R+P Post 20: Reflections so far and looking ahead

What went well:

• The initial planning for stage 2, the storyboard, shootboard and animatic, went really well. We all listened to each other's ideas to put together our opening sequence. 
• We successfully managed to shoot all our intended shots during our test shoot
• We also managed to edit all the shots together to form a chronological sequence with music, titles and voiceover. 
• We have finalised our ideas for the main shoot to ensure that we can make our main shoot more successful than our test shoot. 
• We have redrawn our storyboard accordingly and also redone our shootboard to fit the new shots in and remove the ones that we are no longer using
• We worked efficiently as a team during this stage of the planning as we all listened to each other's ideas, feedback and concerns and addressed them and adapted our ideas around that.
• The teacher's were pleased with our progress so far and were happy with our plans for our main shoot. 

What could have been improved:

• We should have taken more care when filming to make sure that continuity rules such as the 30 degree rule weren't broken as this was one of the main problems we faced when editing our rough cut
• The directing of the actor's could have been better as our male actor, Mario, wasn't really acting in character and obviously, as director's, Angela and I should have directed him better and shown him exactly what to do and how to act.
• We included shots that were irrelevant to our story so for our main shoot we have picked only the shots which are relevant and we feel would work well in our opening sequence. 

R+P Post 19: Our Rough Cut

Now that we have our footage from our test shoot we must watch through them and pick out our best shots. Once we have decided which shots to use we have to edit it together in Adobe Premiere Pro to create our rough cut. Once the basic sequence has been made we can overlay our titles, music and voiceover.

Here is our finished rough cut: 

After editing together our rough cut we realised that we had a lot of work and re-planning to do before our main shoot as we weren't really satisfied with the way it looked. We also got feedback from the teachers and after quite a long chat with all three of them we came to the conclusion that we had a lot of improving to do. So, we went back to our storyboard and timeline and removed the shots we no longer wanted and added shots that we felt would work really well. 

Our planned improvements:

We plan to get rid of this alarm clock shot but in it's place just have the alarm clock sound effect so as not to slow down the action.








We also want to film this shot from a lot lower (bed level) and also have him roll out of bed to add to the comedic value of our opening sequence.








We also want to change the font and placing of the titles. We feel that the font of the titles we have now don't really fit our genre so we intend to change this.

There were quite a few jump cuts in our rough cut because we didn't film our actor's walking on and off screen so it was hard to cut the shot to fit in with the rest of the sequence without breaking continuity. It was also because we kept breaking the 30 degree rule as it was hard to realise when filming whether or not we were sticking to the rule.



The continuity between these three door shots were broken because we broke the 30 degree rule. In order to amend this we will film the whole thing as one shot and that way we can avoid breaking continuity.

We also decided that we want to scrap the shot of him throwing the clothes onto the bed as it was challenging to shoot and hard to make it work in terms of continuity, Instead he's just going to pick out two equally ugly outfits, hold them up, then pick one.

We weren't really satisfied that the shirt he was wearing really connoted what we wanted it to. It wasn't what we envisioned so we have to pick out a new shirt that we feel fits our genre and our character.

We also decided to scrap this shot of him making his tea and spilling it down himself as the shot is really long and slows down the pace of the opening sequence and doesn't really add much to it. It was also really hard to achieve the shot of him spilling the tea as it was hard to get a natural response from the actor to the spilt tea and it doesn't work effectively with the rest of the opening sequence.




Our planned new shots:

• Rolls out of bed onto the floor
• Opens curtain
• Circles his date on a gaming calender 
• Walks out of shower with a white bathrobe on 
• Shot of just his feet where we see him drop his bathrobe
• Puts on shorts
• Chooses between two ugly shirts by holding them up 
• He's ready early this time and decides to sit down and play some games
• Gets a text from his date asking him where he is which finally distracts him from his game and he realises he's running late
• He runs down the stairs and straight out of his house 
• The interaction between Guy and Bella will be longer so that the audience understand why she wants to get away from him

R+P Post 18: Our Test Shoot

Before the test shoot

We will be filming our test shoot this weekend, on Saturday 7th February 2015. After a lot of research and planning we feel we are now ready to test out our ideas and see if they work. We will also use the test shoot to become familiar with the equipment that we will be using throughout the course of this project.

What we aimed to achieve from the test shoot:

• Test out all our ideas to see if they work practically
• Test out all the equipment and become familiar with it (camera, tripod etc) 
• Test out how the lighting in Mario's house worked since we planned to just use the spotlights in him room
• This was also an opportunity for the actor's to relate to the character and understand a bit more how they have to act in the main shoot
• The test shoot is basically a chance for us to make our plans a reality and see how practical/entertaining what we planned so far is.

This is the camera that we used 

Our Test Shoot

What went well:

• We all cooperated and worked well together
• We all got to grips with using the camera, tripod and clapperboard
• I feel like we filmed all our shots well 
• We got all our shots done within the time which allowed us to re-shoot some which we thought could be better

Here is one of the rushes from the test shoot: 

After filming each shot we all watched it back and discussed whether or not the shot was good enough or if we had to re-shoot it to improve the shot. 

R+P Post 17: Our planned costumes and props, hair and make-up

Here is a table that we created during one of our production meetings which outlines the costume, hair and make-up for both characters:

Here is the picture of the shirt that we bought from amazon for our character, Guy, to where. 

Inspiration from real media

Our main inspiration for Guy's costume was Will from the Inbetweeners but we just decided to make the shirt more funky to make the representation of him as an outcast stand out more. 

For Bella's costume we didn't really use a particular film as an inspiration. Instead we decided we wanted her to look modern and trendy like any university student. Black is a colour that is popular and considered cool amongst teenage girls so that helped us pick the colour scheme. Also we knew crop tops and high waisted skinny jeans and leather jackets were also trendy so that  is what we decided for our costume. 

Props

In terms of props we don't really need much apart from a few general things like: 

• A phone
• PlayStation and games
• Gaming posters
• Gaming Calender
• Aftershave
• Hair brush 
• Bathrobe

R+P Post 16: Casting

In order to decide who the right actor and actress would be or our opening sequence we had a set criteria that they had to meet.

Criteria for actor:

1. Must be a good actor who can pull off being socially awkward in a comedic way
2. Must be willing to look like quite a fool on screen
3. Must be available during our shoot times

Criteria for actress: 

1. Must be quite attractive and stylish 
2. Must be available during our shoot times

Our choices for actor: 

Headshot of Alkim

Headshot of Mario

Our choices for actress:

Headshot of Angela

Headshot of Aybala

In the end we chose Mario to be cast as Guy and Aybala to be cast as Bella. These decisions were made because we felt like they were better actors and they could adapt themselves to any situation we need them to act in. 

R+P Post 15: Our planned filming location and set design

In one of our group meetings this week, we decided that we want to film the majority of the opening sequence in Mario's bedroom as Angela and I didn't have a stereotypically male bedroom and since this was one our representation it was important that we filmed in a male bedroom.

Here is a top down plan of his room that Mario drew for us during one of our production meetings so that we had a better idea of how much space we had and where everything was:

Mario's bedroom:

As you can see from the pictures he has  computer, TV, games console, loads of games, a controller and games poster. We have to dress the set a bit more by adding more posters and also removing the Arsenal mat just to ensure we are getting across to the audience exactly what we want to get across in terms of representation.  

Mario's bathroom and stairs: 

 We are also planning to film some shots in the bathroom where he's styling his hair, some shots outside his bathroom where we hear him scream through the door and also some shots of him running down the stairs and out of his house.

Some of the shots will be filmed outside on the streets where we see him running and also outside a restaurant.

Road near Mario's house where we will film him running. 

R+P Post 14: Our Production Schedule

We had to make out production schedule so that it fitted around everyone's usual routines and that our parent's and teacher's were happy with this arrangement. In order to do this we had to fill out a shoot organisation form: 

We decided that we would need to set aside three weekends as the weekends where we were going to shoot and we decided to shoot each day for 8 hours in order to leave plenty of time to film all our shots in the best possible way. Here is what we decided: 

1. Test Shoot - Saturday 7th February 2015 from 9:30am - 5:30pm
2. Main Shoot - Saturday 28th February 2015 from 9:30am - 5:30pm
3. Back up Shoot - Saturday 7th March 2015 from 9:30am - 5:30pm

For editing, we decided that we would use our group meetings, our lesson time and also individually when one of us has a free period.

R+P Post 13: Our Shoot-board

A shoot-board is a document which gives us detailed description of our opening sequence to help us during our test shoot. Our shoot-board won't be in shoot order but in the order of the location that we're filming at as this makes more logical sense and makes setting up the camera equipment a lot quicker.

Here is a section of our shoot-board:

We worked collectively on this document and we all helped and did out part to finish it. Here is what each column represents and why we chose to use them:

1. The first column is the shot number - since we aren't filming in shot order we need to know what shot it is.
2. The second column is the time we're going to film it - this gives us a rough idea of our schedule for the day and hopefully will help us keep on track with the filming.
3. The third column shows which location we will be filming each shot in
4. The fourth column is where we put our shot image - this helps us identify what shot type it is, what camera movement to use and also the framing of the shot. 
5. The fifth column is where we add any extra bit of detail such as dialogue and provide a brief description of the shot - this enables us to ensure we are getting all the shots right and also provides any additional information that we might need during the shoot. 
6. The sixth column shows who the actors/actresses are and also highlights if we need any props - this means we only have to call the actors in during the time slot they are needed and reminds us of the props we need to take to set. 
7. The seventh column is or use on set - we can tick off the shots once we have taken them to prevent us from forgetting to film any shots .
8. The eighth column is for when we are watching our footage back - helps us identify any shots we need to redo. 

R+P Post 12: Our Animatic

An animatic is also a visual representation of our opening sequence idea but in the form of a video which includes music and also the voiceover. We already had all the shots drawn for the storyboard so to make the animatic we had to take photos of the individual shots and edit them together in Adobe Premiere Pro with the music track and voiceover.

Here is our animatic: 

It was quite a simple process creating the animatic but the lessons we learnt from it were very valuable.

What we learnt from our animatic:

• Some of our shots were far too long so it gave us a better understanding of the timing of the shots.
• The voiceover that we originally recorded didn't really fit in with any of the shots and there were also massive gaps between every time he speaks so we decided to rewrite the whole voiceover and also add in actual dialogue just to mix it up a bit and keep in interesting.
• The music track also didn't really go with the shots so decided to change this too.

Once these changes have been made we will be ready to move onto our shoot-board.

R+P Post 11: Our Storyboard

A storyboard is a graphical representation of the camera shots in a film sequence which are connected together to create a narrative flow.

A storyboard will enable us to visualise the flow of camera shots and sets that we intend to use. They are really helpful and can help us identify any shots that we can't use and also the transition between the shots, the shot type (framing) and also how long the shot will be.

This is our finished storyboard:

We decided to use colour coded post-it notes so that if we wanted to change a shot or move the position of a shot we could easily achieve this, It is also mounted on a massive piece of A3 sugar paper so that it makes visualising our shots a lot more easier.

This is the colour code we used: 

Yellow to show close ups

Pink to show mid-shots

Orange to show title shots

Blue to show long shots

This method worked really well for us as it enabled us to see whether we were using a particular shot type continuously in a row and if we did it enabled us to change it. It also helped to see whether we'd break any continuity rules as the storyboard made it quite easy to identify shots which broke rules such as the 30 degree rule.

In order to get the storyboard done effieciently we all did some of the drawings. The drawings weren't too detailed but provided us with a rough idea of what our opening sequence would look like.

This process will help us with our animatic as now we have drawn the pictures we just have to put them into Adobe Premiere Pro and add music and voiceover to see it all roughly come together.