Closing Post.

This blog is now closed!

We hope you have as much fun looking through our blog as we have had making it and completing this project :D

Audience feedback

We decided to record some audience feedback for our film in order to see what is good about the sequence and what could be improved.  We organised a time and date for a screening in the media block, using our posters and a facebook group to advertise it.  We had a turnout of over thirty people which suggests that in terms of audience feedback, our advertising could be considered successful.  We allowed our audience first to watch the sequence the whole way through without filling out the questionnaire so that they could fully engage with the sequence atleast once.  We then screened the sequence again, this time asking the audience to fill out the questionnaires.  These were there responses.

As you can see we recieved very positive feedback, from a wide range of the lower end of our target audience although there were some things we could have improved on. Please check our individual blogs for our individual feedback on this.

Gun shot

We wanted a realistic gun shot in our movie to represent action. we asked our technician for advice and he told us to look at Freddiew you tube channel which we found very useful. here we have one of his short clips with special effects, and then a tutorial on making a realistic Muzzle flare.





                  

We ended not using the Muzzle flare but we have taken elements from the tutorial to make a realist gun shot. this was all new to us and very useful into how special effects are used, and for the future.

Colour Grading Research: Underworld Awakening

As we are currently starting to finish the basic edit and focus on the smaller details now, we have decided to do some research into colour grading.

We want to use the colour wheel on premiere to give the film a blue tint, to make it seem colder and therefore more menacing.

We found an example of an action film that has similar blue grading: Underworld Awakening. This film is similar to ours in genre (although it has horror and fantasy elements as well) and the fact that it has a female hero. As you can see in the image and clip below the blue colours makes her character seem harder, tougher and more sleek and professional.

However this clip is slightly too strong in it's colour grading in our opinion and we would be more subtle in our film, as we don't want it to be noticeable, just to influence the audience's impression of Lotus and the events taking place subconsciously.The snapshot below (from the same film) is more illustrative of the type of grading we might use.

Lotus the title

while researching fonts we came across this font:

We liked it as it looked pretty like the flower lotus but quite sharp with the pointed extensions.

while looking through Live type there wasn't a particular animation i liked with the font however i came with the idea of having the extensions (the end) growing . Our technician showed me how I could do it and I ended up making a successful title.

firstly i removed the extensions at the start of the time frame

I removed the tools to reveal the extensions at a different time frame so that the extensions are revealed slowly looking as if they are growing

Poster

We have designed a poster for our film! We have built on the theme of shadows in our film which creates enigma, however it is clear the figure is a female assassin our major selling point.

This poster's appeal will be put to the test when we host our opening sequence premiere in school.

Last Minute Name Change

After teacher feeedback sessions, we decided as a group it was best to change the name of our film, mainly because of the misleading oriental connatations of Lotus. Instead we have decided to name our film "Deadly Shadow." This is beacuse the main motif in our opening sequence is the use of shadows. For instance:
The first thing we see of Lotus is the shadow.
When the guy is killed we see his shadow on the wall.
Her shadow crosses his dead body to get the briefcase.
The shadow theme would also be used in our marketing campaign and the rest of the film.

Reply to Re-shoot post:

Hi Francis, it's Nico. I called Natasha and the re-shoot is fine for today :)

Re-shoot: FOR ATTENTION OF NICO AND NATASHA

Hi Guys it's Francis, we need to re-shoot the shot, as the gun shot does not look good without any make-up and we can't edit around it.
If possible can we do today during the media lesson. Chris (technician) can drive us down to mine.
Please reply on the blog. Thanks.

Behind the scenes- Real shoot 25/02/12

This is exclusive behind the scenes footage of our real shoot.  I talk through our setting, props and equipment, whilst also asking talking to group members Natasha and Francis!

Lighting tutorial

None of us have used lightning so we ask for a tutorial from our technician as from our test shoot we noticed how badly we needed them to stop the images from looking grainy.

Our technician demonstrating using Francis as focus of lightening

Nico adjusting the light positioning

Francis adjusting lightening density

Natasha adjusting volume of light projected 

Shoot Permission Form

This is our shoot organisation form which everyone had to sign, including our teachers, to make sure our arrangements were clear and that we would all stick to them.

Real shoot organisation sheets

As one of the main problems in our test shoot was the lack of props. Here we have written up a comprehensive props list with who is getting what. Secondly we have written up a list of things we ned to do better this time around to make sure the shoot goes smoothly as well as the changes we intend to make.

Teachers Improvements

After our test shoot we showed our teachers our rough cut and we recieved feed back which we took o to make sure our real production is successful.

These are the notes we made when running through the rough edit with Mrs Blackborrow, Mrs Dymioti and Chris, our technician.
Many points and issues came up. The main ones were:

• Changing the opening shots so it did not include as many shots of knives as this is a genre convention of horror, not action/thriller. Focus more instead on items like cigars and whiskey to create the uneasy image we are going for.
• Making it look like the action is continuing beneath the titles.
• Lingering the shot where he picks up his briefcase and replacing the match on action of the door with a new title.
• Including more camera movement.
• Making the gun scene less static by shooting from more angles.
• Get rid of jumps
• Use more interesting framing in the gun scene to draw in audience
• Include shots such as CU of money in briefcase (match on action), assasin picking up briefcase and possibly her taking off her gloves
• Using better lighting to get rid of the grainy image.
• Make things faster-faster shots and possibly a cut down script.
• Use make up and effects for the gunshot.
• Use better props for better mise-en-scene e.g briefcase, whiskey glass, whiskey bottle.
• Making the gun scene a lot more dramatic. Possible ways we discussed were non-digetic sound effects, zoom in to the guys face see a change of expression then zoom out to see the gun, or even a fade to black of the guy in his relaxed state with a sudden jolt back to the image as the assasin appears.

Shoot Logistics

Our scheduled test shoot was to be on 5/2/2012; however it snowed heavily the night before and Nico and Natasha wasn't able to get to potteres bar where the film location was to be (francis house) as natasha  was taking public transport and it is quite a distance from her house and the trains were not working, also Nico's mum could not drive him on the icy roads specially since Potters bar is on the out skirts of london; there for still having icy roads.

Our shoot that was meant to be in Hollywood, while we was on our media trip, also failed as we were not allowed to shoot in the location. However it was fine we had a back-up of either shooting back in London next to the enfield civic centre or cut out the scene. As having two locations would be difficult and the first scene doesn't necessarily need that scene.

We rescheduled another test shoot at the film location (Potters Bar, Francis house) to be on 19/2/2012. This meant we would have to catch up really quick with the editing of that week hopefully finishing by 22/02/2012; so that we can do our real shoot on 26/02/2012

Behind the scenes

Here is a behind the scenes view of our test shoot. We are setting up for shot 6, the focus pull of the man washing his hands behind the drugs.

Group 2 LotusTest Shoot

This is our test shoot footage edited into a rough edit which matches our animatic.
The test shoot itself went pretty smoothly. We started quite slowly however and found ourselves a bit rushed towards the end. This meant we didn't use the clapperboard towards the end, something we need to do for our real shoot. We alos didn't have access to the proper lighting kit for this shoot and also had some stand in props but all these issues will be sorted out for our real shoot next week.
There were many great shots and positives from the test shoot, in particular the general style of the opening CU's and the idea of the shadow in the shooting scene. However there are also many things we need to work on and improve on our next shoot. This is all detailed in the Teacher Feedback post above.

Costume, Props, Make-up

Here are all the props that are needed:

Costume

Man:

Dark suite with a tie and white shirt

Lotus:

Grey jeans, military boots, black vest top and a leather jacket if possible

Props:

Whisky bottle

Whisky glass

Briefcase

Big knives

Stack of money and fake money (a lot)

Cigars

Ash tray

Drugs (flour in clear bags, pills

Gun

Table

Drinking storage e.g. Silver tray or shelves

Make-up:

Blood

Concealer for both shades

Face paint/ eye shadow

Latex/lash glue

Cotton

Eye liner  

Costumes

Here are the final costumes we will be using:

For Lotus we went for simple, practical clothing. We wanted it to be dark to contribute to the "shadow" idea. Not photographed is the leather jacket she wears which makes her look sleek and classy as well as hard and professional.

As for the "businessman" we wanted him to be in a shirt, tie and suit, formal trousers and formal shoes to connote the ideas of money, greed and dodgy business (which the iconography helps with.) This is shown in the photo above.

Shot log

We made sure we were organised and kept to our schedule by noting down everything on the table.  It also will help us when editing when using time codes. Here are our shot logs:

Shoot Schedule

This is our shoot schedule.  We have planned when we will film each shot throughout our day of production, giving it structure and organisation.  Surely nothing can go wrong now??
Set-Ups:
11:00 Dress Set and Walkthrough
12:00 Sink Setup: 1, 5
12: 20 Knife Setup: 2,
12: 30 Sharpening Setup: 3
12: 40 Radio Setup: 4
12: 50 Kitchen Setup: 6
13:00 Briefcase Setup 1: 7, 8
13: 20 Briefcase Setup 2: 9
Lunch
14:20 Walkthrough setup: 10
14: 30 Long shot Front Room Setup: 11, 25
14:50 Chair Setup: 12, 15,16,19,22
15: 40Drink Setup: 17, 20, 21
16: 10 Headshot Setup: 18, 23, 24
16:40 Picking Up Briefcase Setup: 27, 28, 29
17:10 Money in Briefcase Setup: 13
17:20 Flicking through money Setup: 14
17:30 Glove Setup: 26
17: 40 Outside setup: 32
(Hour allowance means 19:00)
Hollywood:
Hollywood Chair setup: 30
Boss ear to phone setup: 31
Lips Boss Setup: 33
Walk out hotel setup: 34
Walk down Hollywood Boulevard setup: 35

Animatic for opening sequence

Here is the finished animatic for our sequence.  It has really helped us visualise how our final product will turn out, and has enabled us to consider shot duration and timings without yet filming, definitely worth the time doing! One thing we need to change is the script, as it isn't sounding quite right yet. After talking with our teachers we've also decided for the purpose of this opening sequence, it's best not to use bad language.

Storyboard

Here is our group storyboard.  There are a total of 35 shots in our sequence, ranging from closeups, which are shown in orange, to mid-shots and long shots which are shown in purple and green.  Doing our storyboard in this way has helped us balance out the range of shots in our sequence, as we were able to see if we had too many closeups or too few midshots.  We finally created a suitable mixture of shots so that our sequence is interesting and engaging for the audience.   Our titles for our sequence are not in this storyboard as they will be entered digitally on Adobe Premiere Pro when we produce our animatic using these stills.  From this we will hopefully create a rough structure to our sequence.

Locations Addition

In addition to shooting in the kitchen like we posted earlier, we are also going to have the character cross into the front room, as the glass doors work well, and here is a more suitable place for him to sit and relax.

More script Drafts and final script

We went through a long process of scripting. We initially had quite a long speech from the guy, however this was too long-winded and dragged the sequence on so we cut it down again.

Draft 1:

MAN:

(He releases a deep breath, as though a weight is lifted off his shoulders)

So he decided to send someone with a little class.  You’re fresh out of the farm, aren’t you?  Only time a mark gets to talk is if the asset is a little green.  Should have shot me before I said anything.  Now that bastard gets to know that I had time to think about the fact I was dead.  What kind of twisted asshole does that?

Silence.

            MAN:

Pour me the rest of that scotch. 

She pours.

Someone once told me it “takes the edge off”.  Doubt that applies to a 9mm to the skull though. 

He drinks.

Fuck, that’s gonna hurt.  You should do it when I’m not expecting

She shoots.

Draft 2 and 3:

We eventually went with Draft 3 but cut the third line and Lotus's dialogue to make her character more mysterious.

Audience Research

Having decided on a target audience the group asked me to do some research into our audience:
Target audience: 16-24 Male and female


I found the BFI's 2011 statistics yearbook which focused on the year 2010.
Here are some statistics I found:

As this data shows we have chosen a lucrative audience, as they visit the cinema the most. We have also chosen a good genre to target them with as many action films (e.g Kick Ass, Inception, Iron Man 2) made the list of the most popular films within that age group.

However the thriller aspect of the film might appeal to the 25-34 demographic more as the most popular film for them was Green Zone, a thriller. Most of our film is action however, but the 25-34 year olds could well be a strong secondary audience.

Genre research

Here some research into our two main genres from Wikipedia:

Thriller
Thriller (also Suspense) is a broad genre of literature, film, and television programming that uses suspense, tension and excitement as the main elements. Thrillers heavily stimulate the viewer's moods giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety and/or terror. Thriller films tend to be adrenaline-rushing, gritty, rousing and fast-paced. Literary devices such as red herrings, plot twists and cliffhangers are used extensively. A thriller is villain-driven plot, whereby he or she presents obstacles that the hero must overcome.

The primary elements of the thriller genre:

• The central protagonist(s) faces death, either their own or somebody else's.
• The force(s) of antagonism must initially be clever and/or stronger than the protagonist's.
• The main storyline for the protagonist is either a quest or a character who cannot be put down.
• The main plotline focuses on a mystery that must be solved.
• The film's narrative construction is dominated by the protagonist's point of view.
• All action and characters must be credibly realistic/natural in their representation on screen.
• The two major themes that underpin the thriller genre are the desire for justice and the morality of individuals.
• One small, but significant, aspect of a thriller is the presence of innocence in what is seen as an essentially corrupt world.
• The protagonist/s and antagonist/s may battle not just on a physical level, but on a mental one as well.
• Either by accident or their own curiousness, characters are dragged into a dangerous conflict or situation that they are not prepared to resolve.

Action
Action genre is where one or more heroes is thrust into a series of challenges that require physical feats, extended fights and frenetic chases. They occasionally have a resourceful character struggling against incredible odds such as, life-threatening situations, an evil villain, and/or being chased in several ways of transportation (car, bus, truck, etc.), with victory achieved at the end after difficult physical efforts and violence. Story and character development are generally secondary to explosions, fist fights, gunplay and car chases.

Film pitch feedback sheet

 Year 12 film pitch feedback group 2

We pitched to the class and our teachers today, however we didn't quite get the green light as several changes are needed, and lots of points need to be more clear. The feedback is listed above.
Individual reflections of this are on our individual blogs.

Revised Film Treatment

We have created a treatment for our film so that when we pitch it to the teachers they they can use it to support what we are saying and visualise the film better.

Dexter Inspiration

Just like this openign we want the audience to straight away feel unease by the mans pleasures. Instead we will have close up shots of thing such as drugs, money, knives, gory food and cigarettes and alcohol. Also since this is a drama series we will make it more movie like we will have cut-away titles.

Opening sequence Inspiration

Here we have two opening sequences which follow a similar idea of a murder in an unexpected place e.g a home, a public bathroom.

Treatment

Title

Changes to Narrative

We decided not to give the male character a name and also decided that the inital conversation should be more cool and relaxed. The guy just turns round and see Lotus sitting at the table and they have quite a casual conversation e.g "I knew you'd be here one day." He goes to get her her a coffee and gets his gun. He then points the gun at her. She says something like "not a good idea." Then they fight, she gets the gun. He dies/ This is also subject to further changes. We also thought about getting rid of the school run/wife scene as it joleted with the high class assasin idea however we felt family photos were a good idea.

Possible Location/Possible Actor for Daughter:

We talked about where we could shoot our film as we want it in a kitchen and posibly a front room. We agreed Francis's house was the best place to do this as his kitchen was recently refurbished and looks very modern. We also took exterior shots just in case. Francis also said his sister might be able to play the guy's daughter.

Most of these pictures are of my kitchen and garden, which we discussed as being an interesting setting for the action to take place in due to the binary opposites of domesticated life and international assasin's/fights to the death. Part of this came from the influence of the opening scene of Kill Bill: Part 1.

The second picture is of my younger sister who could play the role of the victim's daughter. However the group is more keen on the idea of a toddler than an older child and so this is just a test shot and the role may be played by someone else.

Very Rough Script Draft

Here is a rough first draft of the script I have written up focusing much more on the dialogue then stage directions or any technical description of shots. It's mostly to give a rough idea of the dialogue and the shape the scene will take at this stage:

Enfield, London, 23^rd February 8:00am

Wife: Goodbye darling. I’m going shopping after dropping her off so I’ll see you in a couple of hours (Kisses the top of his head)Have a lovely day

Michael: Bye darling.

Daughter: Bye Dad!

Micahel: Don’t I get a kiss?

Daughter: I’ve got to go to school Dad!

Michael: (Laughs) Okay. Have a great day

(Door slams. Michael sighs. Picks up plate, brings it over to sink to wash up. Suddenly there is a knife on his neck. )

Lotus: Hello Michael...

Michael: Lotus?!?

Lotus: (Laughs cruelly) You know me too well Michael.

Michael: I thought you were in jail. You had at least 10 years left.

Lotus: Things change Michael. I mean look at you. Nice house, wife and kid, quite a life you’ve got now. But you’ve been a bad boy...And the boss isn’t happy about it. (Pulls the knife in tighter)

Michael: (half laughs, teasing) Do you think you’re going to kill me?

Lotus: I know I’m going to kill you Michael.

Michael: You couldn’t kill me, I knew you couldn’t.

Lotus: (digging the knife in) You know nothing about me Michael.

Michael: I know that you couldn’t kill me.

Lotus: (Presses hard, forcing him to sit down) I could slice this knife right through your neck right now Michael. (Runs knife across his neck, blood starts to spill down.) But I’m enjoying this too much.

Michael: You won’t enjoy this, I promise you...

(Fight. Ends up with Lotus on the floor, Michael opening gun compartment looking for gun. It’s gone!!!)

Lotus: Are you looking for this

(Lotus standing up, holding gun towards him)

Lotus: I know where you keep your guns.

(Shoots him. As he luys on the floor bleeding she bends down, right up close to his face, to talk to him.)

Lotus: You don’t f***with him Michael. And you definitely don’t f*** with me. (or "mess" as a subsitute)

(Removes gloves etc, walks into garden. Takes out phone)

L.A, California, 23^rd February, Midnight

(Boss sitting in hotel lobby. Gets call and takes it outside.)

Lotus: This is Lotus. Mission Accomplished.

Boss: Good. Return to base.

(Snaps phone shut. Walks off down Hollywood Boulevard)

Inspirational clips on female assassins

Through varied meeting during this week we researched a lot on our key topic of female assassins, and what kind of film it will be. here are most of our inspirations, which gav eus our idea for having a female assassin film.


From this film we had the strong sense of what kind of assassin she would be in our film.


we had the inspirational idea of our title from this movie, as her name means something to her, we aslo wanted our character to have a meaning full name. we first researched which flowers represeent revenge; as just like the character in colombiana, our reason for our woman becoming an assassin was that she wanted revenge. Instead we came across Lotus which means chsity and purity. this is ironic as she is a killer but we see it as a sense where she is trying to get her purity back as she kills men that have done her wrong in her past and finds all men a target.


We thought this young female assassin was highly skilled, and we didnt want our assassin to be too old or too young however.


From this movie we thought about having a scene of the assassin in action but in black and white, as though her whole persona changes when she is on a mission, changing the film setting completely.


This is a tv sereis which has this assassin often in different disguises, we thought about having two looks for the assassin in the begginning: one before she kills her target and one when leaving the scene of the crime.

These are more movies on female assassins:

Ideas Brainstorm and Inspiration

We met to discuss ideas and genre's we would like to base our film openings on. We discussed the fact that thrillers were quite common among filmmakers our age and that we wanted to try something different. However, having siad that, watching other student opening sequences we realised perhaps thrillers were the easiest films to come up with ideas for. During our brainstorm we came up with several ideas, some of the main ones being:
1) A female assasin. Hotel room scene where she murdrs someone. Genre: Action/Adventure

2)Odd Roomates type Comedy/Hotel Room Mix Up. Opening set-up of one messy, one clean freak. Comedy.
3)Abused woman alone in her house, crying, messy, husband comes home and yells at her, she kills him in self-defence. Thriller
4)Teenage Slasher.

5)Escape from an Underground Basement. Tied Up, beaten up etc. Thriller OR make it a comedy with kids as the captors, tied up their babysitter.


As is probably evident these ideas are all quite vague. Therefore we decided we would all come up with either a fully developed new idea or develop one of these ideas to pitch to the group next week. Then we would make a decision on our final idea.

Research: Leon The Professional

To start our research we brainstormed some genres we might want to try. Nico suggested watching the trailer of this film because he'd seen the film and it was a good example of a ganster thriller film which a genre we were thinking of researching. It gave us some inspiration for film ideas if we decide to go down this route.