Monday, 31 March 2014

Film Diary (Part One)

 
Due to being organised, we were able to film on just one day (30/04/14) and we began at 10:30am and ended at 5:00pm.

 Before we began to actually film, we had to set up our equipment and also any props/special effects that we were going to use, for example, while one group member began to set up on set, the other was with the actor prepping them for the takes.

As you can see,  liquid latex was added to the actors hand, and then thickened with more layers, and red/black face paint to give the illusion of a deeper wound.

The special effect took roughly around 10-15 minutes, which was the time we estimated when creating our plan for the day. Apart from the small complaints from the actor (that he didn't like sitting still) our prep for the day seemed to be going well.
 



Later on within the day (1:00pm onwards) we began to film our exterior shots on location. Things were running smoothly with everyone involved, and we didn't seem to have a problem with filming. When looking at our storyboard we began our first shot with that of 'shot 26' which, in theory was an interesting shot, but put into practice, we didn't realise how hard the shot would be to make.

'Shot 26' included one of our group members sat awkwardly in the back of the car nearly falling out of the car itself. This shot took a lot of time to get because although we took each shot three or more times, to ensure that we would have the right shot, the camera wasn't steady, or group members, or the camera would of been seen in shot. So again, we all thought quickly and changed our seating within the car, and were then able to get the shot that we needed.


Still shooting our exterior, we can up to a hurdle yet again. When consulting the storyboard, we then realise that the actor would have to cry so we could get the shot that we wanted. The actor, although capable of our directing, found it hard to produce actual tears. Different tactics were used, such as the actor fanning his eye, and staring at a spot without blinking, but none those tactics worked. So we ended up using a bottle of water to produce the tears for him instead.  This shot was, although rather funny to film, was rather difficult, and when we come to edit,  as a group, we possibly won't end up using this shot because it doesn't look realistic and the camera was a little shaky on all four takes.
 


Our final exterior shot was easier than the others, and also was one of the final shots within our story board. This shot was at a high angle, and therefore only needed the tripod to be lifted high enough over the actors head. The shot didn't take long, and meant that we were on time with our plan for the day, and also meant that we could have a longer lunch break as we had finished slightly earlier.



*When shooting our interior shots, we also paid attention to Health and Safety on set*





Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309

Friday, 28 March 2014

Rough order of our Titles

Phoenix Productions

Small talk Pictures

Produced by Jenifer Flannigan and Andy Lucas

Christopher Taylor

Samantha Green

The Dead End

Casting by Jackie Black
 
Costume design by  Stella Artois

Original Music by  Chris Taylor


Editing by Xavier Jimenez

Directed by  Jade Flack and Joseph Anderson-Luck



Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309

Joseph Anderson-Luck - 8109



Rough Cut 2



Our feedback from rough cut 2: 

*Your titles are ALL in the wrong order – look at your research – Produced by does not come at the start
* Is that font appropriate?
*Consider placing of titles – the ones in the centre of the screen are not following institutional conventions
*The jump cuts when he goes out of the door are not great
The ECU of the eyes crying does not work – it needs to be longer, it looks like he is sleepy.
 
 





Uploaded by Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309

Created by  Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309 and Joseph Anderson-Luck - 8905

Thursday, 27 March 2014

Rough Cut 1




Our Feedback from our first cut:

You need an institutional logo at the start
* Framing is not great – tops of heads cut off – it makes it difficult to follow the narrative
* You only use close ups and ECU’s – we need to see more of a variety of shot distances
* It needs a soundtrack
*Too much of the smoking shots – although the ash dropping shot is good
*Not much happens in the narrative – man has a photo and drives away. He is sad – where will the film go from here?
*You need titles




Uploaded by Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309

Created by  Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309 and Joseph Anderson-Luck - 8905

Wednesday, 26 March 2014

Possible Location one, and Final location.

Before shooting the film we needed to find a varied list of locations which could be used for the film opening based on locations sketched in the storyboard and mentioned in our narrative.

The road side (5)
This scene, in which Alex is sat in/by his car taking in what is going on in his life, is set on the side of a road where he will have taken the chance to stop while he could. It needed to be in an area where he would likely be driving through in his situation and where he would easily be able to stop at but not too public.










Road Side: (Possible 4)







 
 
 
 
 
 
Final Locations:
 
 
 
 



House's driveway (Possible 3)
This scene would be where Alex is packing his car preparing to leave the house. Aesthetics weren't majorly important as most of this scenery wouldn't be shown, however we had to consider lighting effects and any scenery which may appear on camera.


Alex' bedroom (Final)
For this scene one of the main things was the positioning of objects in the scene in relation to our storyboard as the bed and mirror had to be facing each other in the correct position for our camera angles to work how we wanted.


The house hallway (Final)


Nearby park (Possible 2)
This was a park which may replace or be included in the 

Joseph. A. Luck- 8105

Costume ideas

Our character's costume would set a variety of features for the audience including mostly the genre and mood of the narrative and character.
Colours
Because of this we firstly needed to use colours which would connote his sad but inactive nature and at the same time work well with each other to make the character look natural within the genre.
The most effective colours for this were green, blue, grey and black because they gave a more negative feel due to their cold emotion.


Clothing
Next we looked into the best clothing specifically to reflect the character's personality and match the style of clothing for our chosen genre, this being general everyday clothing. 
His irresponsible persona led us to deciding he would need quite scruffy and little-fashionable clothing and what first came to mind was mainly tracksuit bottoms, jeans trainers and hooded jumpers.








Final design
Based on what we thought was the most appropriate colour combination and what we could find to purchase we drew up our final design to test if it worked well together, the best combination being a grey jumper, green top, black shoes and dark blue jeans. The grey jumper and blue jeans connote the dull, negative mood of both he character and narrative and the green shirt gives connotations of envy and greed, reflecting his selfish personality.




























Jade Jacqueline Flack - 8309
Joseph Anderson-Luck - 8105