Reasoning for title

I have chosen A Skaters Paradise for the title. The reasoning, simply, skater reflects the background and lifestyle of our main character, and because paradise symbolises death etc. And our story is essentially about this one rural teens life and death. Which essentially is summed up in the first two minutes of the sequence. I feel it is a title that can work, as we have had many problems in deciding for the perfect title (Rough cuts may be called 'Skate'). But my final piece however will be with the new title idea.


A reason for the word paradise, is after research on 'Thesaurus.com' typing in words related to Death. Paradise was the only one which sounded less brutal for a title name. It can also connate to a dreamy word in that its a skaters dream/life etc. But what it actually means is death, however if you research paradise on Thesaurus.com death isn't related to paradise adding a subtle and slightly obvious enigma to our title.

Rough cut v2

Here is our updated Rough cut with our new Actor; Ruben Haywood
Evaluation to follow

Actor update

Due to unavailability of Felix recently and deadlines, we are required to and wish to film constantly. Unfortunately Felix couldn't meet these planned filming times, so we most likely switch to a new actor, someone who we know better and can ask skate and portray a skating role;

Ruben Haywood

Ruben Haywood is a lad we have asked, and he is willing.
We feel that Ruben is also more of a skater so can give a bigger influence and as he's better on a skateboard, it could workout well for us.
Unluckily Ruben did give us feedback on our piece but now he's in it, but obviously that feedback was before he will be in our piece.

 We hope to film with him tonight, update our rough cut and find it easier to get out and film.

This now makes it easier to film for us, and what I have learnt is, to use a reliable actor, and that you can't always expect to have actors constantly but its ideal to have someone who can communicate with us and give availability.

Codes and conventions of a film

Film distribution

 Film 4 is a British film distributor.

We have chosen film 4 because they have been in the film business for a very long time, they are also very successful and have distributed less well known films like sightseers, and have distributed both inbetweeners films which have a convention we wish to follow (Narration).

They have also distributed Trainspotting which is a British film which through distribution of film 4 became a bigger hit than expected, but this could be due to their use of actor;

Ewan McGregor
Key Actor in Trainspotting
Well known for 3 episodes
of Star Wars.

Ewan McGregor

Film 4 aims to develop new and upcoming British talent, and lead the British film industry. They wish to invest £500k per film at a film distribution of 20 films a year, this is important to us as obviously producing a British dram, we will need help to distribute our product, and who else better than film 4. One of British films main distributor who we can place trust to help market and exchange our product.

Roles in filming

Producer

J.J Abrams - Producer
Star Wars

This person is essentially the group leader and is responsible for managing the production from start to finish. The producer develops the project from the initial idea, makes sure the script is finalized, arranges the financing and manages the production team that makes the film.
The producer also coordinates the filmmaking process to ensure that everyone involved in the project is working on schedule and on budget. Without the producer at the helm, films do not get made.

George Lucas - Director
Star Wars 

Director

The director is primarily responsible for overseeing the shooting and assembly of a film. While the director might be compared to a novel's author as a film's primary visionary, he or she would not be able to make the film without the help of numerous other artists and technicians.
In fact, the notion of the director as an author is misleading because it assumes the director, like an author, does everything. A director works at the center of film production, but is inextricably linked with dozens of other people who get the job done together.

Carrie Fisher - Screenwriter
Postcards from the Edge
Also a Star Wars actor

Screenwriter

While the dialogue in a film may seem natural to the viewer, a writer carefully crafts it; however, the screenwriter does far more than provide dialogue for the actors. He or she also shapes the sequence of events in a film to ensure that one scene transitions to the next so that the story will unfold logically and in an interesting way.
Like the producer, the screenwriter's role is generally overlooked by the movie-going public, yet is essential to the completion of any film. If there is no script, there is no movie.

William Cameron Menzies-
Came up with production design

Production Designer

Before one inch of film is shot, the production designer is the first artist to translate the script into visual form. He or she creates a series of storyboards that serve as the film's first draft.
A storyboard is a series of sketches on panels that shows the visual progression of the story from one scene to the next. Creating this sketch of the film on storyboards also ensures the visual continuity of the film from start to finish. Storyboards serve as the director's visual guide throughout the production and will be a template to follow during the editing process.

Stuart Craig - Art Director
Harry Potter

Art Director

The art director is responsible for the film's settings: the buildings, landscapes and interiors that provide the physical context for the characters. This person is responsible for acquiring props, decorating sets and making the setting believable.

Kath Janie Bryant - Costume designer
Mad men and Deadwood

Costume Designer

Costumes convey a great deal about the film's time period and the characters who wear them, including their economic status, occupation and attitude toward themselves. Be sure to think about how costuming can show something about the character visuality.

Wally Pfister - Cinematographer
Batman, Inception & Italian Job

Cinematographer

The director of photography, or DP, is responsible for capturing the script on film or video. The DP must pay attention to lighting and the camera's technical capabilities.
When the director wants a shot to achieve certain visual or atmospheric qualities, the DP achieves it through his or her choice of lighting, film stock and careful manipulation of the camera. This craft is referred to as cinematography.

Mary Jo Markey - Editor
Star Wars
Mission Impossible

Editor

Shortly after shooting begins, the editor begins to organize the footage and arranges individual shots into one continuous sequence. Even in a single scene, dozens of different shots have to be chosen and assembled from hundreds of feet of film. The editor's choices about which shots to use, and the order in which to place them, have a profound effect on the appearance of the
final film.

Liam Neeson - Actor
Star Wars, Schindlers list & Taken

Actors

Responsible for portraying the characters in a film, actors work closely with the director and cinematographer. Considering an actor's role within this larger context also suggests that his or her job is much more difficult than just appearing on the set and reciting lines.

Music Supervisor/Composer

John Williams - Composer
Star Wars, Indiana Jones & Jaws

Emma Watson - Actor
Harry Potter & This is the end

Music has been an integral part of movies since cinema's earliest days in the 1890s. A piano or organ player accompanied even the simplest silent films. The silent movie palaces of the 1920s were equipped with elaborate organs and orchestra pits to accommodate large groups of live musicians. Today selecting just the right music for the film will intensify the story for the audience.

    

Practising establishing shots

Recently I went on a little venture around Ottery (Our place of film) to practice my camera techniques and apply composition into my shots. But also to gain some establishing shots for our final piece. (Which after Liam edits will soon be on my blog).

 This first shot wasn't on our animatic and it was never intended until I felt it could work quite well, the light gives the shot more effect as it increases the texture and could be perfect for our opening credits, it is not guarantee that we use this shot, but the texture aspect makes it a possibility.

I feel it is a good still shot, however I did intend to pull focus as we want to begin our sequence with a pulling focus.

This second shot also wasn't on the animatic but at the time everything just looked right and I felt it was necessary to take. It simply creates a calm atmosphere, I also think it would work quite well or our opening of the opening sequence.

This shot for me was smooth and nice, but it is a little blurry at points, therefore should me and Liam plan to use it, we will either have to cut it down or re-film it.

The final shot once again also wasn't on the animatic or storyboard, however it is similar to one of our animatic shots of the church. We wanted something to emphasise the silence and signifiers of the church, and had we use the original planned shot, there would have been a wall in the way. Therefore it would be easier to go onto the church grounds and shoot a pan across the grounds. This will help the emphasis of the signifiers of death and silence which are conventions of our piece.

This shot was better than the ones in front of the church, simply as it is looking into the light, giving a better view of the church and the ground compared to the planned shot from the animatic.

Overall evaluation:

These shots I feel are good, they're smooth and would work well. However, in places they loose a little focus which could influence it badly. The lighting gives them texture which is certainly is effective for composition, I also chose these shots as they are potential shots I wish to use, I will just need to ask for peoples opinions on how they think the shots are.

Location and areas of filming

Here is an aerial view of Ottery (Our place of film) The coloured lines represent the areas we plan to film in, smaller circles represent indoor filming or one place only filming. The larger lines mean there will be a majority of shots taken. The red line (explained why red below), is our riskiest area as we will be skating there and using tracking and dolly shots on roads where risk assessment will be CRUCIAL.

Red - Area of filming with potential risk
Yellow - Potential area of filming with no potential risk
White - Area of filming with little to none potential risks

Ident update

As I-dents are crucial for identifying a film company, our i-dent needs to be eye-catching and relevant so that it brings in an audience and people recognise our work by our I-dent.


Me and Liam have only encountered two I-dent ideas, these being

• FatCat productions
• Black sheep Productions

FATCAT productions was an idea made in 5 mins, clearly it stands out more, but with disagreement in our group and being told it wouldn't be relevant to our drama, we went against it. There was no reason or synopsis behind it, it was a rushed idea. I feel it turned out well and looks good, but its not completely relevant.

Black Sheep Productions is our final idea, and for many reasons both words have hidden meanings behind them and they fit quite well. As we are doing a drama which can be either dark or sad, we have used black as it symbolises Evil or bad things - Skaters in todays society (even though they aren't) thats what the media makes us believe. It also symbolises death which we aim to achieve in an enigma, deaths also symbolised by our opening shot of the church swell as the colour black in our i-dent. Black also applies to fear and mystery, mystery being whats happening to our main character, and fear the wayne will be presented. The sheep essentially just represents our character, as it symbolises innocence, vulnerability (will be backed by high-angle camera shots). Sheep's also represent social norms, and we are following the social norm of a skater in an unconventional way in that we will portray skaters how the media don't to gain sympathy for our character.

Audience feedback

Audience feedback on our rough cut

Both Ruben and Dylan work on different areas of filming where as Cameron and Matt are just a target audience, we asked them all to watch our rough-cut and evaluate here after.

 Here are their responses; 

(The quotes under their images were said whilst they viewed our piece)

Ruben Haywood (Filmer)
"Im a fan of some of these very high
quality shots, particularly the crab shot.
 Rule of thirds was done well!"

Ruben Haywood - 

Positives: Good variety of shots, editing is smooth, works well I can tell a lot of research went into this, strong piece with potential.

Negatives: A few errors with mise-en-scene, some rocky camera shots, very dim lit and a lack of sound.

Favourite shot: The shot behind Felix is nice, but that crab-shot is high quality, great composition deffo my favourite shot.

Improvement: Re-film some of the darker shots at a lighter time of day as well as the shaky shots, ensure your mise-en-scene is relevant as I spotted christmas lights, its now nearly Easter - if mise-en-scene can be sorted there will be more potential in this piece.

Dylan Fielding (Editor)
"The editing is fantastic, so
much so that the shots slide
together perfectly looks like
a very good piece!"

Dylan Fielding - 
Positives: Editing is certainly good. Some good camera work with particular shots. Can sense the vast research gone into shot preparation.
Negatives: Some shots can be shaky which can impact overall level, there is a lot of unrecognised miss-en-scene which will affect this piece.
Favourite shot: Particularly the crab shot, however the zoom on the clock for me is a key shot, very focused and effective
Improvement: Pay attention to mise-en-scene! Maybe redo some of the shots as it appears very dark and can give a mixed feeling of a horror and I'm sure thats not the genre you guys are aiming for.

Matt Parker (Audience)
"Have you ever heard the story
of 'The Inbetweeners?' This
seems similar, just a little
less...   Funny."

Matt Parker -
Positives Certainly a clean product, flows smoothly gives a great insight as to what is going on.
Negatives: Very dark, quite christmassy despite it not even being christmas.
Favourite shot: When the cupboard opened, I certainly felt the shot was effective and smooth
Improvement: Obviously the lens flare needs to go! Possibly refill a few shots (where the lighting is poor) could maybe do with some more editing in places to increase the smoothness of the shot transitions.

Cameron Phillips (Audience)
"With some improvement
I see great potential"

Cameron Philips -
Positives: Looks good, some well thought out shots.
Negatives: The lack of sound makes this a little confusing as to what is going on, very dim lit as well, couple of minor errors like the lens flare,the shaky shots and obviously the christmas lights.
Favourite shot: Has to be the one in the cupboard, don't see many of these kind of shots today in film, and your one fits in well with the sequence
Improvement: Obviously this isn't final but there is plenty room for change, perhaps add sound to make us aware to the situation of this character. Increase the lighting and re-film the bad shots (shaky and lens flares)

GNACS

GNAC:

• Genre
• Narrative
• Atmosphere
• Character

These 4 factors are key in filming, they represent the basic structure of a film and essentially are some of the most important factors.

GENRE

Genre is essentially the backbone and basis of the film, it sets the feeling and mood. A genre can be recognised by its common set of distinguishing features

What you can learn from genre is how big an audience is for each genre and how popular each genre is. This is important because if we do an unpopular genre, people simply will not watch it.

NARRATIVE

Narrative in media is basically the media term for 'story telling.' 

Narrative is the way different elements are organised to form a story, an example of these elements would be in documentaries or characters in a drama or comedy (Will- Inbetweeners)

ATMOSPHERE

Atmosphere is the genuine feeling the movie gives the audience, essentially the way the audience interprets the text (denotation). Atmosphere can be anything, the surrounding, characters or the dialogue for example, in a comedy you would expect calmer, friendly dialogue, a friendly setting and a lively main character. Whereas, in a horror, we would expect a darker atmosphere, where our character would be horrible, surroundings dark and low key lit, and freaky dialogue. 

CHARACTER

Character in media is crucial, the character is the main characteristic of a film,simply because they represent the film. Our character 'Felix' will be important as our film focuses just on him, and will portray the conventions of todays representation of skaters. So it will be important to nail the characteristic side of our filming much like the rest of the GNAC Factors.

Sound terminology - Understanding Basic Sound

Pleonastic- Sound which is heightened to create fear, tension, excitement etc

Ambient - Background sounds which are present in the scene e.g. animals, people, weather etc

Selective - Sound which is used to place emphasis on certain things in a scene 

Sound Bridge - At the beginning of a new scene the sound is carried over from the end of the old scene

Sound Effects – Sounds which are used to make a psychological impact or place emphasis on certain things in a scene

Score – Music which is played during a scene which can create a certain mood, link two scenes or help add to the plot

Silence – Used to create suspense or get some sort of reaction from the audience

Theme music – Music which is played throughout the movie and is used to develop the narrative and match the theme of the movie

Voice over – The voice of a character which is used to guide or inform the audience but can also mislead them

Synchronous – When a sound matches an action or event on screen and can be used to emphasize it

Asynchronous – When a sound or music does not come from the diegetic reality of the movie

Contrapuntal – Sound which does not match with what is happening on screen and is used to create a different meaning 

Diegetic - Sound which is the source is currently coming from someone or something on screen e.g. Characters speaking

Non-Diegetic - Sound which the source does not come from something that is happening on screen e.g. Narration

What I can learn from these key terms is the basic sound terms in media so when doing coursework i can buff up my grades with good knowledge and terminology on the sound aspect of media. 

Risk assessment

British film analysis

Eddie the Eagle is an example of a British produced film. The company responsible for the production is MARV productions.

Eddie the Eagle pulled in $46 millions worth of grosses (£12.8m) in the UK, making it the highest grossing British to date. It had a production budget of £23m.

20th Century FOX distributed the film as well as Lionsgate (Canadian) to help market and exchange the film for a wider global audience, this is important because ETE (Eddie the Eagle) is a drama like ours. We need to research a British film however, because we need to see the kind of production studios we will use to put in our opening sequence when we present our own film company (Black sheep productions)


We will use MARV to partnership our film as people will see this and be aware they are quite a strong company as they have produced such a strong, touching drama film which is one of the UK's most successful.


Obviously we can't use a major American partnership like Walt Disney or 20th Century FOX because our production is only little and we feel the film wouldn't go international as it touches on a minority audience (Young people, teens) whereas big American companies produce family friendly films for everyone

Musical themes in Media

Leitmotif: A reoccurring theme throughout a film or musical, attached/associated with a character, location, emotion or situation.

An example of a leitmotif producer is; John Williams - Famous for:

• E.T and Jaws
• Star Wars - Darth Vader
• Indiana Jones
  
  
  
  
  
  This style of sound can be helpful if we plan to give our character a personality, we may not use this style of sound but we will consider it when filming and editing our final piece.
  

Colour and their meanings in Media

Colour plays a crucial part of the Mise-en-scene aspects of film. Colour is very important in that it symbolises different meanings such as; Black - (Death/Power) or White - Innocence and new beginnings

Colours and their representation

This is important because if the colour isn't nailed in film it can look very unusual and give the viewing audience integrated ideas on the character. Say if you took a murderous villain, you'd expect the director or costume designer to dress them in dark dull colours to represent bad feelings like death etc. Not in bright yellow or green to represent happiness or cowardice.

As a team, me and Liam can use this chart to dress our character accordingly so that he fits the gloomy drama setting, whilst maintaining a stereotype of 'the typical skater.'

Learning Premier Pro and basic editing

In one lesson when editing our animatic, Liam (our editor) showed me how to edit so that I can use pro in the future should he not be able to.

What I learnt is that editing can be a long, hard and complicated process if you do to know what you're doing, however even though I not doing any editing for our final piece. Learning to use premier is important for me in case I decide to work alone for next years final tasks. What I have learnt, is how to bring in different transitions like dissolve, cut etc. I've also learnt how to overlap and import sound which is crucial as I share a joint role with Liam on sound.

This will help me greatly with my media as now I know all the main aspects of film making (Sound, Camera and Editing) I can use these skills to my advantage and make the bet I can out of our final piece.

Rough cut

Here is a one minute rough cut (sequence of clips for rough footage NOT final) of a part of our final product. The sequence you see here is the first 1/4 of our film to about halfway.

There are some minor errors I as the camera man will redo, such as when our protagonist Felix is putting on his top, it was intentionally meant to be an arc but I decided against it last minute, and it became a very shaky handheld shot which I have evaluated and will improve on when we re-film and add the rest of our segments.

 I especially like our crab shot in the cupboard as the composition is perfect and the scene really flows. however in that sequence in the kitchen we have paid minor attention to Mise-en-scene and glowing Christmas lights can be seen which will take away the attention of our viewing audience. Another reason we have to re-film. Also because we filmed at dusk and the lighting isn't as natural as we'd have liked.There was a fair amount of planning and we had our animatic aside to roughly get similar shots. But evaluation for next time is use a tripod more often and pay more attention to Mise-en-scene.

Mise-en-Scene

Mise-en-Scene is a French term meaning what is put in the scene or frame, basically Visual information in front of the camera.

There are 5 key areas in Mise-en-Scene which are crucial to any success in film, These 5 areas include:

Setting & Props:

These are a very important part of film, simply because its not just "backgrounds." They are usually a set built from scratch and there is vast research and time taken into setting the set. Settings can also manipulate the audience by creating expectations ad then taking a different turn. Props can also be handy as they set the genre for the audience.

Costume, Hair & Make up:

These factors all indicate the personality of the characters within the shot and help the audience establish status and role of the character.

Certain costumes can signify set individuals, - Cape can signify a superhero, or a suit a hero or villain depending on the genre



Facial Expressions & Body Language:

Facial expressions provide a clear indicator of how someone is feeling

 if someone is smiling broadly, we assume they're happy. However if you apply different lighting, the audience get a different feeling if the lighting is followed up with clothing that matches the tone.

Lighting & Colour:

There are two main types of lighting;
LOW KEY - Deep distinct shadows/silhouettes can be formed, gives away small parts of the frame. Commonly used in horrors or darker films.
HIGH KEY - Brightly lit sets or a sunny day, gives off a lot of the frame. Commonly used in romances or upbeat films.

Colour carries set connotations which can add distinct meanings to a scene. (Red - Danger/Love | Black - Scary/Sad) Giving them looks, feels or a mood. Also used to create dramatic effects.



 Positioning of the character/objects within shot:

Positioning within a shot can draw audience attention to an important character/object, this applies to the use of rule of thirds I explained in a previous post.

Our main character

Felix Hirsch-Keogh

Our main character (Felix) will portray the role of a skater, we aim to be unconventional with him however. The normal representation/convention of a skater is that they're a bad influence usually fairly old lads and do all things bad, like ruin the streets, litter and do drugs/smoke.

We aim to move away from the conventional skater, make our character likeable so the audience sympathise with him, so that his death/disappearance in the sequence affects our audience. After watching multiple famous films we have learnt that having someone who can act or portray a role in a set way is important, and that you need to establish a character to communicate with the audience so that the piece is more effective.

Learning to film with sound

In our lesson we were taught by a year 13 Media student Tom Joyce, who taught us all the techniques for sound when
filming.

Before  filming you must (as the camera man)

- Call what's going to happen

- Call the take

- Get the actors to clap to make the sound synchronisable

The sound needs to be synchronisable so that there is a peak of sound in which the person in charge of sound can use to help fiddle with pitch and tempo.

Sound man however just needs to stand out of shot with the microphone and audio device.
This lesson was useful to me as we can use this skill to record audio without any external sound interference like wind etc.

Pitch

In our last lesson, me and Liam presented our pitch/idea to the class. We feel it went rather successful, unfortunately few students put their hands up when asked who would watch it. We got very minor student feedback, some of which consisted of 'needs to be clearer.'
To us this was fair enough as it was fairly rushed and could have been better. Our biggest critic was understandably Miss. She gave us strong criticism in which we took well, she told us how to adapt our character to keep audience engaged, and we have.

One of our audience who said they'll watch it was Harry Stoakes. He claimed he'd watch it as its a kind of film he like to watch. Not only tat but he has always been a film watcher and will watch anything. to us this is helpful as it tells us that there is more a male audience than female, he also gave us a comment as to that its a good time to produce as set genres on films have times when they peak (e.g - Horrors/Halloween, Fantasy's/Christmas).