Anatomy of a film poster

Here is the first major step in my planning and research into the first (compulsary) ancillary task of the specification:




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_poster

Production Completed

Today's session marked the completion of our editing process, we have officially finished creating 'AWAY'. I was particularly happy with the end product, much happier than I thought I would be, there was a diverse range of shots and techniques including: low/high angle, match on action, objective and subjective viewpoint, various transitions between scenes, diegetic and non diegetic music, sound effects, selective sound, sound bridging, over the shoulder shots - plenty of cinematographic work, editing, sound and mise en scene too. I am truly relieved to have the production process over, but truly excited to proceed into the next part of the portfolio - the ancillary tasks.

My next few blog posts will be dedicated to planning and researching into ancillary tasks. As we have now broke up for the Christmas holidays, I will not be able to access the facilities and software from my home computer for the actual creation of the radio trailer and poster, however I can showcase my ideas and research here until I get back to college.

Editing process

I and the rest of Clueless Productions are currently in the editing process of the production of 'AWAY'. So far we have cut all of our footage down to the length we want it so it can be pieced together perfectly. Using FinalCutPro we used the razor tool to trim all of our footage down, it is a pretty basic method of cutting but once you use the razor tool it introduces you to the basic function of the software.

After all of our footage was cut down, we began to identify which transitions worked best between the various scenes we had. When we pieced some scenes together we saw that because a lot of our footage is subjective and contains our stalker simply looking at things point blank, there is not a great deal of movement and it looks a little rigid. So we played around with short 'Cross fades' between scenes, so it is not a very obvious transition but is a nice and subtle way to lead scenes and shots from one to another.

No film looks great without sound, so we were slightly concerned when we watched our film back without any sound effects and non diegetic music. However through using Apple software 'Garageband' we found plenty of sounds that were excellently suited to our film. As a transition from the end of the office scene at the beginning of our film to the train track in which our stalker appears to board a train to his work placement 'away' from home, in filming a bird happened to pass across the shot, creating quite a nice shot. So we searched 'bird noises' into FinalCutPro and stumbled upon a favourite amongst the list 'swallow' I felt this was an angelic noise which fit great with the empty traintrack we had. To use sound as a transition, we decided to begin the sound of the bird tweeting as Sarah is exiting the office and continue it into the subsequent scene, as a use of sound bridging.

 

 



As we could not find a suitable automated train cue voiceover to play for the announcements whilst I was in the train station (on Garageband) we decided to get the zoombox out again and create some of our own recordings. So Sarah (Played by Izzy) who has a very clear and eloquent speaking voice took the part whilst I recorded her. Me and Evie devised a short script for her to read:

"Now standing is the 15:38 train to Manchester Airport, calling at Thornaby, York, Leeds and Huddersfield. Please be aware that passengers are entirely responsible for all baggage. Have a safe journey."

We thought that this piece of voice over could be played alongside our footage of the trains at the train station, but also of us walking on the bypass under the station, where we would reduce the volume of the voice over and put an echoed effect onto it, creating the impression that we have gone under ground and it can only be heard distantly.

We are making significant progress with out editing and will soon be coming to the end (20/12/13) of our entire production, we hope that with our dedication and effort we can produce an excellent end product.



 



 

Script update

In our final stages of filming, we found the opportunity to add some more speech. Once in the delivery I mentioned in the previous blog post, with a new addition to the cast: Evie's mum, and then with the flashback of Izzy tearing up the flowers in the most tense part of the film. These are only short pieces of speech but they are relevant and help to piece up the film:




Delivery Woman: "Flowers for Sarah Foster?"
Sarah: "Oh... Thank you."
Delivery Woman: "Thank you."




Sarah: "Eugh... Just leave me alone!"

05/12/13 - Filming (Final session)

Here is a glog showing the final stages of our filming process - the next two weeks before the production deadline will be dedicated solely to editing, unless some filming needs to be redone or added for effect, in this case the filming progress will be updated here.

Focus group

Here is some footage of a focus group I got together for some solid audience research before we filmed the final part of 'AWAY'. The general consensus was positive however they encouraged that we get some more interaction between the two characters to make their supposed relationship more evident, to avoid people realising the stalking early. They all said that they would view the film on websites such as YouTube and social networking sites, which gave us some exhibition ideas.

03/12/13 - Filming (Session eight)

Today after college I went round my friends house to capture a bit of footage that I realised could be included in our montage scene. As a voice over is used throughout our montage, containing the line "Every time I hear our song I think of you...", I thought it would be a good idea to go and film my friends record player in motion. With her consent, I took a variety of different shots of the record player so we could include various or simply pick the one we liked most. I thought that a record player was a good prop cause they are typically used in Romance films, so the illusion of a relationship is enhanced through props like this.

With the camera I took the shots:

• High angle shot

• Birds eye view shot

• Eye-level shot

• POV shot

Risk Assessment

Short film narrative & suspension of disbelief

As we will be shortly dedicating the rest of our time to editing the footage we have caught over the last few weeks, in today's lesson we analysed the technique in some of the short films that our former college students had produced. We analysed the films 'Orphanage' and 'Note to self' they were very different films that I believed had different focuses.

Orphanage- For some unknown reason the video of Orphanage from YouTube would not embed so I have hyperlinked the title 

 I thought 'Orphanage['s]' use of camera shots, movement and editing were particularly impressive considering it was an amateur production. I thought the camera technique was very professional, you could see they had used a wheeled tripod to avoid shaking and it truly paid off as I thought it looked like a legitimate film. This short had some excellent match cuts, particularly the ones of the diary, where we got three different perspectives. I also enjoyed seeing the transition between objective and subjective viewpoint when following the blonde character through the wreckage, it truly created the horror/thriller vibe. I do think that some things were left unexplained, or didn't make sense, but they were solely issues with the narrative whereas we were focusing on the techniques that had been used, to essentially avoid the mistakes that were made here into ours. 'Orphanage' showed that there were several continuity errors that could have been bettered if not totally avoided through editing, for instance this unexplained nose bleed that was not on the girls face, then suddenly appeared without cause. However, I do feel it has gave some inspiration for when me and the rest of Clueless Productions properly approach the editing process. Match cuts particularly have shown to be very effective if done correctly. I believe that this group used non-diegetic sound particularly effectively as a form of suspense in their film, it truly enhanced the atmosphere and ticked the conventions of a horror, I thought that both sound and location made it clear from the off-set of what genre this short would fall into.

Note to self



'Note to self' was my least favoured on the grounds of editing, cinematography, mise en scene and sound. Although I did find this story line ultimately more compelling, and containing less continuity errors/unexplained acts, there was a serious lack of professionalism in their technique that led it to be the more amateur and ultimately the worst of the two. Specifically the section with the note writing on the wall, it was long winded, could not be seen clearly on the screen and was (for me) the ultimate technical downfall of the short. I see how scenes like this that are pivotal to the film could be bettered through the use of a montage, or in comic cases a fast forward. Their use of non-diegetic sound effects were somewhat excruciating to watch, they were in irrelevant places and did not appear to support the situations that were occurring. They also appeared to have a true lack of camera shots and editing techniques, although all they used were relevant, they were unfortunately limited. However, there were positives to this film that I intend to carry through to our own editing process. I believe the use of the flash back being slightly distorted was great in conveying the enigmatic air that the film carried, it also introduced the theme of time in an effective way. However I did prefer 'Orphanage' based on the technicalities.

Filming delay

Although we did intend to film on 29/11/13 last Friday, me and the rest of the group faced several unavoidable issues that have unfortunately delayed the filming until this Thursday (05/12/13) which does leave us less time for editing. This is something we hope will not conflict with the time we have left and we truly intend to work hard on ensuring our film is to the same standard it would have been. In the meantime, we are going to focus on audience research work, editing anything we have not yet edited and focusing on planning and production for the two ancillary tasks I mentioned on the specification brief. Progress and research for these various things will be updated on the blog as they are done.