Our task was to do a 2 minute film, in which we conveyed our storyboard and established a film and genre as well as a story and character. We decided on film noir as a genre, because we both liked examples of film noir films, such as Physco, Vertigo and The Lady Vanishes. We really liked the mix of crime, mystery and darkness inside the film noir films. Both of us also like thriller as a genre, and film noir is quite similar. We also like the twist that comes, and the good plots. We used these ideas to create a synopsis, and from that a storyboard of the first 2 minutes of the film. These showed a dark bridge next to a canal, and a mysterious woman walking next to it. She collects a suitcase from a mysterious stranger, and we find out that there is a gun in it, and this leads to her considering killing herself, connoting that she has many problems. We filmed this at dawn to get good shadows and dim light, and also not alot of people around.
We got many of our ideas from films such as the 4 minute film school, a film school on you tube. This was useful, because it gave us many ideas, such as the way to use shadows, or transition effects. Also, Lily is studying black and white films in complementary studies. This also helped us, because it showed as classical film ideas, such as slow establishing shots to create tension. We also researched Film noir films by watching many of the srtars of them, on youtube and they gave us ideas about how to establish ideas, ideologies and characters. Because of this research, we decided to change the film to black and white, which made it more shadowy and dark. It also led us to film in the morning, because the light would be darker, and also create shadows. We also keep quite longer timed shots, and we added on many shots of a lonely canal to connote loneliness and mystery. Also, we do not see the actor's face until quite late into the film(about 1.05 minutes in) and this creates suspense, and also mystery-because the character seems to be hiding, and it links the character with crime. Also, we heightened the exposure to make the scene feel even closer to reality and also to enhance the shadows and light. This is similiar to film noir films, and gives makes everything very mysterious. In some shots, however, we dont go completely black and white, and let the colour of the red dress, for example, show through. This was because it added to the old feeling of the movie, as it looked sephia, and also because the red dress linked to danger, sex and death. This connotes excitement, and danger, making Ingrid seem exciting, and setting up her character.
We have few props, except for the gun and the bag. One of our props was to put a wine glass and wine next to Ingrid's' bed, and this connoted that she was losing control of he life, and that she was in trouble. Although this was not a large part of the film, it also established that she was quite stylish (as it was gin or beer, which are less classy.) The lack of props meant the audience were not distracted, and also meant that the room was quite expressionless, meaning that our character may not have been there long, or be going to stay there- connoting to despair or lonliness.
Although we are happy with what we achieved, there are some things that we could have done better. An example is while filming, there is a massive wobble on one shot- this was because the camera was cold, so the record button was stiff, so trying to push it made the camera wobble. We didn't realize until later, and we couldn't edit it out because the shot flowed into the next. This was bad. Another bad thing was the resolution of the camera-in dim light, it caused grainy-ness. This was due to the quality of the camera, and because were shooting in half light to get a film noir effect. Luckily, the grain added an old look to the film, but if the camera had had a higher resolution, we could have done it better, and made the resolution less pixelated- at times, it is hard to see the subjects. Another problem was the editing programme we used-it was too basic. We found that the transitions and the titles were too limited- we wanted to put in an effect where the whole scane swirled into the next scene-an effect put in many of the films we studied. However, we had to use the more basic approach, where we just did a circle moving inwards to the next scene. We also couldn't use more sophisticated titles either. Another issue was the music-it took a long time to get the right music, and we wanted to use uncopy righted music. However, we found that the music that fitted best was music already used in other films. This was initially a problem to our plans, but we decided that because it fitted so well, we might as well use it.
However, i feel as through we did our task well- we wanted to create a 2 minute film,which established a genre, character and setting. I feel we did this, and we are quite pleased with our results.
Tuesday 13 January 2009
Further editing
We looked for other music on the internet, and Lily found the soundtrack from Physco Wolf, which are quite classical, but also horror music. The versions we found are classical versions, and this means that it adds a thriller effect, espeically with the violins. This makes the whole scene quite eeiry, and adds a mysterious edge to the scenes, which links to the black/white film noir music. Also, because Physcho is a film noir/thriller, this music seems very relevent, and works well.
We also added titles. There were some problems here- the titles on our programme(Imovie HD) were not very advanced, and did not move, and we could not place them anywhere we wanted in the frame. This was infuriting, so we had still title, however, we wanted rolling titles, which links to other film noir titles. However, instead, we placed the titles in the corners, which looks stylish and also maens that the picture is not obsured. We also changed the times of the titles- we made them long enough to read, and also made sure they were easy to read by changing colour, size etc.
We tried to not get any jump cuts, so all of the scenes flowed together- we did this by using alot of our shots, and editing very precisly so the movements and match on actions fitted togther well. To make the flow better, we made sure there were no different sized shots, so they fitted togther well. Although we considered doing long shots next to very short ones, we decided to make all the shots fit togther by letting them get steadily shorter or longer, which builds tension.
The light was quite bad and grimy, however, this adds to the age of the film.
We also added titles. There were some problems here- the titles on our programme(Imovie HD) were not very advanced, and did not move, and we could not place them anywhere we wanted in the frame. This was infuriting, so we had still title, however, we wanted rolling titles, which links to other film noir titles. However, instead, we placed the titles in the corners, which looks stylish and also maens that the picture is not obsured. We also changed the times of the titles- we made them long enough to read, and also made sure they were easy to read by changing colour, size etc.
We tried to not get any jump cuts, so all of the scenes flowed together- we did this by using alot of our shots, and editing very precisly so the movements and match on actions fitted togther well. To make the flow better, we made sure there were no different sized shots, so they fitted togther well. Although we considered doing long shots next to very short ones, we decided to make all the shots fit togther by letting them get steadily shorter or longer, which builds tension.
The light was quite bad and grimy, however, this adds to the age of the film.
Tuesday 9 December 2008
Editing.
After finishing shooting, we then started editing. We had to capture the film from the tape by using the firewire, and using I-movie on the Macs. We ended up with about 5 minites of footage. To start with, we took rough cuts of all the shots- this meant we decided which shots to use, and cut out any begginnings, ends, or distractions which we didnt need. We arranaged them on a timeline, and then fine tuned the cuts we had made. During this, we fitted together the match-on-action of movements, as well as 180 degree rule, the shot reverse shot, and our other shots. We also cropped a few shots- luckily, the programme resizes the shots so the size isnt jumping about. After the basic cutting, we worked with the light in ecah shot. We took the satuartion down in each shot, which made the colours black and white. However, we noticed that we didnt want this for some shots, because we lost the connotations with the red dress, or the colour of the bridge. So, we altered teh stauration for each shot abit- this creates a sephia look, which makes the film look quite old fashioned, which is quite effective. We also lowered the light or contrast to make the shots more dark, to create silhouttes. However, this did give us the problem that we were losing details, so we needed to heighten exposure, which worked against the darkening of light. In each one, we decided what levels suited the situation best, and used that. We also took all the sound off, because we deceided we did not want the noise of the camera,(which is hissing, and sounds horrible) and we are currently deciding what music or not to put on the top.
Monday 8 December 2008
December main task work
After being granted our camera from our pitch, we prepared for our filming. We did this by alerting our actress-Ingrid Hesselbo(thankyou ingrid!)about clothes, times, duartion, and went into detail with her about our storyboard. We told her to wear a red dress because it symbolised danger, as well as blood and seduction-all features that linked closely to the character and the story.
We were delayed by a day, but managed to shoot on Sunday instead. It was very cold, and very early. However, the light gave the area a half-dark look, as intended, and it also meant that there were few people about to walk into shoot-the only distractions were the ducks(very noisy). The shooting went well- for each shot we swapped being dircetor or camera operator. We took a white balance every few shots, and we set out the shots acoording to the storyboard. We decided to do several takes of each shot just in case there were things in the scene which we hadnt noticed, but didnt want(such as cars etc). We also focused on the mise en scene of the shots- making sure they told the audience what we wanted. An example is when we went inside, and we tried out with several views of the character holding the gun, so we could see which ones told the story most effectivly. We decided our orginal idea of her in the mirror with the gun in the foreground looked best, so used that.
Ou filming took around 2-3 hours, and we were all relived that half of the shots were inside, with tea. During our shots inside, we did add a few new aspects, such as the character swithching a bdeside lamp on. This was a good chance to show match on actio, and we also used a focusing effect on the camera that made the shot really interesting.
The onlt problems we faced was when shooting on the bridge-the shots were usually slanted, because the bridge was slanted underneth. We did try to create a realtivly straight ground for the tripod, but in some shots the camera is still slightly tilted. Otherwise, it all went very well(if abit cold) and me and lily worked very well together.
We were delayed by a day, but managed to shoot on Sunday instead. It was very cold, and very early. However, the light gave the area a half-dark look, as intended, and it also meant that there were few people about to walk into shoot-the only distractions were the ducks(very noisy). The shooting went well- for each shot we swapped being dircetor or camera operator. We took a white balance every few shots, and we set out the shots acoording to the storyboard. We decided to do several takes of each shot just in case there were things in the scene which we hadnt noticed, but didnt want(such as cars etc). We also focused on the mise en scene of the shots- making sure they told the audience what we wanted. An example is when we went inside, and we tried out with several views of the character holding the gun, so we could see which ones told the story most effectivly. We decided our orginal idea of her in the mirror with the gun in the foreground looked best, so used that.
Ou filming took around 2-3 hours, and we were all relived that half of the shots were inside, with tea. During our shots inside, we did add a few new aspects, such as the character swithching a bdeside lamp on. This was a good chance to show match on actio, and we also used a focusing effect on the camera that made the shot really interesting.
The onlt problems we faced was when shooting on the bridge-the shots were usually slanted, because the bridge was slanted underneth. We did try to create a realtivly straight ground for the tripod, but in some shots the camera is still slightly tilted. Otherwise, it all went very well(if abit cold) and me and lily worked very well together.
Tuesday 2 December 2008
Main task
Gunpowder
I am working with Lily Joyce, and we decided to do a genre of Film Noir, because it is full of suspense and darkness, and because we both enjoyed several film noir films such as Pyscho and Vertigo.
To start with, we collected research. we watched several beginnings of Film Noir films youtube as well as others, and made notes about what happens, and what the atmosphere is like, and how the story/characters are established. We noticed that the placing of things in the scene(mis en scene) was very careful, and this was very visually attractive. We also noticed the use of silhouettes, mist and balck and white created interesting shots. We decided to mimic this to make it conform to the genre. We throught about how to attract audience who watch scary thrillers and we did this through making the story have crime aspects and a female protagonist-who would attract males. We would also have trailer which has darkness and shadows which link to the noir theme. The trailer would also be ambiguos, so people are curious about what it is,and want to view more-it would be a dark screen with a wilting rose for a few minutes. This is enigmatic, and the auience would reconize the sign of a dieing rose as love, and blackness as fear and thriller. This would interest people.
Synopsis for “Gunpowder”
Scarlet Rose obtains a suitcase from a mysterious stranger, which turns out to have a gun inside. We see her considering killing herself, but then she puts it away. We find out through a conversation with a man called Bob that she is planning to kill her brother because of a wish from their dying mother. The audience do not yet know why. As Scarlet goes away, we find out that Bob is actually working for Scarlet’s brother, and they are planning to stop Scarlet going through with the murder, but to capture her so that she does not “cause any more havoc”.
A few days later, Scarlet goes to her brother’s house and there is a very tense meeting where they begin to fight and shoot through the brother’s big old house. Finally, Scarlet is caught, and locked in a basement, guarded by a man called Roul. Scarlet seduces Roul, and then admits that she was going to kill her brother- but only because her brother had stolen the family riches, and was using them illegally. She asks for Roul’s help, and so he lets her escape, and sets about hiding her and planning a way for her to gain what she has lost.
The 2 start a relationship while hiding from her brother, who is following them, with deadly intent. Sometimes Scarlet has only the gun to save her life. She cannot forget the brother, and formulates a plan to kill him again, although Roul tries to persuade her against it. Scarlet finally goes through with the plan, and as her brother is dead in her arms, Roul learns the truth- Scarlet has lied. The man was not her brother, but a past lover who had wronged her and deceived her even though she loved him. Roul is so upset because Scarlet wronged and deceived him that he picks up the gun and shoots Ingrid and then himself. All that’s left is the gun.
Pitch
A film noir of mystery, suspense and crime, this is a thrilling tale about a beautiful seductress called Scarlet Rose, who is trying to kill her brother- an evil man who stole scarlet's fortune which was given to her by her dieing parent. Or is she?
Sinister enamies follow her; soon she is dragged into a dark plot, where her past and present are merged and her life depends on the mysterious suitcase she has picked up. With help from a handsome hero, can Scarlet overcome the ghosts of madness?
We hope to film on Saturday early in the morning at Aristotle lane, and later in day for scene 2.
Research
We looked at alot of Film Noir film starts such as Physco, Vertigo, Shadow of a woman and The Lady Vanishes. We also looked up many clips from film noir films on youtube to get a feel for them. We also looked at callsic film noir pictures such as this one:
The use of shadows and black and white here shows a classic film noir setting, and also the characters abd their clothes connotes crime, mysterty and prision.
We really liked this dark, shadowy and mysterious kind of film, so decided to use it as a genre. To give us more ideas and learn more, we used:
This was very useful, because it showed us how to do film noir movie successfully.
Especailly the idea's about the use if light.
Other things we did to get ready was to create several other film pitchs- here is one we made for Harry Potter: A fantasy feature legnth film set in our world, where a mysterious wizarding world resides along with our own. This magical film follows the suddenly magic and famous orphan Harry Potter into the wizarding world to the magic school Hogwarts. However, the exciting new magic has darker undercurrents- some evil wizard from Harry's past is creeping back, putting the school into deadly danger-can Harry and freinds save the school, defeat Harry's terrible enenamy, and survive without getting expelled?
I am working with Lily Joyce, and we decided to do a genre of Film Noir, because it is full of suspense and darkness, and because we both enjoyed several film noir films such as Pyscho and Vertigo.
To start with, we collected research. we watched several beginnings of Film Noir films youtube as well as others, and made notes about what happens, and what the atmosphere is like, and how the story/characters are established. We noticed that the placing of things in the scene(mis en scene) was very careful, and this was very visually attractive. We also noticed the use of silhouettes, mist and balck and white created interesting shots. We decided to mimic this to make it conform to the genre. We throught about how to attract audience who watch scary thrillers and we did this through making the story have crime aspects and a female protagonist-who would attract males. We would also have trailer which has darkness and shadows which link to the noir theme. The trailer would also be ambiguos, so people are curious about what it is,and want to view more-it would be a dark screen with a wilting rose for a few minutes. This is enigmatic, and the auience would reconize the sign of a dieing rose as love, and blackness as fear and thriller. This would interest people.
Synopsis for “Gunpowder”
Scarlet Rose obtains a suitcase from a mysterious stranger, which turns out to have a gun inside. We see her considering killing herself, but then she puts it away. We find out through a conversation with a man called Bob that she is planning to kill her brother because of a wish from their dying mother. The audience do not yet know why. As Scarlet goes away, we find out that Bob is actually working for Scarlet’s brother, and they are planning to stop Scarlet going through with the murder, but to capture her so that she does not “cause any more havoc”.
A few days later, Scarlet goes to her brother’s house and there is a very tense meeting where they begin to fight and shoot through the brother’s big old house. Finally, Scarlet is caught, and locked in a basement, guarded by a man called Roul. Scarlet seduces Roul, and then admits that she was going to kill her brother- but only because her brother had stolen the family riches, and was using them illegally. She asks for Roul’s help, and so he lets her escape, and sets about hiding her and planning a way for her to gain what she has lost.
The 2 start a relationship while hiding from her brother, who is following them, with deadly intent. Sometimes Scarlet has only the gun to save her life. She cannot forget the brother, and formulates a plan to kill him again, although Roul tries to persuade her against it. Scarlet finally goes through with the plan, and as her brother is dead in her arms, Roul learns the truth- Scarlet has lied. The man was not her brother, but a past lover who had wronged her and deceived her even though she loved him. Roul is so upset because Scarlet wronged and deceived him that he picks up the gun and shoots Ingrid and then himself. All that’s left is the gun.
Pitch
A film noir of mystery, suspense and crime, this is a thrilling tale about a beautiful seductress called Scarlet Rose, who is trying to kill her brother- an evil man who stole scarlet's fortune which was given to her by her dieing parent. Or is she?
Sinister enamies follow her; soon she is dragged into a dark plot, where her past and present are merged and her life depends on the mysterious suitcase she has picked up. With help from a handsome hero, can Scarlet overcome the ghosts of madness?
We hope to film on Saturday early in the morning at Aristotle lane, and later in day for scene 2.
Research
We looked at alot of Film Noir film starts such as Physco, Vertigo, Shadow of a woman and The Lady Vanishes. We also looked up many clips from film noir films on youtube to get a feel for them. We also looked at callsic film noir pictures such as this one:
The use of shadows and black and white here shows a classic film noir setting, and also the characters abd their clothes connotes crime, mysterty and prision.
We really liked this dark, shadowy and mysterious kind of film, so decided to use it as a genre. To give us more ideas and learn more, we used:
This was very useful, because it showed us how to do film noir movie successfully.
Especailly the idea's about the use if light.
Other things we did to get ready was to create several other film pitchs- here is one we made for Harry Potter: A fantasy feature legnth film set in our world, where a mysterious wizarding world resides along with our own. This magical film follows the suddenly magic and famous orphan Harry Potter into the wizarding world to the magic school Hogwarts. However, the exciting new magic has darker undercurrents- some evil wizard from Harry's past is creeping back, putting the school into deadly danger-can Harry and freinds save the school, defeat Harry's terrible enenamy, and survive without getting expelled?
Monday 17 November 2008
Media work
Preliminary task
We have made several tasks to ready ourselves for our media cursework. This is the results so far!
This is our preliminary movie, where we try to use match on action, reverse shot reverse and 180 degree rule.
enjoy.
Evaluation
Our task was to take a film of a man walking into a room, sitting down and sharing diagloue with another character. We had to use shot/reverse shot, match on action and the 180 degree rule within this film, to show we could do basic camera moves. This was useful because it meant that we gained expereince using the camera, and trying out some ideas. We also gained expereince about how to oragnise and create a storyboard, which was very useful because we could plan what we were going to shoot, and we had a visual idea of how we wanted the shots to work. This meant that the task was quicker, more organised, and it also let us plan the mise en scene, to see if we were telling the audience what we wanted them to think. This is our photographic storyboard:
This helped us to plan, and to develop the story. However, i found that our shots were quite different to what we decided on the storyboard, and that we needed more planning- such as maybe several revisions of our storyboard to make it easier to follow.
However, we could consider our mise en scene because of the storyboard. The use of not seeing the main chacters face until the middle denotes a film about crime, and the use of a wig, helps to connote comedey. We considered this during our planning stage, and this helped to show the story more efficently.
Doing the actual filming was very fun, and we worked well as a group. It let us get expereince of how to use a camera, and postion it. This let us know what looked good and what didnt. We did a shot where the camera was on it's side; and this looked quite bad, because it was different to all of the other shot- although it was orginal- if we did it again, we now know that we should keep the camera on the same angle, or else it looks odd.(unless we wnat it to look disconcerting, such as in a thriller, or to make it look like a POV. During filming, we managed to use all 3 shot types- shot reverse shot was used when the 2 characters met, match on action was when the protagonist went through the door, and 180 degree shot(s)was used during dialogue. We had to edit this to make it look as though it flowed.
We have made several tasks to ready ourselves for our media cursework. This is the results so far!
This is our preliminary movie, where we try to use match on action, reverse shot reverse and 180 degree rule.
enjoy.
Evaluation
Our task was to take a film of a man walking into a room, sitting down and sharing diagloue with another character. We had to use shot/reverse shot, match on action and the 180 degree rule within this film, to show we could do basic camera moves. This was useful because it meant that we gained expereince using the camera, and trying out some ideas. We also gained expereince about how to oragnise and create a storyboard, which was very useful because we could plan what we were going to shoot, and we had a visual idea of how we wanted the shots to work. This meant that the task was quicker, more organised, and it also let us plan the mise en scene, to see if we were telling the audience what we wanted them to think. This is our photographic storyboard:
This helped us to plan, and to develop the story. However, i found that our shots were quite different to what we decided on the storyboard, and that we needed more planning- such as maybe several revisions of our storyboard to make it easier to follow.
However, we could consider our mise en scene because of the storyboard. The use of not seeing the main chacters face until the middle denotes a film about crime, and the use of a wig, helps to connote comedey. We considered this during our planning stage, and this helped to show the story more efficently.
Doing the actual filming was very fun, and we worked well as a group. It let us get expereince of how to use a camera, and postion it. This let us know what looked good and what didnt. We did a shot where the camera was on it's side; and this looked quite bad, because it was different to all of the other shot- although it was orginal- if we did it again, we now know that we should keep the camera on the same angle, or else it looks odd.(unless we wnat it to look disconcerting, such as in a thriller, or to make it look like a POV. During filming, we managed to use all 3 shot types- shot reverse shot was used when the 2 characters met, match on action was when the protagonist went through the door, and 180 degree shot(s)was used during dialogue. We had to edit this to make it look as though it flowed.
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