Blank - Final Cut

Reflective Comment:
It's done! Obviously we now need to work solely on evaluating and getting more feedback of the final one - perhaps showing it in assembly to the whole of Sixth Form if we're brave enough. Be me and Chloe are incredibly proud of this and feel it was a big learning curve for us both. 

Sound for final OTS

Sounds used, and where they're used, in 'Blank':

Sounds Used In 'Blank':

• Better Days - BenSound.com (copyright free) 
• Intimidation - Purple-Planet.com (copyright free)
• House on the Hill - Purple Planet.com 
• Sweep Motion - Downloaded Online (copyright free)
• Thunder Roll - iMovie Sound Effects
• Drone Dark Suspense 2 - iMovie Sound Effects
• Ambient Effect 2 - iMovie Sound Effects
• Voiceover - Original (recorded on a marantz audio recorder)
• Door Close - Original (FOLEY)
• Light Switch - Original (FOLEY)
• Clank - Original (FOLEY)

I have created a SoundCloud Playlist with all 13 tracks (11 listed above) and also 2 which we considered as using as the main music before we found Intimidation, these are called Sardonicus and Insidious and were both downloaded from Purple-Planet.  



We decided against Sardonicus as we felt it was too scary and too breaking of the Film Noir conventions. We also thought it didn't fit with the images shown and had a too disturbing feel when played. We were keen on Insidious for a long period of time but once we'd found Intimidation we felt that worked better and was easier to manipulate around the footage to make it feel scary. 

The main parts of the backing music are Better Days and Intimidation mixed with House on the Hill. Better Days is from a website called BenSound. This is a copyright free website where you can search for ambient backing music by genre. Better Days is a calm piece of music with an occasional jazzy twang. This is the most Film Noir conventional piece of music we have in our project. Most of our scary music, that plays after the ident, is promotionally Intimidation, Thunder Rolls, Drones and House on the Hill. These create an up tempo, low pitched beat for it to be easier for the viewer to watch. We foley-ed a clank from when the pencil sharper blade moves, the light switch click, the door closing, and a finger click. We did also record these noises at the time of shooting the footage but they seemed muffled and unclear to we re-filmed them using a Marantz audio recorder whilst also recording Harry doing a voice over and letting the story unfold of what Harry will do in this film. a Marantz audio recorder is a good thing to use as the sound comes out clearly and they are also easy to use. 

Chloe wrote the script for the voice over, it says: 
I never thought I would have the bottle to commit murder, and take a vindictive, sly, suductive, women from this Earth but she betrayed me and I needed justice. So now I am left with all traces of her, that drill holes through my mind, traces I have to get rid of before I kill another. This time with no consequences. My future is nothing but a blank page.

What Does This Say?

Reflective Comment: I think this was a really effective video. It was a quickly filmed vox pop of what my class thought the titles Chloe had made said. We found that only half got it right and that simply isn't enough for if it was mass shown half of the audience wouldn't even know what the film is called. We know from this quick survey that we need to re-think our titles and try again to create them. 

Reflective Comment: This was another quickly filmed vox pop of what our friends and family thought the titles Chloe had written said. All got it write so we know they've improved since the last ones. 

Feedback

Reflective Comment: I like this video, it clearly shows Harry and Eleanor's views. They point out the parts they liked/disliked. We chose these two as they have experience with mine and Chloe's filming, they know the Film Noir genre and have excisiting knowledge of characters and camera angels due to their drama and performance studies A-Levels. However Harry was our actor in this as so could be bias and not being honest about what he really thought of the acting or scenes filmed. Also Eleanor and Harry are both mine and Chloe's friends and may have felt they needed to be nicer about the rough cut than they would've been if they didn't know us. 

I have received positive feedback in the comments box on the YouTube video. This is always nice to receive and will take his comments on board.

Reflective Comment: This video is something I quickly made to show where me and Chloe are at with our production. Jack and Fabian made some good points that me and Chloe can work on and improve on and they also have knowledge of the brief and theme as they are in our A-Level Media Studies class. However, as this was filmed without their knowledge we wanted them to be as honest as they could and didn't want to prise answers out of them but I do feel we could've asked more questions to get more accurate answers. 

Planning

This is mine and Chloe's rough storyboard. Chloe wrote it on Post-It notes so that it could easily be re-arranged so we could adjust what went where. We did also do a picture story board on paper and we brought the both of them to all filming occasions. They were very useful and kept us on track. 

Reflective Comment: me and Chloe are both happy we did these storyboards and although we could've added more of our scenes to the Post-It note written one we had enough that we could follow it and also improvise where necessary.  

Experimenting with camera angles, filters, music, speed etc. of clips we could use

These are possible camera angles, filters etc. we could use for our clips of our tapes and also if our main protagonist does write something. These were just a play around on my iPad on iMovie and also to show Chloe Smith how to use iMovie a little bit in preparation for our editing. 

Reflective Comment: This was mainly to show Chloe how to use iMovie in preparation for our editing of our final production. I like how we showed what we could use and also how we experimented with nearly ever tool on iMovie, it gave a good incite into what we want to try and what we could do when it comes to filming. 

Timeplan of our Opening Title Sequence

Week Beginning:

21st December 2015: I need to write up ideas on props and costume, Chloe Smith needs to write up ideas on location and set (lighting).
28th December 2015: Script written &; messaged Harry Colgan (the actor of our main protagonist) about meeting and possibly start filming?     
4th January 2016: I need to teach Chloe how to use iMovie and do a trail-run, discus what camera angles we would like to use
11th January 2016: I need to do a write up of typography and start thinking about ident, Chloe Smith needs to start thinking about typography 
18th January 2016: Photoshoot with Beth Reid (our femme fatale) and I will edit it to black, white & red. Chloe Smith and I need to film Harry speaking, I need to trail run make-up (tired looking). 
25th January 2016: Have started editing Harry footage. Harry & Chloe need to come round mine to film more scenes with things such as tapes, blades & books
1st February 2016: Be well into editing. Need to film more blades with Harry and do another voiceover of what's happening
8th February 2016: Edit edit edit sound sound sound
15th February 2016: DUE &; HANDED IN

Reflective Comment: This has obviously been worked around but was useful to keep us on track. Also we have been told we also have the half term break (the week beginning the 15th) to work on this as well so that takes the pressure off a little bit but I am proud me and Chloe have kept plodding through it and haven't left everything last minute, this was evident when we were the first in our class to have a rough cut to show our class to see early on what our peers thought. 

Priest (2011) Extract Sound Analysis

These are the recreated sound effects and how some of them were made.




Reflective Comment:
I am looking forward to continuing with this series of Vlogs and also helps me to keep track of where I'm at. From Ventress Class Vlogs #2 I like the work I did of the Priest work having the red lettering over the top and has opened my eyes into how many sound effects me and Chloe will need to do for our Noir OTS. Now that I've done all the sound effects I needed to do I need to compare with Chloe Smith the other half she's done and start working on our Noir OTS.

Narrative adapting for our Opening Title Sequence (OTS)

Mine and Chloe Smith's Vlog we did in class the other day 
(we've been asked to record our progress as we go along). 
We're making a film noir opening title sequence (OTS). We needed to look at different types of narrative so see how to develop our storyline.



Today we planned our narrative properly thinking about all the things on written on the board:

This is our Vlog of what me and Chloe Smith went through today 


Reflective Comment:
Need to finish writing about thess but the Vlogs are done as they weren't serious so although there are improvements that could be made they will do. 

Continuity Task

Our Brief
To create a Narrative: a Fairy tale reinvented OR modernised OR Subverted but meeting Film Noir conventions in some way. It also has to include a match on action, an 180 degree rule and the set action: a person opens a door, walks through and across the room, sits and exchanges dialogue with another person.

Planning
My group, me, Chloe Smith and Freya Rudd, quickly came to the decision to use Cinderella as our fairytale as it was one of the few we all knew and felt would be easy to manipulate the original characters around the film noir theme. We planned on using peers in my year as actors, who have free periods whilst we have Media, so they would be available to film in our lessons, also allowing myself, Chloe and Freya to focus on what was asked of us rather than learning lines. From here we wrote down all the characters in Cinderella: Cinderella, the Prince, the Fairy-Godmother, the ugly step-sisters etc. Out of this list we chose who we thought we could use basing it on who was available to act and also thinking about the story and how we could manipulate it around the film noir conventions (e.g who would be the femme fatale?). Once we had decided all of that, we wrote down one to ten on a piece of paper and tried to come up with ten significant points in the story, like a written down story board. We also wrote down possible costume, props and camera angles we could use. After this we shot 'stills' of our ten points to give us an idea of where to film, what camera angles to use, and just to give us more of a realistic idea of what we can do. The stills are below and the written narration I did is on top.

Film Noir Cinderella - Stills from Emily Ventress

What We Did

Roles:
Emily Ventress (me): Camera, editor, costume, narrative and props manager.
Chloe Smith: Director, camera assistant, script writer, costume and narrative.
Freya Rudd: Script writer assistant, costume, narrative and actress (Fairy-Godmother).

We used our lesson time to our advantage by filming most of our footage in them. We used many different parts in school and worked around when other classes had their lessons and where (e.g. worked out when there was a P.E class in the hall and when there wasn't). I think we only used one or two lunch times and a couple of hours in a school holiday for me to record 'Cinderella' doing it the voice over. After we had filmed all the clips I did all the editing. The school does have iMovie on their Macs but we used our lessons to film and so we didn't have time at school to edit. I know how to use iMovie and as I have a MacBook at home it seemed the sensible option for me to just do it all at home. However looking back it did take longer than I thought and I could've invited Chloe or Freya over to show them what to do and let them do a bit, however teaching somebody how to use it would've taken up time we didn't really have and we weren't free many of the same days within the half term holiday we had as some of us have outside jobs and some live far away. 
After receiving feedback from our teachers we attempted to 'dub' the scene where Cinderella is about to shoot The Prince as this is a very echoed and muffled scene, the dubbing went well and I managed to edit it so it did look synced with their lips however it didn't sound like that noise was coming from the room they were in, I tried using the Audio Effects in iMovie of Echo Delay, Medium Room, Large Room and Cathedral but the Echo Delay, Large Room and Cathedral made the speech hard to understand so in the end I settled for Medium Room.

What Went Wrong
I think one of the major issues in our production was sound. During Cinderella and her best friend's scene where they're discussing the The Prince coming to town, about 8 table tennis games were going on in the hall in the next room, this has caused a constant sound of ping pong balls bouncing off the tables, the 'reduce background noise' button on iMovie could not correct this either. The background music (Ofelia's dream off Bensound.com, copyright and royalty free) also overtly going loud of quiet frequently as I tried lowering it whilst people were talking but it just sounds very jumpy and doesn't flow very well. Another issue with our final production is the background clutter in the scene where Cinderella is talking to the Fairy-Godmother. We filmed these scenes in the school's studio. We did notice it was in the background so initially we filmed it so you could only see the Fairy-Godmother but still hear Cinderella however as most of hearing is also lip-reading it became hard to understand Eleanor without seeing her. Then on iMovie I tried putting a picture-in-picture of a black box to cover the background but I couldn't cover off of it without cutting off the Fairy-Godmothers back-of-head. Also focusing more on Mise-en-Scène could've helped as Cinderella seems to have sex with socks on which doesn't really add to the stereotypical sexiness of her and Cinderella seems to scrub the floor with her scarf at one point.

What Went Well
I think the general feel of the film feels right for a film noir. I also think we chose actors and characters really well. I like all of the camera angles we used and made a good attempt on some of those we'd never done before (e.g focus pulls). I think lighting went well as although my teacher said she didn't like the shadows I think some of them are really good with Cinderella and the Prince dancing. Also I think the fact we got the whole thing finished is pretty impressive as apart from all the editing, the voice over and the script writing it was all done within school hours. Posting what we had done on social media made a lot more people see it so that was a good idea, I put it on Facebook, Twitter and Youtube. On my Facebook post a lot of people commented saying well done and our Youtube video of our final production stands at 176 views.

Overall

Overall I am happy with our final production and feel it was a success. I am proud of what we achieved in the short time frame and I do think it has improved since our previous (and our first) production being a Sweded version of the Insidious 3: Teaser Trailer. Of course there were things we could've improved on but this will be a good learning curve for the next production we will be asked to produce. 

I enjoyed this activity and hope we get to do similar things in the future (maybe with a little extra time!)



Reflective Comment:
My Reflective comment on the actual video(s) are above however my reflective comment on my evaluation would be that I think I did this well, it's not too long but says all I needed to. I could've written more in my conclusion (Overall) but I would've felt I was repeating myself.

Insidious 3 - Sweded

This is my sweded version of the Insidious: Chapter 3, Teaser Trailer. Enjoy!! :)
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Insidious 3: Planning, Storyboard, Props, Script, iMovie, Facebook, Twitter & YouTube from Emily Ventress

This is our planning, storyboard, props, script, iMovie, Facebook, Twitter & YouTube evidence of making our Sweded film, Insidious 3 Teaser Trailer.

Reflective Comment

I really enjoyed making this film. I think it turned out well (compared to the original Insidious 3: Teaser Trailer). It could be improved by filming all on the same day so that the lighting doesn't keep changing and also so all members of the group could be there. Also if we had filmed it at night so it was darker and more likely to scare people.