Question 7

Question 6

Question 5

Question 5 on Prezi

To create the slides I used Paint

Question 4

Question 3

For technical issues the order of the slides is wrong; the right order is:

1. Question 3
2. Production and distribution of "Lucid"
3. Types of distribution
4. National Distribution
5. Guerrilla group
6. Worldwide Distribution
7. Conglomerates' images
8. THe best distribution company for my film

Question 2

Question 1

For technical issues the order of the slides is wrong the right order is:

1. Question 1
2. Phrase
3. 4 opening structures
4. Conventions of title sequence-colour and fonts
5. Title sequence
6. Pictures of "The Stepfather"
7. Transitions and effects
8. Pictures and explanation of "Arlington Road","Seven" and "Psycho"
9. Opening of Lucid
10. Images and Explanation of "Lucid"
11. Images and Explanation of "Lucid"

Comments from the crew of 'Lucid'

First day of filming - on set pictures

Above are some on set pictures that we took on our first day of filming before we actually started to shoot. As you can see the first 4 shots are of the interior rooms that we are going to use such as the kitchen, work surfaces and the corridor and also the exterior of the back garden which we are going to film the killing scene in. Taking these pictures helps us to plan out where we are going to place the characters and the props ect. We will be able to dictate where we want to put things by looking at these pictures. We are happy with our chosen set as it has all the things that we wanted to have such as the dining table, work surfaces and then garden area.

Location for filming

Here is a screen shot of the map of where we will be filming for our opening of LUCID. We are filming at Jayne's house as it is accessible for all of the group members to get to and we can use her kitchen for the interior scene and her garden for the exterior ones. She lives at number 2 Ferrestone Road which is in Hornsey, Haringey. As you can see on the map, there is a railway station close by which is called Hornsey station and this is good because then the group can easily travel there. 

First trial of Soundtrack Pro

Here are the screen shots that we have taken while we have started to use Soundtrack Pro for the first time in todays lesson. Gustavo and I decided to use photobucket in order to present the images so that it will be more aesthetically pleasing and so that our blog doesn't get boring with just having loads of images. Here we are experimenting with sounds so we are using a number of different tracks that we have chosen from the sound bank. We have been trying out a number of different string instruments as they are very good at creating suspense with their orchestral feel. We hope to finish our compostion soon as we are working hard in order to create a track that has a suspenseful feel.

Schedule and Call sheet

This is our schedule sheet and our call sheet; the call sheet is made for the purpose of enabling the actors and crew to know the where to go for filming, how to get there and what time to be at the location. This is very important so that all the crew will arrive at the set on time. This call sheet also gives information such as full names and mobiles numbers of the main crew members such as director, producer and sound and director of photography as our opening is not a big budget production we do not have a director of photography and sound technician so they are not featured on the call sheet. This sheet also gives the information to the cast about what particular times they are due to be on set and what time they are on set. 

The schedule sheet gives information information of all the days that we will film on and the scenes that we are doing and the amount of pages from the script that they are doing. As we are doing an opening of the movie we do not have any script therefore the scenes and the pages are not relevant in our schedule. 

The pitch

This is the planing of our opening, is very simple and clear but gives enough information about how the opening will be produce.

LUCID Rough Cut

Above you will see the rough cut of our opening to our film LUCID. Here we have briefly strung the footage together in the correct order  we would like it to flow in. We have not used any effects or titles on it yet which we will add soon. We also need to finish composing our music which we will lay on top of the footage so it will create intrigue and suspense. Currently there is not much suspense built here as this is just the footage following simply and with the music played over this it will build the suspense and make it much more dramatic. So far we believe that our work is panning out well as we have got all the relevant footage we need so we do not need to film anymore because all the footage is fine how it is. When we filmed we spent a lot of time taking many shots so that when we came to editing we had more choice of footage to play with. This was a good thing to do as now we have got great footage with good camera shots and angels that we have been able to use to make this rough cut of our film opening.

Final Project Editing

Today in class we have started the editing of our final project for our opening Lucid. We are using Final Cut Pro to edit our work and we have taken some screen shots of us editing. Our editing is a slow pace as the camera work was handheld so the shots are quite long therefore the editing does not have many cuts in some sequence. The effects that we have added at this point are quite basic such as dissolve in and fade out  because we are trying to focus on creating a good sequence first before adding more effects. We have used cross cutting at the end of the sequence so we can alternate between two scenes of the killing and of the man writing the information down. To establish the location we used various different shots of the front of the house in order to set the scene for the audience.

The screen shots above are the ones that we have taken while we have started editing, in the first screen shot you can see a shot of the location where the story is taking place. This looks like an ordinary house from the outside which may lead the audience to believe that an ordinary person lives there which they will soon be shown that this is not true. The second screen shot is of all the thumbnails of the footage that we have taken, we had a lot of footage to choose from but we have chosen the best ones to use in our editing. The final screen shot featured here is of the main character (Mark) acting, it is important to introduce the main character here in the opening sequence so the audience can get to know the character and know from who's perspective the film will revolve around. Overall we believe that it is very important to take screen shots of our work so we can document what we do incase we need to look back for future reference.

ADDING TITLES

We have know begun to add titles to our film opening while we are editing. We have continued to use Final Cut Pro throughout our whole editing which has been good for our group because we have all learnt about how to use the program. In the first screen shot you can see the title of the film, "LUCID" appear in big clear black font over a white wall. The whiteness here reflects the innocence of the characters however the black font on top also reflects the dark acts the man commits. In the second screen shot we see Mark coming through the font door and we  then see his name appear next to him as he walks through. This is a good timing to put the actors name in as we can see who the actor protrays in this film so we can be clear in our heads about this.
The third screen shot shows the titles that say "An Amber Ryder Production" over the as shot of all the bloody knives layed out across the kitchen counter. It is very important to feature the production company/ producers in the title sequence as these are very important for the making of the film. The whiteness of the font here sits nicely against the blue back ground which makes it stand out clearly.
In the final screen shot we see the killer holding the knife beginning to walk towards the lady to kill her and here the directors name appears on the right hand side. Again we use the white clear font that we have used for all the other titles. The directors name appears here because the most important scene is about to take place and the director is the most important person for the creation of any film.
We have now finished putting on the titles which means that we have finished our editing. The editing was a fun process although it could be quite tedious at times because it takes a lot of effort to make it perfect. Due to the fact that we took numrous amounts of footage whilst filming, this meant that we had lots and lots of footage to play with while editing which gave us a good advantage because we could chose the very best clips that we had so we didnt have to go and film anymore.
Editing was a fun process and with the hard work from some group members we were able to get it done on time.

Cinematography

As a director and camera-man in "Lucid" I have planned to experiment with handheld in our opening but also having some classic shots as MCU and CU. The opening of "Lucid" needs to give enough information to catch the audience into the story and create intrigue but also has to be interesting in the way is tell. As a director I want to give life to objects as the main character follows the orders of a mobile it is important to create that connection between objects and audience. To to this I have been looking at the work of Pedro Almodovar; Spanish director who is famous for his romantic and dramatic stories based on a woman as a main character. The use of the ECU in objects with panning in his films is very effective to create that connection between object-audience and even when is totally different genre I will like to experiment this technique.

Todo sobre mi Madre
(All about my mother)

This kind of shots are very interesting for the audience and as I believe can be very effective in a thriller. This technique was used in "The stepfather" just once.

The stepfather

This technique will be definitely something that I will experiment with during the filming, I will try to do the most of the filming in handheld, to accomplished a better views for the audience and be different from the other openings.

Audience

Be aware of the target audience is one, or the most important pre-production issue. The target audience, sets the mood and the way how the story is going to be tell. The audience has a direct connection in the way how the story is tell as an example is the sequel of Shrek. Shrek is an huge ogre that does not like anyone but for situations of life he has to save a princess; during this adventure he has to fight soldiers and different kind of monsters, as the target audience is children, we do not see blood in any of the sequence including in huge fights of soldiers, the use of personification make soft the idea of the main job of the animal, for example an ass is just use to carry thing but in the film does not. If the target audience were adults the story will be the same but the way that is tell will change drastically. In the fighting scene will be more realistic battles with blood and injure people and the animals will have the real purpose.

Before the film is release and even when the filmaker knows which one is the target audience, the film has to be classified and this process in the UK is made by BBFC (british board of film classification)

The process of classifying


In most cases the decision is ratified by a Senior Examiner, but if the Examiners are in any doubt or fail to agree, or if important policy issues are involved, the work may be seen by other members of the Board up to, and including, the Director and Presidential team. The BBFC has published guidelines to know more or less what is the path to classified a film.


Examiners look at issues such as discrimination, drugs, horror, imitable behaviour, language, nudity, sex, sexual violence, theme and violence when making decisions. They also consider context, the tone and impact of a work (eg how it makes the audience feel) and even the release format (for example, as DVDs are watched in the home, there is a higher risk of under-age viewing).


The categories


The BBFC endeavours to classify submitted works in one of the following categories:

The following pages set out guidance on how the main issues (for example, sex and violence) are specifically applied from ‘U’ through to ‘R18’. The criteria should be read in the light of the general approach set out earlier under ‘General Principles’, ‘Overarching Factors’ and ‘Main Issues’.

Because works from time to time present issues in ways which cannot be anticipated, these criteria will not be applied in an over-literal way if such an interpretation would lead to an outcome which would confound audience expectations.

Opening Plot

The plot of our film "LUCID" is about a killer who has a peculiar way of organising his life, and thus his kills. The title is called LUCID because it is ironic - lucid means when something is clear and easily understandable, but the killer's coding and organisation seems complex and confusing, however for him it makes perfect sense.

The storyline follows the reasons for his madness. Every so often he receives a text with an alphanumeric code, which he then writes down on a sticky note and pastes on his wall. The viewer can see that there are many notes already on his will, crossed out in blood, which leaves the suspicion that he has done this before. To raise this suspicion, there is a line of various "murder tools" that are covered in blood in his kitchen.

The scene opens with the killer outside, covered in blood with a bloody knife in his hand. He seems angry, so the viewer can assume he has just killed someone. He then returns home, and takes off his shirt, putting it in a bin bag that has obviously been placed there in advance. He then moves over to the sink where there are knives soaking in a bowl and drops the bloody knife in. The water turns red as the blood comes off. The killer wipes the blood on his hands off onto a sticky note on the wall in front of him. He leans over the sink, showing he is tired. Suddenly, a loud buzz is heard and he looks around. A phone is vibrating on the table. He goes over and picks it up, looking at the message he just received. He then sits down, and begins to decode the message onto a new sticky note. The message reads "Sarah Williams". He then puts it up on his wall. The scene then jumps to a woman doing her gardening. All of a sudden, the killer appears, and kills her. He returns home, and the scene somewhat repeats itself.

Although it seems long, when condensed, the film time should not be too much. We may cut some things to shorten the scene. We'll have to see when we get to editing.

Filming!

Over the last two days, we've been hard at work with the process of filming our opening for our film, LUCID. To document our experience, we've been taking lots of on set pictures. Overall, I think the one thing was can say was we had the most fun playing with the fake blood!

 

 Location filming in the street, this was very ideal especially for this sort of thriller movie because it tells the audience a story in a way, just by looking at the setting.

Adding the fake blood for our Mise En Scene

to emphasise how crazy and twisted this man really is. also how far he is willing to go just to kill someone

fake blood is very cheap and we were able to collect allot of it from stores.

Our Camera man out in the wild. just testing the camera and the lightning as we are going to be filming the death scene there.

Opening up the bin bag, this is the bag that the murderer is going to hide his bloody clothes in.

 Caught red handed! always great to have fun when in production and work as a team

Improvising a blood-pouch for the stabbing section.

Mark conceals the pouch in his hand. so when the knife is dropped into the sink the pouch is squezzed and fake blood comes out.

Amber is fixing a stool so we can have the proper angle for a certain shot.

Gustavo is trying to avoid getting his shadow in the shot. in the end we got there although this was very difficult.

Trying to get the necessary lighting via reflection.

Overall our last day of filming turned out very well as we had fun doing it which is always an important part that you enjoy what you are doing. We also decide to take lots and lots of footage of various different shots and angles of the same scene so that when we come to the actual editing we have have a lot of footage to play with and to work from. We spent about 5/6 hours filming so it was a long day and we were all tired out afterwards but we are glad that we got everything done. The most fun was to film the stabbing scene, Jayne is a very good actress and she made the stabbing look really realistic. Also Mark was a good actor too as he portrayed the character of a murderer very well. We are sad that filming is over now but we are happy with the footage we have. Today we also recorded foley sounds like phone vibration and the gasps so that we can add them over the footage in the lessons coming up.

The planning

in today’s media studies lesson we started to plan our thriller films, there were many ideas that came to play in our group discussions for example the title that we choose, which is called “LUCID”, we choose this name to be our title because the word is obviously known for being a clear perception and understanding of something which links to our plot as it is very deceptive. The plot is about a man who reads numbers off a device (mobile phone) and they indicate who he is supposed to kill. In the opening the audience will establish a house, prop which is the device and the characters. He is pleasant to his family, until the device goes off, at which the point he leaves promptly, taking a knife from the kitchen and kills a young innocent girl.

Well genre means any category of literature and sub genre is a category that is a sub division of a larger genre, so in a way it is a combination of two types. Our thriller film is a thriller action as it uses violence, knives and blood. The film that inspires us to do such a sub genre was the movie step father as the man (step father) was a sweet, polite and kind-hearted man to society but to his own family he is a monster.

Mice en scene is the expression used to describe the design aspects of theatre production and film production. The props that we are going to use were fake blood when the lady gets stabbed and a knife. We were also going to use the device which will light up and give signal for the man to take action. The clothes that the characters will be wearing will be regular clothing especially for the murderer as we did not want to make this character seem suspicious to the people around him and to the audience, we want the audience to be surprised. the body language may vary between characters for example the young women would look sweet and innocent while the murderer himself to his family would portray this cool, carm and collected body language but once the device lights up you will notice a switch in the man’s head and this aggressive body language will emerge and he will afflict it on others. The setting will take place in Jayne’s house as the inferior (which means inside) as her house has bigger space and the exterior would be in the garden (which means outside). We expect the audience to react to these microelements in a shocked way especially to the man who they will think that he is a carm and a cool guy but they are wrong.

Our schedule times will be quiet tight due to Jayne who is one of the members and characters that will be portraying a role in the movie, is currently ill and Gustavo who is the camera man and producer of LUCID will not be hear from the 13^th to the 17^th of February, which means that there will only be two members of the group that will possibly be shooting instead of 4, that is if Jayne’s makes her return. we start production of the filming on the 12th febuary 2012.

There are many risks when we are using the cameras outside school premises for example if the weather is bad and it is raining the cameras could get wet and could break down. As Jayne’s house destination is far we may get lost or confused in which direction we should take to get there. Fake blood consists of many things that can cause a skin reaction especially for those who have sensitive skin therefore we should be careful the way we use it. The battery plays an important part because if the battery was supposed to die then this could have a bad effect on us especially if we are far away from the school; this means that we will have to travel back to school which will consume most of our filming time

We have learnt many skills on this course for example we have learnt how Foleys have benefited films in the long run therefore making them successful and how producers have used it. We as a group know how to blog regularly on a daily basis on things that has inspired our thriller film. We have also learnt how to use the cameras such as inserting batteries and using the camera itself this was the most crucial part. The 180 degree rule was another thing that we know how to do and when to use it. Last but not least the hidden curriculum (learning things that you do not know that you are learning) for example doing blogs and meeting deadlines.

The audience that we are going to target this film would be 15 yrs and above due to the violence, blood and the use of destructive weaponry such a knives. The audience will watch this sort of films in the cinema were it is dark; it’s for those who like getting shivers down there spine like a “crippled finger”. It’s for those who love films that are suspicious and scary.

The preliminary ideas about sound is that we well be using allot of Foleys, Foleys are sounds added by editing for example the sound of knives being taken form a cupboard or the noise a knives makes when it connects to a human body, the way we will make this sound is by using a knife and stabbing an apple to make the Gnostic sloshing noise. This will help emphasise that particular movement. This will benefit us as the cast and producers because we are able to hear it much better, so the audnece will get an idea of what is going on.


the production scedualle will now be changed to 9th of febuary as my group is currently unavailable