Main task- Technology, props and uses

Technology list (so far)

Gopro- this will be used to give a first person view i.e. attached to the head. or to record from difficult angles for example in a certain scene it will be attached to a skateboard.

tripod- in order to stabilise the camera this equipment is needed to increase the quality of the filming and reduce shakiness to a bare minimum.

video camera- for recording each shots and sections of scenes ready to edit together.

phone- this is encase we require a "hand held" effect to any recording.

premier pro computer software- this will e used to edit cut and modify all of our camera footage to create the thrillers final design.

after affect computer software- to enhance any effect that we cannot accomplish on premier pro such as titling.

Main task- Age rateing and post preduction research

After researching the bbfc age rating company I have gained a further understanding of the process and guidelines which may help guide me to rating my own media movie in this coursework.
 with the obvious objective of censoring the media to restrict inappropriate material/footage to younger or impressionable children or young adults, I can use the set guideline they use by applying the quota for deciding the age rating of my film. as most 18's are usually noted to more often than not excessive gore, violence, swearing, drug use, sexual content etc. Iv realized that I do not have the expenses to allow me to create some of these features such as I cant include sexual content and I don't have props to allow gore. although as its a "horror" drama it cant be a U or PG leaving me with 12 or 15 as I want a more adult storyline I believe my production will be a 15 and if so I will not this at the start of the film itself.

Additional data on research will be added at a later date.

Studio cannal

Main task- Disability textural analysis work link

http://www.theguardian.com/society/joepublic/2011/sep/22/ricky-gervais-stephen-merchant-disability

 This blog on disability can truly show the contrast on disability in media as even a show like Derek about a disable care home worker As usually this is put in a negative perspective. this is due to the fact that he isn't disabled yet imitates someone with this handicap, which most people may find off-putting however it clearly states in this article that there are some greatly pro disability aspects in this media production and that its appearance is merely subjective and how it actively suggests the negative mind frame against disabled people in the public such as refusing disabled workers jobs simply due to there condition than mocking disability in itself, while still showing the unreasonable attitude that's true to life. Whereas there's no negative comments on the series "Derek" noted.

Main task- Light work

By shining the lamp up at his face from bellow his chin the cast shadow is
 spread across the lower contours such as bellow the nose and chin giving
 a horror appearance.

directing the light to the side of his face only as expected illuminates
one side this could be used in interrogation or crime scenes perhaps fade the
face by moving away from the light.

By placing the light behind tom it creates this nice silhouette affect.

He faced right as I shone the light down on his face this created
darker tones the further out from the centre of the face you go.

Another down upwards angled light this one highlights certain areas of my
face wile leaving in depth areas almost black, an even more contrasting image of the
same type is below.

Main task- Se7en intro textural analysis

Main task- History of thrillers

Hitchcock-

The first thriller film created was called "The Lodger" in 1926 by Alfred Hitchcock often called "the master of suspense" due to his frequent use of psychological suspense in all his films, he was well known in the film industry for creating over 50 films and defined the thriller genera into filming and was responsible for the most famous horror thriller of all time "Psycho" and "Birds" in 1960 and 1963, he continued making and directing films all his life till he died in the 19th of April 1980 a year after winning the "American filming institutes life achievement award". this is a link to my source of information- http://www.biography.com/people/alfred-hitchcock-9340006

 there method of filming remains unchanged in some certain aspects such as the use of narrative codes however through more advanced cameras lighting and all-round technology filmmaking in particular Sci-Fi's and dramas have evolved and improved throughout the years.

 

Main task- Our roles

Sam's roles (me)

Towards this project we are creating a 2 and a half minute introduction to our own drama horror to the best of our ability in the allocated time. I have a variety of locations accessible and of great use for filming locations and general settings of the whole drama, additionally I researched premier pro software so I am fairly skilled in manipulating film clips for example altering sound at key point lowering saturation or adding my own personalised effect such as flashing or vibrating and I have a firm grasp of being able to store and transfer data through different means. although I lack camera work skills as I am unable to figure out shots such as panning without poor results.

Brantley's roles
For the production of this task, each member of the group has been assigned a certain roll. My roll is to sort out and decide which camera shots angles and movements will be used throughout the opening. I will attempt to make my decisions to the best of my ability and refer to other thriller opens for inspiration and guidance to influence my decisions. I will attempt to include some of the key aspects of thriller films while doing this and also maintain the importance of flow throughout the entire opening and also my role in production. As well as this, I will also assist in the editing and refining of the production and clips.
Tom's Role

I am mainly going to be in the film as one of the characters as that is my strength , I will help as much as I possibly can with the editing and give input where possible but it is not my main strength

Main task- Barthes "narative code" main task preperation

Barthes codes of narratives are guidelines to filmmaking that allow easier distinguishing between protagonists and antagonists and give a general set to the storyline when pinned out. the five codes include:

• enigma code- Used by usually showing a clip or scene at the start of the film that currently makes no sense to the audience at present time such as "guy stabbed by masked man" but as the film progresses it would begin to make more sense so you watch in order to figure out who the man at the start was making the viewer enticed.

• Semic code- Simplistically it is a symbol or sign that can tip the audience as to what the film may be about or a major part of the film or location for example a war film may have a Nazi symbol to indicate world war two or a flag to indicate a country.

• The cultural code- Used to an culturally aware audience for example martinis in James bond films, and are usually used repeatedly to familiarise specific traits of a character and the audience can easily recognise the real world elements.

• Code of oppositions- This code is simple and used frequently by directors it binary opposites i.e. black background for antagonists light for protagonists, woman vs. man, war vs. peace.

My uses of narrative codes is fairly frequent however there are gaps that could have been improved via precision editing, examples of the semic code in my horror drama introduction is the countdown in the TV static white noise close up shots that show a centred clock counting down to when the last scene with me in terror occurs throughout the first 3 quarters of the film, by using this it puts the audience on edge as they begin speculating to what happens when it reaches zero. However the flashes of the timer though were sometimes to fast or sudden to see the actual countdown so this may loosen its desired affect, I should have extended the timeframe that they appeared in.

Main use of code in my clip is the enigma code, this was used at the very start of the film by showing intense moments of running panting and fear before a final clip a third of the way in the film of me being shocked and looking up, by not showing the death scene the audience is left being unaware of what happens then it cuts away to after the possible murder this leaves them wondering "who was the murderer?" "who's the victim?" and "did he die?" coaxing people to continue to watch, this code was executed as planned and no apparent flaws were noticed.

A possible use of cultural code is that the start of the film was entirely recorded by phone and made to look like it by having shaky parts, especially when the boy holding it is scared to seem more realistic this could be applied to the social aspect.

For code of opposites I have used an affect on the phone camera scene to make it appear darker in lighting to give a more sinister effect, this gives the villains main scenes more drama by clocking there body more to shroud there body, another is the use off sound, as I dulled and lowered the volume in non intense moments such as the walking scenes after the attack in the last 45 seconds of filming and raising the volume dramatic in intents scenes to create tension and potential jumps from the audience. If I had more time or were aware of these guidelines during its creation I could have set another effect besides lighting and sound such as saturating the colour in the antagonists scenes.

Main task- Drama title creation

Recently in class iv been  lerning how to use a program called after effects here im able to design a cinematic title with affects to place in my movie, so far i have sussed out how to make the leters move individualy and how to give them a strobe pixelated effect. This will match greatly to the static in the intro if I manage to add a flashing lightbulb in sinc with the strobe effect on the lettering it would appear as though it was lighting them up.
heres an image of the work so far-

Preliminary- Review and full intro clip

Media Horror drama intro review

first of all my short has been submitted and as a final part to the start of my year I must first review my current progress and drawbacks. the piece I created was of high technical standard as i applied recordings from multiple area and scenarios and shot them together i.e. tv satic and forest landscape to inside a school and added desired affects such as background noise for example one instance where I cut the video but not the sound while i was running so that the noise of me panting and the crushing pebbles underfoot built tension for the audience and the final effects being alteration of music sound levels so it quietens in crucial moments or to create atmosphere then there's the rotation of the shots so they were all the correct way as a precaution we didn't consider was keeping the recording device horizontal throughout production, the shots taken include a wide shot of the forest area at the beginning of the scene which panned left and right purposely in a sloppy manner to appear as though its hand filmed and rushed to create a sense of realism to its introduction. A extreme close up of the handle as the minor character enters the room that the other is sat in. a shot reverse shot at the end of the intro is being used to show reaction of each person to what the corosponding person has just said this gives the audience a feeling of being in the actual conversation by using a first person view and lets them feel more connected to the characters. and included the 360 rule by not going beyond the degrees as it would disorientate the viewer as regulated by the marking scheme.

However there were a few shots that were missing in the finished film such as establishing shots however i managed to load some shot such as this onto my blog and the alround video had difficulties due to recording scenes at different angles parts goe from wide screen to a narrow one from recording in both horizontally and diagonally.
 

Preliminary- Music and final touches

Iv added music that was created by my brother on request for the drama that fits with its intense theme, once it was added i altered the sound levels at specific parts for the scenes talking to become clearer, then i added white noise affects with a countdown to create a sense of unsettlement then toned down lighting to make the film have a darker saturation and feel to it. the finishing product will be published on YouTube tomorrow.

Preliminary- Location

These are establishing shots of the forest area near the abandoned chemical works we had no place that they were needed in the preliminary drama scene so I decided to add them to the blog.

Preliminary- Update

Filming has had difficulties such as requiring a room that already has a class for filming, and its difficult to get certain shots due to weather and lighting that are outside with rain being the biggest issue at hand. however during editing iv figured how to add certain effects such as sound fading and sharpening this will work well for when I attach music to the intro, additional iv placed the footage in premier pro and begun adjusting and shaving the frames to how long they need to be and added other sound effects like white noise to build tension. next tomorrow I need to add titles to in-between the scenes. il add print screens to the blog off my teamates and locations and eventually the intro itself.

Preliminary- Utopia and post-preduction

After studying the drama series "utopia" in further depth it has offered information on post-production that the directors have used that could be applied to my project, as, in creating the comic book effect of vibrant colours with extreme contrasts of light and dark the film was shot in black and white and was painted afterword's using the opposite of traditional colours with yellow cyan and magentas.

post production is a key feature to any media and fine tunes the entire production to its final state, I could consider the idea of altering my own work to a standard like utopia in the sense of creating offbeat colours that makes an alternate feel to the film i.e. grayscaleing it would make it seem older or I could adjust the speed a scene plays for dramatic affect.

drama movie introduction

the main task of this half year will be that I will create a drama short for my as media coursework, I will go through each step on blogger and document how it is preformed and to what affect I will scan my current un updated storyboard. I have been to the woods on the outskirts of an abandoned chemical plant to shoot parts of the introduction where a murder is set so far I have done the chase scene and wishing to proceed into the shots involving close-ups of the area that its in for the mise on scene. till I film in the chemical works itself. Later scenes will be explained as they are in production. I had a couple of issues with the flow from scenes meaning I need to do additional scenes to place between.

Exploreing shots

For my first practical while studying media my assignment was to acquire shots of my teammate at specific angles and proportions such as wide shot typically use to portray the background a characters set in, or a shot reverse shot showing reaction in conversation between two people, and close ups show usually intense scenes or emotion. we posed for the photos with a theme of antagonist and protaganist these shots are displayed below.

Establishing shot                     
Used to show the viewers where the entire film or scene will be shot at this gives the audience a clearer sense of direction of both the characters and the plot of the film.


 
wide shot with leading line
This wide shot allows the full body of the person in the shot to be shown along with a large area of space either side to give the feel of the area too usually used in dramatic scenarios, the leading lines draw in the gaze of the viewer to follow the line this is intended to lead them to what the director wants them to see or not too.
           







Extreme close-up
This shot technique is used specifically for the build-up of tension and occasionally to focus on fine detail.



Mid-shot with evil glare
This is the most common shot in film making as it allows us the see most of the body including the face for expression, and this means it can include conversations and reactions.



Low-shot
the low angle shot creates a sense of power and dominance to the one being looked up to, and the one looking up either appears insignificant feeble or respecting.










Long shot
used in creating distance or for a greater shot of the background it can create any number of effects depending on how its used such as tension if used in a foggy background and a shadowy figure or if in a cathedral it amazes the audience.

starting media!

hey im sam and im a student currently studying media, I don't watch tv realy but pretty much every other type of media im enthralled with movies, music, computers, the lot. I will show you throughout my blog my achievements and how my work and productions are going I hope you enjoy my blogs

I became interested in media through the idea of editing and photo manipulation as im highly passionate about art I knew that this course would improve my capabilities and show me new potential career paths in creative media. even though I don't watch much tv, computers photography and editing are something I would love to learn in further depth and music is a massive part of my life. im looking forward to the filmmaking the most as I can have free to create whatever I want.

I have been looking at specific types of camera shots such as longshot wideshot and establishing shot that il go in further depth in later blogs.