Preliminary To Final

We started off by doing are preliminary excersize, which consisted on a teenager walking down stairs, along a hall way and into a room, he then consulted a man working at his desk, to see if there was a plastic hexagon he could borrow, the man says no, shortly after this, andother teenager comes through and asks the same question, however this time the man says yes and a plastic hexagon is exchanged, we then see the man walk out and that is the end off the sequesnce, however, during this whort clip there were alot of errors that we didnt take note off, and therefore made the piece of short film look bad. If i was to do it again i would review the film part way through filming, or instead of filminig in once big chunk, do it in seperate bnits, as is we were to do this we would be able to prevent as many silly errors. For example the teenager that first walked in, we see his hands change position more than once in the clip, however we dont see any movement inbetween, so it looks odd, if we were to see the change it wouldnt look as bad, however it jumps to and from him, meaning the mistake is clearly illustrated to the viewers eye.
Other things i would change if i was to repeat this excercise would be to take a variety off different shots for the same movement, as we ended up with a short film that had bad shots in it, but we couldnt change this as we had only taken one view off the sequence meraning that we didnt have any choice, and what we had at the end off the day is what we were left with. Which also meant there was no margin for error. However when we were filming we did spot a few little things, such as one off our friends getting inside the camera frame, and if we hadnt of spotted that there and then, we would off had to crop the video, changing the proportions of the video, therefore making the video out of proportion, or changing the resoloution, as we are using less pixels to fill the same ammount off space.
We also found it hard to edit the shots together, as they were so jumpy, and the consistancy wasnt right, for example when the teenager is coming to the bottom of the stairs he sqings round as if to show he is about to travel left, however we then have a jump cut to show him walking along the the right, which doesnt look right, wheras we should of made him walk purpousely to the right, so that it looks correct in the viewers head.
The costumes and props that we used were also inappropriate and not very good, they were a bit to immature, for examply asking for a ‘green plastic hexagon’ wasnt very imaginative, the costumes that were being worn werent very appropriate for what we wanted to do, and set a rather relaxed atmosphere as the teenages was just wearing trackie bottoms and a hoodie.
When we got round to doing our final piece we had learnt all off these lessons meaning that our final piece has far more potential to do well and we would have sucess in making it look as professional as we possibly could. To do this we used Different types of camera shots, This meant that when we came to editing we had far more choice, and many more options to make our video clip look professional, as it meant we could mix different clips together, so that the short clip made more sense to the viewer, when it was playing, we also felt it made the piece more dynamic, and exciting, as there were alot off different views expressed. And different angles portrayed within the clip. We also changed the  costumes and props, again so that the viewer was more intrested in what was going on in the clip, it also helped us to achive a professional feel to everything, as the charachters looked the part, they looked realistic, rather than wearing every day things, we made them dress in suits, with a bowler hat on. As we thought this represented the role they were playing well, we looked up pictures of what natzi characthers wore, so we had a vague idea off what we had to achive, it also meant that what we created was as close we could get it to the real thing, improving the veramilitude of the piece. As well as this we also split the film into 2 sections We firstly shot and edited the first part off the film in sam’s house, this was filmed upstairs in his attic, and we got that piece of clip as short and too the point as we could make it, we then filmed the second part off the film, which we filmed locally at the bickerly bridge, we thought it was appropriate to do as it looks like the outskits of an otherwise demolished city, this also improved the versamilitude, and meant that trhe setting was more realistic. After we had filmed this piece we then edited it to a shorter piece off film, and put it next to the first piece of filming.
I think that between filming out preliminary excercise and our final piece we learnt alot about filming. Which is good as it meant that the final piece that we created was alot better than it could off been, if we hadnt started by doing our preliminary excercise we would off made many more mistakes than we needed too. Meaning that doing the preliminary excercise wasnt a waste of time but instead a very important learning curve for all off us, as it showed our group what we should and shouldnt do with our pieces of film, as well as what looked good and what didnt look so good.

Effects

Dust – 00.12 we used caster sugar as dust to imply an aged book this will attract the audience’s interest.

 Photo – 00.21 the photo we used is of my uncle and another soldier in an army uniform that means if anyone looks closely it looks similar to our two actors in Nazi uniform.

 Wannsee – 00.54 this is actual footage of the Wannsee building, the typewriter writing took a long time and took up 26 different videos! However with real footage of the building we attract audience’s interest.

 Uniform – 01.01 the Nazi armbands were made especially for us, and we dressed the characters according to the fashion of the time, therefore attracting audience’s interest

 Camera – 01.04 the camera is a Box Brownie camera of the 1930’s era and increases the verisimilitude thus attracting a wider audience.

 Money – 01.06 the money is the template of the 20 Reich mark printed off this will increase audience as it is an example of good mise en scene.

 Dialogue 01.27 all of our dialogue here on is dubbed and synching this was hard to get right, however with a good lip synch we please the audience.

 Red – 02.04 the red, white and black effect is briefly achieved here as it was hard to get it throughout this will attract audiences because it has an artistic style.

Music

Above is an example of the swing music we researched, we took inspiration from this when choosing our soundtrack.

Above is an example of the sad piano instrumental we use in our film.

Using ‘Garage band’ we were able to use some preset examples to construct the music of our film. We found swing music to convey the time and suggest an animated, busy environment, this then contrasts with the dramatic and sombre piano music that conveys a sinister moment. We also used ‘freesounds.com’ to get a pitch rise for the flashback, slow string music and a typewriter sound effect. This is an easy way to get sound effects and music without breaking copyright laws. We sought inspiration from similar films soundtracks and through our research into typical music of the 1940’s

Target audiance

Our target audience is anyone with historical interest in the war, adventure and mystery. We don’t expect younger audiences to be interested in this film and the mature subject matter makes this film likely to be a 15 certificate. The older generation with interest in this film may be interested aswell as those who enjoyed other war films, which we know are popular. ‘Schindler’s List’ is one of the most influential films of all time, and a film we researched that won 7 Oscars suggesting these films can be very successful. The film could also attract students who are maybe studying history and interested in the subject that our film covers. Having a teenager as the main character however could attract teenager’s who may relate to the character.

Editing

In the past few weeks our group has been editing our film which was a great learning experience despite various problems along the way. We had a good variety of shots from our filming however the dialogue was very indistinct because of the winds, the extent of which we didn’t realise until we put it onto the computer. This meant we had to record our actors speaking their lines and then carefully dub the audio over the original footage. We used this form of A.D.R to good effect as the dialogue had a good quality and synchronised with the actors almost perfectly. We had to layer the new audio with our previously recorded ambient sound of the Bickerley Bridge to increase the verisimilitude.

To achieve the black and white effect was easy however the red, black and white effect was difficult which meant we had to settle for only having it at points in the film opposed to throughout. We switch from colour to black and white between the modern-day scenes gradually and then back to colour at the end. The effect shows the journey back in time and special effects make the journey believable.

We use blurs, cross dissolve’s and slow motion as visual effects in the film to increase viewer interest and make the film more dramatic. All these effects were easy to apply however they look professional and effective. To achieve a typewriter tagline we had to take a time-consuming and clumsy approach of doing it. We created over 20 different titles each with a new letter to have the letters come onto the screen synchronised with the typewriter noise we got off ‘freesounds.com’. Despite the cumbersome approach the finished article is what we hoped and clinical.

Aswell as the typewriter noise we also downloaded string noises and pitch rises off the site ‘freesounds.com’ which doesn’t break any copyright laws. As for the other music we created using presets on Garage Band to make dramatic and intense piano music aswell as contemporary swing music.

When editing we made decisions to jump cut a long establishing shot and used our initiative in various other circumstances, the beauty of editing is that you can go with your heart but things can always be changed. We wanted to animate our titles to add to the professionalism of the film.

Our Storyboard (Animatic)

To create our storyboard we wrote descriptions of the shot then drew the description to help us understand the imagery of the shots. This was a vital step in the planning stage and helped us understand what each shot was going to look like and the practicalities of it. We developed the story board in conjunction with the shooting script for a more well structured plan, and then we animated the story board using Adobe premier pro. This was a quick edit to show each shot in our story board but helped us a lot in the planning of filming, it was a matter of putting the clips in order and then putting it on youtube thus it becomes animated.

The filming (3 Day period)

After careful scheduling juggling weather, actors availability and equipment availability we were able to start the process of filming.

We were able to film over a total of 3 days the first was at my house and primarily my loft, we had to spontaneously adapt our plans as the place where we had originally planned to film was not available, despite this when designing the story board and shooting script I modelled the film on my own loft and therefore the location was suitable but we had lost some filming time.

As we were filming in a loft the space was restricted so filming with four of us proved difficult we overcame this by moving boxes and creating space. Lighting was another issue as we had little natural light this was overcome with 3 or 4 lamps tactically positioned. The filming itself went smoothly and we had no problems with the equipment or cast, my mum kindly stepped in to play Cynthia.

On our second day of filming, we were on location at the Bickerley bridge in Ringwood, and it was a very sunny and clear day in half term, which meant we had to attempt our shots in the times when the many tourists and dog walkers were absent from the bridge. We had to stop and start a lot to make sure we didn’t get anyone in our shots or pick up their talking on the audio, which would have ruined the continuity of the 1940’s setting. In hindsight, it probably was not the best place for us to film with these complications however the location and imagery of the bridge was too good a prospect to ignore.

Another problem that we faced on  the day was that the battery that we had for the camera was faulty so we had a small amount of time to film before we had to take time out to recharge the battery. On reflection we should have checked the seemingly working equipment.

The biggest problem was due to the fact that our scene involved characters wearing Nazi swastika armbands and this could be misconstrued . Since the bridge is quite near some housing, which must have disturbed one of the residents, causing the police to be called. Once the police had talked to us and seen that we were making a harmless film, they quickly left us to carry on. On reflection we should have notified the residents to make sure there were no misunderstandings however we did do our utmost to be discreet with the armbands hiding them between shots.

As the faulty battery caused us to rush the shots and disrupt up the audio, we decided to come back for a third day, which was overcast and cloudy, which was exactly what we wanted, and it all went smoothly without complications. This time we could film without the disruption of dog walkers as frequently and it was a very clinical day of filming, the actors were very tolerant and were happy to redo scenes lots of time to give us the shots we want. We were able to finish the filming in just over 2 hours and we hope we gave a good selection of shots to later be edited.

Props, and costume during filming.

We used these swastika’s as replicas that we made by hand from bits of cotton, it looked authentic when it was recorded on camera, which is all we needed it to do.

We had various props that were used in our filming, the majority of which in the second part of the film. We were able to acquire a 1930’s brownie box camera that significantly improved the mise en scene. Additionally, we had to print off the actual transcript of the Wannsee conference and put it in a typewriter font also we printed off 20 Reichsmark the currency in 1942 and it looked convincing on film. We were also able to create some swastika armbbands which looked very good as well as finding a suitcase that seemed appropriate for the 1940’s era.

As you can see above we costumed our actors in suits and hats that we researched to be typical to the era to add to the verisimilitude of the film. Ian playing the camera man wore working class clothes to show his class and contrast with the smartly dressed Nazi’s.  For the day one filming we needed to obtain a picture and photo albulm, this I find in my cupboard so was easy to get hold of. I wore a typical young teenagers clothing with a t-shirt and jeans.

Analysis of Films in our Genre

January 22, 2010

We took inspiration from each of the films two-minute openings however on these films YouTube didn’t allow us to copy the link to our post due to copyright laws. The first two-minute should be interesting and make the audience want to watch more, in our film we end on a mystery to keep audiences interested, which is why we chose these films to look at, as they are of a simular genre of which we are trying to re create.

Schindler’s List

When researching films of a similar genre to our own, we found Schindler’s List to be very inspirational, many aspects we want to include in our film our inspired by research into this film. The context of setting a film around the second world war is similar to our film and the black and white effects used is something we want to use at points. Additionally, the film circles around the horrors of the holocaust, a part of history that we felt would be interesting to explore and possibly inform people. The music in the film is sombre and dramatic and it seemed to capture the mood perfectly, something we really wanted to achieve. Schindler’s List is about a german business man who defies the horrific events of the holocaust and likewise we had a german as our main character who eventually rejects the holocaust. We took inspiration from costume and mise en scene from this film, in our film we show Germany with a shot of the Wannsee conference building and Schindler’s List had many shots itself in Germany.

Sin City

Only the first 2 minutes illustrate the research we explored with the film Sin City, which was the red colour effect in black and white. The colour correction technique was something we strived to use at some point in our film and we wanted to show the swastika in red contrasting with the overall black and white scene. The technique is artistic and we wanted to challenge ourselves with editing by incorporating unique and interesting visual effects. The context of the film doesn’t match our context however this clip illustrates the colour correction technique we wanted to use.

The Pianist

Similar to Schindler’s List the context is similar however this film is in colour, which we use at points in our film. The Pianist has a very good soundtrack and the dramatic piano music is something we want to include in our film. The Pianist is from a Jewish perspective however our film tells the past of a Nazi and seeks to challenge audiences without being controversial.

The Reader

This film revolves around the theme of the holocaust and very much alike to our film reveals a character’s past throughout the theme through flashbacks and reflection, however in ‘The Reader’ this is done in court scene’s. The mystery and revealing of secrets is something that we really wanted to have in our film as it adds to the tension and excitement.  The Weinstein Company write that “THE READER is a story about truth and reconciliation, about how one generation comes to terms with the crimes of another”. This follows the concept for our film as our Nazi character tries to reconcile and the teenager comes to terms with the crimes of his generation.

Shooting Script (exterior)

Scene – Outside Wannsee conference
Shots	Shot description	Audio and dialogue
1	(Effect – camera flash), LS of Two men standing together
2	MS, photographer asks for money	That will be 20 reichsmark, your photo will be ready next week
3	Pan S,  men give the money, CU of  money exchange	Thank you – Lucas
4	Tracking Shot, men walk off into back alley
5	2S, Lukas gives him suitcase
6	Mid shot, looks down at suitcase	Is this the transcript – herm
7	CU, of Herm face smiles
8	Mid shot, puts suitcase by side	How did it go- herm
9	OTS, we see Lukas	As planned no interruptions- Lukas
10	Shot reverse shot, CU, Herman smiles	Good then it is in action- Herm
11	CU, of Lukas, looking worried and concerned	Yes- Lukas
12	OTS, Herman sees Lukas’ expression
13	CU, Lukas still concerned look, Reaction shot, Herman speaks. Lukas quickly changes to reassure Herman	Don’t you agree- Herm Yes- Lukas
14	CU , of Herman looking suspicious, reactionary shot, hear Lukas	Yes my allegiance is with the Fuhrer- Lukas
15	LS, 2S, Both salute then shake hands and Herman leaves	Heil Hitler- Both
16 17	CU, Lukas looks guilty Tracking shot behind Herman stops and goes over the shoulder we see him looking at transcript. Nazi symbol in red