Initial Ideas - Development

After receiving feedback and thinking about our initial idea we have decided to redevelop some of our ideas.

Apart from Kool Kids which we don't think will appeal to a broad enough audience the other two ideas we feel will be too serious to develop into comedies as well.

We have looked at other examples of comedy openings and have decided that our ideas have been far too complicated for what we really needed to do and what we need to do is to make something far more simple.

Our new idea which we are yet to name, is set in a city at sunset. A teenage boy is running away from a very angry man indicating he has done something wrong. Whilst running away, the teenager encounters unfortunate comedic events like stepping in dog mess, tripping over bins and other various incidents. We will use many different types of camera angles and shots throughout this scene. The penultimate shot shows the teenager, after finding a passing garden to hide in, not knowing where the angry character is. The final shot shows the teenager relax, after he has found a place to hide, sitting against the garden wall breathing deeply. Then his phone rings which blows his cover as the angry man hears it and knows where he is. That is where the scene will end. The titles will be showing during the running footage.

We believe that this idea will appeal to a wider audience, I feel it will be easier to produce and will produce the best overall video.

Sin City - Lighting Analysis

Key Light

The shot on the left is an example of the use of a Key Light. There is a shadow on the left side of the nose meaning that the keylight is coming from the right side.

Back Light

This shot is an example of the use of a backlight. You can tell this by the large amount of shadow on the left side of his face.

Filler Light
This shot is an example of a filler light, the light isn's as bright as a key light meaning the shadows are more suttle.

Lighting

Lighting can suggest atmosphere and mood, e.g. in a horror movie, light and shade are important codes of meaning and major signifiers of genre. High-key lighting is harsh, low-key lighting creates a dark atmosphere, soft-key lighting creates a romantic atmosphere, spotlighting picks out a particular character from a group as special in some way. I will now explain certain aspects of lighting:

• Key Light - Usually the brightest and most influential
• Back Light - Helps counteract the effect of the key light making the character more rounded
• Filler Light - Helps to soften hard shadows, there may be more than one filler light
• Underlighting - When the main soure of light come from below the character, often used in horror films
• Top Lighting - When the main source of light comes from above, can be used to create a glamourous look in a star
• Back Lighting - When the source of light is from behind the subject

Initial Ideas

Today we presented our initial ideas to the rest of the group. We gave a basic idea of the storyline and what we would do for the opening scene.

Kool Kids - The five characters skive a day of school to go to Hunstanton, without realising one of the characters goes missing. The film shows the rest of the characters search for a missing person and what happens during the search.

Feedback: It will be difficult to script and produce a comedy film due to peoples different tastes in humour and would be a big risk trying to make it work.

The End - Haunted Woods at night, people camping, each character has a scene on their own in the forest. They end up disappearing, until the end of the film when the character finds all of them possessed.

Feedback: Again with the genre, a horror movie is a very typical genre for this type of project, we would struggle to be original making it harder to stand out with such a large number of similar projects. 

Stanton - 4 main characters, go on a day out to Hunstanton. Its planned to be a normal day out but something goes wrong...

Feedback: Will be difficult filming in the car with health and safety issues, using a green screen was suggested but it will be hard to access the technology. Was the best received idea out of the three and will be the idea that we choose to develop for our main project.

Camera Movement

Tracking

A tracking shot is when the camera is mounted on a wheeled platform that is pushed on rails while the picture is being taken

Crane
A crane shot is a shot taken by a camera on a crane. The most obvious uses are to view the actors from above or to move up and away from them.

Tilt
A shot in which the camera remains in place but rotates vertically on its axis so that the character is continually reframed.

Pan
A shot made while the camera swings on a tripod in a horizontal arc

Camera Shots

ELS - Extreme Long Shot/ Establishing Shot: This shot is to show a panoramic view of an exterior location, taken from a distance.

LS - Long Shot: This shot makes the subject look small and far away; often
used to show an object in relation to its surroundings.

MLS - Medium Long Shot: This shot is taken with the camera at a distance from the subject, but closer than a long shot.

MS - Medium Shot: The medium shot usually shows a person or group of people from the waist up.

MCU - Medium Close Up: This shot shows more detail of the character from the mid-chest to the top of the head.

CU - Close Up: This shop shows the head and shoulders of a character and is used to show emotion and feelings/reactions.

ECU - Extreme Close Up: This shot shows a small part of a face or object, it can also show extreme fear or emotion if tightly on the eyes.

Preliminary Exercise - Storyboard

Preliminary Video