Monday 22 February 2010

Location Richmond Park


We decided to chose Richmond Park as the location for our project because it lets us explore and create the conventions of sci-fi in this particular location. The reason for this is there is a lot of space to make a super natural events happen, because we are filming it in the night it creates more tension in the woods. Therefore it makes the audience think anything could happen, so in a realistic point of view something like aliens could occur in this type of area.

Treeva Pasha
















The reason we decided to film uphill was to create a sense of isolation between our character and the rest of the world. We wanted to express to the auidence that he is entirely alone and although he is very bright, he is still voulnerable to what is out there in the woods. Another reason we decided to film uphill is because we felt this would be a great oppourtunity to film some point of view shots and have our character facing the view of the land, tress, roads and bushes from a distance on top of the hill.

Mariam Nikpour

Wednesday 10 February 2010

Final 'Have you fed the Fish?' ancillary task



Overall this clip was 2 minutes and 50 seconds.
We used offlicenced music from http://www.freeplaymusic.com/
This clip was edited on Imovie newest one.
The camera used was a Lumix Parasonic FZ38.

Research: The Godfather



We chose to do a study on the film 'The Godfather' because the elements used in this film such as the lighting, genre, the plot and characters have been refelcted on our work. When we mention the lighting in the film 'The Godfather' it is very dark which represents the theme darkness and it creates a sence of a dangerous atmosphere. We had to use certain props to make the genre clearer to the audience, Person B 'The Boss' was wearing a leather jacket which represents his type of character, he is in a office yet he is not wearing a suit or formal clothing, this emplies that he is not your usual 'Boss' and his character may give a bad impression and is shown as your typical bad guy towards the audiance.

Wednesday 3 February 2010

Editing: Feed the Fish


Once we finished filming, we them attempted to upload the footage on to the Mac's. We had some difficulties uploading the videos on to iMovie because we used a different camera to what the school provided us with. The camera we used was a more advanced piece of technology consequently there was a different technique to use when uploading the videos, as this took us some time to discover how to figure it out, we asked the school technician to help us and he showed us the special technique as to what to do, we took note of this and in a few weeks time when it comes to uploading footage for our final task we will know what to do. When the footage was imported on to iMovie, we then carefully watched through the videos we had previously filmed and we made at note of what we felt needed to be deleted and what we will be keeping. As we looked through all the footage, we realised that we had made some mistakes. Firstly the lighting that we used during filming turned out to be surprisingly dark, for example when there is a close up of the sign on the door; we cannot read the writing because it is too dark. Due to lack of time we could not re-shoot the scenes that needed to be so we had to work with what we had by using iMovie to edit and brighten up certain scenes, as we began to edit we realised that the ''dark effect'' works well and it brought a more spooky mysterious effect to our project. Another mistake we made during filming was that we ''crossed the line'' of media rules, we did this by filming Person A from one angle and then cutting to film the same shot from another angle. Again we did not leave ourselves enough time to overcome this problem by re-shooting these scenes. However now we have acknowledged our faults and we will learn from this for future preferences.

Monday 1 February 2010

''Feed the fish'' Story board



1a) We decided to follow the guideline and create a establishing shot of a municipal building in New Malden high street. We had two choices, one building was called the ''C I Tower'' and the ''APEX Tower'' When we looked at them we decided to go with the ''C I Tower'' because it had the grey colour scheme which represents an unsettled atmosphere. This is very important in conveying our genre.

1b) In the guideline it said ''a camera tracking into the building and up a flight of stairs'', we thought we could film them in two seperate scenes, rather than tracking the building with the stairs, this was to find stairs which helped the audience to identify the genre, this added to the tension of the scene.

2) We tracked up a flight of stairs which had a natural yellow and black colour theme. This informs our audience that there is going to be a sence of danger because the use of the two colours next to each other represents danger.

3a) We decided to change the guideline again by shooting an establishing shot of the office door before the close up of a sign on a door. We opened the door slightly so a ray of yellow light would beam out from the darkness, this could represent a near death experience for person A.

3b) We did a close up of the sign on the door with a point of view shot of person A. We used our camera to give a weak focus, which showed how nervous the character was and it gave an idea that he was about to pass out. This links well with the near death experience we have explained above.

4a) We chose to do an over the shoulder shot of person A opening the door, this shows to the audience that the yellow light covered his body which shows that he is entering the danger zone. To support this idea we placed the camera behind his shoulder, as if we are hiding behind him.

4b) We carried on filming him walking into the office, using an over the shoulder shot. This time we filmed him walking directly into the room.

5a) We filmed a reverse angle shot introducing our new character, person B. We filmed behind person B not showing his face, this represents him as being a mysterious man, this puts the audience into an uneasy position.

5b) We decided to do a close up shot of person B's feet on the table showing that he does not show any remorse and shows his higher status.

6a) We decided to create a mid shot of person B sitting with his legs on the table showing characterisation that he is cocky and snobbish. Person B then says ''I wondered when you might get here'' as he says this he places his legs under the table showing that he is now engaging with perosn A, he then says ''please sit down''. It is essential for him to say straight foward short sentences showing the importance of this character B.

6b) We shot a point of view shot of person B sitting on the chair infront of perosn A. We made the tracking shot really unbalaced which shows how nervous person B is, which links back to shot 3b.

7) We decided to track person A to the seat aswell, this was so that we could mix the shots 6b and 7 to show his facial expressions and his movements to make it clear to the audience that he is nervous.

8) Then we shot a medium close up of person B as he says ''so what kept you?'', this was to show his emotionless face, this helps us the audience learn more about his character.

9a) We chose to film a high angle shot of person A sitting on the chair as he says ''yes, sorry im late, traffic''. This allows us to look down on him which shows the position of this situation at the moment.

9b) In shot 9b we filmed a shot reverse shot of person A to person B, this was show their relationship and that they are having an intent conversation. We also decided to film a close up shot of person A, this was to focus the audience's attention on person A's facial expressions.

10a) We decided to film a reverse angle shot of person B, not allowing the audience to see his face, they could only see the back of his head and the chair. We did this to create a sense of mysteriousness of the character. 

10b) Just as person B begins to talks, the camera changes to another reverse angle shot at the opposite direction, the audience can now see the back of person A and person B sitting at the table. Person B then says ''Have you fed the fish?'' Person A then reply's ''yes, don't worry, I've taken care of it'' Person B says ''good''. The reason we decided to film a reverse angle shot showing the back of person A was to make the audience feel that they are on person A's side and it helps them to emphasis with him because we can also see how angry and scary person B is.

11) We then filmed a close up of person A as he says ''what do you want me to do next?'' we decided to film a close up as he said this so that the audience focus on his facial expressions. He looked nervous and on edge.

12a) We filmed a mid shot of person B as he stands up. We decided to chose a mid shot so that the audience focus only on his facial expressions and hand gestures.

12b) Person B then walks around the desk, this time we filmed a low angle shot to show that he is higher in status and his actions are important.
12c) Aa person B walks towards person A, he places his hand on person A's right shoulder, we filmed this in a mid shot - two shot to show the characters relationship between one another. We also filmed the back of person A and person B's face was in full view of the camera, we did this to show person B's facial expressions and at the same time we wanted the audience to feel like they are on person A's side again.

12d) We then filmed a reverse angle shot at the opposite direction as person B says ''i was just coming to that''. We did this to portray person A's facial expressions and his hand movements. He was touching his fingers together and looking down, this represents his lower status and lack of confidence.

Ancillary Task ''Have you fed the fish?''

First Task
''Have you fed the fish?''

We were given a short script as a guideline, however we could manipulate or change it in any way that we wanted to, this allowed us to change the script in any order, play around with the genre of the story and present it to the audience in any way. Using a tripod was essential since half of our shooting sessions were done using a tripod.
The first impressions we got from this guideline was the idea to present it in a typical office setting. However we wanted to make sure the genre was clear, therefore we decided to change the idea to a gangster style drama.