Monday, 25 April 2016

Evaluation Question 7

My Prelim:



When i first started to film my Prelim task it involved no research this is mainly because of the lack of time we had to create this and also the prelim wasn't in any specific genre so there wasn't really any research that needed to be done.  This was a lot different to my final production. For my final production there was a lot of research carried out. I had to research into the genre of my film so that i had a greater knowledge and could incorporate my knowledge into my own work, it was also important to research the genre so i could understand the conventions. Planning was another aspect that wasn't done in great detail in the prelim task. This was because there was not a lot needed in terms of props for the prelim task and it was only short which meant coming up with a story board didn't take long at all because there was only a few number of shots. Planning was a lot different for my film because we went into a lot more detail of every aspect than the prelim task. We created a long detailed story board, shot list and call sheet. There was planning looking for suitable locations to film in and also planning which dates that we would film on, we planned them by looking at the weather forecast to make sure the weather was suitable and fit along side previous shots we had. There was also planning of which equipment we would be using for each shoot as this changed thought different scenes, this was different to our prelim task because there was only one scene where we just used one camera. 

Time Management: The prelim involved very little time management, it consisted of two lessons one where we went out and got the shots and the other where i edited the shots. There was not a lot to do so it wasn't difficult to manage our time, the only thing we had to focus on was making sure we had all the shots by the time the lesson had finished. This was a lot different to my final  production because we found that managing our time was a very important aspect and that if we did not do it we would not have been successful. One of the factors which meant we had to manage our time was that we were filming at the end of the year which meant it got dark earlier so we had to make sure that all our shots for one scene where shot at the same time to show consistency in our work. Another things i had to manage was making sure i had met deadlines, this was important because if done it meant i was not behind. There was a big difference in time management between my prelim task and final production and i have learnt that time management is a very important factor while creating a film.


In my production and prelim there was no external casting done. All the actors which i used were in my media class. The reason why i didnt cast externally in my production was because i was in a big group and if we all were behind a camera there would bound to be someone left out who didtn have a fair contribution to the film, therefore  used two members of my group to act in my production. We chose Tom to play the protagonist as we believed he fit the look and style of a protagonist from an action film and we decided that Will would best suit the antagonist role out of the other members in my group. There was no change when casting from the prelim to the production.

When it comes to mise-en-scene, props and costume these were taking into account more in my production that prelim. In my prelim task i did not focus on mise-en-scene and costume in the slightest. This was completely different to my production as i took mise-en-scene and costume very seriously as we wanted to make sure our film was a professional as possible. One prop that we felt was very important was the bag which tom carried, this had a vital role in our film and for a few shoots we had got some shots without tom wearing the bag which resulted in us not being lazy and going back out and reshooting the shots with Tom having the bag on. We also made sure that Will and Tom were wearing the same clothes each shoot. We kept an eye on little details like this to make sure our film was professional and consistent .

Location wasnt though about at all in my prelim task, no though twas put into it, this was mainly because of the time that we had to do it. In my production this was very different, in my group we focused a lot on finding the perfect place to film each scene, we looked for a while narrowing down different locations until we were certain which one would suit our film the best. We had to think carefully about our location because we had to make our chase scene look like it was shot all in a constant flow but it was actually shot all over the town we live in, we chose our locations so carefully that this wouldn't be noticed even my a resident in the town.

My prelim task was shot in one take and there wasn't any chance to go back and reshoot our shots or take any sample shots. The shots were filmed and then edited straight away. However in my production this was different because when on location shooting i would also set up the camera in the correct position (being the cinematographer) and then i could conduct a few practice shots to see which looked the best (taking on the role of director). Once decided which was best i would then shoot the final shot.  Once i had all the clips and was editing i could see if there were any shots which needed to be reshot, there was a fair bit of reshooting done because we didnt want to settle for not the best we could get, this resulted in me creating a number of rough cuts for m group.

Sound was not a feature which i incorporated a lot into my prelim task, there was no dialogue and the only sound which was in was a few basic sound effects such as footsteps. In my production this was very important, i had realised that sound is a vital part of a film and it can make a film 100x better and more professional. I also wanted to make sure the sound in my production was right which resulted in me spending a lot of time messing around with the sound. There was a lot of effort making our music right in my final production which was very different to my prelim task.

Because i created my prelim task early on in the year i had not created my ident yet this was only created during my final production. Everyone in my group created their idents individually, once they were all created we then imported them into the film. I learnt a lot about idents such as the time they are on and other things that are common in idents.

The editing in my prelim task was very basic and it didnt require much depth, i feel like the editing in my final production was also quite basic but that my production didnt need anything extra, i found the editing simple and easy to complete and had no difficulty editing. Nothing new was really learnt from the prelim to the final production because i already knew how to edit and had them skills.

First Rough Cut

Final Cut



Sunday, 24 April 2016

My Contribution to our Production

Director-

  • Me - Deputy director
  • Alex- Director
  • Tom- N/A
  • William- N/A

Cinematography-

  • Me- Co cinematographer for the chase scene and main cinematographer for the gym scene.
  • Alex- Main cinematographer for the chase scene and co cinematographer for the gym scene.
  • Tom- N/A
  • William- N/A

Editor-
  • Me - Main co editor for the Gym Scene
  • Alex- Main Editor for whole production + input into the Gym scene
  • Tom- Main co editor for the Gym Scene
  • William-N/A

Music- 

  • Me - N/A
  • Alex- Found music from other sources
  • Tom- Found music from other sources
  • William- N/A

Actor-

  • Me- N/A
  • Alex- N/A
  • Tom- Protagonist
  • William- Antagonist

Pre Production work-

  • Me- Location scouting, 
  • Alex- Shot list 
  • Tom- Story Board, Call sheet , Team manager
  • William- Screen Play

What Roles did I play and what did they involve?


I was working in a fairly big group while creating my production. We decided it would be best if we allocated each other different roles of which we were most comfortable with, this would hopefully result in no one doing nothing and everyone having a fair contribution. The roles and my contribution which i had in my group were:

Director:
While being behind the camera i felt it was easiest for me to direct because i could see what looked good through the camera and what worked and didn't better than the actors. I was the main director for the film as i had to vision of what i wanted on camera because i could see the shots and how they would look. Robbie joined me behind the camera and would input his ideas to each other and decide what would work best. It was good to have someone else with me because it meant that we mixed ideas to get the best output altogether. I was the main director for the chase scene. This meant i gave orders to the actors (Tom and Will) told them what looks best and if what we filmed was good enough. For the gym scene i shared my role with Robbie and i took the role of Deputy Director. This would consist of me adding to Robbies ideas and helping out.

Cinematographer:
I took to role of cinematographer for the chase scene and then for a few of the shots for the gym scene i was in charge of and for the rest of them Robbie was the cinematographer and i gave Robbie help and ideas for what shots would look best while he was in charge of those shots. Being a cinematographer resulted in me having to set up the shots in different angles and trying out different angles for each shot to see which is the best. It meant i had to be always thinking about how the shot would look in the edit and if it will match the rest of the clips.

Editor:
The role of editor was my main role in the group and the one which i enjoyed the most and also think was my best attribute. I was the main editor for the whole production and edited almost all of the film opening, this consisted of doing the titles, trimming clips placing them together, seeing which shots worked best which other to make sure that there was a story coming out of what we shot, also adding the sound effects and making sure the sound fitted the production. For the main part of the production i edited it all which some input of what worked and validation of Robbie. For the opening scene in the gym i handed the role over to Tom and Robbie to co-edit some of the gym scene, they put the clips into the timeline and trimmed the clips down to suitable lengths. I then took over the job of actually editing the cllips so that they fit and created a narrative and also edited the clips together to the music so that the scene was fast paced and matched the music and fit together as a complete scene. Some other things which were involved in the role of editor was trimming down sound files and cutting parts out so that the sound would match the video footage and adding in the small sound effects such as footsteps and also titles.

Music:
The original plan for the music was that Will would create a full piece which would fit to each scene and continuously run for the whole production. The music was going to be created on garage band. The music on garage band wasn't successful and as a group we did not believe it fit into our production and didn't follow common conventions of films in our genre. This meant we had to resort to a plan b which was finding music online which we had permission to use. So i went onto the internet looking around on different sites to find some music which i believed would be good for our production. I came across two different tracks one on the website youtube and one on soundcloud. Both of the tracks gave permission for us to use them in our production which was perfect. The music turned out to fit brilliantly into our film and was just what we were looking for.

Shot list/planning:
For the planning aspect of our production i was in charge or creating the shot list. This was a good role for me because i was also the director it meant that it linked to my other role.
For the other aspects of planning i was involved in the creation of the story board,  i would input some of my ideas and views while Tom was sketching out the story board. I also was involved in planning, we would all contribute our ideas for what happened in each scene.

Overall i believe i had a significant role within my group in this production. I contributed a lot to the main aspects of film making. I am happy with my contribution and overall how my work has turned out altogether.


Saturday, 23 April 2016

How we communicated

The following images show how as a group communicated to make sure we all knew the plans of where to be and when. We used Facebook messenger to create a group chat, this allowed us all to talk to each other so that we could ee each others views and opinions and to talk about when we were free and when was best to go out and shoot the film. We would ask whats the best day for everyone and then work around what we had to make sure we could all be their at the shoot.  One time it didnt go to plan because we were very rushed to get the final scene at the gym (to give narrative) because we were rushed this meant that one of our members (Will) was unable to join us for the film shoot. This wasn't much of an issue because we didn't need him for the acting but it would have been nice to have his thoughts about what worked shot wise. Using Facebook Messenger was very efficient because it was a lot quicker and easier to communicate through rather than other types of communication suchas email.



Saturday, 9 April 2016

Target Audience

Why do people watch films:
  • People watch films for many different reasons, one reason why people watch films is for entertainment purposes, this is the reason why the majority of people watch films, because it is fun and gives them time to relax and enjoy themselves. 
  • Another reason is people watch them to relate to the characters, people can be inspired and interested into the lives of the characters and they get drawn into films because they relate so much to the characters.
  • People also find them selves watching films because of escapism, this is so they 'escape reality' people like to do this so they don't have to think about their problems and just get to sit down and enjoy a good story without having to think about anything else, it can be relaxing for some people.
  • People watch films for inspiration, they will be struggling for ideas in lots of different creative platforms and watching films can give many different types of inspiration eg for your own film idea, for a type for art work, for music, or a new story for a book
  • They could also watch films to gain information and knowledge of a certain topic, films would increase their understanding but in an enjoyable way and that is why people watch them.
BFI facts and statistics on films with the action genre and their target audience 

In 2014, 15-24 year olds made up the biggest proportion of the UK cinema audience with 31%. Women were attracted a wide range of different genres, while men were typically attracted to films which had a strong amount of violence integrated in them. The top most watched film for males in 2014 was Fury, this film was put in the same genre as our film which is action.

I used this information to decide what the target audience for my film would be. I decided that the target audience will be 15-24 year old males and the secondary audience would be females. The reason for this is because males in this age range are the people who watch action films the most.