Filming day... again

Today, February 26, we attempted filming again... it went well however we need to make some improvement. When we filmed, I suggested that we should focus on the ending bedroom scene because we were only able to film from 4:00pm to 5:30pm because of our schedules, but, we wanted to keep getting as much raw footage we can get so re-shoots wouldn't have to happen before the peer review day on March 3. Once we got to Montana's house to film, I changed my clothes into the costume we saw fit that was the same as the one I wore to the lake filming day. While we filmed, I was mostly the director and actor, directing in the beginning and acting at the end when I was needed. While I directed, I made several adjustments to the room to make it look more like night as it was around 4:45 when we began to film. Some of the adjustments I made were: pulling a second layer of the blinds out to cover the window more and only letting in cracks of light that were more a light white, sort of like the moonlight, coming through making for a perfect set for a middle of the night dream. I also was a camera man as I was the tallest to get the high angles that we needed as well as quiet enough so footsteps wouldn't be heard. One issue we encountered was one of our actors breaking character at times making for scenes that we could not consider because of a crack of a smile during a scene. This persisted for some scenes, however, at times she would remain serious and we would get the shots we needed. Also, I was an actor throughout this film, so when needed I switched positions with one of my group mates. As an actor I needed to stand over the victim and draw the weapon before it cuts to a black scene. I completed my role and then we dumped all footage onto my laptop where it will stay until we edit our film. 

Editing day: Editing the bedroom scene

It has finally come time to edit some parts of our film that we were able to record during the week. During the course of the week, we went to a group member's house and we were able to capture the ending scenes of our original movie intro. In our storyboard, the girl jumps out of what seems to be a bad dream of being chased, however, the dream becomes reality after the same character that was seen chasing her reappears in her bedroom. To edit the movie we decided on the iMovie program in apple computers. All raw footage was dumped onto my personal laptop where I dragged and placed the scenes into the open iMovie editing area. During the editing process, I covered the transitions between the scenes that are being used as well the sounds in the film. While moving through the different scenes and angles several times, I began to find the rhythm of startling events so I decided to use jumpshots as well as some cross screens but I found that the split screens do not work as well with film as it does for video games. Also, during our editing process I was also entrusted with covering all the sounds in the film, whether they are diegetic or non-diegetic. For example, I usually had to alter the sound by lowering the volume of it so it wouldn't overpower the heavy breathing used in our film. Another example would be me using the different sound tools already in iMovie and finding their place within our film without it seeming unnatural to our film.

Filming Blog: Securing our locations

Our group has had difficulty coming together for a set film date because of personal schedules, however, I have taken the time to secure our locations as well as ensure we will be ok filming there. When it came time to plan for blogs We have decided to film February 22, 23, and the 28 as all days were available for each group member. Transportation has also played a significant factor when it comes to our group coming together. Since most of us live over 10 miles from each other, the location we meet at to film, Silver Lakes Nature Park, is in Davie, FL. Davie being closer to me since I live in West Hollywood, FL; however, our farthest group mate, Reese, lives nearly 45 minutes from the park. Reese also has no car that she can take for hours at a time to get down here so her not being able to drive is also an obstacle. With all these obstacles, our group can 100% get the job done when it comes to coming together for the filming process. Like I said, our dates to film as of now go for: February 22, 23, and finally the 28. This will give us optimal time to edit as we can meet after school at a nearby Starbucks and finish our editing. On March 2, we have our peer editing review day, a day where another student watches your nearly completed movie and grades it, so all of our work must be done by then. Although there is limited time, I strongly believe that my group will be able to get it done as we are pretty clutch. During this time I did take the liberty of checking out the park itself and deciding where it would be best to film for lighting and least interruptions from the surrounding areas. I chose towards the back end of the lake to the left as sun is able to penetrate through the trees, but just enough so a glare wouldn't be produced as a result of it being reflected off the water. Below is a picture of the lake side we are using for a scene during our movie intros to give a better understanding of what the park looks like.

Title Power Point

Planning Power Point

For this week of planning, we discussed certain elements that will be important when we film. Specifically, we went over health and safety, location, participants, our schedule, and title design.  When discussing Health and Safety, we thought it was important to discuss how we will navigate through a wooded area since it will most likely be at sundown when we film. Additionally, as I just mentioned we will be filming in an area that resembles the woods, most likely a large park nearby one of our houses. Then, for our participants, it will only be my group mates and I acting and producing the film. Since there are 4 people in our group, we decided it was best to have a loose schedule since there might be days where something unexpected comes up, but we are also hoping to only film twice at most (2 separate days).

Shooting Script

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  The shooting script blog is different from the sound script as the shooting script includes some if not all camera movements and angles. The reason that we included a shooting script is because it is a written form of the storyboard with the same amount of detail. Once again we broke down the film into multiple scenes and described briefly the action that the character is doing as well as the camera movement around that character. Without the shots script, film makers would have a much more difficult time shooting film because they have no plan. Also, as students we do not have film sets so we must film wherever we possibly could and not be able to shoot retakes as we are crunched for time. 

Sound Script

• Since we have prepared our final task we began to plan and make our scripts for the introduction of our two minute movie beginning. In our script we decided that we will be separating our opening sequence by scene and indicate exactly what the audience will be hearing in each scene. In the topic of sound we covered every piece of it, from the Voice overs to non diegetic sounds that will be played through the course of the film. When writing our sound scripts for our film, we stressed the importance of it. Sound scripts allow us to plan and hear what the audience will be hearing, also, it lays down a foundation as to how the movie will move along with the sound alongside it. In the case that the sound script is ignored or isn’t prioritized, the quality of the film would greatly decrease as the movie will be lost. Since sound is the major accompaniment to film, these reasons are why it is so important to have a huge priority