Thursday, 26 April 2012
Production Diary
15/01/12- I had completed the preliminary task, and had grasped the concepts of using the camera to take certain shots. I am now onto starting the initial ideas for the opening sequence.
21/01/12- My group and I have been informed by our tutor that the opening sequence must be based on a new crime fiction film. We decided to choose the subgenre of an Italian Gangster Parody. The usual things that we will hope to include to represent the American gangster area are the upper class type of people, guns, cigarettes, tuxedos/suits, hired help and low key lighting.
28/01/12- We thought of how we would be able to use low key lighting in our film and where the location may be to shoot this effect. The decision had been made to use the recording studio on the college campus to do this. The problems with this may be that the studio may not have the sufficient equipment to create this effect. However, this was overcome by asking Andy the man in charge of filming if this would be possible and he agreed that this could be possible.
04/02/12- With completing our moodboard this week, it has given us the specific ideas of the costume and props we wil use to the film to represent the stereotypes that must be portrayed. The problems encountered was that for the suits needed to be used, we first decided on using different coloured suits to show the difference in gang leaders, but there was only one suit in the college's media costume box. We sorted this problem by deciding on not using different coloured suits and bring our own suits and create our own props to use for the film.
19/02/12- The storyboard has been completed so we now have an actual narrative and have decided who will act what. There were some disputes on who will play what, though the group decided to have a vote for each position/ role of the characters that will be used, also the roles in making the film.
26/02/12- After completing the storyline, scheduling when our group could film was the next thing to do. We setted up a table on what each person should be doing each week and the location we would be meeting to film specific shots. The issues on the scheduling was that not everyone was able to meet the times needed to shoot the required shots, but was overcome by working around this problem by contacting everyone in the group the day before filming making sure they were able to film.
05/03/12- The script was typed up on a college computer, the main issue with this was making sure that it was typed the certain way that met the requirements. This issue was sorted by looking at the template that the media tutor had placed on the college website to help us.
12/03/12- After creating the script, we started filming which we kept doing until 10/04/12. The problems wa sthis was most of our shots were needed to be filmed in the recording studio, which other groups were using aswell so must be booked and sometimes we couldn't film. This was overcome by making sure we booked in advance, and had organised what we were doing each time in the studio so we used all the time we could have.
11/04/12- Once all the filming had been done, we imported the film onto a computer in the editing room so we could start editing the film. As it was only imported to one computer we had to wait for when that computer was free, so some of the group came in their spare time to make sure the film was edited in time.
18/04/12- We had finished editing our film and uploaded it to Youtube.
19/02/12- The storyboard has been completed so we now have an actual narrative and have decided who will act what. There were some disputes on who will play what, though the group decided to have a vote for each position/ role of the characters that will be used, also the roles in making the film.
26/02/12- After completing the storyline, scheduling when our group could film was the next thing to do. We setted up a table on what each person should be doing each week and the location we would be meeting to film specific shots. The issues on the scheduling was that not everyone was able to meet the times needed to shoot the required shots, but was overcome by working around this problem by contacting everyone in the group the day before filming making sure they were able to film.
05/03/12- The script was typed up on a college computer, the main issue with this was making sure that it was typed the certain way that met the requirements. This issue was sorted by looking at the template that the media tutor had placed on the college website to help us.
12/03/12- After creating the script, we started filming which we kept doing until 10/04/12. The problems wa sthis was most of our shots were needed to be filmed in the recording studio, which other groups were using aswell so must be booked and sometimes we couldn't film. This was overcome by making sure we booked in advance, and had organised what we were doing each time in the studio so we used all the time we could have.
11/04/12- Once all the filming had been done, we imported the film onto a computer in the editing room so we could start editing the film. As it was only imported to one computer we had to wait for when that computer was free, so some of the group came in their spare time to make sure the film was edited in time.
18/04/12- We had finished editing our film and uploaded it to Youtube.
The Edit
There were some effects that we used during the edit stage of the film. In order to create the 'old time' effect, it was decided to change the all of the colour of the film to black and white. Sound effects such as gun shots, and a cat sound were used to give it more of a parody edge throughout, also we used a voice over in one of our scenes to create a flashback but yet having a conversation in the present. The main transition that was used was the fade in/out effect, also the mirage type transition to make the flashback understandable to the audience.
There were some effects that we used during the edit stage of the film. In order to create the 'old time' effect, it was decided to change the all of the colour of the film to black and white. Sound effects such as gun shots, and a cat sound were used to give it more of a parody edge throughout, also we used a voice over in one of our scenes to create a flashback but yet having a conversation in the present. The main transition that was used was the fade in/out effect, also the mirage type transition to make the flashback understandable to the audience.
The Pitch
Our group pitched our ideas to the class using a power point presentation. Each member had certain clips to talk about which described our initial ideas of what our film was based and how and who would we distribute it to. The pitch lasted around 5 minutes and used several pictures and not a lot of detailed paragraphs on the clips to make it easier to the eye for the audience and make sure it was well understood. At the end of the pitch we asked the class on whether they had any questions, and was given useful feedback about the presentation and our ideas.
Most of the feedback was very much positive though some did state the areas for improvement that we could develop on. This was that because we are doing a parody to make sure we kept to the comedy aspect and not make it too serious. The narrative was changed slightly to make the story more exaggerated to create a more humorous edge to the film and the production name and certain costumes were changed too.
This is the copy of the power point presentation we pitched our ideas on:
Our group pitched our ideas to the class using a power point presentation. Each member had certain clips to talk about which described our initial ideas of what our film was based and how and who would we distribute it to. The pitch lasted around 5 minutes and used several pictures and not a lot of detailed paragraphs on the clips to make it easier to the eye for the audience and make sure it was well understood. At the end of the pitch we asked the class on whether they had any questions, and was given useful feedback about the presentation and our ideas.
Most of the feedback was very much positive though some did state the areas for improvement that we could develop on. This was that because we are doing a parody to make sure we kept to the comedy aspect and not make it too serious. The narrative was changed slightly to make the story more exaggerated to create a more humorous edge to the film and the production name and certain costumes were changed too.
This is the copy of the power point presentation we pitched our ideas on:
Wednesday, 25 April 2012
Costume, Props, Locations, Casting
For the potential resources needed for filming an American/Italian Gangster stereotyped film, there are certain aspects that need to be considered. Firstly, certain locations are needed to create a realistic effect throughout the film. We are basing our film more towards the Godfather type atmosphere so by viewing certain locations in the films it gave us a good understanding on where we should film. By looking at the image below, this is a shot taken from the first scene in one of the Godfather films, very much like an office type room with low key lighting used. To do this we are going to use the recording studio in college to create this interrogation effect.
For the outside shots, we thought that to keep the intense and dramatic atmosphere where violence and crime usually takes place, we decided to use a dark alley on the college campus to film this.
Costumes like I have discussed before in some of my previous posts will need to portray this classy yet mobster feel, which we did with using suits and ties, shown by the image below. Hats were also used for certain characters. Moustaches were also added to the characters to create a humorous aspect to the film which is what we intended to do throughout.
For Props I have also discussed in some of my previous posts but yet again the convention of the old mobster, violent stereotype was needed to be conveyed so we used cigars, drugs, money and guns. However to get the element of comedy put across aswell, we used the use of marshmallows in some of the characters mouths to copy the Godfather’s look of slurred speech. Also a toy cat was used to convey the cat that was seen in the first scene of the Godfather aswell. For the drugs, sherbet and icing sugar was used wrapped up in clingfilm with chocolate coins for the money.
We had a variety of casting since half we through filming two people left the course, which sadly did make filming more difficult. For the actors we used people in the media course to help.
The script is shown in the image below, not much dialouge was used but we did try to make as much speech possible in the maximum of two minutes of filming space that was required.
Sunday, 15 April 2012
Scheduling
To start with our filming we had to schedule around the times of our friends timetables, and book in times for when the media studio was free to film certain shots in the planner that the studio had. Lists had to be made by me and another member. An example of one that shows how we organised members together, which were days and things needed that was written down every week, as shown by this picture:
Some obvious problems that we did encounter was that half way through filming 2 members of the film had left college and was very hard to schedule times for everyone to film together, therefore we had film again with completely new actors and made sure that times and deadlines were made to ensure everyone was able to film.
To start with our filming we had to schedule around the times of our friends timetables, and book in times for when the media studio was free to film certain shots in the planner that the studio had. Lists had to be made by me and another member. An example of one that shows how we organised members together, which were days and things needed that was written down every week, as shown by this picture:
Some obvious problems that we did encounter was that half way through filming 2 members of the film had left college and was very hard to schedule times for everyone to film together, therefore we had film again with completely new actors and made sure that times and deadlines were made to ensure everyone was able to film.
Audience Research
In our group we decided to do a survey for the class to fill out. This was to find out what is the usual favourites and dislikes the audience to a film have and there is a variety of ages in the class which is also helpful to get a wider range of results.
Mainly the questions consisted on what type of film did the surveyor prefer and what was their favourite convention, which helped me decide on what type of film I should make and to watch age group I was appealing to.
The results from the research had shown us that the audience to a film do like a comedy aspect which was the overall perception we got back. This gave my group and I the reason to do our crime film with a comedy edge, giving us the idea to create a godfather type parody film, which will hopefully appeal to teenagers and young adults.
In our group we decided to do a survey for the class to fill out. This was to find out what is the usual favourites and dislikes the audience to a film have and there is a variety of ages in the class which is also helpful to get a wider range of results.
Mainly the questions consisted on what type of film did the surveyor prefer and what was their favourite convention, which helped me decide on what type of film I should make and to watch age group I was appealing to.
The results from the research had shown us that the audience to a film do like a comedy aspect which was the overall perception we got back. This gave my group and I the reason to do our crime film with a comedy edge, giving us the idea to create a godfather type parody film, which will hopefully appeal to teenagers and young adults.
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