What's been happening recently

Recently I've been sorting things out on making my drama and corporate video.

Corporate Video

For this module, I first made a choice on promoting the Waterstones store in Stafford. But then I was asked how this is going ahead. I then thought that it wasn't going to work.

I was then suggested on making a promotional video on the course I'm doing and I thought it will work. I then planned out most of the paperwork ( still got some to do) and planned out how its going to look. I asked two of my lecturers for an interview on how they guide the students and I've also asked two students to be interviewed about their recent projects, what they think about the course and would they recommend them to existing students.

I have recently shot the two interviews from the students. This went very well and they were very honest on their opinions. Still got to interview the lecturers though.

I want to, at one point, to email an old student that was on the course previously and ask him or her for an interview about the course.

Drama

This module is going well sofar. I recently wrote the rest of the script and made some changes to make it more realistic. I asked the people I want to use as actors and they agreed. I have had many discussions with the main actress on when to film, about her character, asking if her sister would have a small part and about the script changes.

I have recently made a Powerpoint pitch of my film for the group with many inspirations and my ideas etc. I felt that I did well but it would have been better without the youtube adverts before my clips I chose the show. I hope I get good marks for it.

We've been set an isighnment on watching two tv shows or films and writing about the pre production, production and post production and then relate to our own pieces. We also have to write what we think of the methods that the filmmakers used. This was very challenging at first because alot of films have inspired me thorough out my own pieces. I had permission to watch The Shining with audio commentary (yippee, my all time favourite film). I had help on choosing three other films, which were Gothica and Shutter Island and The Others, which are other films I love. I watched Gothica with audio commentary, which was really good. I then watched behind the scenes of Shutter Island and The Others, which again were really good. Unfortunately, The Others and Shutter Island didn't have audio commentary. Through out watching these, I kept on pausing or rewinding to take notes. This was alot of work but very enjoyable (especially on the Shining). I now at the stage where I'm writing the report with my collected notes and having the use of my Stephen King movie guide for The Shining.

Last night, I shot the first scene with the main actress and a friend of mine that's playing the part as the main character's friend. I also made a start on the second scene with the main character and her sister. Last night was a success but I had issues with the lighting on the first scene because it went very dark. We worked around this and I thought I could keep it that way to make a spooky atmosphere. I used the street lamps as the lighting.

The second scene also went very well. But the actress's sister was very nervous infront of camera, so the actress and I tried to help her become more relaxed. We did this by saying that it's only us that's watching her and filming her, not a large film crew. I also helped her get into character by making her imagine that her sister is actually being horrible. This really helped and when she shouted her lines like she was supposed to, I was even taken aback! haha. I want to improve on the log sheets on catching up what I just filmed. I'm, sure I've got time to do this through out filming my drama. And even my corporate video.

I have still got more to film and edit for these modules but I'm sure they'll come up well.

What I've done recently

Through out the second year of my course, I have recently been learning about Documentary because we will be doing the module next year. Our lecturer said that we should do a head start.

By doing this, we've learned the history of documentary, of when it started etc. We've also been watching many documentaries, to see the different styles and how it's done. This has been really interesting to see the different formats and the subjects that were chosen.

We've also been going back to the Corporate Video module. This time, we had to choose a company to make a video for, ourselves. This I thought was very difficult because I didn't know what company to choose. I had help by suggesting to do a corporate video for the course. I agreed and chosen a video to promote the course.

For this, I have been going through paper work and preparing to film for it. I should be filming very soon.

I've also been going back to the Drama module. We have to make a short drama of our choice. So I've written the script on a drama idea. This time, I've written another horror (yippee!!!). I've asked a friend of mine if she wanted to have the part as the main character and asked her sister if she wanted to take the part as the character's sister. They both agreed and I have sent the script to her. I've given her a week to learn it and will be starting shooting next week.

The report for drama we have to do is to choose two films or TV shows to watch and write about what happened in pre production, production and post production. We also had to connect them through out our movie making experiences   I have been allowed to choose the film, The Shining (gives me an excuse to watch it again, cheers Dave!! :D) and I have watched with the audio commentary to help. I have also watched some of the special features on it aswell. No these I thought really helped because they were very informative and interesting. I have got a Stephen King movie guide to help me write about the pre production of the film.

I have to choose another film to watch. This I struggled with because when I have made films, more than one film has inspired me. To I was suggested to watch three films with audio commentary and choose the best one. I have picked the films, Shutter Island, Gothika and The Others. I love all three of these.

I found then that Gothika has audio commentary but the other two haven't. But the other two have the making of features. So what I'm going to do, is that I'm going to watch Gothika with the commentary and Shutter Island and The Others making of's. I'm going to see which one of them is the best to write about.

I will be catching up more with blogger, so excuse me for the delay.

Condensing my film

I've recently decided that, for my film I recently made, I'm condensing a version to 10 minutes for the uni and keeping the original for everyone else because its 21 minutes, which is too long for the uni.

This was quite challenging to condense because I had to choose the right parts for the film, so it can make sense. The outcome of it, I thought, came out really well.

Here is the link. Enjoy :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tvqk-Gd7OI

Coming Up- New Cross review

During today, on Channel4.com, I watched an episode from the TV series, Coming Up. It was called New Cross.

To begin with, the acting was great and made the characters very convincing and made us care for them. But I wish I got to know them a little bit more.

The filming was brilliant. Some really excellent shots with very good editing.

Now the story, yes it was good, but I felt I've seen something like this before, for example, the films Notes On A Scandal and An Education. But other than that, it was good. But the ending was, I thought a bit rushed because at the end, the main character gets beaten up by a couple of thugs, wakes up the next morning and sits down next to a travel agency like poster, showing paradise. Maybe that was a sign that he was going away, I don't know. I reckon they should have made that clearer. Also, I wish there was more explanation for the thugs. Were they robbing him? Again, I don't know, I wish that was explained.

Overall, it was pretty good. I hope David Stoddart makes more films because he's got a great vision. :D

First day back to uni

The first day back to uni. Went through what's going to happen through out the semester. We're going back to the modules of Corporate Video Production and Drama Film Production until September until January. Also, we're going to make a start in Documentary Production. We discussed on what the learning outcomes were for these.

I found out that the Corporate Video is more independent this time because we have to think about what company we want to use ourselves. This will take some thinking to do.

For drama, we had to write down what ideas we could do for our drama to make. I came up with two. My lecturer, Dave, really liked them and could see potential in both of them. I think I may do the first idea. So that evening, I got in contact with a friend of mine to ask her if she wanted to act for the first idea if it goes ahead. She agreed to it. So that's a great start.

'It Takes Time' Completed!

I have recently finished making my short drama film, 'It Takes Time'. Filming went very successfully. The last scene I had to shoot was the rest of the walk scene. I didn't finish it earlier because of weather conditions. This time the weather held up.

I changed a few parts of the scene to make it slightly shorter by changing a few angles and cutting out other ones. I also filmed a clip and asked the actors to be recorded for dialogue to put over the clip.

The last part I shot was the beginning of the walk, witch was inside the house. I suggested to film all the parts outside first because the weather was unpredictable. Through out filming, I changed an angle or two in this because the original angle didn't work. So I chose tow others. Overall, a successful last shoot.

I edited the film all together, which again was challenging at times. This was because there was different sounds through out the outside scenes. I tried editing a clip with a bit of sound at the end of it and made re repeat itself. This didn't work at all, so I tried many other attempts, for example, using the same clip but cutting it into all different sizes which was very tedious. I then had an idea by downloading a video from youtube of wind and nature sounds. So I then downloaded it and put it into Premier, cut out the image and kept the sounds. This went very well with the scenes because it sounds the same.

After editing, I then converted the film and watched it with my family. They really liked it and they made a few suggestions by cutting some angles off the kitchen scene because they thought it went too slow. They also suggested by cutting out some of the credits because my name kept  re appearing. Afterwords, I then went and changed these parts. After watching it, it looked much better.

I realised that the film was too long for uni, so I had an idea by keeping the whole film and convert a version to a trailer. This was very hard to begin with by coming up with an idea of what it can look like. For help, I went on youtube to look at existing trailers. I looked up on the film 'Lorenzo's Oil'. This I thought didn't help. I then finally came up with an idea of what it can look like and then created it. Here is the link to the trailer I created. The whole will be up soon but this is mainly for the uni. Enjoy :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e66dBcIDfLc

28th August Filming with my two borthers

On this date, I shot the scene with my two brothers down in my local brook.

This I thought went very well. There were a couple of times where there was wind interference and background noise but other than that it went very well. During that time we decided to film actual practise shots, with the two actors holding the scripts and saying their lines. Also, when there was a shot of just one of the actors, we decided it would help them by the other actor walk beside them, holding the script infront of them, out of angle. This helps because the actor actually has to look at the other actor because its conversational scene.

For editing, this also went very well. There were times where I had to increase the volume so I can hear their lines. For the music, I chose a particular track and cut some of it out because I thought it sounded a bit too dramatic for the scene, so I chose the best part of the track.

My next day of filming will be tomorrow afternoon. This will be the last scene I shoot