, I'm going to struggle with the lighting as I do want it to be dark to create a more sinister atmosphere, but due to the lack of lights in the actual woods it is probably going to be very hard to achieve and do well. Because of this, the location I may use could be an alleyway with a street lamp in it. This would mean the lighting would be easier because the actual area of filming would be lit up. I'm going to visit both of the locations in the dark and assess which one would be better for me. Below, you can see pictures of my the woods (Mousehold) which I obtained form Google Maps, and a possible alley way that I went out and took myself, in case the lighting in the woods fails.
I honestly think that I will end up adjusting my plot and using the alleyway as a meet up point for Clare and Tom instead of the woods, simply because the lighting will be much better and will make the quality of my film a lot better. The woods is probably a better idea in terms of location and would work in the daylight, however I think that a murder scene in the daylight wouldn't create the same fear and tension as it would in the dark. I will decide later, but the alley will most probably be used. Looking at the idea of semiotics (the study of signs and symbols that create meaning), I can relate the locations to this study. For example, the location of an alley way in the dark represents the idea of danger and lack of safety. Also, an alley way in the dark is usually seen as being quite scary and somewhere that people wouldn't want to go. This can also help build my character as it represent her naivety and the lack of understanding she has of danger due to the lack of care her Mum has shown her over here life.
Reflective Comment:
I've known in my head where the locations of my film were going for a while so it was good to get these ideas into a post. I think that having two possible locations for the murder scene of my film is actually a good thing because it gives me the variety and freedom of choice to decide which one works better in terms of the atmosphere and lighting. To improve this task I could have actually gone out to take some photos of the woods in Mousehold. However, I couldn't see the point in making the journey when I can get the images through the internet, and I did go out to the alleyway and use my iPhone to take the pictures.
Tuesday, 1 November 2016
Film Magazine Review Initial Ideas
This post will look at some initial ideas for the film magazine review as the second ancillary task for my A2 course. Again, I don't want to spend too long on these tasks as they don't award me as many marks as the final production will. Having said this, I still want to ensure that I do these tasks to the best of my ability to earn maximum marks. Below are some film magazine reviews I've looked at online, and like the poster I have listed some of the typical conventions from the reviews.
Reflective Comment:
Like the initial ideas for the poster, this was a good starting point for the magazine review. Again, this post appears brief and without in depth detail, but like the poster it was just intended to be a base starting point to talk about the starting research I have done. I plan to analyse how a film magazine review is done in more detail soon and do some research into the best way to create my own.
To find these posters I also went onto Google images and typed 'film magazine review', and above is the screenshot of the first pictures. They are of a mix of different genres, because I just want to start by looking at the typical conventions of the reviews:
- Either a big picture or lots of little ones from the film are shown either around the writing or in the middle of the page.
- The reviews typically are read across two A4 pages (A3 landscape).
- There are usually quotes either from the film, actors or directors.
- Title of the film in a large bold font to stand out.
Reflective Comment:
Like the initial ideas for the poster, this was a good starting point for the magazine review. Again, this post appears brief and without in depth detail, but like the poster it was just intended to be a base starting point to talk about the starting research I have done. I plan to analyse how a film magazine review is done in more detail soon and do some research into the best way to create my own.
Monday, 31 October 2016
Film Poster Initial Ideas
I've now started to look at my ancillary products, and began thinking about what kind of things my poster needs to have to meet conventions. Because the poster and magazine article aren't worth as many marks as the main production, I don't want to spend as long on them. However, I must still plan them well and think about how to gain maximum marks on them.
As you can see from the screenshot above, there are a series of different posters from a variety of different films with different genres. To find these posters, I simply went onto Google images and typed in 'film posters'. These are the first ones that came up. From looking at these, I can note down some conventions that occur on each one:
- The main character/s are nearly always on show as the centre of the poster.
- The background of the poster usually relates to the main location of the film.
- The font style is considered and used in relation to the themes and genres of the film.
- The actors named who featured in the film are somewhere on the poster, along with the release date of the film.
Reflective Comment:
As a starting point for my ancillary tasks, this post was very needed to begin talking about the initial ideas and research I'd come up with and done to begin thinking about the poster. Although this post appears quite basic, I only intended it to be a rough idea on some of the things I had thought about with the ancillary tasks. My next plan in relation to the poster is to decide exactly how I'm going to create it and carry out some research on the best ways to do this.
Thursday, 27 October 2016
Short Film Textual Analysis
I've decided to look at some already existing A2 media films to gain some inspiration and some possible ideas. One film that I found featured something that I thought worked really well, and would fit with my film because of the modern theme. The whole film itself does not relate much, but one scene in particular does. The whole film is embed below with a screenshot of the scene I like:

As you can see from this scene, the computer screen he is looking at is visible on the screen. Its a camera angle from inside the computer, showing the characters face as he works. I think that for my production, this would work really well because my main character will be spending a lot of time talking to a boy in a chat room, and a lot of character development will be built around these conversations. However, I have absolutely no idea how to do this, and so a lot of research would be needed to look into how to edit a piece in this way. As the editing process approaches, I'm planning to carry out a lot of research on these type of editing techniques to see what could work for my film.
I also went on to look at another A2 film. This one doesn't relate to my film in terms of the plot, but most of it has been filmed in the dark and the lighting still remains good, so it relates to mine in that way.
The genre of this film appears to meet mostly thriller, with the girl being followed home by a random person. This is how I want mine to turn out, and so watching films similar to them has helped me picture mine. I'm going to have to do a lot of research into the lighting to ensure that if I do record my film in the dark it can still be seen. Also, the general feel of this film is good, and makes it all appear very sinister and strange. This is exactly how I want mine to turn out, and so creating a dark theme is very necessary.
Reflective Comment:
This task was very useful as it allowed me to look at products that are similar to mine. The first short film helped me to gain inspiration about how to best modernise my film. The second one was good to look at in terms of the lighting, because its something I'm worried about and watching a film utilise the lighting so well gave me faith that in can be done.

As you can see from this scene, the computer screen he is looking at is visible on the screen. Its a camera angle from inside the computer, showing the characters face as he works. I think that for my production, this would work really well because my main character will be spending a lot of time talking to a boy in a chat room, and a lot of character development will be built around these conversations. However, I have absolutely no idea how to do this, and so a lot of research would be needed to look into how to edit a piece in this way. As the editing process approaches, I'm planning to carry out a lot of research on these type of editing techniques to see what could work for my film.
I also went on to look at another A2 film. This one doesn't relate to my film in terms of the plot, but most of it has been filmed in the dark and the lighting still remains good, so it relates to mine in that way.
The genre of this film appears to meet mostly thriller, with the girl being followed home by a random person. This is how I want mine to turn out, and so watching films similar to them has helped me picture mine. I'm going to have to do a lot of research into the lighting to ensure that if I do record my film in the dark it can still be seen. Also, the general feel of this film is good, and makes it all appear very sinister and strange. This is exactly how I want mine to turn out, and so creating a dark theme is very necessary.
Reflective Comment:
This task was very useful as it allowed me to look at products that are similar to mine. The first short film helped me to gain inspiration about how to best modernise my film. The second one was good to look at in terms of the lighting, because its something I'm worried about and watching a film utilise the lighting so well gave me faith that in can be done.
Thursday, 13 October 2016
Text Message Editing Techniques

For my final production, I'd really like to edit text messages/online messages onto the screen just as you can see from the images here. Because my film has a very modern theme, I think that this feature would enhance that modern theme and make the young audiences relate to the film more. It would also be very useful when it comes to the character development of Tom, the boy that Clare meets online. By the messages he sends her appearing as an extra on the screen, rather than having to show her laptop screen, the audience will also be able to see her reaction to each message as they are sent. Although this is a good idea for my production, the process of doing it well could be challenging. From looking online, I've found that one of the best ways to do this is through Adobe After Effects.
However, this is not a free tool, and would cost a fair amount of money to do. Because of this, I'm going to look at doing it in more simple ways, such as through iMovie. Having said this, I don't want to do it without it looking real, so when the editing process comes around I plan to look in more detail about ways to do this.
Reflective Comment:
Coming up was this idea was something that has helped my visualise my film in my head a lot more. I'm really keen to do more research into this when it comes to the editing process, and will definitely look into how I can make this happen in my production. To improve this task, I could of included some of the research I did into the Adobe programs that help make these text effects possible. Having said this, I did mention in the post about the Adobe After Effects and the cost, I when I come back to do more in depth research on this editing technique I will be sure to include it then.
Friday, 7 October 2016
Character Profiles
Now that I have the storyline of my production planned out and I understand it in more detail, I've decided to move on and talk about the characters that I plan to have in my film and how I want them to be portrayed.
The film will focus mainly on one character, but there will still be others that play a big part in the development of the story.
Main Character:
The main character is a girl who I've decided to name Clare as of the descriptions in my storyboard. She lives with only her Mum. Because she is the main character and has some terrible stuff happen to her, I want to portray her as being a very vulnerable and weak character. The stereotype of her being a female adds to her vulnerability as in films female characters are generally looked at as being more weak, although I think this role could have worked with a male actor but I've decided to have it lead by a female. To show her weakness, I'm going to make it very clear that she doesn't have a good relationship with her Mum and is generally a very miserable and alone character with nothing to do in life. Therefore, she spends most of her time on her laptop where she eventually meets someone online and her naivety causes her to agree a meet up.
The main films I looked at that relate to mine were Unfriended (2015), and Trust (2010). The main female character in Unfriended isn't really shown as being vulnerable and weak, and is only made to look it by the horrors that happen to her in the film. However, the main female character in Trust is shown as being very naive just as I want my character of Clare to be.
In Trust, 14 year old Annie gets a laptop for her birthday and begins talking to people in an online chat room. Soon she begins talking to a boy she believes to be a similar age to her, but meets up with him to find he is a 30 year old man who ends up ruining her life. I've never actually seen this film, however from reading the plot description online it seems that some of the inspiration for my film actually was used in a similar way in Trust. I plan to watch this film in the upcoming weeks as it could give me some ideas on how to present her female character in a vulnerable way. Obviously the character I will create will be different to the character in Trust, but because they play a similar role in the trust they put in a random person online, research into how this character is portrayed could be very useful.
Susan (Clare's Mum):
Clare's Mum isn't a vitally important character, but I must ensure I portray her in the correct way in order to show the audiences the kind of relationship she has with her daughter. This will further develop the vulnerable character of Clare, and make her situation seem worse because of the lack of connection she has with her mother. To do this, I plan to show Susan sitting around all day doing practically nothing whilst Clare goes to school and comes back. There will be a lack of dialogue between these two to further show the lack of connection they have with each other. This will be most effective at the end of the film because when Clare is murdered, Susan will feel even worse as a Mum because she was never there for her. This will also make her death more sad, and hopefully have a greater effect on the audience.
Tom (Chat Room):
Tom is the character that Clare meets in an online chat room. His character will be mostly developed through the conversations they have in the chat room. I haven't planned at how I'm going to edit my film yet, but in order to develop his character without actually meeting him, I have to make sure that the conversations they have online are clear to see for the audience. In terms of his actual character, I'm going to try and make it clear to the audience that he is lying about what he is saying, but Clare is too naive and broken to realise, and the attention he is giving her is so new to her. By doing this, the audience will straight away take a dislike to him, and be equally as shocked when he emerges from the woods to find Clare's dead body.
Police Officer:
The police officer appears at the end of the film to tell Clare's Mum that her daughter has been found dead. His role isn't very big or important, and we won't actually be able to hear what he's saying as sad music will be playing over any dialogue.
Reflective Comment:
Creating in depth character profiles from my production was a very enjoyable thing to do and has moved me further forward with the planning of my film. As you can see, I analysed a similar product in relation to my main character (Clare), and also created profiles for the other characters that will feature. Analysing the film 'Trust' was very useful. Because it is a similar film with fairly relatable events, I looked at how the main character in that is shown and used that to develop Clare. To improve this task, I'd of like to look at more similar products, and plan to add a post on this later on.
The film will focus mainly on one character, but there will still be others that play a big part in the development of the story.
Main Character:
The main character is a girl who I've decided to name Clare as of the descriptions in my storyboard. She lives with only her Mum. Because she is the main character and has some terrible stuff happen to her, I want to portray her as being a very vulnerable and weak character. The stereotype of her being a female adds to her vulnerability as in films female characters are generally looked at as being more weak, although I think this role could have worked with a male actor but I've decided to have it lead by a female. To show her weakness, I'm going to make it very clear that she doesn't have a good relationship with her Mum and is generally a very miserable and alone character with nothing to do in life. Therefore, she spends most of her time on her laptop where she eventually meets someone online and her naivety causes her to agree a meet up.
The main films I looked at that relate to mine were Unfriended (2015), and Trust (2010). The main female character in Unfriended isn't really shown as being vulnerable and weak, and is only made to look it by the horrors that happen to her in the film. However, the main female character in Trust is shown as being very naive just as I want my character of Clare to be.
In Trust, 14 year old Annie gets a laptop for her birthday and begins talking to people in an online chat room. Soon she begins talking to a boy she believes to be a similar age to her, but meets up with him to find he is a 30 year old man who ends up ruining her life. I've never actually seen this film, however from reading the plot description online it seems that some of the inspiration for my film actually was used in a similar way in Trust. I plan to watch this film in the upcoming weeks as it could give me some ideas on how to present her female character in a vulnerable way. Obviously the character I will create will be different to the character in Trust, but because they play a similar role in the trust they put in a random person online, research into how this character is portrayed could be very useful.
Susan (Clare's Mum):
Clare's Mum isn't a vitally important character, but I must ensure I portray her in the correct way in order to show the audiences the kind of relationship she has with her daughter. This will further develop the vulnerable character of Clare, and make her situation seem worse because of the lack of connection she has with her mother. To do this, I plan to show Susan sitting around all day doing practically nothing whilst Clare goes to school and comes back. There will be a lack of dialogue between these two to further show the lack of connection they have with each other. This will be most effective at the end of the film because when Clare is murdered, Susan will feel even worse as a Mum because she was never there for her. This will also make her death more sad, and hopefully have a greater effect on the audience.
Tom (Chat Room):
Tom is the character that Clare meets in an online chat room. His character will be mostly developed through the conversations they have in the chat room. I haven't planned at how I'm going to edit my film yet, but in order to develop his character without actually meeting him, I have to make sure that the conversations they have online are clear to see for the audience. In terms of his actual character, I'm going to try and make it clear to the audience that he is lying about what he is saying, but Clare is too naive and broken to realise, and the attention he is giving her is so new to her. By doing this, the audience will straight away take a dislike to him, and be equally as shocked when he emerges from the woods to find Clare's dead body.
Police Officer:
The police officer appears at the end of the film to tell Clare's Mum that her daughter has been found dead. His role isn't very big or important, and we won't actually be able to hear what he's saying as sad music will be playing over any dialogue.
Reflective Comment:
Creating in depth character profiles from my production was a very enjoyable thing to do and has moved me further forward with the planning of my film. As you can see, I analysed a similar product in relation to my main character (Clare), and also created profiles for the other characters that will feature. Analysing the film 'Trust' was very useful. Because it is a similar film with fairly relatable events, I looked at how the main character in that is shown and used that to develop Clare. To improve this task, I'd of like to look at more similar products, and plan to add a post on this later on.
Thursday, 29 September 2016
Rough StoryBoard
Now that my film plot is fully updated and I've decided what will happen, I decided to create a rough storyboard to the six main parts of the film. Due to my lack of drawing ability, the pictures on the storyboard are very simple and just stick men. However I think this works as it is only a rough start to the storyboard. I hope to improve this in time and replace the drawings with actual pictures of what will happen with real locations.
Scene 1: Clare is lonely and vulnerable, looking for anyone to connect with.
Scene 2: Clare meets someone online called Tom, and she instantly feels loved and needed by him.
Scene 3: After days of talking she agrees to meet up with him, She is very excited.
Scene 4: Clare goes to meet up with who she thinks is Tom, but someone else emerges with a knife and stabs her.
Scene 5: Clare is laying dead on the floor when Tom actually appears from the forest and finds her.
Scene 6: The police arrive at Clare's house to break the news to her Mum.
Reflective Comment:
This was a very basic storyboard and is no where the final piece of storyboard work I will do. Although the detail in this is very brief, it has helped to make the story clear to me and I can now visualise what is going on well. In the upcoming weeks, I'm going to create a new storyboard with actual photos of the locations and characters in them.
Wednesday, 28 September 2016
Film Plot Final Update
After doing some research on narrative theories and having time to apply this to my film, I've decided to do this blog post explaining exactly what is going to happen in my film so that I can move on to creating storyboards and looking more in depth at the ancillary products.
The narrative theory I decided to best apply to my film was Barthes theory, as it focuses around an enigma (mystery) which is best suited for the type of film I want to create.
The theme of my film is going to be very modern and specifically aimed at the youths of today's generation, because they will understand the references made throughout the film and also what happens.
The genre of my film is mostly thriller, with a mystery being created around the story line. It may have aspects of horror but will mostly focus around the unexpected things that happen, rather than making it scary.
The film itself will follow a girl who will be the primarily main character. I've decided to name her character Clare. She will be shown at the start as being quite a lonely character, and having no friends and nothing to do with her spare time. As a result of this, she spends all of her free time on her laptop, where she begins to join online chat rooms to talk to people. After a while, she meets a boy on this chat room website called Tom, who treats her really well and makes her feel needed and loved. Due to the lack of love and care shown to her from people, this is a shock to Clare and she is very happy. Tom is also happy, and asks Clare to meet up with him in the woods soon to have a walk together, and she agrees straight away, desperate to see him. She arrives in the woods expecting him to arrive, but she is instead greeted by a threatening looking character in a black hoodie. He approaches Clare and brutally stabs her. He then runs away into the woods. The audience will most likely expect this character to be Tom, the boy she was talking to online, but it is in fact not. Tom then emerges from the woods ready to meet Clare, and finds her dead. The scene will then fade out and show a policeman sitting down with Clare's Mum to explain the news of her death.
Reflective Comment:
This was a very needed post in order to move onto other aspects my film. I think that I included a good amount of detail here, and it gave me a complete understanding of what will happen in my production. With this now done, I can move onto developing the characters I've mentioned here and look at how similar products portray these characters and how they are shown in other films.
The narrative theory I decided to best apply to my film was Barthes theory, as it focuses around an enigma (mystery) which is best suited for the type of film I want to create.
The theme of my film is going to be very modern and specifically aimed at the youths of today's generation, because they will understand the references made throughout the film and also what happens.
The genre of my film is mostly thriller, with a mystery being created around the story line. It may have aspects of horror but will mostly focus around the unexpected things that happen, rather than making it scary.
The film itself will follow a girl who will be the primarily main character. I've decided to name her character Clare. She will be shown at the start as being quite a lonely character, and having no friends and nothing to do with her spare time. As a result of this, she spends all of her free time on her laptop, where she begins to join online chat rooms to talk to people. After a while, she meets a boy on this chat room website called Tom, who treats her really well and makes her feel needed and loved. Due to the lack of love and care shown to her from people, this is a shock to Clare and she is very happy. Tom is also happy, and asks Clare to meet up with him in the woods soon to have a walk together, and she agrees straight away, desperate to see him. She arrives in the woods expecting him to arrive, but she is instead greeted by a threatening looking character in a black hoodie. He approaches Clare and brutally stabs her. He then runs away into the woods. The audience will most likely expect this character to be Tom, the boy she was talking to online, but it is in fact not. Tom then emerges from the woods ready to meet Clare, and finds her dead. The scene will then fade out and show a policeman sitting down with Clare's Mum to explain the news of her death.
Reflective Comment:
This was a very needed post in order to move onto other aspects my film. I think that I included a good amount of detail here, and it gave me a complete understanding of what will happen in my production. With this now done, I can move onto developing the characters I've mentioned here and look at how similar products portray these characters and how they are shown in other films.
Friday, 23 September 2016
Target Audience Primary Research
Here you can see the survey I created through the website SurveyMonkey. This website was very useful to create a survey as it was very easy to use and allowed me to develop each questions just as I wanted. It is embed below:
Create your own user feedback survey
My survey results are what I expected. The results are embed in a slideshare below:
There was a mixture of males and females who filled out the survey, which doesn't effect my desired target audience as the film I'm planning to make will be suitable for both.
For my second question about age, the main people who filled out my survey were aged 15 - 18, which is ideal as this is who I plan to aim my film at as they are the more younger generation. There was also then a mixture of people aged between 19 - 21 and 22 - 25, and very few between 26 - 30. People of these ages could enjoy my film, but as I'm planning to aim it more at people who are 15 - 18, it is good that these were predominantly the users who filled out my survey.
For my next question, I asked whether or not the people had seen the film Unfriended, or FriendRequest. I decided to ask this as these two films are the closest things I could find that relate to the film I'm planning to create. Both of these films are aimed at the younger generation of people, so the question worked with the relation to people aged between 15 - 18. The results for this question showed that more people had seen Unfriended, but a lot of people had seen both. There were then some people who hadn't seen either, who I think were definitely the older people who filled out my survey as these films are not aimed at them. I would think that most of the people aged between 15 - 21 had seen these films which is good because it means they must of shown some interest in the content.
I then asked them how they rated either of these films if they had seen it, and the majority of people rated it 3 stars, with a few people rating it higher. This shows that not many people thought these films were much more than average, which could mean that the content or ideas of these films aren't enjoyed as much by the younger generation. This is useful for me because it means I know now that the content and ideas of my film have to be good and original to be rated by my audience.
My final question asked if people would be interested in watching my film which would be very similar to these ones and containing modern day characters. Most people said maybe rather than yes. There were a few who said no, but I can assume that they were the older people who weren't interested in these type of films as they are not aimed at them. The fact that most people said maybe shows that they are not completely interested and so again I would really need to develop the plot and ideas of films to make sure they are worth watching.
Create your own user feedback survey
My survey results are what I expected. The results are embed in a slideshare below:
There was a mixture of males and females who filled out the survey, which doesn't effect my desired target audience as the film I'm planning to make will be suitable for both.
For my second question about age, the main people who filled out my survey were aged 15 - 18, which is ideal as this is who I plan to aim my film at as they are the more younger generation. There was also then a mixture of people aged between 19 - 21 and 22 - 25, and very few between 26 - 30. People of these ages could enjoy my film, but as I'm planning to aim it more at people who are 15 - 18, it is good that these were predominantly the users who filled out my survey.
For my next question, I asked whether or not the people had seen the film Unfriended, or FriendRequest. I decided to ask this as these two films are the closest things I could find that relate to the film I'm planning to create. Both of these films are aimed at the younger generation of people, so the question worked with the relation to people aged between 15 - 18. The results for this question showed that more people had seen Unfriended, but a lot of people had seen both. There were then some people who hadn't seen either, who I think were definitely the older people who filled out my survey as these films are not aimed at them. I would think that most of the people aged between 15 - 21 had seen these films which is good because it means they must of shown some interest in the content.
I then asked them how they rated either of these films if they had seen it, and the majority of people rated it 3 stars, with a few people rating it higher. This shows that not many people thought these films were much more than average, which could mean that the content or ideas of these films aren't enjoyed as much by the younger generation. This is useful for me because it means I know now that the content and ideas of my film have to be good and original to be rated by my audience.
My final question asked if people would be interested in watching my film which would be very similar to these ones and containing modern day characters. Most people said maybe rather than yes. There were a few who said no, but I can assume that they were the older people who weren't interested in these type of films as they are not aimed at them. The fact that most people said maybe shows that they are not completely interested and so again I would really need to develop the plot and ideas of films to make sure they are worth watching.
Target Audience Primary Research from Coey1611
Reflective Comment:
This was a key piece of research for me and really helped shape the desired target audience I have. I used a lot of different forms of presentation software in this (SlideShare, SurveyMonkey), so its also helped make my blog more interactive. The task itself proved what I already knew that the type of film I'm planning to make will be primarily enjoyed by the younger generation. Analysing survey results helped me to see how many young audiences were interested in modern films involving the use of social media, and how in demand they are. If I were to improve this task, I'd of liked to include more questions to further break down the interests of my audience. Having said this, the questions I did ask were good enough to find the key research I needed.
Reflective Comment:
This was a key piece of research for me and really helped shape the desired target audience I have. I used a lot of different forms of presentation software in this (SlideShare, SurveyMonkey), so its also helped make my blog more interactive. The task itself proved what I already knew that the type of film I'm planning to make will be primarily enjoyed by the younger generation. Analysing survey results helped me to see how many young audiences were interested in modern films involving the use of social media, and how in demand they are. If I were to improve this task, I'd of liked to include more questions to further break down the interests of my audience. Having said this, the questions I did ask were good enough to find the key research I needed.
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