Restarting

As a group we watched over our recordings and we thought that the first half, the part where the girl kills another person, was terrible. We like the second part as that bit had good camera angles and techniques but we thought that it would be too short and too boring if it was just that part, as most groups film someone in their house making tea ect. Miss Foster spoke to us too and we decided to restart so we will have to plan, storyboard, film and edit all over again.

Second Day of Filming

On 16th November we filmed first half of our opening sequence. We filmed from 4:30pm-6:30pm for lighting purposes as we wanted the windows in the background to show that it was the evening. Even though the main character, me,  kills Yasmin by suffocating her, we used fake blood to show that she was already injured. The audience can assume that she was injured by the knife I put in my bag in the second half of the opening sequence.

Once we filmed we uploaded all our footage to the Mac.

British Film Institute

On Friday 11th November we went to the British Film Institute (BFI) as a class for the day. In the morning Tom Woodcock spoke to us about conventions of film openings.

Firstly, he spoke about Macro elements of a film opening and how important they are in the opening title sequence. Macro elements include Genre, Narrative, Character, Themes and Atmosphere. We watched three opening sequences; The Wedding Singer (1998), Napoleon Dynamite (2004) and Casino Royale (2006) and we had to fill out in our booklet how much the opening sequence provided for Marco elements. This was an good task as it made us think about what Macro elements are in our own opening sequences.

Then he spoke about Micro elements such as colour, lighting, font, costume, props, setting and sound design. For this, we saw four different opening titles and evaluated what was consistent in them. Consistency helps the audience understand what is happening. 

Afterwards we had lunch and when we came back we saw Dexter Fletcher, an actor and director. He spoke about his three films he had directed and what he did for their opening sequences. His style is to integrate the titles into the film as he believes that the film should completely be about the film, rather than having a stand alone title sequence. His three films were Wild Bill, Sunshine on Leith and Eddie the Eagle. I enjoyed listening to his opinions as I saw what title sequences meant from a directors point of view, rather than a students. 

Todays trip made me think about our groups opening sequence and possible changes we might make.

Dexter Fletcher

First day of filming

We filmed for the first time today and overall, it took almost 2 hours. We filmed from 1pm-3pm as we wanted to use natural light coming in through windows. Morgan did most of the filming, Yasmin helped direct and I acted. We were filming the second half of our opening sequence at my house, and we had to film this half first because the clothes Yasmin and I wear get blood on them in the first half, which we did not want in the second half. We used our paper and youtube storyboard to remind of us what scenes we had to shoot.

First we filmed from the beginning of this half, with the camera zooming out of my eye. The lighting where we were wasn't great, so we used a LED camera light borrowed from school.

 This made the shot brighter, and it allowed the camera to zoom closer and stay in focus.


For one of the shots Morgan was filming from the top of the stairs for a high angle shot, however she couldn't just hold the camera as her hand was shaking. Therefore, she used a stabiliser and this made the shot steady.

We will film the first half of our opening sequence on Monday 14th November 2016 after school.

Age certificate

The age certificate for our film would be a 15 as there is violence and blood and it would be quite detailed. Also there may be a reference to drugs and other adolescent illegal activities depending on where the storyline would go if the film would be made.

Mise-en-scene

In the bathroom the only extra things we will add is the blood. This is because in the story we are unaware of how the girls ended up in the bathroom and this means that it is not their bathroom. Therefore it is just a normal bathroom and the only added things is what the girls bought with them.

At the girls house it will be normal daily items around such as a cup of tea and a bag. We are also having my brother there to represent a casual, normal family house so that it doesn't look suspicious. We will also be having a knife come out of a wooden table and this knife is put into a bag. This is a type of foreshadowing as we have already seen that she kills someone but does this by suffocating her, so it is a mystery to the audience as to when the knife comes into play.

Storyboard

Once Morgan and I completed our storyboard at my house, Morgan made the storyboard film. This is our opening sequence in storyboard form with potential sound effects. We will work off this when we film.

Ghost Recon Wildlands

In this clip, there are a lot of creative technique used. Right at the beginning, it has a man talking with  subtitles at the bottom, even though he is speaking english. This gives a serious mood to the clip as the audience have to concentrate right from the beginning. There are diegetic sounds of men being hurt, accompanied with non diegetic, low level sounds which crescendo into the noise of a helicopter. This tells the audience that something, most likely an action shot, will come. While the music is rising, there is a pool of blood which trails off into the cracks on the wooden table. The camera pans to show this blood traveling around violent weapons such as guns and knives. These props suggest the character is involved in an illegal deal. The blood then drops off the table, and this blood drop is transitioned into a man skydiving. I like this technique as it connects two scenes, but does not tell the audience how they're connected, e.g. what did the skydiving man have to do with the blood and guns.

Once the man appears, the non dietetic sounds stop and you can hear the wind and birds. Then we hear music which indicates some action, and it makes the audience feel more upbeat compare to the previous scene. This is the part of the clip where it becomes apparent that this is a trailer for a video game. We receive point of view shots of a man locking his target and tracking of the car.

Then it goes back to the blood on the table, and this time it trails upwards into a white powder, which is presumed to be cocaine. The cocaine absorbs this blood and it looks grainy, and the camera zooms into this and it transitions into a birds eye view of soldiers running in the rain, and the camera tilts upwards so you can see their whole bodies. This is my favourite transition in the whole of the clip because its is original and inventive. Again like the previous transition, it connects two scenes but leaves the audience questioning why.

Later on in the clip (2:50) a soldier throws a drop into the air, the camera quickly zooms into the drone and the next shot is a point of view form the drone. This provides continuity as the audience knows exactly where the drone is going.

Even though this clip has very different themes to our groups opening sequence I decided to evaluate it as it had transitions and techniques I had never seen before. Also, I personally don't watch video game trailers but I had never seen one with such detail and though gone into it.