Dark Room from BDC on Vimeo.

Evaluation

This is an evaluation of the things in the last few months that has lead to the completion of our thriller opening. Our product is like many other thrillers in that it starts with string instruments, has many dark scenes and has credits that are in a cold colour(black in our case). One thing in our thriller that is different is that the forrest seen throughout isn't dreary in the least.
I think that Warner Bros. would be a good institution to distribute our media because although they've reprisented many thrillers such as Ocean's Eleven, Twelve and Thirteen it has also distributed less conventionall thrillers like The Matrix. Another institutuion that may be good to represent our flm is Fox Searchlight Pictures. Not only has it given us Slumdog Millionnaire but would be able to advertise to a large amount of people taking into consideration the amount of media power the owner of Fox, Rupert Murdock has.
The target audience for our film are mainly males with the average age ranging from 18-25. In our soundtrack for the film we had strings to start of with but then introduced an electro style wich surprisingly seemed to work. I think this made our opening seem a bit more up-to-date.
Having a dark room as one of the settings was very helpful as darkness is one of the things that gives an uncanny grittiness that thrillers are known for. In our film we've used the red light of a dark room, costume and a torch to provide the look of a swinging light in certain scenes. We decided to use the darkroom's light because we thought it would look more authentic then a filter.
From this project I've learnt a lot about filming pieces of action as it has taken longer than I thought it would to get a two minute amount of footage. Before I'd started the course I didn't even know how to use a camcorder. I have also learnt new skills in editing with Final Cut Pro and how to use Soundtrack Pro. This will be useful in future projects. If I did it agai I think I'd try to come up with a clearer and more detailed story board. A lot of valuable time was spent on decideing which shot to make next and where to put it.

Storyboard

The editing process

The editing process i have found really difficult. it has just seemed to take a long time. We found putting it together fine that all seemed to go well. However it has been the looping of sound that has taken time. Also putting on the credits. We couldn't manage to get them on in the way that we had imagined which was annoying. We had to spend a lot of time going over this again and again to try out different things until we finally what we got. Finally we were worried that our opening had ended up looking like a trailer and not an opening so we had to rectify that problem to which meant going back to the beginning and changing some bits to make it better.

The soundtrack that we have had to create for our piece is really hard. I don't really know much about music so i found this really hard. I had no concept of what to do and how it should be composed and i think to be fair is where our piece will fall down because i think the soundtrack that we have created is just not good enough to go witht the filming that we did.

Filming of our Thriller

I found the filming of our piece really enjoyable. The first day in the photography suite i found really hard. I t was very time consuming because we were looking for a particular light to swing across which of course we had to rig up ourselves so it was difficult to get the right speed of swing with the right amount of last cast on the camera so it just took a lot of tries to get it right. However once we had it we managed to do the light on the water table much easier. The arranging of the pictures was also quite difficult because we kept changing our mind and couldn't agree on the way we wanted them arranged and which ones took prominance.

Filming in the forest was a lot easier. We had a little more scope to do what we wanted and there was a lot less to set up. All we needed was the camera and Yolanda. Once we had got the shots that we had scripted down which went well once we had picked the right locations to start we then were able to have a little more fun. We each had a chance to film the bits that we wanted and we all shared our ideas some of which i think worked really well in the end. Better than some of the shots that we scripted. I felt sorry for Yolanda because she did end up doing a lot of running up and down the forest but in the end i think that she enjoyed it.

Shot list for Thursday

This day was a lot harder to write out the shots that we were going to use because we didn't know what the location was going to look like until we went there.
Low close up shot - Shot watching the feet of Yolanda as she runs
Long shot - Panning shot from high up in a tree showing the whole forest
Long Shot - Panning from the tripod on the ground showing the whole forest
Long Shot - Panning from the ground establishing the senery
POV Shot - From in the bushes looking at yolanda running and following her as she runs past
Medium shot - As yolanda travels over a log from one side to the other with the possibility of using match on action
Medium shot - Watching Yolanda run from down behind a hill to up over it and back down the other side.
Long shot zooming in to Medium close up - Far shot of a clearing zooming in to then seeing yolanda run across the screen
Medium shot - Yolanda running through dense foliage and running close past the camera.
These were all the shots that we planned for. Wer also wished to do several shots using the trees as cover and shooting in between them and around them. This meant that we were unable to list these prior to filming our piece.

Shot list for tuesday

Close up - A dark room. A light swings across from the ceiling. The light eluminates a camera, the light goes past and the room is in darkness. Whilst the light shows the room, our credits will be shown.
Close up - The dark room. A light swings and shines on a water tray on the table with some film in it. The light goes across and then swings back into darkness. Credits will be shown on this.
Close/medium shot - The dark room. Light shines on a wall of pictures. We take a long shot of all the pictures. We then zoom in on various close up pictures aswell.
Long shot - Long shot from high in the corner of the room panning slowly from one side of the room to the other so that we can get a whole shot of the surroundings.

Contingency PLan

If it rains then we will shoot on the weekend after the thursday or friday after school.
we will take extra batteries so that we do not run out of power
we will take extra tape so we do not run out of tape
We have booked the studio to make sure that we will be able to use the space
We will bring extra lights to make sure that the swinging light that we want is possible to get

Production Schedule

Tuesday 25th November
Costume:N/A
Props: light, torch, camera, pictures of Yolande, Film reel
Actors: N/A
Script: N/A
To be filmed during the lesson in the photography suite

Thursday 27th November
Costume: Trainers and jogging track suit
Props: Camera
Actors: Yolanda Bramble-Carter
Script: N/A
To be filmed in the morning of the day in question at 9am at the back of Taio's house in the forest.

Final Idea

A camera is sitting in an empty room. A single beam of light swings across illuminating the camera and then swinging back. Cut to a single tray of water with a few pieces of negative film in it. Once again the light swings across and swings back. Next cut to a wall in the same room with lots of photos on it of the same person. Cut to different pictures. Finally have a slow pan of the room giving us a whole look at the surroundings.

Meanwhile, in a forest somewhere a women is out running. it is early morning. Various shots of her from different angles and running up over hills and past trunks and through bushes. Another man is in the forest. he is watching her run. Following her and takiing pictures for his private collection. The photos in the empty room are of this women.

Preliminary task Review

I think that our preliminary task has come out very well. We did exactly what was asked of us and i think the out come is good. We have managed to adhere to the 180 degree rule making sure that we placed the camera together well. We have a good range of shots that show our competence with the camera. There are a few shots that don't seem to work so well. I also think that our match on action isn't completely perfect but i think that it is the best we could possibly ever get it because we had to completely move the camera in between takes. Overall i'm happy with what we have done and feel very positive for how our thriller is going to turn out to.

Preliminary Task

This is an introduction to the preliminary task. We have been asked to make a simple film. It had to consist of simply a person walking into a room and simply having a little conversation. We have then been asked to story board it together and then we have been asked to film it in our lesson. We have to star in it ourselves and make sure that everyone has a fair chance at using the camera. We also have to make sure that we adhere to the 180 degrees rule and the continuity rule aswell.

Editing part 2

For the last few days we've been working on putting effects on our credits and spreading them evenly throughout our thriller movie. We discussed the fact that we wanted the credits to be in black so that when the light plays across the screen at certain points the words are revealed, much in the same way evidence is revealed in a thriller movie. I thought it was a bit of a gamble and origonally opted for white or another cold colour but black seems to work so we've kept that effect. We've also been working on our movie soundtrack. At first we were going to record a version and add it to our work but this proved too complicated and so we decided to use Soundtrack Pro. We decided to use strings because although they're stereo-typical thriler instruments it gives the inroduction the coldness it deserves. We've made a good start and will be finnishing up this week.

Filming Diary

The filming process was easy to handle mainly because we knew very much so what we wanted. As a group we had the same vision and therefore could bounce off each other very easily. This has been the case throughout the hole process so far. The one thing that I could say about the first day is that our lack of experience showed in our ability to hold concentration.
The monotonous activity of setting up the camera for every different shot brought about a slow recline in our concentration that could be seen in the amount of takes that we had to do and the time taken. This concentration resulted in some clashing of ideas between members of the group. I was happy however that despite this, we were mature enough to talk through these and continue with the work.

The second day of shooting was in the forest behind my house which was easy for me. It was a very relaxed process and less of a test than the previous day. I think this may have been because of the fresh air unlike being in a dark room shooting. In some ways the forest gave us some inspiration and we ended up shooting a few more shots than we had originally anticipated.

There was a problem in the fact that we were filming in a communal forest meaning that we had unwanted “background artists” as I called them, but they were mainly primary school kids that were rather adorable.

We found a problem regulating the sun light, creating a continuity problem for us. Through out the morning we had to re-shoot a couple of the shots or wait for clouds to help solve the problem.

Yet again, the equipment re-arranging became annoying. Unlike being indoor where you just have to move across a room, this time we had to move around a forest which became tiring by the end.

Over all I believe we left with some good shots and enough footage to create the idea that we have.

Idea Analyzed

We have created an idea for our thriller opening that we hope will engage the audience whilst still un nerving them. I have always felt that these are two of the most integral things in thriller openings. However we have taken into account that we are not shooting a high budget film like most thrillers so our idea (previously explained by Jack). We therefor wanted to make it simple but still effective. We have organized to shoot in two easily accessible locations to help. This means no money coming out of our project. We use one actor who is also in our group which yet again cuts complication.

Our production schedule Tuesday 25th November and Thursday 27th November are the fewest amount of days we could shoot in whist still getting the shots we need. This will avoid any extra complications with clashes in our own personal schedules. Using fewer days also give us a chance to have contingency day to shoot another story-boarded idea if we don’t collect enough footage.

“A camera is sitting in an empty room. A single beam of light swings across illuminating the camera and then swinging back. Cut to a single tray of water with a few pieces of negative film in it. Once again the light swings across and swings back. Next cut to a wall in the same room with lots of photos on it of the same person. Cut to different pictures. Finally have a slow pan of the room giving us a whole look at the surroundings.

Meanwhile, in a forest somewhere a women is out running. it is early morning. Various shots of her from different angles and running up over hills and past trunks and through bushes. Another man is in the forest. he is watching her run. Following her and taking pictures for his private collection. The photos in the empty room are of this women.”

POSTED BY BRIT SCHOOL BDC AS THRILLERS AT 12:52 0 COMMENTS
LABELS: JACK

Our opening has no clear narrative. We decided to do our opening this way after being influenced by openings such as “Usual Suspects” and “Momento.” This devise is used to force the audience to want to know what can happen next. They ask the question “what is coming out of this?” However, in order to do this we must have a clear answer to that question, otherwise our opening will loose the effect that we want it to have and it will look sloppy.

We have also chosen to follow a femme fetal challenging that characters you would normally see. She isn’t Caucasian with blond hair. WIth this we hope to break through a different audience barrier and appeal to more people. We felt that the classic idea of a femme fetal was in many way out dated and by changing this we hope to show our vision of future film.