Research & Planning: Film Magazine Name Ideas

These are the ideas I came up with to name my film magazine.

Production: Premiere Pro editing: Classroom

For this scene we wanted to show the whole class laughing, smiling and talking but the pan shot we original took was very long and slow, so to speed up the scene I double clicked on the segment in the timeline at the bottom and selected Speed/Duration, I then changed the duration from 25 seconds to 5 seconds. This however distorted the sound of everyone talking, but by double clicking the scene in the timeline it appears in the left hand frame and I chose Audio effects and changed the pitch, to get them all back to normal.

Production: History Classroom Original Takes

Research & Planning: History Classroom Props and Costume

HISTORY TEXT BOOK

Another subject that really isn't the top of our characters priorities, showing no interest in the subject.

 

PAPER AIRPLANES

Used as a distraction from all the stress. Other people making and using them, representing their lives as being carefree and chilled, contrasting with our character.

DISPLAY BOARDS

Nothing of interest

EMPTY NOTEBOOK

No interest, nothing of value and interest.

Costume:

In this scene our character is wearing a grey dark hoodie. The hoodie makes his complexion look a lot lighter, which in turn shows his tiredness. The fact that he has his hood up shows that he has no interest with what is going on around him, and wants to be left alone.

Research & Planning: History Classroom Props and Costume (Other Characters)

Above (Anne Marie left, Reece back left, Faisal back right, Hannah front right)

Anne marie shows the alternative fashion, the geeky, nerdy style by wearing mainly black and white, wearing beanies and having dyed red hair. She also has an iPod on the table with an earphone in to show she slightly cares about her work but really would prefer to talk.

Reece is a typical guy likes football, and playing games on his iPhone, he is wearing a graphic t-shirt easily found in high street stores. He is also holding a paper airplane to show he has other things he would rather be doing than work.

Faisal: He has messy hair and wears simple clothing including joggers to show a different working class background, he also shows diversity throughout the college by being of a different ethnic background.

Hannah: Another showing the alternative fashion, and sporting the ombre hair trend and pairing that with a patterned headband. Her mix-matched fashion makes her stand out, again displaying diversity amongst the class room.

The girls at the front are smiling and laughing talking about the things they have in common taking no notice of our character in the back corner of the room.

(Liam, Bih, Kadie, Caitlin, Laura, Shafia and Natalie left-right)

Liam is portraying a typical boy at college, tightly curled hair and trimmed beard shows that he looks after himself and cares about his appearance.

Bih: Another ethnic background showing diversity, she also has an interesting style making her perfect to sit in between two quite normal looking students. Her leather jacket and bowler hat display her style and that she looks after herself.

Kadie: She is wearing a band merchandise t-shirt which tells us more about her personality and her likes and dislikes. Paired with the t-shirt are a pair of skinny jeans and vans shoes. Her indie style presents another group of teenagers to the classroom.

Laura: Portraying the typical girl wearing natural makeup and on trend clothes, she cares about her appearance, showing that she has more time on her hands than others.

Shafia: She displays another ethnic background, her glasses and big smile show her enthusiasm towards the class and her social life. She is the opposite of our main character performing a contrast between the two.

Caitlin and Natalie: Both wear simple clothing and considered quite "nerdy" compared to others, having their notepads actively open with pens ready, and Caitlin turning round to discuss the topic displays how much they want to learn and do well in college.  

Most students have note pads and textbooks out, but they are empty and nothing has been written I them. This presents how chilled they are and how laid back they can be towards work and college life. This again is to show a stark contrast between them and our character.

Research & Planning: Shot List History classroom scene

Research & Planning: Location Recce & Risk Assessment: History Classroom

Production: Library Original Takes

Research & Planning: Library Props & Costume

These are the props we will need for this particular scene:

Manuscript: These pieces are to show our characters ideas of possible audition pieces, and him trying to improve them, but getting frustrate very easily because of his short temper.

College work: Other work to show how much he needs to complete, but has no time or effort to do anything other than practice his music.

Broken Pencil: Initially a complete pencil but to take out our characters aggression he will snap it and throw across the table.

Ripped manuscript: Another way to show his aggression is ripping up some of his major work.

Student Card: Typical necessity of a college student.

Costume

Our character is typically working class since he has no support of his single parent, he is trying to do well for himself, which is why he is wearing Converse shoes. His outfit is simple, nothing extravagant, since he blends in to the rest of the college community.

Research & Planning: Shot List Library Scene

Research & Planning: Location Recce & Risk Assessment: Library

Research & Planning: Shooting Schedule: Trailer

 This schedule starts at the 30th November since we had issues with a previous main actor. 

We had to accomodate the schedule to later dates to suit with our new actor. 

The confirmed scenes on the list have been shot and edited.

The provisional scenes have yet to be filmed and we have given rough dates as to when they will be filmed. 

Research & Planning: Establishing shots: Filming

Research & Planning: The Chase Test & Analysis

Research & Planning: BBFC rating analysis

Social realism films vary across the board with BBFC ratings meaning depending on the content it could fall anywhere.

Our film trailer most likely fits into the 12A-15 rating. 

A 12 rated film would include no explicit language, but our film possibly could, so it would be more practical to rate it at a 12A to allow the working class voice and vocabulary to be expressed fully.

However social realist films can border into the 15 category by use of imagery and content for example drug use, sexual content, gore. 

Our trailer will not be including any of these options so again 12A would be the most appropriate rating. 

Research & Planning: Extra production company

Film 4

As a group we decided to choose a production company familiar to us that produces a wide range of films, so Film 4 seemed the obvious choice.
Film 4 have co-produced the film Submarine, from which we took a lot of inspiration from.

We will be using this clip of the Film 4 logo before our trailer in our introductory credits.

Research & Planning: Distribution Company

Pathe Distribution

I researched into film production and distribution companies, that could relate to our trailer.
Because our trailer is British our distributor should also be British. So I did some research into British Distributors and these are the ones I found:

Pathe Distribution
Related to Universal and 20th Century Fox which release films under Pathe Distributions.


Axiom Films
Known for the film 'Half Nelson' with Ryan Gosling. (Student with a drug habit)


Studio Canal
Formerly known as Optimum Releasing, Studio Canal operates in the UK, known for it'[s relationship with Anime and Studio Ghibli.


Soda Pictures
Anglo-Canadian film distributor, established in London in 2002. They combined with Thunderbird Films, and premiered this new establishment at Toronto Film Festival with their film the Riot Club.

Out of these 4 we all collectively decided to use Pathe Distributions, because of it's slight connections with Universal and 20th Century Fox. Along with their easy distribution to the UK they have connections with France since the company was originally founded there, which allows the film to be distributed across mainland Europe. Aswell as having a successful production and distribution sector, Pathe owns many cinema chains and Television networks across Europe.

This short clip will be used in our introductory credits and will be cut to about 12 seconds long:

Research & Planning: Production company logo Development

We decided to use the world play of a piano key and an actual key, and the word key meaning essential. 

We grabbed an image of a key, and inverted the colour since originally it was a black key on a white background.

We then made a white box and typed 'Key' inside, making the K bigger to fill up the empty space.

We then followed up key with 'PRODUCTIONS', and this filled the space along the top of the key.

To make sure everything was centered and equally distanced I used the rulers to calculate the middle and extra space. After this we used the guidelines to mimic the style of a clapperboard.

This is the finished logo. This will be used at the start of our trailer in the opening credits, alongside another producer and distributor. We are going to add a sound effect of a key unlocking a door over the top so the still becomes slightly more interesting.

Research & Planning: Production Company Logo Designs

These are a couple of sketches based around possibly names for our own production company. The names we thought of are listed at the top and the two we decided to play around with in terms of design are ticked. 

We ended up devloping my last idea for Key Productions, as it allows a play on words relating to a pinao key but also unlocking a story.

Research & Planning: Social Media Feedback: Intital Trailer Idea

As a group Aisha sent out a message to a group chat on Facebook to get some feedback on our initial trailer idea.

We got two responses from the chat:



Research & Planning: Voiceover Script

Our script aims at both types of student.
Dan is a intelligent character and his vocabulary is second to none, however his anger sometimes gets in the way and he can't control his language and emotions.

This is why in our script we have added strong language to show our characters darker side.

Key:

·       Red is only significant to the group.

·       Blue is significant to Rob’s stage direction (compliments voice over or dialogue) 

Voice over: Aim to bring more character into the voice over

Theatre entrance scene:

Greats like Mozart said, “The music is not in the notes but in the silence between.” Yeah I know, totally cliche but you just have to be brave enough to listen.

(LINKS TO THE NEXT SCENE BECAUSE IT SHOWS FAMILY STRUGGLE)

Park scene:

“I’ve always been seen as a burden to my mother. She would spend her days wasted out of her brains so naturally I wouldn’t stick around. This place right here is the only place that I can find myself.  This was our special place, mine and my father’s, before he passed away. I like to come here sometimes. It’s my sanctuary, my place of clarity. He wrote me this letter; this is all I have left off him.”

(CONTRAST FROM SCENE TO SCENE- A PLACE HE FEELS PROTECTED AND AT HOME TO A PLACE THAT HE IS ISOLATED AND RESTRICTED)

History Classroom scene:

“I wish these idiots would shut the fuck up (MAYBE SHOUT SHUT THE FUCK UP) I mean look at them, no care in the world. Some of us haven’t got time to spare for such nonsense. It takes time for genius to thrive, to be nurtured to (BELL RINGS- GOES TO NEXT SCENE. THOUGHT PROCESS STOPPED BY THE DAILY ROUTINE PROCESS. THE CLASSROOM SCENE LINKS TO OWN VIDEO OF PIANO PLAYING)

Music Classroom scene:
(SETS UP CAMERA) (MUTTER) “Oh it’s on, the names Dan. Dan the piano man.”

Oh it’s on… erm Hi…I’m Dan…wow how lame do I wanna sound (Mess with hair)

“I’m going to play you a little something… erm I call it lost for words.”

FADE

Notice board scene

“It started out with just one worry and then it built up and up and up…

Now I’m here, stuck in a spiralling vortex of my own self-pity and constant hostility. 

I’m never going to get out of this fucking mess.

I can’t concentrate. Here come the headaches, the sleepless nights, the complete lack of containment.”

(LINKS TO NEXT SCENE BECAUSE OF ANGER PRESENT)

Jayne classroom scene

“Oh I forgot to mention this is Jayne, my mentor and let’s just say she’s my only friend. Other than my piano.”

NO VOICE OVER PIANO SPEAKING

(THIS PIANO GOES QUIET AND DELICATE)

COMPLETE CONTRAST OF EMOTION

Alleyway scene:

“I’m useless *pause (kick)* pathetic *pause(kick)*unwanted… I don’t know why I bother, when everyone and everything is trying to kick me when I’m down… but I will prove them wrong no matter how long it takes.”

(LINKS TO SNIPPET SCENES BECAUSE IT SHOWS ROB TRYING TO COMPLETE WORK, TO PROVE PEOPLE WRONG) 

Fast/ snippet scenes: NO VOICE OVER FOCUS ON DIEGEGTIC SOUND

·       Library scene- The pencil snaps and the frustration carries onto the next scene

·       Barging shoulder scene- Where Rob walks with paper and then an extra actor barges into him. Rob stumbles, extra acts as if he is non-existent.

(AN EDIT CAN BE USED WHERE THE PAPER SCATTERED ON THE FLOOR GOES TO THE NEXT SCENE WHERE ROB IS SURROUNDED BY A CIRCLE OF PAPER.)

·       Circle of paper- Overwhelming situation

·       Rob hunched over, head in hands sobbing but mainly anger- Overwhelming situation

·       Canteen scene- links to interview where the laughing in the scene shows his insecurities about the interview.

BRIGHT WHITE CUT

FADE TO INTERVIEW

Interview scene:

“Life has an unpredictable turn of events. One moment can change everything. That glistening moment that justifies your whole existence. My moment is in the hands of this pretentious arsehole in front of me.”

DIALOGUE: ‘Hi it’s a pleasure to meet you’ (SHAKES HAND)

“Yeah, this is going to take a while to impress him.”

(INTERVIEW INTRODUCES MINI FLASHBACKS. THE INNER/ VOICE OVER SHOWS DAN TO BE ARROGANT WHEREAS ROB SHOWS DAN TO BE SHY BUT AGRESSIVE NATURED.)

Theatre:

Then goes back to the theatre. Leaves a sense of ambiguity of success or failure.

Research & Planning: Quotes for voice over

I collected a few quotes from famous pianists/composers. Our plan was to reference one of these quotes in our voiceover to show our characters immense passion for music.

Research & Planning: Initial Script and stage directions

This is our first script.

As well as including the voice over narration. This will need to be edited in case the scenes change.

Production: Initial Composition

This is our composition piece that will be played throughout the trailer.
This is just the basis to the trailer, some parts will be lengthened to co-operate with different parts of the trailer, to add suspense, or relief.

Production: Audition music

We have started to produce our main piece of music which will fade in and out of the trailer. 

As of now we have picked out the different sections of music we liked and now we are playing with the layering of sound, the pitch and the volume of each part.

Research & Planning: Music cue sheet

Here is the music cue sheet Aisha filled out for our soundtrack and sound effects. 

Research & Planning: Social Media Communication 2

Myself and Aisha got thinking about the sort of typography we would use for our own trailer title and the end credits, we ended up drawing inspiration from Whiplash to use a clean simple font.
The emaze presentation below documents our progressive discussion.

Research & Planning: Reviews and Quotes + Font Experimentation

I created a Powerpoint presentation including made up quotes and reviews that could be including in our trailer along with some simple typeface experiementation.

The second Screenshot from the Powerpoint shows me looking at different fonts and thicknesses.
To start I found a font that was similar to the one they use in Submarine and then I consulted with the girls in my group and we decided that the text shouldn't be so square and we should be using a Sans-Serif font. Before we chose to completely get rid of the boxy letters we tried Times New Roman again which is an average font but works well but we still agreed that this was too old-fashioned to go with our trailer which is why we ended up choosing Century Gothic because it is thin in weight and a clean cut easy to read font in capital letters.

This is the Powerpoint uploaded to Slideshare to view the whole Powerpoint:

Font Experimentation from stephgracey

Research & Planning: Second Trailer Title Ideas

'Lost for Words' was a temporary title whilst we held the auditions.
After we chose our actor we discussed again using Solvr the new title of our trailer.
This is the process we went through:

Research & Planning: Reviews and Credits Research: Submarine

Submarine: Reviews and Credits

As a group we knew we needed to create some reviews to sell the trailer to possible viewers, so we took to looking at other social realism films to create some. For this post I looked at Submarine. They include quotes from Empire, The Los Angeles Times and The Telegraph. We will use these institutions in our reviews and make some quotes to sound relevant to our trailer.

Along with review quotes we will need a title like the above, so we have decided on a font that is clean cut, crisp and nothing to extravagant. We will apply a drop shadow to this title to correspond with the rest of the text in the trailer. 

Lastly we wil need finishing credits. We will be using the Steel Tongs font to create the different roles and filling in the names the same as we have done on our film posters.