Practice opening 2: Planning

Final idea:
The idea we decided to go for was the one of the woman remembering the beach; however we have developed it a bit more. We decided to have the woman at home rather than going to different locations on the beach because it would be easier to organise due to availability; but we would still have the younger couple on the beach. Our idea was to then have shots of the younger couple doing typical things on a first date; like walking along the sand, skimming stones, holding hands etc and then have them go the the rollercoaster and get someone to take a picture of them in front of it. Then we would cut to the woman holding the same picture in a photo album in her house. This way it would have a more nostalgic effect as it would be more evident that the woman was reminiscing on childhood memories. We also decided that we wouldn't have any dialogue in our video due to the fact it would be difficult to get good quality sound at the beach due to the wind and waves etc, so we thought just having a song over the top of the footage would have an overall more effective affect.

Final characters and casting:
We decided that the main characters to be introduced in our opening would be the younger couple; a teen boy and a girl. We wouldn't reveal too much about the individual characters of each, just make it evident that they are on a date/ in a relationship. Then our assigned character, the 40 year old woman, would be introduced towards the end of the opening, and she would be depicted as a sad whilst she looks back on childhood memories to perhaps hint at something more tragic to have happened involving the younger couple. For our casting we decided to use my mum because she was the only parent who was available for casting in the time frame we were given, and we wanted to use my twin sister to make sure  that they would look alike, however she was not free so we decided to use our friends from school as they also fit the description of what we were looking for. Furthermore they were already in a relationship so would feel more comfortable than perhaps actors that were not.

Rebecca ( teen girl)

Sarah ( 40 year old woman)

Will ( teen boy)


Final location :
Our location is Yarmouth beach, specifically the old rollercoaster. We have  decided to go earlier in the morning try and make sure it isn't too busy, so we can get the shots that we want to without having to worry about what people are doing in the background.

Prop list:We do not need too many props  for our idea, only the fish and chips, a camera, and a photo album with the picture in it.

Costume:In the end we decided that we would go for the woman wearing the uniform, as it fitted with our idea more because she could just be in her work uniform at home when she is looking through the photo album, rather than trying to co-ordinate someone who is not part of the plot being in a uniform in the background.

Final lighting plans:We decided that doing a time lapse would be too difficult as no one could get to the beach early enough to film it completely, as instead we were just going to film at the beach as early in the morning as we could get there so that the sun will still be rising so it can be in the shots we take there, and also we will have to film the  woman sitting in her garden so that it can also be in the background of the shots with her in as well, thus sunrise will still be a part of our opening.

Final filming schedule: We decided to do the filming on the beach on Friday 28th October, because that was the only day that everyone was available. We would film the shots of the woman at home on the following Sunday so that we would have all the footage for when we came back to school, so we could edit it in class.

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Practice opening 2: Research/ideas

What was the task?

The task we were given was to create a film opening based on conditioned mise-en-scene that we randomly selected. Mise-en-scene is an expression that describes all aspects within filming production, e.g. the characters, settings, lighting, costumes and basically anything you can see in the frame. Thus we were given a setting, character, lighting condition, prop and costume which we had include within our opening.  We could come up with any storyline that we wanted to, we just had to make sure we followed the conditions that we got given.

What elements of mis-en-scene were we given?
We were given the elements that are illustrated in this picture:

• Setting - the old rollercoaster on Yarmouth Pleasure Beach
• Prop - Fish and chips
• Character - 40 year old woman
• Costume - uniform
• Lighting condition - sunrise on a Saturday or Sunday morning

Our initial plot ideas:
We brainstormed a few plot ideas and then decided on one to develop further.
One of our initial ideas was a woman that visits the beach and walks to different places; the idea being that she would be remembering a specific time she spent there in her childhood, which we would depict by switching to clips of a younger version of herself whilst she was walking around. Another idea we had was of her being mugged outside the rollercoaster by a younger man, which we thought might be fun to try and film as we could make it into more of an action scene. Our last idea was having a woman go to the beach to meet the man she is having an affair with, whilst her husband remains at home oblivious.

Initial brainstorm

Chosen idea brainstorm

What were our casting ideas? 
Our original casting ideas were to have one of the group members parents as the adult as it would simply be the easiest when trying to co-ordinate a filming schedule, rather than bring in an external actor. For the younger people we were thinking of perhaps using someones brother or sister so that they would look similar to the parent, thus fit in with our idea. This would also be more convient to organise and our actors would be more likely to be comfortable with each other if they knew each other berfore-hand.

Location ideas/research:
We were given our location as part of the conditioned mis-en-scene so we didn't have to come up with any ideas of our own; our location was Yarmouth beach. Some of our group had been there a lot before so were familiar with the layout so we didn't need to do too much research into the actual location because we already knew the places we thought would be good for filming. However we did look into certain aspects, such as a ferris wheel to see if we could get some shots from higher up. Here are some pictures of our location:


Prop research/ideas:
The orginal prop we were given was a cup of tea, but we swapped it with another group for fish and chips as we thought that would fit in better with our location; there is an abundance of fish and chips shops by the sea so we would definatley be able to include even if it is just in the backgroud. We also thought perhaps we could link it to the plot as at the beach it would be relatively easy to include fish and chips and the storyline still make sense, whereas a cup of tea could be slighty more difficult.

Costume research/ideas:
The costume we were given was 'uniform', so we thought of a couple of ways to include it within our opening. Our first idea was to have someone who works at the beach within the film, for example someone who works in one of the stalls for the rollercoaster or staff in a cafe. We thought this might be a good idea because then we could just include it in the back of one of the shots, so we didn't have to worry about changing the plot. The other option we thought about was having one of our characters in uniform, for example the 40 year old lady in her work clothes or something similar. This way we wouldn't have to worry about asking people if it is okay to include them in our opening as the actors would have already agreed to do so.

Lighting ideas/research:
The lighting we were given was sunrise, so we thought we could get up early and try to film a time lapse of the sunrise one  morning on the beach to try and set the scene. We also thought of just having some of the shots take place early in the morning as well so we could have the lighting continued throughout,  however the majority of the group preferred the idea of trying to do a time lapse. We thought we would try and recreate a shorter version of the video below:

Filming plan:

We decided that the best time to film it would be in half term as that was when most of the group and potential actors would be free, so we could organise a day more easily. It also gave us more time to do the filming as most group members have part time jobs or other commitments at the weekend so our schedule would have had to be much shorter if we did it on a weekend. It would also give us the time to go back and film more shots if we needed to because we had a whole week off. We don't have a specific plan for the day of filming as we are planning on decided where the best places to film are on the day, as variables such as weather may change any ideas we have now. 

Stop motion animation

This week in media we were given the task of creating a small stop motion animation; we could create anything as long as we had the materials to produce it in class. Me and Luke worked together to create a short story of the Eiffel tower getting hit by lightening. I thought the process was really fun, but the finished piece was a bit scruffy as it was our first time doing stop motion animation. I really like the way this form of film making looks and now can appreciate just how much effort goes into making it look good. It is something I would consider putting into my own coursework, however I think I would have to practice it a bit more to try and figure out the best ways to make it look professional. You can watch mine and Luke's animation below, as well as some pictures completing the task:

We also looked at some work by people who had done stop motion animation professionally and discussed what we thought of their work.

Nick Park:

Nick Park was born on December 6, 1958 in Preston, Lancashire, England. He is a producer and writer, known for The Curse of the Were-Rabbit(2005), The Wrong Trousers (1993) and Chicken Run (2000).These are probably some of the most well known stop motion animation pictures which have won multiple Academy awards. The characters are made from moulded plasticine modelling clay on metal armatures and filmed with stop motion clay animation and I think they produce films that are quite fantastic. They demonstrate just how effective stop motion animation can be, and his work made we want to investigate how they were made and look so smooth. You can watch one of my favourite scenes from the film Chicken Run here.

 

Jan Svankmajer:

Jan Svankmajer was born in Prague, where he still lives now. He trained at the Institute of Applied Arts and also at the Prague academy of performing arts. He was originally more involved with theatre, and encountered film later on. He is famous for his surreal style and work with animation; as depicted through his first feature film 'Alice', a rather unique adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. Although I appreciate that his work is an fab example of animation and must've taken a huge amount of effort to complete to that high a standard, I personally find his style quite unnerving and do not like his work as much as some of the people he inspired; such as Tim Burton.

Practice 1: evaluation

Click here to watch the finished opening !

In the end we completed the filming on the evening that we originally planned and it went well; we managed to get all the footage that we needed to create the opening and all the variable factors ,like the weather, did not disrupt our filming schedule. Our camera did run out of battery before we had finished filming but luckily Megan had a spare one in her bag so we just used that to complete the process.

We had some issues with the editing process as some of the footage wouldn't import onto the editing software at school; so we missed the deadline of when the work was due because we could not figure out what was causing the problem so thus could not fix it. Other than that it went okay but it was my first time using the software so it took a while to get to grips with how it worked.

What went well?
I think the planning of what we were going to do went well and our organisation was good as we managed to get everything but the editing done within the time frame set. Also the actual filming went well as we all contributed and worked well together as a team, and the actors were easy to direct to get the shots that we wanted.

What would I change?
I personally am not happy with the finished editing, as I think some of the shots don't fit in with on another and some of the cuts are a bit abrupt; however this is mainly due to the fact that the software was new to us and we had to rush it a bit due to the delay because of the issue with importing the clips. Also I think some of the shots could be improved as they don't always capture the whole scene we intended within the frame.

What I have learnt for next time:

• To make sure that the camera is fully charged before we leave
• Always film the shot more than once so you have a choice of clips to choose from when editing
• To practice using the editing software beforehand to make the process slightly easier
• Give yourself plenty of time to edit so then you can see if there are any shots you want to reshoot and thus address this within the time frame

Here are some pictures I took of us on the day of filming:

BIG FISH

<3 Big fish <3

Last Thursday, 29th Sept 2016, we watched Tim Burton's film ' Big Fish'. We were given a list of topics we could discuss, and I chose Truth, lies and exaggeration.

The film is based around the 'stories' that Edward Bloom tells us and his son ,Will, about some of the extraordinary events in his life. These fantastical adventures then become the root of a dispute between father and son as Will believes that he doesn't actually know that much about his Dad, only about the protagonist in the stories he tells; whereas his father swears that he his telling the truth.

This blurred line between truth and lies is something that continues throughout the entire film. At first the viewer believes the tales they hear to be a true account to what actually happened, but as the film goes on they begin to become more doubtful of the honesty in them; making them go through a similar journey to Will as he also believed his father when he was younger, but as he aged he developed a distrust in the stories, therefore a distrust in his dad. This then became detrimental to Edwards Blooms relationship with his son as Will believed his father to be lying but Edward remain adamant he is telling the truth. This then leads to a curious line of thought for the audience because they do not know who to trust, as logic would like with Will's view of the idea that his dad is just an old man who wants a more extravagant life than he actually led, but the romanticised stories about Edward Bloom are hard not to want to believe. This uses of conflict between truth and lies therefore acts as a tool to keep the audience engaged as they want to see how the situation dissolves as the ambiguity is an incentive to keep watching.

The magic realism that is used throughout the film is tainted by Wills viewpoint on the stories, as it acts as a constant reminder to the reader as to what 'reality' really is. There is one scene towards the end of the film, which you can watch here, where the story of Wills birth is put straight. Within the scene the doctor says 'if I had to choose between the true story and some elaborate version including a wedding ring and a fish, I would choose the fancy version', suggesting that perhaps it isn't always the best to have the truth, sometimes a different version of reality can be better. This then poses the question that is the truth actually as important as we think it is? Does it actually change anything, as Edward Bloom lived his whole life on supposedly fabricated stories, yet he seemed happy in the end of it all.

At the end of the film it is revealed that the stories were not in fact lies, but just exaggerated. The two headed singer was in just fact a set of twins, the giant was just a really tall man and so on. This raises the thought that perhaps Edward Bloom himself is just an exaggerated example of ourselves, as we all exaggerate in everyday life, whether we do it consciously or not, thus he is more relatable to the audience as he is just an extreme example of a trait that everyone has. Furthermore, it gives Will some peace of mind as he realises that he knew his father better than he thought he did, some of the facts were just slightly distorted thus also giving the audience some closure on their relationship.