We have been working on our script, and our finished result is underneath this introduction. We found it very hard to create without having any spoken dialogue in our film. The point of the film script is to give the production team and the cast of actors know exactly what to do and when. We will give out copies of the scripts to members of the cast to revise and go over, ready for filming on location with the equipment.
On the 7th of December, me and my group pitched our film ideas to the class. We've came up with the name 'Shadowed' for our film, as it is basically about a young male being followed, or shadowed, by his other personality, as he's Schizophrenic. The film makes out that he is not the one killing, it's someone else, who appears to be stalking him, killing people close to him. It is revealed that it is, in fact, himself killing everyone and this mysterious 'shadow' is actually himself, only his other, darker side.
Below is our recorded film pitch
A film pitch is where a movie production company (people with the ideas) go and see a publishing company (people with the money) and try to persuade them to have their film made. However; there will be more film companies there, and not all of them will be picked for production, so the film pitch is one of the most important things to get right, it's vital. If all goes well, your film will be commisioned, and if it doesn't... no film for you!
It starts with Connor, the protagonist, running towards a safe place, his workplace; the science labs. He pulls a gun out when he arrives, breathing heavily and in distress. We plan to make use of thunder sound effects, lights (for lightning) heart beat sounds and footsteps combined to create a very effective and tense atmosphere for our thriller film.
Neil Evans, 16 years old, male. He is in year 12 currently studying AS Media, Music, Physics and English at Great Wyrley High School's Sixth Form. He is an imaginative boy, who has planned his whole future. He's hoping to go to University and further study Media and Music.
Living with his parents, when he isn't studying, he plays intense sports like Rugby and reads books like 'Murdoch Mysteries', 'Goosebumps' or 'Percy Jackson'. In spare time, primarily on weekends, Neil goes out with his mates and/or his brother to watch the latest film of almost any kind, although his favourite genre types are Horror, Action, Thriller, Mystery/Crime and Sci-Fi. Two of the films he's watched recently are Dorian Gray and Taken 2. He's a fan of older, classic thriller films but doesn't know which is his favourite.
Neil saves nearly all of his money for the cinemas and buying new books and DVD's for his vast collection, and he does this by working part-time on Saturdays. He also has a University fund and a car fund in his bank account, hoping to buy a black car; a Bentley or Jaguar, as they're favorite make of car.
Neil likes music with a powerful, rolling beat that can drown out background noises when he reads or studies. Some of the bands he has albums for are Nickelback, Queen, Black Sabbath and Panic! at the Disco. He also listens to other music from areas such as rock, pop and alternative rock.
Before we finally pick our target audience, we thought it would be wise to go and do a bit of research first, to make sure we know exactly what we're dealing with.
Target Audience Research:
Classification:
The classification (age rating) of a film is something that should never be neglected by film producers. If a film is aged at 12 year olds, but then gets a certificate of 15, then something 's gone wrong. The certificate is given based on the content involved in the film, and the biggest factor is sexual content, closely followed by extreme gore. For example, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring is a PG, yet Boromir is shot by three arrows in the chest, all of wich are shown, in slow motion just in case the kids miss! Also, there are numerous accounts of decapitations, yet the film scores a PG. Then there's the Inbetweeners Film. I am pretty sure nobody is decapitated in that film, yet the certificate is much higher because of the degree o sexual behavior.
All of the factors are put together and discussed by members of the British Board of Film Classification, or BBFC for short.
The BBFC:
This is an official organisation who tests films and gives them the appropriate certificate. They all watch the film and note down what they think, and then after official meetings, elect a certificate for the film. Below here is a list of the possible certificates, with a summary of each:
UNIVERSAL
Films are appropriate for viewers of any age, hence the name 'Universal'.
Sexual behaviour is kept to a minimum, with little more than a kiss involved.
Subtle language can be used, but no swearing is acceptable.
No drug use of any kind. No exceptions.
PARENTAL GUIDANCE.
Films are appropriate for children if any age, so long as their parents allow.
Sexual bevaviour is strict and must be minimal.
Drugs are sometimes shown in PG rated films, however, they're kept to a small standard.
Drinking and smoking is acceptable to an extent.
TWELVE
Violence is shown in more detail, but must be closely checked.
Sexual violence is shown sometimes to an extent, but must be justified.
Drugs are present but in small portions, and nothing major.
Sexual behaviour can be shown more clearly, but still must be checked. Subtle nudity allowed.
Aggressive racist or homicidal language is not acceptable.
Mild swearing is accepted, but not too frequent.
TWELVE ACCOMPANIED
A 12A rating follows the same rules as a 12 age rating - only this is the age rating used for cinemas, and requires children under 12 to have an adult present, and most 12 year olds are with adults at the cinemas anyway.
FIFTEEN
Aggressive racist or homicidal language is acceptable.
Drugs are able to be seen clearly, storylines may revolve around them.
Sexual violence is allowed, although in small amounts and maybe in limitation.
Strong violence is allowed.
Stronger language used more frequently is acceptable.
Sexual nudity is allowed in more detail.
EIGHTEEN
Very strong language allowed.
Heavy amounts of blood, violence and gore allowed.
Intense sexual scenes allowed.
Drug use is allowed to almost any level, but is still used in moderation... most of the time.
Extreme racist and homophobic behaviour is accepted.
RESTRICTED EIGHTEEN
These films are only allowed to be televised at specially licensed cinemas.
Specialist category, restricted classification for explicit materials.
JARLINC's Identified Target Audience
Piecing all the information gathered together, we came to a conclusion of giving our film a certificate of 12/12A. This is because children below the age of 12 may be affected by trauma of the film, as elements of horror is involved and incorporated into the film.
Age of Target Audience: 12+
Gender of Target Audience: Both sexes, but most likely male.
Ethnicity of Target Audience: West European/English speaking countries.
Education Level of Target Audience: Year 11 and higher
Genre Preferences of Target Audience: Thriller, Horror and Action.
The sound editors are members of a film production team that specialize in the audio of a film. Audio in films are split into three main categories, these are: dialogue, music and effects. Some highly skilled or experienced sound editors specialize in one of them three categories, overall improving the audio quality because everyone is better at their job as they have only a smaller part to focus on, also improving speed of production.
Sound editors can also work in other areas of the Media, like radio stations and video games. These are slightly different, but essentially do the same thing; edit sounds! As I mentioned above, there are three categories of sound:
Dialogue
The dialogue is the speech of characters. The sound editor can cut and trim the files, and change the audio volume to match the other audio in a film; you don't want a character's whisper heard clearly over an explosion! The dialogue is a fairly straight forward audio aspect, because the actors do most of the work, and all the dialogue editor has to do is look after the files, trim them and position them onto the sound file.
Music
The music is probably the hardest audio to edit. This is because the transition between tracks when the on-screen footage changes can be hard to match carefully, and it is not hard to make the sound appear to jump. For example, if it's a bright sunny day, and then suddenly someone pulls a gun out of their pocket and shoots someone, then I doubt it will be playing Fur Elise in the background. Matching up the backing tracks to the film can be extremely challenging, so these are among the most skilled sound editors.
Effects
The effects are some of the more basic sounds to edit. Making sure they fit in and are positioned correctly is vital; seeing an explosion before the sound appears in obviously unacceptable, unless, of course, it's a distant volcanic eruption, lightning/thunder or something like that, because light travels faster than sound, so the audio would appear after the visual effects. This is something all effects editors must consider, as it's really easy to not do it right.
BEFORE SOUND IN FILMS
Films before around 1930 were nearly all in complete silence, which obviously means sound editors didn't exist. They were considered a scientific revolution back then, but with the invention of sound and colour television, it was almost unbelievable.
The most famous filmmaker in the early 20th century was Charlie Chaplin. His films were almost all silent, and he made a large variety. In those days, the cameras were gigantic pieces of machinery and were not moved once recording started.
With the invention of sound, the sound editor was born. They were proficient, and their numbers grew rapidly as the film industry became more popular. Sound editors were also used in the production of patriotic films, like advertisements such as 'Join your country's army!' *god save the king* and so forth. The sound editor has became a key element of any filmmaking crew and production team.
In the early days of film, there were no production companies as such. They were usually presented under a name, for example 'Charlie Chaplin'.
Charlie Chaplin
Foley and Dubbing
Foley in Media is the creation of sound effects that are recorded separately to the video and added in during post-production. Some of these include doors closing, wind howling, glass smashing and people knocking on a door. The purpose of them is to make the sound able to be edited and in this way the sound editor can make sure the sound match up to the video, and to make sure the sound effect is clearly heard. The perfect edit will make sure the foley effect is realistic to the video, and the viewers believe it is a diegetic part of the film.
Foley is usually created with everything you can think of apart from the actual thing it's creating. For example; the noises of the sliding automatic doors in Star Trek are just pieces of paper slipped in and out of an envelope to symbolise the hydraulic noise of the doors. They can also be used to cover up the sounds that are actually recorded, which is down to the sound editor.
Dubbing is another process in sound in the Media, and it is created by removing the original audio of the film and replacing it with a edited version to make it sound better. This is used all the time in musicals, they record the sound there to make sure it will fit, then create a studio recording and overwrite the previous sound, to make the audio sound perfect.
Class example of foley sounds
In groups, we took it in turns to attempt to create foley sounds with a variety of everyday things, like flour in a box, a pink scrunch and a rolled up newspaper. We used these to create the following sound effects:
A Cat Purring was created without using any equipment. Instead, we got a member of our group to make a cat purring noise using their tongue close to the sound recorder.
A Punch was created by using the rolled up newspaper and hit somebody on the arm to make a thump sound that, especially on the sound recorder, sounded much like a genuine punch.
A Walking in Snow foley sound was created by using the flour in a box and the scrunchie. By placing the scrunchie into the flour and squashing it with a stick, it allowed us to record a sound identical to walking in snow.
THE FOLEY SOUNDS WE CREATED:
Role of a Music Composer in Film
I will now talk about composers in the media, and my chosen example is Howard Shore, who composed the music for Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. The role of a film music composer is to write and perform unique tracks for the film. Most of these are non-diegetically added in, but some are actually played diegetically on-screen, mostly during scenes in very expensive restaurants, or, like in James Cameron's 'Titanic' film, on the deck of a huge sinking cross-Atlantic steamer! Musical compositions that are unique to a film, like the Star Wars theme, bring a film to life. The start of Iron Man, AC/DC's Back in Black is played. Okay, it sets the scene, but has no personal character to it. When properly composed, film musical tracks can really boost the popularity of films, as people want to go and see the amazing compositions people make! Howard Shore has received 63 awards and 55 nominations.
Howard Shore was born in Toronto, Canada on October 18th 1946 and has has scored music for over 80 films, and so below is a select list of films Howard Shore has composed music for:
Big (1988)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Mrs. Doubtfire (1993)
That Thing You Do! (1996)
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (2001-2003)
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010)
The Hobbit Trilogy (2012-2014)
Below here I have embedded a few videos of Howard Shore's compositions. Personally, I like any of the soundtracks from The Lord of the Rings, but I have no particular favourite. My preferred three are Concerning Hobbits and the themes of Rohan and Isengard.
Concerning Hobbits
Rohan's Theme
Isengard's Theme
The way that Howard has placed a heavy contrast between the music helps put a more in-depth character and personality to the regions of Middle-earth in The Lord of the Rings. The film starts with a light, cheery song (my first embedded example - Concerning Hobbits) and moves on to a heavy song (the third example - Isengard) when the tide turns against them. The outstanding contrast between the places of the world in The Lord of the Rings is extremely well-done in the musical aspect of things.
The Wilhelm Scream
The Wilhelm Scream is a member of a 'family' of sounds known as 'Stock Sounds'. This particular one was first used in 1951 and was (is) very famous. It has been used in many key films, and has existed in over 250 films worldwide. Two examples are the Star Wars films and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and I've embedded an example below. The Wilhelm Scream is at 0:59.
After coming up with the genre our group chose for our coursework film, we started brainstorming ideas for our storyline. We discussed a few before coming up with our final choice, but all the ideas we did come up with were all linked.
The main thing we needed to do was come up with a main idea. This was to have one protagonist and one antagonist. We thought up of them both, and decided upon the antagonist first. He would wear fully black clothing to give off an imposing and intimidating look. He stayed mostly the same for all of our film story ideas, with a few adjustments, like trying to cover his face with his hood. We decided that he would keep to the shadows, and that is where our film name came from. A dark shadowy figure following a protagonist; 'Shadowed'. We thought up his name. Not mentioned in the film, it wasn't really important but we needed to make up a name so we had something to refer to so we knew which character we were talking about, and it made it possible for the script to be made.
We then started characterising our protagonist. We decided upon making him a scientist, as that's a stereotypical good guy job. Subverting this can give an evil mastermind scientist idea, but we kept the standard for our protagonist. We opposed the antagonist by dressing him in white, a lab coat, to make it easier to distinguish between them. The name for our protagonist came from my middle name, as this relates to us. Connor, the protagonist, would be running from this shadowy attacker, Seth (the antagonist). His 'good guy' interpretation would be subverted when he finds the gun in the science laboratory.
We were discussing which way to end our film, whether to have Connor, the protagonist, kill Seth, the antagonist, or have it the other way around. We settled this by coming up with the idea of not telling the viewers which character kills the other, and we did this by having them encounter each other and having them both raise their guns. The screen would go black and then a gunshot would sound, which would mean nobody knows who killed who, but the last thing the viewers see is Seth's smiling face, which may tell them he is the one that kills Connor because he is enjoying it, and Connor is afraid.
One of the last things we came up with, was to make them related in some way. We decided we would have Seth acting as Connor's other side, his split personality, just physical. So, if Seth kills Connor, Connor is essentially killing himself. Connor's schizophrenia is not presented very clear, but is a way of understanding Connor's confusion and the fact Seth gets through locked doors; he simply isn't there.
Pros
1) No special effects or props will be required, as it is set in the present day. 2) We only require two actors, which will make it easier and reduce risk rates, as there's less people to get hurt. 3) As with the first pro, we don't need to go to extreme lengths to find the costumes for our characters, and there's only two characters we need to find costumes for.
Cons
1) The lightening effects will be hard to execute using the lights.
2) Our film idea requires us to film in the dark, as this improves the effect of our film.
The next step is thinking in advance about what questions we will need to answer in our evaluation. We discussed these thoroughly, and wrote down some answers for the questions.
Below are the questions we are considering:
In way way does our media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real life media products?
How does our media product represent particular social groups?
What kind of media broadcasting company might distribute our media product? Why?
Who would be the target audience for our media product?
How did we address our target audience?
What have we learnt about technologies from the process of producing our media product?
Looking back at our preliminary task, what do we feel we have learnt in the development from it to our finished media product?
My production team and I addressed these questions, and below is our conclusion:
The idea of our film challenges the thriller convention that there's one protagonist and one antagonist. We subvert this convention by making the protagonist, Connor, also the antagonist, Seth, by being schizophrenic, having a split-personality. We also use connotations of the colour black in our film, as Seth is dressed in black and is evil, mysterious, dangerous and scary, as black is dark and people are afraid of the dark. At the end of our two minute minute film, we want the viewers to think that Connor is shot by Seth.
The film challenges social groups by Seth, the antagonist, being dressed in all black; hoodie, jeans and boots and Connor, the protagonist, being dressed in white. Seth's costume set up is very similar to that of a modern day 'chav' and so says that their social group is a trouble-making evil lot. Connor is shown to be a normal scientist, until he finds the gun in the laboratory. This subverts his social group, as he knew exactly where the gun was hidden and was pleased when he found it.
It is most likely that a small or developing distributor company which has not really been heard of, as this is the most likely company to accept us, as we're a newly formed production team with little experience, therefore probably creating less successful films.
We originally came to the decision to make the target audience 15+, but later changed that to 12+ to give a broader viewer range, and it's not really horrific enough to be rated 15. What's the point in targeting a rated 12 film at 15 year olds?
The content of our film will most likely attract males rather than females, and people interested in tense films. This is because there's a variety of jump scares and suspense, attracting that sort of target audience.
We haven't used much of the more advanced camera hardware, and so we've planned to use the tracking dolly, tripod and disco dolly. We have had a growing amount of experience with the editing software, and we all focus primarily on different, parts. We are all capable of different operations, but getting each group member to become more familiar with certain elements (such as sound editing and using final cut) because that way we can all work at the same time on different pieces, and then come together for the final adjustments.
The three films so far this year (The Western, Preliminary Task and Chess Film) have granted us the vital skills and experience we'll need to make a final film. The Western helped getting familiar with the camera equipment, the Preliminary Film got us more familiar with editing techniques like match-on-action, and the Chess Film just refreshed us with how the equipment is staged, and let us put the terms into practice, such as 180 degree rule and so forth. On a whole, the Preliminary Task was the most important piece in the way of helping us get to grips with the filming techniques.
My group and I, Deanna . Hopps, Daniel . Springthorpe, have been coming up with different names for our production company, and we started playing with our names. By combining all the beginning letters of all our names, we came up with: JARLNC. We then decided to add a 'I' in between the 'L' and the 'N' to make it easier to say, and so our production company name is JARLINC Productions.
We have also been discussing our Film Ident. After a long discussion and debate about the many different ideas we threw at each other, we combined a number of ideas and came up with a jar tied up in chains, and it bounces around and then a dragon flies out of it, and breathes fire into the screen, burning the letters JARLINC into the jar.
Our production company name JARLINC reflects our own personal values because, simply, it's a jumble of letters from our names. Here is a break-down: J - From Daniel's middle name Jack. A - From Deanna's middle name of Amy. R - From Deanna's other middle name Rayetta. L - From Deanna's other OTHER middle name of Leah. I - Added letter to make the word possible to be pronounced! N - From my middle name of Neil. C - From my middle name of Connor.
We decided to use this method because we wanted to be able to relate to the name, which would have been almost impossible with a name like 'Epic Studios' or 'Production Pros!'
We wrote down the first letter of all our middle names (6 between us) and started playing around with them, putting them in different orders. We found it hard to make a word out of it, so we decided to cheat and add a letter, the 'I'.
Chosen Colours
We have came up with two possible colour schemes. The first is red. It is an effective colour, and contrasts well with black, giving a thriller-like connotation - black for evil maybe and red for blood or gore...?
The second idea we thought up of is a more silver and gold related scheme. This will be more gentle than the red and black, and will be more fitting to our film than most other colours. They reflect our values because we all like silver and gold, and all agree that they can go well together.
Logo Design
We chose a dragon, but may need to change around with that if it's too hard to get hold of. We chose this and it reflects our values because we are all interested in the Medieval era and creatures from legends, like dragons, and Deanna is especially fond of mythological creatures.
