Synopsis
When filming we will need the following things and to visit these places:
A place for memories to be filmed: Southend, beach, amusement arcades, rides.
A train station.
A train.
A scrapbook.
A bag.
The characters in our films opening: We have three main characters which are Daisy played by Libby, Elyza played by Katie. Daisy is the girl that is suffering from amnesia and Elyza is her friend. During the film opening we go through Daisy's memories with her friend Elyza.
Location: Our film opening will be located in Southend using the attractions available, we are using the beach, amusement arcades and the theme park. We are also going to be located at chelmsford train station and on a train.
Costumes: The two characters will be wearing normal everyday clothing as we are showing memories of special day to day things so we feel we don't need anything special or unique to be worn.
Audience: We have decided that our audience will be from the ages of 12-18 however it can be viewed by anyone if they wish to watch it. The certificate is a 12A.
A place for memories to be filmed: Southend, beach, amusement arcades, rides.
A train station.
A train.
A scrapbook.
A bag.
The characters in our films opening: We have three main characters which are Daisy played by Libby, Elyza played by Katie. Daisy is the girl that is suffering from amnesia and Elyza is her friend. During the film opening we go through Daisy's memories with her friend Elyza.
Location: Our film opening will be located in Southend using the attractions available, we are using the beach, amusement arcades and the theme park. We are also going to be located at chelmsford train station and on a train.
Costumes: The two characters will be wearing normal everyday clothing as we are showing memories of special day to day things so we feel we don't need anything special or unique to be worn.
Audience: We have decided that our audience will be from the ages of 12-18 however it can be viewed by anyone if they wish to watch it. The certificate is a 12A.
Music Changes
After trying out our music options with the filming we had done we decided that a more fast paced, as the music we had reflected a film that was more sad than dramatic so we thought a tense piece of music would work better in building tension and suspense to start the film off. We did some research into some more music and found the following;
I suggested this piece of music as it has a heavy beat behind it which automatically builds suspense which is what we wanted to create through the music. However we can't use this music as it too well known.
Our next song choice is an instrumental version of John Legends song Made to love. Similar to our first option is has a heavy beat that builds suspense. There is also a change in the music which suits our film opening as we want a different kind of music when the memories of Daisy begin to play.
Our final choice is a song that none of us had heard before, I found it whilst searching for some songs using youtube. I came across it and immediately thought it would suit our film.
Photos
This slideshow shows the photos that make up my blog and the journey from planning to filming. I have also included pictures from task I completed before beginning planning our film opening.
Titles
In our film opening we currently have 9 titles. in the following order:
-Libby Collins
-Runner productions
-Frankie Edwards
-Katie Harragan
-Amnesia (film title)
-Directed by Simon Hull
-Executive Producer Andrew Lavin
-Sound Effects by Debbie Ellis
From our feedback we found that we need to added 4 more titles:
-Music by Philip Round
-Casting by Jacob Odd
-Production designer Melanie Smith
-Costume designer Leanna Clark
-Libby Collins
-Runner productions
-Frankie Edwards
-Katie Harragan
-Amnesia (film title)
-Directed by Simon Hull
-Executive Producer Andrew Lavin
-Sound Effects by Debbie Ellis
From our feedback we found that we need to added 4 more titles:
-Music by Philip Round
-Casting by Jacob Odd
-Production designer Melanie Smith
-Costume designer Leanna Clark
More feedback
We edited our final opening scene using the feedback we recieved fromoir draft. We then asked our teacher to watch it, she gave us the following things to change before giving in our final cut-
We need to look at pur titles research and pit the titles in the right order
They need to be 2-3 seconds each
Part of the coice over doesnt make sense so we will delete the part saying she want to 'achieving my memories'
More photographic effects- freeze frames before they play
Sort music out- they change to quickly so it doesnt make sense
Bowling alley and ice hockey shots are too long so we need to delete a few seconds off each
Script Changes
During receiving our feedback we had a lot of people said the script wasn't long enough so the story line was unclear. They also suggested that it came further back in the film and we rerecorded it to make the voice slower and more meaningful.
From this feed back we made the following changes to the script.
Originally the voice over said-
'The doctor said brain activity should be maintained, he said looking at old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help.
It is now-
'I'm on my way back from the neurology unit at the specialist hospital in London. There was only a single thought running through my head that afternoon. The doctors that brain activity should be maintained. He said that looking through old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help. This was my first therapy to help with the retrieval of my memory and i was determined to make it work'
Originally the voice over said-
'The doctor said brain activity should be maintained, he said looking at old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help.
It is now-
'I'm on my way back from the neurology unit at the specialist hospital in London. There was only a single thought running through my head that afternoon. The doctors that brain activity should be maintained. He said that looking through old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help. This was my first therapy to help with the retrieval of my memory and i was determined to make it work'
Things that went well
From our first draft we were able to see things that went well as well as things that didn't, from our feedback and personal opinion we found that these things went well:
- The footage is southend fits well with our genre and looks good.
-The idea of the film is original and creative
- The footage is southend fits well with our genre and looks good.
-The idea of the film is original and creative
- Putting some of the effects to go with the music was good
- People thought the final shot in front of the sunset was good.
-The parts that fit with the beat of the music work well.
-We included various camera shots.
-People likes the production logo
-The titles that are pushed by the train look good.
-We had many comments saying the editing was good.
-Most of our shots were steady.
-The parts that fit with the beat of the music work well.
-We included various camera shots.
-People likes the production logo
-The titles that are pushed by the train look good.
-We had many comments saying the editing was good.
-Most of our shots were steady.
Storyboard
This shows our storyboard, it includes locations, angles and the titles that will appear in each shot.
Feedback
Various classes watch our film opening and gave us constructive criticism and advice on what would make our film better and more successful. We received the following feedback:
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This person gave us what we considered quite harsh criticism.
This person gave us some criticism as they didn't think the genre was obvious and they thought we should use dialogue to help make it obvious.
This was one of the best marks our of 60 that we received. Their only criticism was that the voice over should be further back in the film.
This person gave us an average mark out of 60 and gave some good advice on how we could make the genre more evident.
Overall we received both good and bad feedback and on average we received around 37-47 out of 60 for our first draft. We are pleased with this mark as we know it will improve with our final cut. The main things that were brought to our attention that we need to change are:
-There are to many black outs
-Some of the shots are shaky
-The audience are unsure of the genre in some places
-The audience weren't sure if the black and white parts were in past or not.
-The voice over is good but should come further back in the film.
-Needs more dialogue to make the story line more clear.
Marketing Campaign
This prezi shows how and where we will market our film using inspiration from a film similar to ours.
First Draft
This is our first draft for our film opening. For our final draft there are various things we need to add and improve on:
-We need to film some more footage of the scrapbook and add it in where there are black spaces.
-The music needs cutting at the end and at one point it jumps so we need to change that.
-Some of the footage is wobbly so we will need to re film and add that in.
-One title is missing from this draft which needs to be in the final draft
-We need to move the voice over further back in the film opening as it comes to early on.
-The footage looking over libbys shoulder into the scrapbook jumps so we need to change or re-film that footage.
I am pleased with our first draft but it does need losts of improvements before we hand in our final draft. Overall I think we did well with the time we had to plan, film and edit.
Draft Feedback
After watching out film opening draft for the first time, our teacher re-watched it and gave us some feedback on what was good and what we needed to improve on.
First of all she said what was good about our film:
-The first shot of the lift was good.
-The titles that are pushed by the train look
She then gave us feedback on what we needed to improve on for our final draft;
-The voice over came to early on the film, if people were just sitting down to watch the film they might miss it. It should come slightly later and should be slower and more serious, we will rerecord this.
-The shot of her walking along the platform at the train station is too wobbly, we need to re-film this or find a way to make the image still.
-The flashing to black is good as it builds tension but it happens to much so it begins to get annoying.
-The shot of Libby sitting look out the window holding her scrapbook is a nice shot so it should be longer.
-To fill more time we need to include 2 or 3 still shots of the scrapbook as it is so significant in the film.
-The sound effects title needs to be moved as it may be cut off once we export it.
-The effect on the tea cups looks to dark compared to the rest. We will change the saturation to make it lighter.
-The last title needs to come earlier as only trailers finish with the film title.
-The film is too short so we need to film some ore footage to make it to the required 2 minutes.
Using Premier
I have previously used premier but only the basic features. Within our film we wanted to include some interesting effects and images, for this we had to apply our own knowledge and find out how to use these effects and if they would work.
One effect we wanted was sections where there was just a black screen, and then flash back to the footage, like a shutter effect. To find out how to do this we used youtube.
We also decided that the memories should be in black and white. I found out how to do this on my own by playing around with some different effects.
We also wanted some of the effects to be slower as it seemed quite rushed, again I found out how to do this on my own. I knew how to change the speed of videos so I used the same strategy with the effects.
Some of our shots were too wide so we had parts that needed to be cropped. We used this video to find our how to do this.
From our feedback we were told that it would help with the understanding of the film if we had parts that were frozen and reflect the pictures in the scrapbook. This video helped us with how to do this.
One effect we wanted was sections where there was just a black screen, and then flash back to the footage, like a shutter effect. To find out how to do this we used youtube.
We also decided that the memories should be in black and white. I found out how to do this on my own by playing around with some different effects.
We also wanted some of the effects to be slower as it seemed quite rushed, again I found out how to do this on my own. I knew how to change the speed of videos so I used the same strategy with the effects.
Some of our shots were too wide so we had parts that needed to be cropped. We used this video to find our how to do this.
From our feedback we were told that it would help with the understanding of the film if we had parts that were frozen and reflect the pictures in the scrapbook. This video helped us with how to do this.
Titles font
This is the final font we choose for out titles during editing. We think it is quite simple but not so simple that it is boring, we didn't want the titles to be too distracting.
Reflection
Throughout planning our film opening we have had to make changes to suit the amount of time we had, how things would look on camera and the facilities we have.
-The first change was to the script. We originally planned to have a doctor giving the character (Daisy) her diagnosis however we found this would come to early on within the film. It also meant that the audience would have no idea as to why Daisy was travelling on the train looking at a scrapbook of her old memories. So we decided to change it to having Libby record a voice over Daisy explaining the treatment subscribed by her Doctor.
-We also had to change the amount of flashbacks to memories we would have due to timing issues. We originally planned to to have two or three pictures with each one having a pictures in the scrapbook we would zoom into before the memory played. However we found once we began editing we had more time to fill so we added in some more memories. This wasn't a problem as we shot as much footage as we could on the day we traveled to Southend so we didn't had to spend another day filming unless necessary. We now have just one picture in the scrapbook which triggers the other memories being played.
- When filming our title sequences we found that filming them letter by letter wouldn't work, the rest of the page looked to boring and blank. So we decided we would create some interesting titles using premier pro when we begun editing.
-The first change was to the script. We originally planned to have a doctor giving the character (Daisy) her diagnosis however we found this would come to early on within the film. It also meant that the audience would have no idea as to why Daisy was travelling on the train looking at a scrapbook of her old memories. So we decided to change it to having Libby record a voice over Daisy explaining the treatment subscribed by her Doctor.
-We also had to change the amount of flashbacks to memories we would have due to timing issues. We originally planned to to have two or three pictures with each one having a pictures in the scrapbook we would zoom into before the memory played. However we found once we began editing we had more time to fill so we added in some more memories. This wasn't a problem as we shot as much footage as we could on the day we traveled to Southend so we didn't had to spend another day filming unless necessary. We now have just one picture in the scrapbook which triggers the other memories being played.
- When filming our title sequences we found that filming them letter by letter wouldn't work, the rest of the page looked to boring and blank. So we decided we would create some interesting titles using premier pro when we begun editing.
Filming
Today we went to Southend to film our footage for our film opening, overall it went well and we got everything we needed and wanted to.
We began at Chelmsford train station where we filmed some footage including Libby walking through the barriers, getting on the train and the train pulling into the the station. Luckily we didn't have to wait for a train to long as we looked into train times before we left to ensure we didn't waste any time.
We got on a train to Shenfeild, we had to go here to change to the train that went straight to Southend. Between Chelmsford and Southend we filmed Libby walking down the train to find a seat. We also filmed her looking at the scrapbook and looking out the window.
When we got to Shenfeild we filmed Libby walking down a corridor and up the stairs which took her to the platform. We had some time before our train came so we decided it would be a good idea to re-film Libby walking onto the train to ensure we got a good, still shot. Luckily a train was already pulled into the station and wasn't leaving for a few minutes so we were able to film it a number of times and get the best possible shot.
We got a train from Shenfeild to Southend which didn't take to long. On the way we continued to film some footage on Libby on the train looking through her scrapbook and out the window. We moved down the train to find a carriage with less people in so we didn't disturb anyone with our filming and we didn't have anyone else in our shots as we want Libby to look as alone as possible.
When we got to Southend we walked down to the sea front as the majority of our footage would be shot there. We first shot the lift footage as it took us down the sea front, when we got down to the sea front we noticed that no one was in Adventure Island Theme Park, we immediately went to asks someone if it was open or not and unfortunately they told us it wasn't. We were hoping to film some of our footage within the theme park so we had to quickly think of other places to film. We had checked the website for Adventure Island before we came and nothing stated it wouldn't be open.
We didn't want to waste any time so we continued with our filming while we thought of some more ideas to replace the footage we would of filmed.
We first went to an arcade to shot some shots of Libby and Katie playing on various machines. There was a miniature bowling alley in the arcade so we thought it would a good idea to film some footage of Libby bowling.
Once we had shot all the footage we wanted in the arcade, we went out to the beach were I filmed Libby and Katie walking along the small pier, i also filmed a panning shot of the sea. We did this just at the right time as the sun was setting and it a nice effect to the shot. We liked the sunset so much we shot it with Libby standing just to the left of the sunset.
Finally we went back to the lift we first used and re-filmed it and also shot some footage of us standing infant of the sunset.
Overall i think we planned the day almost perfectly. we checked the weather to make sure it was suitable for outside filming, we took all the equipment we required with us, we had enough time to film all the footage and some extra incase we needed it.
We began at Chelmsford train station where we filmed some footage including Libby walking through the barriers, getting on the train and the train pulling into the the station. Luckily we didn't have to wait for a train to long as we looked into train times before we left to ensure we didn't waste any time.
We got on a train to Shenfeild, we had to go here to change to the train that went straight to Southend. Between Chelmsford and Southend we filmed Libby walking down the train to find a seat. We also filmed her looking at the scrapbook and looking out the window.
When we got to Shenfeild we filmed Libby walking down a corridor and up the stairs which took her to the platform. We had some time before our train came so we decided it would be a good idea to re-film Libby walking onto the train to ensure we got a good, still shot. Luckily a train was already pulled into the station and wasn't leaving for a few minutes so we were able to film it a number of times and get the best possible shot.
We got a train from Shenfeild to Southend which didn't take to long. On the way we continued to film some footage on Libby on the train looking through her scrapbook and out the window. We moved down the train to find a carriage with less people in so we didn't disturb anyone with our filming and we didn't have anyone else in our shots as we want Libby to look as alone as possible.
When we got to Southend we walked down to the sea front as the majority of our footage would be shot there. We first shot the lift footage as it took us down the sea front, when we got down to the sea front we noticed that no one was in Adventure Island Theme Park, we immediately went to asks someone if it was open or not and unfortunately they told us it wasn't. We were hoping to film some of our footage within the theme park so we had to quickly think of other places to film. We had checked the website for Adventure Island before we came and nothing stated it wouldn't be open.
We didn't want to waste any time so we continued with our filming while we thought of some more ideas to replace the footage we would of filmed.
We first went to an arcade to shot some shots of Libby and Katie playing on various machines. There was a miniature bowling alley in the arcade so we thought it would a good idea to film some footage of Libby bowling.
Once we had shot all the footage we wanted in the arcade, we went out to the beach were I filmed Libby and Katie walking along the small pier, i also filmed a panning shot of the sea. We did this just at the right time as the sun was setting and it a nice effect to the shot. We liked the sunset so much we shot it with Libby standing just to the left of the sunset.
Finally we went back to the lift we first used and re-filmed it and also shot some footage of us standing infant of the sunset.
Overall i think we planned the day almost perfectly. we checked the weather to make sure it was suitable for outside filming, we took all the equipment we required with us, we had enough time to film all the footage and some extra incase we needed it.
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