Production/Editing

Editing

So, if you have been keeping up with my previous blogs. I have not finished all my recordings because we have been unable to, but plan to finish tommorow. So in the mean time, I have just been editing the clips I already have just to not waste any time doing it later. After editing it completely, we now have the fully finished clip which is the end scene for the opening.

Here is the fully finished clip after I edited in some background sounds. This full clip shows Oliver in the bathroom where he is taking out the weed from his bag which is wrapped in his clothes. the the bag of weed is just meant to show that Oliver is doing drugs, but the whole purpose of the scene is just to show him skipping school and changing into more street clothes from his school clothes.

I was going to put a video in this post showing my editing process for this clip, but for for some reason blogger is not letting me so here is just a picture of the editing software: clipchamp.

Production Post

We Finally Recorded!!

So, I know after my last post, we were not doing to well, pretty far behind, but we finally started recording and did the ending scene to the opening. My partner was the only one who could record the scene as I had practice, This part that was recorded was the character Oliver going in the bathroom after his mother dropped him off for school and getting weed out of his backpack.

Here is one of the shots that we got, it shows Oliver getting the weed out of his backpack (we used oregeno lol). 

This is also another shot we got of the same scene, we did this to try and get a variety of shots of the same clip because it makes the film just look better and captures a piece of Oliver's face.

I also used some sounds from pixabay like a toilet flushing, sink water running, and kids talking outside  for a solid soundscape.

Next Recording session

The next time I will record we will be finishing the rest of the scenes needed to finish the opening. They will be recorded at my house and at the library to show Oliver leaving his mom's car.

2nd Group Meeting!!!

Today's class we did our second group meeting. Here is the picture of me and my group for this meeting. Some recommendations I got for my idea was to use a fog machine for the scene which I really have been wanting to do which shows the character in my film Oliver smoking. Luke also gave me a great Idea that I can do for my CCR (he is the one with his eyes close LOL). He said that since in my film I am showing two sides of my character I can edit myself to show two of myself in the same room talking to each other about the questions in the CCR.

Maia

Film was inspired by not caring about what others think about you. The flm is about a girl who is getting bullied because of her silly behavior. The title of the film is Maia: Unfiltered. Here is Maia's blog

Amanda

About a girl who is a taekwando athlete who gets injured braking her ankle. the whole opening shows how sad she is and portrays it in a funny way. Here is Amanda's blog

Jade

About a girl named Avery who is in a mental assylum. Here is the link to her blog: Jade's blog

Brennan

Brennan wants to do a thriller film about a boy who is more nerdy paired with a very strong more masculine character their names are Asher and Austin. here is the link to his blog: Brennan's Blog 

Luke

About a guy named Will who gets a call from his friend named Derek. Pointed out that Will is very antisocial and he rejects his freind's offer. But the plot twist is that Derek was standing outside his house on the phone with him with a letter in his hand. Here is the link to his blog: Luke's blog

Production Process (not going very well)

 As you can see by the title the production process is not going together very smoothly as I would have liked it too. We were originally set to record this weekend which was was the 21st and 22nd of Feb. However this could not work out because I had a soccer tournement that weekend and was also scheduled to work at my job. 

My partner has also not been to school for the past week, so we have not been able to talk in person about the project. He is also going to be out of town for a Rugby tournement this weekend which was the already late date for when should begin our recording further postponing the production process. This could have definitley been avoided by recording at an earlier date, but my partner failed to inform me of his tournement out of town. My partner will also be acting as Oliver so I am unable to do any recording without him.

New Plan

So the new plan will be to have my partner record a part of the video on his own this coming week. And then the rest of the opening at my house the following day. I know I had an entire schedule and plan for this, but things happen and now the plan is changed and even though we are basically behind everyone in our class that is not going to stop us from getting this done.

In the mean time, I have been doing what I can until he is available to record. I have gotten some of the props ready like a black hoodie for the costume design and a white button up shirt.

Location Scouting

 House Scene (scene 1)

This is my house which is where I will be recording the opening scene of Oliver inside his house. It works out pretty good because my house is honestly pretty big, so it will be good for representing the rich side of my character. 

This is the master bedroom in the house which I will be portraying as Oliver's room to make the house seem even bigger because if I show that the master bedroom is Oliver's room, then the audience will think that the rest of the house is significantly bigger. By the way, I got these house pictures from zillow so the camera quality would be good.

School Scene (scene 3)

I got this image from google earth so I could ge a street view. This will be exactly where I will be filming the scene where Oliver will tell his mother that he can be dropped off here at the library and walk the rest of the way to school so he does not trouble his mother by making her wait in a long line. And immediatley after the camera shows his mother driving off I will show Oliver walking in the opposite direction of the school showing that he will be skipping school.

P.S. scene 2 (the car scene) is not included because it will simply be recorded in the car on the way to the school.

Production Company Logo

This post will be pretty short because it is just my production company logo and name. As you can see in the image below, the name of the production company is Crakked Mirror productions. Yes I know... it is a pretty random name and it really has nothing to do with my film, but I feel like it looked pretty cool and I used two k's in the "crakked" instead of "cracked"

 

I made this design on canva as you can see here in this screenshot. I used a background of a crack in a mirror and edited it to put it behind the text. The font of the text was also quite unique, I honestly just found it on Canva and it looked pretty cool.

Planning for Production

We are now on week 5 of working on this project and I have pretty much everything planned out, so here is the script that I will be following when recording.

 Scene 1

For the setting, since my character Oliver is a wealthy kid from his parents, we are going to start the opening in the master bedroom of a house and show that it is Oliver's room instead. This will work because the master bedroom is typically the biggest room in the house and if we make it look like Oliver's room than the house will seem to be more expensive because the audience will see Oliver's room (master bedroom) as just a regular bedroom and will expect the rest of the house to be even bigger. We will show in the scene Oliver trying to smoke a cigarette but does not get the chance as he has to leave for school. His mother will call him from down the stairs saying "Oliver you have to go to school you are not to be late".  As he hears this, he hurries and stuffs clothes into his bag and goes to his secret drawer which contains a bag of weed (we will just put a mix of herbs into a plastic bag).

Scene 2 

The next scene will be Oliver in the car with his mom or dad (which ever one of our parents is available) on the way to school. In the car there will be dialogue between the parent and Oliver. And an important conversation will be about Oliver's grades. The parent will ask how Oliver's grades are doing and then a close-up will show Oliver's computer on his lap in the car looking at his grades which are all F's. As he sees his grades he replies to his parent saying that they are great in an unconfident way to show he is lying.

Scene 3

In this scene Oliver will tell his parent that he can be dropped of at the library next to his school to not trouble his parent by going through the long line. And as he leaves the car and says bye to his parent looking as if he is walking towards school, I will show a long shot of the car speeding off and Oliver quickly changing directions showing he is not planning on going to school.

This will be the overall set script for when we are recording, however there may be minor changes if any new and better ideas come to our minds when filming.

References:

Shutterstock. (n.d.). Cartoon schoolchild with schoolbag on way to school [Ilustrasi gambar].                      https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/cartoon-schoolchild-schoolbag-on-way-school-1903280404

iStock. (n.d.). School building [Kumpulan ilustrasi]. https://www.istockphoto.com/search/2/image?mediatype=illustration&phrase=school+building

 

 

Audio

 Audio/sound

The audio will be the same aspect as the mise-en-scene. There needs to be two types of audio to represent both sides of the main character.

Internal Side

The audio representing this side of the character will be played at the beginning of the opening scene when Oliver in in his room struggling to light a cigar and rushing to get to school. The audio that will be playing will be some sort of unnaturally loud music to represent the stressed part of this character and to just make everything seem sort of chaotic. Ofcourse there will need to be sound that I will have to edit in to create emphasis such as the flick of the lighter.

Sound Effects:

                                                                                     Lighter Flickering

                                                                                     

External Side

The audio for this side will start as soon as Oliver steps outside of his room to go downstairs for school. The non-diegetic music that was playing when he was in his room will immediatley stop as soon as he steps outside of his door showing the sudden change to his external character or mask that he puts on for his parents waiting downstairs for him. The audio when Oliver is wearing is mask (figuratively speaking) will be purposefully very boring, just the sound of the quiet house, muffling speech of his parents, tapinf of his shoes as he walks down the stairs and through the house. These sounds will helps portray the expensive and spoiled part of the character. During this part I could also add in some very quiet classical music to further establish the sense of sophistiaction.

sound effects: 

Shoes tapping

Additional Sound Effects

There will need to be additional sound effects that may need to be added to make the soundscape sound more realistic. Some of these sounds are...

• lighter flickering
• shoes tapping on floor 
• heavy door closing
• AC unit
• Humming of the fridge

Mise-en-scene Internal Representation

Planning the Visual Narrative

 Internal side

In this post I will go over the mise-en-scene elements needed to represent the internal representation of my main character. This side of my character represents his true side which is a bully, smokes, drinks, etc.

Lighting

The lighting as I said in the previous blog post is not a major element I will be utilizing to represent my character, but I may still be able to add a little extra through the lighting. To represent the internal side through the lighting I can use low-key lighting which would represent the secrecy in his life.

Costume

The costume for the internal side will be very important for representing his internal side. For his costume here, I will use a dark oversized hoodie with the hoodie on his head because this type of clothing is associated with streetwear or even sometimes rebelion.

Props

Props will be very important for representing this side of the character because I am planning on showing the main character using or distributing illegal substances such as weed (not real weed just some herbs) to really show what type of person he truly is. This is will be key in representing this side of the character.

Setting

The setting I would like to be somewhere the opposite of the cleanliness of his room, so I will a drawer in his room labeled "stash" which when opened looks very messy and unorganized which would directly contrasts to the cleanliness of his room. In this drawer, Oliver finds illegal substances like weed and will take it with him in his bag as he goes to school.

References: 

Bigstock. (n.d.). Illustration of a dirty toilet covered in grime [Stock vector]. https://www.bigstockphoto.com/image-93850700/stock-vector-illustration-of-a-dirty-toilet-covered-in-grime

Mise-en-scene External Representation

 Planning the Visual Narrative

External Side

In this post I will go over how I will go about representing the first side of my two-faced character. This side of Oliver will be his outward representation of himself to his family and teachers (his fake side). 

Lighting

For the lighting I will try to use more warm lighting that distributes evenly throughout the room and his position in the frame. I do not have much else to say for this because it is not going to be a major element for developing the representation of my character.

Costume

The costume will be the main way that I will show the difference between the character's two sides because it shows a clear visual contrast to the audience. The costume is also a clear signal that tells the audience his level of social classs and his obedience. So he will bewearing a very neat white button-down shirt because the color white is accosiated with purity and innocence.

Props

The props will be an important element because it also easy to show his "good boy" side. What I can use are trophies stacked in his room along with an expensive computer to show the wealth of his parents. And maybe to add some small details like an honor roll certificate on his desk that definitley add a little cherry  on top for the representation

Setting

The setting will be located in a high end bed room to represent his wealth and spoiled nature. To do this I can just use the master bedroom in my house and call it the main character's room.

References:

Teaching Independent Learners. (2017, September 7). Story elements: Setting [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5USpsvsNJw

Conterio, M. (2018, December 2). Ten of the best costume designs in recent films. Scene360. https://scene360.com/design/117350/best-costume-design-movies/

Character Development

 Character Development

So my character as I have said in my previous blogs will be named Oliver and since the opening will be about how he has a "doube identity" or "two faced" I need to be able to represent the same character in two different ways.

To the outside world, (his parents, family, and teachers) Oliver wears a mask that represents the fake side of how Oliver represents himself to the people close to him. To his parents and teachers he is smart, kind, responsible, etc. However in reality, it is all a lie. To show this side of Oliver I will use mise-en-scene elements such as costume design and props which will helps represent each side of Oliver

On the other hand, The true side of my main character is the opposite of the mask that he wears. he is actually a bully in school, smokes illegal substances and hangs out the wrong croud similar to him.

Overall, my character Oliver will be taking the role of a "priveldged teen" type of character and to show each side of Oliver I will use mise-en-scene elements such as costume design and props which will help to represent each side of Oliver

Media Theory Integration

 Communication Accomodation Theory

Definition: seeks to explain and predict when, how, and why individuals engage in interactional adjustments with others 

seeks to explain and predict when, how, and why individuals engage in interactional adjustments with others

For my film I will be showing how identity is a performance or an act because my character is two sided as he is seen to be smart and a good kid from the perspective of his parents, but in reality is quite the opposite. In my english class, I learned about convergence and divergence which is also very important for the communication accomodation theory. 

Convergence: When a person changes their language to match the people around them. Typically done for approval and to be liked. In the case of my protagonist, Oliver, he will converge to the formal behavior of his parents when he is around them and will converge to the informal behavior of his friends when around them.

Divergence: Divergence is the exact opposite of convergence. Divergence is when a person changes their language to contrast from the people around them. The divergence from Oliver will come directly to the perspective of the audience because they will see the two sides of Oliver.

Sources:

Drew, C. (2023, October 25). Communication accommodation theory (definition & examples). Helpful Professor. https://helpfulprofessor.com/communication-accommodation-theory/

Planning

 Storyboard

On this page it starts with a close up shot of a flame from a lighter. It then shows another close-up of the ned a lit cigarette. Following this, it shows a medium shot of a boy throwing a cigarette outside his window which is my character Oliver. It then goes to a medium shot of him throwing clothes into his bag and going downstairs for school. Then the camera shows a medium shots of Oliver and his mom in a car on the way to school and a long shot of the car stopped next to the library.

On this page it shows a long shot of Oliver stepping out of the car and a long shot showing the car driving off. Next, a medium shot is captured which shows Oliver initially walking towards the school then walking in the opposite direction.

This is the storyboard I have created so far. And after finishing it I have made some changes to the plot of the flm. Instead of the main character Oliver going all the way to the bathroom after getting dropped off, the opening will end as soon as Oliver begins walking off in the oppositie direction and the title car "Straight A's" will be shown.

Current Project Idea

Straight A's

The title above will be the title to my film. In essence, my film will be about a teen boy is around 14-17 years of age and his parents are relatively rich and well off. While is parents think he is a great kid good, smart, nice, bright future, etc. He is acually quite the opposite. He smokes, has horrible grades, is a bully and just just overall does not seem like the rich kid he is. 

Title

The title for this film is very well thought out I would say because while the child's parents in the film view the "A" as his grades, the viewers view it as a allusion to his drug or smoking habits.

Opening Scene

For the opening scene I have been really thinking about the same idea for a long time and I really want to create it. It will be a close up of a lighter being turned on and a tracking shot of the lighter going to a cigarette which is in the kid's mouth. However I obviously cannot capture a kid smoking a cigarette, so i have to change the idea slightly just showing the kid bringing down the cigarette from his mouth. 

First Group Meeting

 Group Disscusions

Group Members

Benjamin : In between wanting to do a thriler film about a guy walking down the street and sees a random phone ringing or a social realism film which he does not know what would be about yet.

My Feedback: I told him that he should stick the the thriller genre and go with the idea he is doing now because the idea is solid, all he needs to do is fugure out who is calling on the phone and then developing the rest of opening will be easy from there.

Sebastian: wants to do a psycho drama about a teen who is struggling with depression and or anxiety. The friends of the character will play a big part in his life.

My Feedback: I told Sebastian he should figure out what the depression of this character will be rooted from and create a backstory for it because without that piece of information, the viewer will be confused as to why the character is depressed.

Python: wants to do a scifi/ thriller film, more on the scifi side. the plot is about a person who creates glasses that can make him see into the future. and he sees his death 5 days later.

My Feedback: I told him that he should be careful with this idea because it sounds like it is a lot of editing and he should be prepared to film something like that.

Emily: Boy and girl who are dating in a car, gets a phone call, but does not pick up, pulls over and writes on a note and shows it to his girlfriend, but the audience does not see the note. the note will put a shocked face of the girlfriend.

My Feedback: I told Emily that she should try and stretch out this idea because it sounds like it is a very short idea and could be filmed in 30 seconds.

Clara: Wants to do a thriller film about a guy in a garage who is tied up in a chair who was kidnapped.

My Feedback: No feedback for her.

Feedback I Recieved

The Idea that I gave my group was to do a drama film about a teenager growing up in a poor setting and deals with many problems like smoking. My plan was to begin the film showing a lighter being lit and the teenager smoking a cigar. The obvious problem with this idea was that teenagers obviously cannot smoke cigars, so this idea would pretty much be illegal to film. But my group members gave me some advice and told me that instead of me actually smoking the cigar, it can just cut instantly to me putting the lit cigar down into an ash tray instead of actually smoking it.