PLANNING Practice shoot video

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Our whole media class made a practice shoot which we each had to edit. Here is my version

TERMONOLOGY Terms I've learnt so far (November)

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Terminology Log (Terms used so far) from OliStr

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Our AS Media Studies class has combined all the terms which we have noted down so far into this one document.

TECHNOLOGIES: Techs I've used so far (Screenshots to come)

Final Cut:

• Setting up Libraries, events and projects
• Editing with greenscreen
• Using effects
• Using transitions 
• Editing audio levels (fade in/out)
• Adding ambient sounds to clips 
• Exporting videos 
• Importing videos/ audio
• Transforming / cropping clips
• Use of the colour correction tool.
• Using the voiceover function

Slideshare:

• Uploading 
• Embeding into the blogger

YouTube:

• Uploading videos
• Using annotations 
• Creating tags 
• Making the video Private, Public or Unlisted
• Creating a playlist 
• Embedding videos into blogger

TERMONOLOGY Semiotic rap

*Link to soundtrack* (Instrumental)

Come on, come close up,
see my whole face,
see my  fast pace
or short takes
now hold up...

Twist that lens sideways
See from my waist
or the eyes on my face
. *pop*

Now its a medium shot
see my chest, then the rest
Are you ready for whats next?

boom

After a little transition
I'll provide expostion,
Or whatever, binary opposition?

Now please, provide anchorage
I wanna know whats happenin
across this whole take.


Now tell me, do you want a birds eye
worms eye, hair dye a new zip and fly?
Cause call me, I got it all like mise-en-scene
I never leave anything unforeseen

*Bam* you hear that ambient sound?
 Was that a shot? so damn hot?

Listen, acheive a bit of what I call
Veri..simi..litude
Hey watch that attitude
Cause now i'm gonna try to make you feel..... *for me*
Its a really sad story

Uh

It was a lonely Sunday
I got filmed, with a HA
Director made me look weak
I mean.. What am I,
T-1k from judgement day?

Tell me, did you like this sound?
This diegetic sound?
Now tell me, who is the audience?
Can you guess the primary
While i tell you the secon
wait for it?....dary.
*mic drop*

TITLES Titles I will use

Idents:

• Usually 3 

Titles (Numbers):

• Around 20-30 titles
• however sometimes only companies and the director is mentioned
• About 5 minutes
• It's quite common to see a gap between titles)
• Companies 
• Usually about 3-4 companies are credited

Wording of the titles: (I will be using these in my film opening)

1.  *Insert a distributor or funding agency* presents
2.  In association with *Insert company*
3. A *Insert production company* production  
4. A *Insert directors name* film
5. *Insert main stars names* (Keep them on their own)
6. Co -starring *Insert actors name* 
7. With *Insert another actors name*
8. Introducing *Insert a new actors name* 
9. *Insert duo of actors names per sequence* (For the less important stars)
10. Casting by: ...
11. Music composed by: ...
12. Costumes designed by: ...
13. Editor: ...
14. Director of photography: ...
15. Lighting by: ...
16. Production designer: ...
17. Screenplay by: ...
18. Executive producers: ...
19. Produced by: ...
20. Directed by: ...

If "Based on the book" or "Based on the novel  by" it is an IP (Intellectual property)

Title design:
Depending on the genre there are many different title designs you could use. A red, serif font usually connotes a horror genre as the red signifies blood and the serif can signify sharp edges of a blade, amongst other things. If I were to make a drama, I would use Sans-serif, with a quite plain, white text as it is creating narrative enigma and setting a serious vibe for the audience. If I  were to create a comedy or teen movie I would use colourful, bubbly font as this connotes that the movie is going to be quite childlike, happy and informal.

PLANNING Storyboard of our idea for Camp Quarantine

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This storyboard is for the first minute of our film opening

TITLES Title analysis: Donkey Punch

TITLES
Number of people/company names in titles: 5 companies 17 people 
Start/end time of main titles: 0:30 - 1:11
Running time of main titles: 32 seconds
Start/end time of second title sequence: 3:13 - 5:00
Running time of second title sequence:  1 minute 47 seconds
Titles in order using exact text:

THE UK FILM COUNCIL and FILM4 -  split over 3 lines, centred 
In association with SCREEN YORKSHIRE and EM MEDIA presents - split over 5 lines, centred middle
a WARP X production - centred middle
DONKEY PUNCH - Large, centred
(INTERTITLE: Mallorca, Spain) - Narrative exposition - bottom centre
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Robert Boulder -  bottom mid-left
Sian Breckin - bottom , mid-right
Tom Burke - Top left
Nichola Burley - bottom/centre, mid/right
Julian Morris - bottom, right
Jay Taylor - top, mid 
Jaime Winstone - bottom left
CASTING DIRECTOR Des Hamilton- centred left, split over two lines
COMPOSER Francois-Eudes Chanfrault - bottom centred split over 2 lines
COSTUME DESIGNER Sarah Ryan - bottom let split over 2 lines
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EDITOR Kate Evans A.C.E - bottom left, split over 2 lines
PRODUCTION DESGINER Delaray Wagener - bottom right, split over 2 lines
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY Nanu Segal - top left, split over 2 lines
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS Peter Carlton Lizzie Francke -Bottom left, split over 3 lines
                                       Hugo Heppell Will Clarke - Bottom left, split over 3 lines



TITLES ANALYSIS 1: THE COMPANIES
5 companies were credited. Warp X is the main production company, a subsidiary of the indie company Warp, meaning they can't do high budget movies at all. Usually in the sub 1mil mark. Screen Yorkshire(Indie)  and FILM4(BBC owned subsidiary) and EM MEDIA are the financiers/ investors in the movie. There are no big 6 companies or other big companies involved as this is a low budget movie made by an Indie company.
TITLES ANALYSIS 2: ROLES
7 roles were mentioned in the title  and so were all the actors. Giving a total of 19 titles (including companies/ inter titles). This is a lot of titles for a movie without any a-list stars of any sorts or any known people for specific roles. The director isn't even mentioned once! Usually s/he gets mentioned twice but he mustn't be very popular to not be able to make the titles.

TITLES ANALYSIS 3: GENRE/NARRATIVE CONNOTATIONS
The companies and production workers have a larger font size than the roles or other words within the title. The text is serif and has no colour scheme. This makes it look modern and dramatic. There is a lot of narrative enigma as they are so commonly used for so many different genres. We can tell that it isn't going to be a happy movie and with the slow fade ins/ outs we get a feel that it is going to dramatic. This is juxtaposed however with the opening playing pop music and filming a group of female friends who are having a lot of fun drinking and partying.

TITLES Title analysis: Hail Caesar

TITLES
Number of people/company names in titles: 2
Start/end time of main titles: 0:34 - 0: 44
Running time of main titles: 10 seconds
Titles in order using exact text:

UNIVERSAL PICTURES     - Centred
            PRESENTS

                 A
WORKING TITLE - Centred 
       PRODUCTION



TITLES ANALYSIS 1: THE COMPANIES
There was two companies mentioned. Universal and Working Title. Working Title is a subsidiary of NBC Universal, which is one of the big 6 companies. These companies are very well known and usually make high budget films. Another anchor that this movie is a high budget as it has around 9 A-List stars but we know this due to the movie cover. There aren't mentioned any distributors mentioned within the titles. 

TITLES ANALYSIS 2: ROLES
There were no roles given in the titles at all. No actors were named and not even the director, who is usually mentioned twice in the opening titles.

TITLES ANALYSIS 3: GENRE/NARRATIVE CONNOTATIONS
The titles have a very serif and roman like font which connotes that the movie is about and or has links to roman times. 

PLANNING Practice shoots: What we need to work on/ what needs to be done.

Planning & Planning sheets:

• Teamwork and idea sharing (accepting parts of everyone's idea and/or coming up with a compromise on certain things.) 
• Call sheets: A summary of all the planning
• Script
• Cast
• Shot list
• Costume
• Organisation
• Making sure all the props are present
• Having call sheets
• Having a location already before a shoot.
• Detailed call sheets (Very important, the more detail, the better)
• Make sure it lists everything

Directing & Producing:

• Multiple shots (More to choose from when editing
• Tape/Chalk markings to tell the cast/ characters where to go
• Make it clear to the cast that the resetting has to be quick (No mucking about, etc.)
• CLEAR Instructions
• Controlling the set
• Making sure no one mucks about 
• "Silence on  set"
• Making sure everyone does their job
• Having food for long takes

Cinematography:

• Experiment with manual focus (Mostly in scenes where there isn't much movement)
• Coverage
• See something interesting but it isn't in your plan? 
• Film it
• Get an idea during shooting?
• Film it
• An actor suggests an idea and you like it?
• Film it
• This way you have a lot more shots to choose from making a more interesting scene / film overall.

5 Key tips for next time:

1. Make sure to use multiple cameras at different angles/ shot types during the same scene to get more footage
2. If you have made a very detailed call sheet, follow it and if you get new ideas, make sure you have coverage.
3. Motivate cast/ crew to work and not mess around 
4. Take multiple shots  until you think you have it perfect and once you have it perfect, do 1 or 2 more.
5. More detailed and clearer instructions for the whole cast / crew. It's always going to become better.

TITLES Film Opening Report: Four Lions

I got the template for the report here.
Four Lions  

CHRIS MORRIS (2010)

BBFC 15, MPAA R

Running time of the opening sequence: 3 mins

Budget: £2.5m 
UK/US/World Box Office: $3,7m, $300k, $4.4m.
Theatrical distribution in 19 countries 
  
Production co's:  Film4 Productions, Wild Bunch, Warp Films 
Production financing:  Wild Bunch, Optimum Releasing, Film4
UK, US theatrical distributors: StudioCanal, Magnolia Pictures

LINKS: The Numbers. Box Office Mojo, Wikipedia

TRAILER:
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TITLES                                                                     
Number of people/company names in titles: 

• 3 idents 
• 1 person (director) 
• 4 companies 

Start/end time of main titles: 2:36 - 3:01
Running time of main titles: 25 seconds
Titles in order using exact text:

FILM4 PRESENTS  (CENTERED)
FOUR LIONS (CENTERED)
IN ASSOCIATION WITH WILD BUNCH AND OPTIMUM RELEASING (CENTERED)
A WARP FILMS PRODUCTION (LEFT)        A CHRIS MORRIS FILM (RIGHT)

TITLES ANALYSIS 1: THE COMPANIES
There was credited 4 companies and 3 of these companies had an ident. The only company without an ident was the indie company "WARP FILMS". "Film4"  allowed for the film to be made and is why it is mentioned first as "presents," whereas the other companies were in association with "Film4". By seeing that it is produced by Film4 which is a free view channel we can tell that the movie is going to be a low budget/indie movie, otherwise the channel wouldn't be able to support it. "Wild Bunch" is the film distribution company and is a subsidiary of Filmo TV., it isn't a known company like "Columbia," which further ensures that this is a low budget movie. "Optimum Releasing," is a branch of "StudioCanal UK," which is another distribution company.

TITLES ANALYSIS 2: ROLES
The title only mentions one person and that is the director. This movie has a long cast list and with one A-list star, Benedict Cumberbatch. However this was made before he became popular and is therefore not mentioned in the title. See the full cast list here. It isn't usual that the title sequence has so little detail about the movie


TITLES ANALYSIS 3: GENRE/NARRATIVE CONNOTATIONS

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Here we see the font used throughout the title sequence. Its a sans serif and all capitalised font. It has a grey colour scheme and is quite bland. This connotes that the movie is serious and maybe dramatic. However this is juxtaposed by the starting scenes where there is an obvious dark comedy involved. This means that the comedy is very dark and about a serious topic. 


FIRST SHOT + THE PROTAGONIST
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This first shot instantly sets a serious tone as it is about a very serious topic, terrorism. We know this as there is a man who looks like a stereotypical Muslim with what looks like a jihadi symbol on his hat. The room is empty and there is a curtain as a backdrop with a bland colour scheme. The camera quality is bad, the lighting is bad, the angle is not straight and there is ambient noise in the background. This is how an amateur films. This is how we know it is a recording and not how the film is going to be like. A real film would never unknowingly have a camera set-up like this. It sets the scene as a stereotypical set-up for a terrorist propaganda/scare clip. We aren't sure if this is the main character as there is a voice-over happening.


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We only find out who the main protagonist is a minute later when the scene cuts to another featuring one guy (and his family) from the whole group that was in the first scene filming, looking over the videoclip they filmed. This scene goes on for about 1.5 minutes without cutting to another character, anchoring that this is the protagonist. Now we know it is "in real life" as the lighting, angle, sound and resolution is looks very professional. 



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ADDITIONAL POINTS
 I found the odd mix between the extremist jihadi culture and comedy is applied in the opening scenes as if "it's a normal everyday life." It helps set the perspective from the actual terrorists which in turn let's the audience see how all of this is from a terrorit's POV.