Contents for FLICK

Double page spread interview

I spent possibly far too long on the cog design (1 hr approx.) as I though it fit in with the theme of our video, cogs can be associated with ticking and time, and most importantly with the brain and how it works. I presumed if in real life Paige would be a Zooey Deschanel kind of person, as she is cast in a Fox searchlight film and is an up and coming actress.

Improvments

After the presentation of our first cut, it became clear to me the quality of our work was not up to standard and definitely not up to par with the rest of the class, however unsettling this was that we had a lot of work to do, I feel like it gave us perspective and a wiser knowledge of what to do next, and of course we had feed back to dwell on as well. I also felt Dan agreed with this and as a team we have seen the following corrections need to be made: 

• Much more context into the film and giving more depth and reason into each shot. We found on watching everyone’s reactions and reading their feedback, they were just confused and couldn't follow the story line. For example the representation of the static and the meaning behind it wasn't put across, and I think the biggest thing I have taken away from the presentation is that you can just expect people to accurately grasp the concept of your ideas, you have to show them pretty much in layman’s terms for your point to be put across. 
• Our music choice was poor, which we knew anyway, but everyone else agreed, and Dan also pointed out it looked like a music video more than a film opening, so we have scrapped the Amanda Seyfreid song, and are unsure of what to do next, as I think we should carry on the pursuit for a track but Dan thinks we should scrap the music and go for ambient sound, which I do think is an option but I feel when there is dialogue and sound effects added the music will seem more in place. 
• The church shots were shit, nothing more can be said on the matter the shots need to be scrapped and a new idea must be made to fill the time. 
• There was one shot were the shot was shaken which needs to be cut short and the static times were not even in timing, showing we should possibly revise the editing to make it pristine. 
• The titles and the bar sequence was good and the audience said they though it looked professional and was a good idea/way of doing it. 
• Mrs Allison pointed out a few tweaks such as the 'starring Paige Law' title, she said we should possibly hold it back and use it when you first see her face. 

First cut

Filming

Today me and Paige went out filming. It had flooded again unfortunately so we improvised and did the shots we could plus adding a few which weren't planned for or in the animatic, which was suspected anyway. We however didn't get as much as I wanted done, as Paige fell and got soaking wet, which meant we had to go home early as she would have probably froze to death. There is one shot I would like to do soon however, and it would be taking advantage on the flood. Even though I would very much like one I sadly don't own a Steadicam and can't get hold of one, nevertheless my Dad told me about a technique the used in 'The Living Dead' as it was a low budget film to strap the camera down to a board of wood and get two people to run at even paces holding either side, thus giving the smoothness a Steadicam would, using this technique along with the flooding I would like to create a quite harrowing shot of a speedy close up to Red. Which I hope to do sometime in the near future, with the help of my Dad.

DVD Case

Using the Quotes from Dan's version of the DVD case and inspiration from the Sin City case I have completed our DVD case. I chose Sin City because it has been an influence over our video with it's use of editing style. It picks out select colors and makes them brighter or exclusively the only color in the shot. I like this because it's not unlike what we hope to achieve by isolating the red color in some shots. I also added a quote from Rotten Tomatoes as I think they would be interested in our sort of film, and would be interested to review it. I also added a new tagline 'What would you do if the Darkness rejected you?' as I think it's more appropriate than the last, however there is a slight issue as the font we are currently using (28 Days Later) doesn't have a question mark, so I will be making one to suit the font at some point.


I have made a gif instead of a jpeg as the DVD case would be holographic as I think this makes it appear more interesting and would attract people to pick up the DVD, but also as I think it suits the genre of our film more. I tried to stick to a strictly Black, White and Red color scheme, only disobeying that for the 18 certificate. I put my own name above the title as I am the director and added the Terra Somnia logo right by the title as they would have funded the film.

Movie magazine

I have made a fake magazine called Flick, and used Red on the front page. I've aimed the TA at late teens early 20's film addicts, examples of how I have shown this would be the color scheme, the Blackberry bar code. The use of the new Gore Verbinski film The Lone Ranger, and adding a web address on the bottom. Also I have made the title to surreptitiously look a little ruder than 'Flick' which I hope will also attract younger readers.

Developments

Today me and Dan focused on editing, we were told our film producers Fox Searchlight were hogging to much air time, so we had to cut down the clip from the admittedly long 25 seconds. We also sorted out some of the sound track and added in the static we needed to make the film more effective. Today's work was mostly tweaks on the project as we had no new clips to use and edit. Also Dan commented on how the music we chose doesn't work with the video, and I couldn't help but agree, so over time this will be changed as well, possibly to a track without words, so I don't have to listen to Dan singing the song all lesson every lesson. After the lesson today, I then looked in to more influences on our production which I spoke about in a post earlier today, and I made the film poster we would use, however left it without a release date, following a dispute in class about when that should be. I also looked up further music choices and possible shot ideas.

Influences

Some of the influences over our opening have helped change the way we have progressed our idea. For example Miss Allison showed us the opening of Arlington road which we thought was a good reference, as some of the effects in Arlington Road, uses negative and inverted shots and effects to give a more eerie and creepy feel, we wanted to help use these techniques to improve our video, however we did feel that these effect weren't in keeping with the rest of our video so instead we used the idea of giving a strange editing feel to our video, so Dan used gamma correction to the video to slightly distort the video, and it solved our problem of the shots being too dark as it took down the brightness and emphasized the dark.

The influence of True Blood came about as I am a big fan of the show and so have seen the opening a lot of times over, and it immediately came to mind as the flashes of random shots and complementary music gives an offsetting feeling of anticipation and it soon because quite iconic after the show was first aired, we used this as an influence as the shots aren't only haphazard but quite ghastly and give a bona fide sense of shock.

American Horror Story (Season 1 / Season 2)was an influence as again it is one of my favorite shows, and I think its opening is very inspiring, and influential. The chaotic shots which flicker and jump around I thought would be brilliant to use as an influence as they really instigate a shock factor with the fast moving cuts and the controversial shots.

However what first made me come up with the idea for the Plot of Red was the song CYMK –James Blake which is why at first I was insisted we had to find a way to use it in our opening despite the very restricting copyright rules. As I originally fit the plot around the lyrics,
‘Look I found her,
Red Coat,
Look I found her.’
Perfect for Little Red Riding Hood with reference to the Red Coat, and look I found her as if she is being tracked down and is in hiding.

Film Poster

                                   Here is a mock up film poster I have made.

Clip from the opening

Developments

        These are some shots were though would be good for making film posters from.

Filming Troubles

Over the weekend, we unfortunately did not do any filming due to poor weather. We intend to film a few more shots during the week in order to fill in the gaps in our production work.

Terra Somnia

After reviewing our film opening, and chosen existing film producers, Fox Searchlight we decided to revise the logo and way the Title was presented. So today I remade the title, logo, and made a short clip which will go at the beginning of our opening.

Development notes

Terra Somnia

After Thursday's lesson we came up with our Film Company's name and I designed its logo, 'Terra Somnia' is Latin for 'Land of Dreams'. We thought that this rather unusual name would reflect our company's unusual nature in relation to the type of films that it would produce.