Time Management: Updates

I have been adding the finishing touches to my blogs by adding things on such as the Costume/Prop table that is in that blog. At the moment, there is little we as a group can do until we begin filming. In today's lesson we are finishing off the Shot List for when we begin filming and currently casting roles.

Time Management: Updates

Today we made our storyboard animatic. We experienced several technical problems which delayed the process but it is now uploaded onto our blog. By the end of the week (Friday 17th December) we will upload our shotlist and finished actors and characters list as well.

Planning: Animatic

This is our storyboard animatic that we have produced. We added in the background music and various sound effects that we will use and also the duration of each scene is accurate too.

Time Management: Updates

In today's lesson, we spent it photographing pictures of our separate shots for the storyboard. We encountered some problems with the camera so it took longer than expected meaning we didn't get chance to make our storyboard into an animatic. However, I did upload the photo's that we took in today's lesson into a separate blog which will give us a head start tomorrow as we only need to import our photographs into Adobe Premiere to create our animatic as all the editing was done in this lesson.

Planning: Storyboard

These are the pictures of our storyboard before we made it into an animatic, in chronological order and with the duration of the shots underneath.

SHOT 1 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 2 Duration: 2 seconds

SHOT 3 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 4 Duration: 6 seconds

SHOT 5 Duration: 7 seconds

SHOT 6 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 7 Duration: 6 seconds

SHOT 8 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 9 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 10 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 11 Duration: 8 seconds

SHOT 12 Duration: 5 seconds

SHOT 13 Duration: 7 seconds

SHOT 14 Duration: 8 seconds

SHOT 15 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 16 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 17 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 18 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 19 Duration: 2 seconds

SHOT 20 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 21 Duration: 4 seconds

SHOT 22 Duration: 5 seconds

SHOT 23 Duration: 3 seconds

SHOT 24 Duration: 5 seconds

Organisation: Costume and Props

Fortunately, as our film is based in a College, the costume organisation won't be hard to do. The majority of people who will be cast will be wearing what they wear to college on a typical and everyday basis. The only person who will need a costume change will be the main character, as he will be a classic nerd we need to buy big and bold glasses which we will do over the weekend. Also, we need the main character to be wearing a shirt and tie with short trousers to dress him up as someone who clearly stands out. 
As for props, we just need to main character to be carrying a lot of books to make him appear nerd-like. The 'popular' person who is introduced first will be filmed entering College grounds on a moped, and when he is walking down the corridor he will be carrying his helmet.

Costumes:

• Typical teenage clothing for extras
• 'Popular' guy in nice clothing
• Main character in nerdy clothes: tie, shirt, short trousers - we will borrow this from old clothes we have ourselves so the cost goes down

Props:

• Use a moped and helmet that we are borrowing from a friend [Josh Deacon]
• Use books from the College library that we will ask to borrow
• Folders that we have ourselves
• Magnetic letters to use for our titles from 'Poundland' that will cost £1

Time Management: Updates

We are currently photographing our complete storyboard and are hoping to make it animated and upload it onto our blogs by the end of today's lesson.

Time Management: Updates

Today we took pictures of the location settings to upload onto our Location blog. We had a few complications with the setting not working after having a look around, but by slightly altering where we are planning the film and in what order, we found that it works better. Everything is running on target at the moment and we are hoping that our Storyboard will be photographed and in a blog by Monday 13th.

Organisation: Location

Today we organised where abouts we would film our opening sequence to our film around College.


We are hoping to use a large corridor in College for the opening sequence in our film. We are planning to film this as a closed set after college hours so that the setting will seem more realistic. So for this, we need to cast enough people to make the setting seem like it is a College. The lockers that we are going to use to introduce the titles on, are in the corridor will we be filming and also the toilets are part of this hallway too, however, we will only be seeing the door for the toilets. Also, we will need to use a classroom so we will have to ask for permission from teachers to ensure that we can do this. We decided to increase the screen time with the 'Popular' guy so we included the outside part to watch him approach the college.

These are the areas of location for our film:

This is the first shot of the outside so we can see the 'popular' guy walking into the Hall way

This is the Hall way where the popular guy will walk through after getting off his moped.

 This is where the popular guy starts to interact with other people within the set, it is also next to the toilets.

 This is the classroom that will be filmed at the very end of the opening sequence

This is the whiteboard within the classroom where the title for the film will appear

Time Management: Updates

We are on schedule to completing the filming deadline on time.
We are currently arranging who we are going to ask to be in our film, and they will be cast by the end of the week. Also, hopefully, our storyboarding and shot list will be completed by Monday 13th December at the latest.

Planning: Script

We decided to make a draft for what the voice over will say during our opening sequence.


Camera is following the 'popular' boy at this point who is walking down the corridor in a laid back manner. The camera makes it seem as if the voice over is the 'popular' boy speaking.


NERD VOICE OVER:
'I've guess you've seen the typical High School Nerd at some point in your life, you know, the one that doesn't get out much? [camera is following 'popular' boy]
Well, I'm your typical guy. I like to party, play football, look at pretty girls [camera cuts to the 'pretty' girls walking down corridor] and ...hang out with the fellas [camera switches to 'popular' boy's friends]. Of course, School isn't my type of fun. The teachers are complete asses who attempt to 'fit in' with their students by using slang and talking about drugs or alcohol. My Mum and Dad don't really care for what I do; I don't have a curfew and they don't mind how much I drink or smoke., which is pretty cool in my opinion..'


CUE CAR BRAKING SOUND


NERD VOICE OVER [continuing]:
(Sighs)
'...Yeah, that's me. The typical High School Nerd who doesn't get out much. I like to party... online, play football... video games, look at girls on porn sites and hang out with the fellas on xbox live. This is my life.'

Planning: Synopsis

The cast and crew names will be introduced throughout the opening sequence, they will appear as magnetic names inside lockers that various people will open to reveal to the camera. There will be non-diegetic music playing in the start. The camera follows a seemingly popular and good looking teenage boy throughout a High School corridor, there will also be a voice over giving exposition. The camera will see him casually high fiving his friends and wolf whistling at pretty girls by some lockers. The audience will be made to think that this is the character that the voice over is introducing, however, the popular boy that was introduced in the first few seconds bumps into a nerd which is when a non-diegetic car braking sound plays. When the popular boy and nerd bump into each other the nerd drops all of his books which is when the popular boy makes a remark aimed at him - "loser", this is when the music stops and everyone in the corridor starts laughing at him, the voice over now reveals that the nerd is the main character. When the main character walks into the classroom next to him, the title for the film is written on the whiteboard.

Genre Research Summary

In this blog, I will summarise all I have found out about genre from the researching my group and I have conducted.



 For our genre - a typical Teenage Romantic Comedy, it is often to see the opening titles in a very arty and three dimensional way. The titles ranging from 'Juno' to '10 Things I Hate About You' all had titles that were very similar to that of a teenagers drawing in a note pad or doodle book. This gave our group a lot of ideas for how we could present our titles in our opening sequence in a creative way. The titles were usually very large and colourful and also introduced at about the same time as the main character in the film. The titles also seemed to relate to their characters or the film - for teenage films the titles came on quickly and seemed to jerk around rather being still and neat compared to a serious romance genre.


The music used in openings to our genre, or very similar, usually have a deeper meaning to them and link in to the story line of the film itself or gives underlying information about the character. The songs are often well known and quite pop mainstream, the title songs are usually non-diegetic although in some openings they are used to be diegetic by the main character driving a car or listening to an iPod. Other types of diegetic sounds that are common to be found in teenage rom-coms are groups of people talking so it seems like a crowd very faint in the background - this is often used to represent they are at a High School full of people which emphasises that at times, the audience are the only people relating to characters.
Music that can be used as a background noise can be songs like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MrqkiHWCnM&feature=fvst or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QXOymwtQKU, for example.

The characters that are most likely to appear in our genre was very easy to decipher. Through my research of the two film openings it is common to come across someone who is an out cast from everybody else in the school, and generally is not liking High School and wants a big change to happen. The main characters are usually stereotypical 'Nerds' who don't appear to have many friends or a social life. Binary Opposition is usually used in teenage rom-coms as it shows the diversity between the 'Nerds' and the 'Popular people' who the nerds want to be. The main characters in the beginning always wear bland and unflattering clothes that don't make them stand out. For female lead characters they are often filmed without make up and their hair tied back, and for male lead characters they are seen with typical 'geek' glasses and an out of dated hair cut. In the openings to films, the camera always seems to film the characters from a long shot or a medium close up - representing that we don't know the character very well because the character themselves don't either. The angle is usually low, as the character is supposed to appear to be belittled by everybody else.


In a typical High School rom-com, it is very typical to see all the lockers throughout the corridor; showing exposition as to where they are for the setting - which is generally within a High School or College. The lighting is usually bright to show how big the High School is and how daunting it is the main character of the film sees it. Also, there are usually big 'sports' fans in the background of most shots and pretty girls applying make up. This could be to connote how much the main character stands out from everybody else at the school. It is also typical to see the classrooms and school books that the main character is carrying, again to see how they only focus on school work instead of concentrating on socialising. 


The narratives that are mainly used are the Enigma codes to show the difference from when everything is 'normal' and how it concludes after a lot of drama and action. The music generally is the media language that represents this, as at first the music is similar to who the character is as a person to begin with. So if the character is from Africa, the music at first would sound like it came from that culture. This is to show that everything is okay - stage 1. When stage 2 occurs, the music usually changes to fit in with the drama. So if a love interest comes into the screen, a love song will play so the music will be non-diegetic and quite slow. It is also often to see Binary Opposition between the main characters and the dominant people in the school. So if the main character is a 'Nerd', you will see 'Popular' people breaking in and out of the screen to connote that they hold the power, so cinematography generally helps this by making the main character appear small in comparison.


Cinematography is usually used to make the main character appear to be smaller compared to everybody else by the camera always looking down onto the main character to show they're isolated. Editing is also used to slow everything that the character does. Such as if they are walking past a crush - they slow down to show that how they are seeing them affects the main character. The camera also gets closer to the character as they appear to go through some drama or action, but then again starts to pull away as they make the wrong decisions. We also have a lot of point of view shots from the main character, so the audience tend to relate to the main character and favour them over everybody else within the film. There are also lots of close ups of the main character to identify the leading character in the movie, especially within openings.

Audience Research - Focus Group Meeting Analysis

After getting responses to our questions asked on our Focus Group page, we copied the comments and the questions.


From our research we found interesting things relating to the topics that teenagers between 16-19 years of age enjoy in a film. The most popular type of genre came out as 'Comedy', so our group was quite happy as the genre we want to make the opening sequence will be a Romantic Comedy. Also, because a few members of our focus group also said they like Rom-Coms too, also gave us many ideas as what we need to include within our opening such as the type of characters they expect to see. 


An interesting point that Sophie Wheeler made is that in a rom-com she expects to see two characters who hate each other, and further down the line end up falling in love. Our group took advantage on the point Sophie had made, so we decided to think of ways that we could make that happen within in introduction without giving away too much of the film that would be to follow.  Also, when she spoke about 'romance' as a genre, she noted that she expected to see something realistic as she enjoys the fact that it could happen to her.


We also took ideas from the comments Rosie-May Williams made about the genre of Comedy. Whereby she likes to see a sense of stupid but still slightly sophisticated humour. This gave our group ideas to make the sense of humour used within the 2 minute introduction a little drier but remaining at the same level of sophistication, instead of being a typical joke after joke comedy.


Within our focus group we had people who came from different backgrounds and different places from the UK. Surprisingly, all the genres that were chosen were about the same and the comments made about them were very similar too. But it is clear to see that people who watch 'Scary Movie' may enjoy a more stupid sense of humour in films rather than a more intelligent comedy for people who enjoy watching films like 'Love Actually'. This slightly altered the way our group thought after a deeper discussion, and we were thinking about the way we could present our humour within our opening.


Overall, we found our focus group to be helpful to us to see what we need to include in a romance and a comedy, and find a common ground between them both to appeal to our audience but also make our film genre work in the 2 minutes that we have.

Our Focus Group Research

As a result of our Focus Group we decided to slightly alter our ideas for the opening of our film:
1. We would change the main character and the love interest to be enemies and completely unaware of each other or their deeper feelings, instead of introducing them as being acquaintances.
2. We would make the 'future romance' seem realistic.
3. We would use comedy that was closer to sarcasm and 'teenage' wit instead of having a joke after a joke within the opening.

Audience Research Focus Group

By using Facebook, our group set up a focus group to find out what people in our target audience range like, in the ways of genre and what they expect to see in it; types of character and storyline. We conducted several questions to ask the people in our focus group to give us more information and help us to round-up our research. 

The people in our focus group are:

Rosie-May Williams 16 years old

Sophie Wheeler 16 years old

Dale Harris 16 years old

Tyler-Rose Neath 17 years old

These are the questions that we chose to ask them:

1. What are your favourite genres of film? 

2. What would you expect to happen in films of that genre? 

3. What do you like about this genre? 

4. What type of characters do you expect to see within this genre?

From those questions we hoped to find out what appeals to 16-19 year olds, to allow us to know what to include when we came to creating our 2 minute opening sequence to a film genre of our choice.

Target Audience

Target Audience on Prezi

The target audience that our group is aiming at, are teenagers who are in college or have left in recent years; the exact age range being 16 to 19 year olds. We don't aim to please just one specific gender, as both males and females would be able to enjoy and relate to the film.
The audience for our film will be of the social grades BC1C2 on the JICNAR scale, as the humour involved would be entertaining for middle minded people yet parts of sophistication would be used that would also appeal to a more intelligent audience. Typically, our audience would be mainstream hedonists who set out to have a good time, on a first basis they will appear to be conformist who blend into the crowd, but once getting to know them you will discover how different they are and sometimes how individual they can be at times too.

Our audience will usually be confident about their actions and who they are as a person, they also like to enjoy everyday life as it comes. They enjoy going to the cinema, parties, going out for group meals but also find sitting in with a few good friends and indulging in a MacDonalds and chocolate just as much fun. They take pride in their appearance and tend to follow the latest trends whilst attempting to add their unique style to it at the same time. Most of the music they listen to is pop and their favourite artists would be Professor Green, Skepta, Nicki Minaj and Rihanna, mainstream music with a different take. Being mainstreamers, they tend to idolize very famous people; such as Cheryl Cole, Katy Perry and JLS. They will tend to shop in places like River Island, Republic, Topman and Primark, where they pick out glamorous outfits to wear for day and night occasions. The audience will also crave being in a relationship and tend to be in long relationships, making them enjoy watch romantic films.They enjoy films like the comical classic 'The Hangover' and all time favourites like the 'Harry Potter' sequels. Although their favourite type of film are 'rom-coms'. Their favourite rom-coms include '10 Things I Hate About you', 'Love Actually', 'Never Been Kissed', 'Adventureland' and 'Mean Girls'. They own many of these DVDs at home where they got from HMV, as they like to watch them after a soak in the bath or at a girly sleepover with their best friends. Although if a more Universal rom-com is on the screens they enjoy nothing more than a trip to the cinema with their boyfriend/girlfriend for the perfect date. Their favourite actors and actresses include Katherine Heigl, Jennifer Aniston and Hugh Grant. Also, if they have the time, they like to attend movie premieres for the latest romantic comedy.

Film Openings - Genre Specific Analysis

For this part of our research, we had to take on the responsibility of choosing two film openings that are relevant to our chosen genre to analyse, so that we can identify the key elements that made the introduction effective. 

 I chose to look at two films that had strong links to the first ideas that our group had, because we are basing our film around a High School rom-com, the first film I chose to analyse was the teen movie, 'Mean Girls'. 

Mean Girls is a stereotypical 'High School' rom-com that came to our screens in 2007. This is established by many key elements that make a film and genre work. It is easy to decipher that the film is aimed at teenagers because the setting is at a High School. Also, the introductory seconds into the sequence, the parents of Cady hold the most screen time, making Cady seem like a child. The elements that create a comedy are the references Cady makes to people who have been home schooled by showing two polar opposites that she labelled 'freaks' that she included herself in.

A most important element that I analysed was the title of 'Mean Girls' itself. It obviously reveals a lot about what the film is going to be like and what it is going to be about. Also, it reveals who the main target audience could be. Because of the first word being 'mean', reveals that possibly the film will be about girls who are not very nice, or because Cady is the main character maybe you will see her change from an innocent new girl into a meaner and more sinister character.

The art of the title also unveils much about the film itself. The boldness of the word 'Mean' draws our eyes immediately to it, making it stand out and appear bigger. The world 'girls' appears to be quite feminine and also a considerably amount smaller than the word 'Mean'. This connotes that being 'Mean' makes you stand out, tougher and a lot bigger than just 'girls', creating a binary opposition between 'mean' and 'girls'. 


Like all teenage rom-com's the main character is usually someone who is average looking, quite unpopular and a bit of an outcast from the rest of their school. In this film, the main character Cady is outcasted as she is from Africa and also had been home schooled up until that point, her costume which is a bland shirt which is baggy and unflattering also makes her stand out from the vain and beautiful people at the High School. This seems a familiar theme amongst teenage rom-com's. Also, within every teenage rom-com there are the dominant characters who are introduced to remind the main characters that they are lonely and don't fit in. However, in contrast the main character always ends up befriending similar people also seen as 'freaks' or 'outcasts'. Cady strikes up a brief conversation with two people in the opening sequence, and as they are introduced together and after the main character, it could be that they are going to be positioned to become close with her.

I identified brief relevance for the narrative theory of 'Levi Strauss' theory of Binary Opposition' during the opening sequence to Mean Girls, Cady is saying goodbye to her parents before entering the High School, at this point the three characters (including Cady) that we are introduced to are in a positive mood and feeling excited. However, when Cady enters the school and begins her first day pushes her into a small crisis where she realises that High School isn't how she expected it to be, as she feels shut out and alone this gives the binary opposition between the typical High School teenagers and people who aren't used to the culture. This is shown by the high angle over the shoulder shot to Cady after being shooed by the girl - this shows she is feeling belittled by the situation and also how she sits in the toilet cubicle to eat lunch, and although without connotation it is easy to see that she is isolated, because she is in a small space it seems as if that is how small she feels in comparison to the rest of the school. 

The cinematography that is used in the opening sequence creates a humorous atmosphere. A low angle, medium close up shot of the two parents makes it seem as if they are talking to a young child. Also because we are the ones looking up at the parents whilst they are 'instructing' us makes the audience feel childish and patronized. This is also enforced by the use of the brown 'lunch' bag that the male 'father' figure is holding, which is most likely something a parent would give to a younger child on their first day of primary school instead of a 16 year old. This makes the introduction quite comical because it is ironic that the parents are patronizing their 16 year old daughter for her first day of High School, but still acting as if she is going to a first school. This also sets up the scene that it is a teen movie, further more encourages the comedy side to the genre of the film as the humour used is sophisticated yet all of the audience can relate it back to their first day of High School.

In this teenage rom-com, there is a voice over from the main character. Perhaps this is because, as someone who has always been typecast as a loner, she feels the need to introduce herself as she is a 'nobody' compared to 'the popular people' who have someone else introduce them to the film. Cady's voice over gives exposition to where we are in place and time, and also gives background to the past as well. This tells the audience what they need to know, in this case to make relevance to the genre, it is vital that we know Cady has just moved to a completely new country and hasn't lived a typical teen life up until now, and because of the tone she uses in her voice and also by the quote "I had a great life, but then my Mom got offered a 10 year at North Western University. So it was Goodbye Africa and Hello High School" shows how she has negative feelings towards going to a High School, like the majority of leading characters in teenage rom-coms. The non-diegetic music used in the opening scene also plays a key part to making the genre work. The song that plays in the introductory seconds is a song that sounds like it is from an African culture as there is the use of more natural sounds, this song is played up until Cady crosses the road to get to the High School, where it abruptly stops. This connotes that High School is nothing like she is used to and indicates where the drama is about to begin in the film.

Another opening to a film that I choose to analyse is '10 Things I Hate About You'.

10 Things I Hate About You is a classical teenager High School romantic comedy. I chose to analyse this film as the opening scene jumps straight into the action and uncovers many stereotypes even within the first few seconds. An Establishing shot of the City reveals to the audience the season of the film as the weather is hot so it tells the audience that it is around spring - summer time. The romantic side to the genre is half way through the opening sequence where a poster advertising 'Prom' is seen, which is a huge convention in every country. The Prom poster is used as exposition in this film as it connotes that they are all coming to the end of the school year. However, a girl who was earlier introduced driving a car rips down the poster - connoting that she doesn't believe in dancing or fairytale romances for whatever reason, perhaps something to do with her earlier in the year antics. Because prom is a tradition which most girls want, says a lot about the character of Kat because she is refusing to conform to tradition, because Kat rips down the poster, it might suggest that Kat is likely to have a transformation within herself and therefore find love when she's not interested in it, rather than standing against convention because of the ironic sense that prom is supposed to be a teenagers girls favourite part of high school, compared with Kat who seems to despise it. Although, through further analysis, the disruption could be questioned, because of it's big studio and big stars cast, the audience may already suspect how the narrative of the film will resolve itself in many ways.

One of the main characters is introduced quickly in the credit sequence, and although not shown first  it is clear to see that she is a key character. 'Kat' breaks into the scene in her 'out of fashion' car and playing her loud and indie/rock music, creating 'Levi Strauss' theory of Binary Opposition' between the girls in the clean and new convertible made up with make up and expensive clothes compared to Kat listening to her diegetic loud music with her run down car, tomboyish clothing and fresh face. Because all of the other girls are staring at Kat also shows the audience that Kat doesn't fit in because she is too different to them.
Similar to the main character in Mean Girls, who also didn't wear figure flattering clothing makes Kat the 'out cast' character in the film. Which enforces the theme that the main character in teenage rom-coms are always scene as being out of place, but the audience are in the position to favour the out cast people. Following on from themes that are used within rom-coms, in the opening sequence as well as being introduced to the main characters, the credit sequence also allows the audience to see other stereotypes that are common in teenage films - such as the 'pretty' and 'popular' people.

The way lighting and sound represents Kat shows her to be a character who doesn't care about the world or about fitting in, and likes to think of herself as a 'individualist' who doesn't need to conform. The lighting that is used within the beginning enforces this, the lighting seems to create a shadow and darker sense around Kat, like the scene where she's driving the car. The girls in the other car appear to be bright and colourful as the light is shining upon them compared to Kat whom is sat in the shadows, which creates a binary opposition between both of the groups.

 The way sounds is used in the opening minute tells us a lot about Kat as a character. The girls in the convertible are listening to a diegetic upbeat and mainstream song playing on their radio, the same song that is played whilst the studios and directors are being introduced. When Kat comes into the scene, her diegetic and loud individualist music overpowers the group of girls. The song choice itself also reveals a lot about Kat and the person she is, the first lyrics "I don't give a damn 'bout my bad reputation" connote that this is how Kat is, revealing that she has a rebellish side to her.

Unlike Mean Girls, the art of the titles in this opening sequence also reveals a lot about the genre of the film. The titles are much like a teenage scribble used in a note pad or a doodle book. This says alot about the genre because it is connoting that it is a teen movie aimed at teenagers. It is clear that key elements in the opening sequence establishes 10 Things I Hate About You to be a typical High School rom-com. A final point that joins in the comedy part to the film, is the 'Teacher' Ms. Perky who hates her job and is far more interested in writing. This brings the ironic factor to the film as she is the teacher who hates the children.


From the analysis of the two teenage High School rom-coms, there are obvious themes amongst both than will be vital to making our genre effective when we are planning and filming the opening sequence. A lot of links to make the introduction work became clear and has influenced many ideas that our group is starting to have.