Juno Opening: first filming task

Today we were told that we would be doing a remake of the opening of the film Juno (first minute).
We started by making a storyboard to plan out what scene we would be doing and the timings of all of them. This would help us when filming because then we would know exactly what to do when we were filming which would make it much easier.

After making the storyboard, we went out to film. Thankfully the road we were filming on was not too busy and it was right outside our school. This took a little longer than expected as we wanted to make sure we got the scene as exact as we could and to also help us when editing i also learned how to use the cameras with more confidence which will help me when filming the final piece. Once we got all of the shots we needed, we went in to edit.
When editing on Adobe Premier, i felt that i learnt how to use the software much more. It was difficult to match up the clips we filmed to the actual opening of the film as i wanted to get it as exact as i could. I matched the transitions to the actual opening which i was very pleased with and overall i was happy with the outcome.

Premier Practice

In the past two lessons we have been practicing using a piece of software called Adobe Premier to edit videos and music. We were given a set of video clips and music to choose from and we had to create a small video with these elements included just so we could get used to the software as we will be using it regularly throughout this year. The first section of the video i used to put different scenes of America to a song and time it correctly. The second part of the video i used a series of clips from James Bond and also used the original James Bond theme tune. I cut the clips to how long i wanted them and faded the music in and out and took the sounds out of some of the clips as i thought the music sounded better without the background noise.

Film Language - analysing movie clip

The Dark Knight Rises
Camera
High Shot - zip wire across to other buildings
Tracking shot - running up to the bank doors
Match on Action - opening the door and running into the bank firing shots as they are running
Close up shots of the faces of the unknown men as they are behind the masks - hidden identity

Sound
unknown men speaking about the 'joker'
gunshots in the building
not much dialogue - mainly speaking about the joker
music nearer the end to create tension

Editing
Straight cuts as there are clips of different men breaking in from a different entrance
Clips are short

Mise En scene
set on a typical day at daytime

Film Language - analysing movie clip

Up (montage)
Camera
Long shot walking up the hill and the woman has to help the man
Happy scenery
Signs of love - wormseye view of them looking up to the sky and looking at the clouds
Birdseye view looking down on the couple as they look at the clouds
Close up of the pot at time goes by and the money builds up and days go by
Camera flash at the beginning signifying that it is a flashback of their lives and how it flashes by

Sound
Music is upbeat and makes the audience feel happy
Slower music when she is in the hospital signifying that she just had some bad news so the audience can feel the emotion
Music is non-digetic as the characters cannot hear it
Digetic - clapping at the beginning and the storm and the smashing of the pot

Editing
Time passing by through the years by looking at the mans tie and seeing the woman do it up through the years
Straight cuts

Mise en Scene
Hair colour changing from brown to white shows time passing
Characters clothes become older and the scenery becomes more colourless and grey

Film Language

Film Language has four key elements, these are:
Camera
Sound
Editing
Mise en Scene
All these four elements are put together to create effects in the scene and manipulate the audience to how you want them to feel. Each of them can be broken down and explained in much more depth.

Camera - FAM
Frame:
extreme close up (e.g. somebody's eyeball)
close up (e.g. someones face)
mid shot (e.g. someone standing (cannot be taken above the belly button))
long shot (e.g. someone standing from a distance)
extreme long shot (e.g. mountains/scenery)
Angle level:
High (birdseye view)
Low (wormseye view)
Movement:
Pan left/right
Tilt up/down
Zoom in/out

Sound - MCDOVED
Music
Contrapuntal (music/lyrics contrast)(opposite: parallel)
Digetic (sounds actors can hear)(non-digetic - e.g. voiceover)
Off screen/on screen (e.g. phone call in another room)
Voiceover
Emotion
Dialogue (way people say things depends on: age, tone, level, accent)

Editing - TOP
Transition (straight cut/dissolves/wipes)
Order of narrative (beginning/middle/end/flashbacks/dreams/time period e.g. years)
Pace

Mise en Scene - CLAMPS
Costume
Lighting
Actors
Props
Setting

Semiotics - photo analysis

Denotations - a group of young adults sitting with each other on 2 G letters.
Connotations -

• The girl in the top right is in red symbolising power and hate, also she is above everyone else so she could be powerful and quite high up in society. She also seems as if she is quite vain and is always expecting people to do things for her as she is above everyone in the photo. Also it shows that she is independant as she is not close to anyone and she is by herself.
• The girl on the far left is in white showing innocence and she is not as far up as the girl in the red but she still is higher than the other characters showing that she still possesses power, also she is very close to the boy in the grey jacket showing that they may have a sexual relationship or be close to each other it also shows that she is not as independent as the other people as she close to another character.
• The girl in the back is also in white again showing innocence but also showing purity and the fact that she is behind the letter shows that she may be a shy character and her stance is showing that she is independent
• The boy sitting in the front shows me that he is quite laid back and relaxed as he is in jeans and as he is sitting it tells me that he is lower down than everyone else as he is below everyone so everyone would look down on him.
• The boy on the far left stands in a very strong and confident manor but having his hand in his pockets shows me that he is a fairly laid back person who can stand up for himself. I noticed he has his shirt untucked which shows me that he does not really care about his look or how he dresses as it shows that he has a scruffy look about him.
• The boy on the far right is dressed in a shirt and tie and smart trousers and shoes showing that he may be quite high up in society and cares about his appearance but he has is shirt untucked and his top button undone showing that he can be quite messy/scruffy at times. The way he is standing tells me that by him hunching over he may have something to hide or he is not completely confident about standing up for himself as he is not standing in a strong stance like the boy on the far left.
• The letters themselves almost look gold showing that these people are rich and high up in society and it also signifies money and wealth which gives me a brief idea that the series is a drama about wealthy young adults as they all have different characteristics that make you think different things about them. The white background shows purity and innocence of all the characters and also showing youth, so the series may start when they are young and go through to when they are older.

Semiotics

In today's lesson we learnt about semiotics. Semiotics is the study of signs and anything that may stand for 'something else'. Everyone reads images in pictures in an attempt to decode them and make sense of what they mean to us.
We broke semiotics down into two key parts:
Denotations - what we see when we look at an image (what is it?)
Connotations - what we understand from this image (what are the meanings behind the picture?)
After learning what each of the two key parts of semiotics meant we had some practice and used our knowledge of denotations and connotations to break down these 4 key colours:

Red:

Danger

Love

Passion

Blood

Blue:

Innocence

Royalty

Water

Pure

Yellow:

Sun

Hope

Caution

Light

Green:

Nature

Envy

Evil

Money

Institution (Low budget vs High budget)

Low Budget - Paranormal Activity (Horror/Thriller)

Budget:

$15,000  (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

 £3,593,762 (UK) (27 November 2009)

Gross:

 $107,917,283  (USA) (15 January 2010)
Produced by:

Blumhouse Productions

Producing mainly horror films, Blumhouse Productions films have other low budget films including:
Insidious (2010)
Budget - $1,500,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend

-

£1,441,292 (UK)

Ouija (2014) - 

Budget:

 $5,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

 $20,006,000 (USA)

High Budget - Spider Man 3 (Action)

Budget:

 $258,000,000  (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

 £11,827,013 (UK) (4 May 2007)

Gross:

 $336,530,303  (USA) (17 August 2007)

Production company:

Marvel & Columbia Pictures

Marvel produce many action films, many of them are very high budget like:

Thor:The Dark World (2013)

Budget:

$170,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:$85,737,841 (USA)

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

Budget:

 $140,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend: $65,058,542 (USA)

 

Representation

Representation

Representation refers to the construction in any medium (especially the mass media) of aspects of 'reality' such as people, places, objects, events, cultural identities and other abstract concepts.

The term refers to the processes involved as well as to its products. The CAGE concept involves 4 main aspects which are Class Age Gender and Ethnicity.

Character Typing

there are three different kinds of character typing

An Archetype

a familiar character who has emerged from hundreds of years in fairy tales and storytelling

A Stereotype

a character usually used in advertising and marketing in order to sell a particular product to a certain group of people; they can also be used negatively in the media.

A Generic Type

a character familiar through use in a particular genre of movie.

Mise En Scene

In todays lesson we studied Mise en Scene. This roughly translates in english to 'Whats in the scene'. So as the traslation states we spent the lesson talking about the various sections of a scene that imact how it looks and comes across to the viewer. There are 5 basic catagories which can all be changed to make the viewer feel or think differently about the scene. The 5 categories are:
Setting and props
Lighting and colour
Positioning of the character
Facial expressions and body language
Costumes, hair and makeup
All of these features are compressed into making a scene and manipulating the viewer in different ways. When the features are not collaborated correctly, the results can be catastrophic as they make a whole new scene which might not even make any sense. The smallest details can make the biggest differences throught any scene in films.

The Lost Ones 227 - a planned horror

This is the Horror film that we outlined and presented to the class today. After recieving some feedback we are pleased with the ideas that we came up with and put together. We all made up the title and had our input in the poster to advertise the film which was quite myserious as it left people wondering. Along with the setting, we had to choose a unique cast and why we thought they were suitable for the roles they were playing and why they were in the film. We all had our input with the storyline and everything else and it was put together well. We also had to mension how we would advertise the film on the market and where we would want to adertise it. After recieving some good feedback and critisism these are the results we had.
The total scores were mainly 7's and they were averaged out from the scores we revieved in the rest of the feedback.
Most of the feedback sheets said that the title was catchy and intriguing and it was intersting how it related to true events that have happened.
We got mixed feedback for the characters as some people thought they were well thought out but some people said that they were not well casted as they were not as well known.
Some people thought the film was different in a way that it was a unique storyline, but some people thought that it was not as original as others because there are many horrors relating to paranormal activities.
The feedback on marketing was all positive as we chose more than one way to make our film become noticed and to encourage people to want to see it.
Overall i was happy with the feedback as it gives me things to work on the next time i have a task similar to this and the positive feedback on some parts were very good as this was the first time we have done something like this.

Mise En Scene - Katniss (Hunger Games)

Settings and Props
Set in woodland area (dirt, trees)
Somewhere unknown, no buildings or other people

Lighting and Colour
High lighting
All nature colours (green, brown)

Positioning of the Character
Centre of the image
Showing she is the main character
No other characters involved or to be seen

Facial Expressions and Body Language
Face looks very serious and alert
Body is tensed and awkwardly shaped
On the lookout for anything that could potentially be dangerous.
Costumes, Hair and Makeup
Costume is modernised but plain and almost blending/camoflauge into the background to keep her more hidden in the cicumstances.
Hair is tied in a plait to keep it out the way and cant get in the way if she is in danger or has quick movements
Makeup is minimal if any but very natural looking as there is no need for it if they had it.

Genre Picture Task

Today the task given to us was to be inspired by genres and then go on to create still images of genres that were randomly chosen. We took some time to plan what we would do and then went outside to take the pictures which are seen below.

 In the image above we are portraying the genre of THRILLER inspired by 'The Guest'

 In the image above we are portraying the genre of HORROR inspired by 'Oculus'

In the image above we are portraying the genre of ROMANTIC COMEDY inspired by 'The Vow'