Camera movement

 So... 

    I really want shots with movement, but I have really shaky hands and the closest thing I have to a stabilizer is a telescope stand that I screwed a chuck e cheese selfie stick onto. Works kind of okay as a tripod, not ok as anything else. I can stabilize still shots in my editing software if need be, but I can't do that with a moving shot since there won't be a constant point of reference. You might be seeing my dilemma now.

    I was practicing getting a stable movement shot so as not to waste time when I have my older sister with me and I thought to myself, "dang, I can't to this, I'm a person, I don't have wheels." But then I realized: I DO HAVE WHEELS and

I thought I was so smart for this. It was still shaky. we'll see if I can come up with anything else.

Tentative filming schedule

     Now that I know what and where I have to film, I've gotten together my actors' schedules and have some sort of idea of when I'll shoot each part.

    Sunday- Dad's monologue and flashback shot of my dad and little sister

    Monday- Maybe pick up lighting equipment from the school? And scope out the locations I scoured google maps to find to see how well lit they are around sunset/night. While I do this I'll get some footage just incase I need some more dystopic landscape footage, but these will be more of a back-pocket resort as the areas are more grassy than I would like for a cyberpunk film. If the hotel location looks good at night I might even take my little sister that same day to film her part in front of it.

    Tuesday- Have my older sister come over and film the government agent parts at my house.

    Wednesday- definitive day that I can take my little sister for her parts since she's free all day.

I tried to fit everything in as compactly as I could within the first few days of the week because I know I'm going to face plenty of issues along the way where I may need to refilm. I also want to give myself extra time for editing because it'll be a process.

Group Meetings- Locale

     Today was the first day our class did group meetings for this project. We were placed into small groups with people working on different films to bounce ideas off of each other and offer suggestions. This was a really fun way to see where other people were at and expand on my project with ideas from other peoples point of view.

    The most important thing I gained from today and this meeting, some of which I definitely wouldn't have known on my own, was establishing the locations I would use throughout the film. The opening relies on three locations: My dad's hideout, the family home, and the daughter's hideout. 

    I decided to use a part of my house that wouldn't be shown for the rest of the opening as my dad's hideout because it looked like where I imagined a man would be hiding from the government, and the fact that it's in my house makes filming much easier. 

    The majority of the opening would take place in my bedroom and back yard, while the agent destroys my dad's video.

    Then, I had come to realize that there wouldn't be a realistic and believable way for the daughter to be hiding within that same house and show it properly, so my teacher suggested having the daughter hiding at a separate location for the last part of the opening. I liked this idea, but didn't yet know where I could put her. That's when the group meeting came to answer my prayer. My peers gave me several good locations they knew of that would fit with the aesthetic and situation of my piece, described what they were like, and even showed me how to get there. This was so helpful and I think that added location will be so good both for the storytelling and visual appeal of my film.

    Now that I knew where I would be shooting, I could make important decisions about lighting. One classmate said it'd be cool for me to play with colored lighting, which I was already hoping to do. Knowing that the final location will be external and probably quite barren and unlit helped me to decide that I should probably film around sunset hour rather than at night, which is what I had originally planned. I'll work on thinking about how I can practically used colored lighting in that sunset type of environment to get the cyberpunk vibe while I work out the final storyboard.

Writing A Good Monologue

     Before I can flesh out my exact shots, I need to know what my dad will be saying in his monologue. This has to be good, because it's going to be the main focus of the first part of the opening, and it's also the only thing giving the audience context, so it's very important that I do this right. I also want to avoid cliches and cheesy writing like the PLAGUE. 

    So, I sat down with my dad and asked him a few questions to see his natural reactions, the way he tended to word things, and what things he would realistically tell his daughter in a situation like this. I thought I should model the monologue as closely as possible by my dad's natural idiolect for two reasons. 

A) This character practically IS my dad, attitudes, occupation, and all, so it makes sense that whatever he would realistically say is also something my character would be saying.

B) My dad is not a professional actor, and the film is kind of riding on this performance. The whole production will strike the audience as so much more genuine and powerful if this monologue is delivered well, and I could make it a whole lot easier for my dad to deliver it well if it's already based on what he actually sounds like.

    Next, I made an outline of all the important timestamps within the song and made note of how much time I had for this monologue to play out. I gave myself a rough estimate of how many words I'd be writing, and I put that 49 seconds of the song on loop over and over and over again. I rambled on incorporating important plot details and phrases I knew my dad would gravitate towards based on our interview and of course the last 16 years of my life. When I had a rough draft, I even whipped out the best impression of my dad I could muster to gauge how his timing would be over the song. Right now, this is the writing I've landed on. My dad liked it when I showed him so that's a big win.

The Rough Storyboard

     After doing my research, I played "Me and Your Mama" one last time for inspiration, and the idea finally came. I drew out a very rough storyboard on a piece of scrap paper to chart out which two minutes of the song I would use and where each part would hit along with the music, and here it is.

   

    The scene starts with a character giving a message to his daughter explaining that the world is in a state of disaster (first picture). He is a former government officer who was taken out after trying to stop the corruption within the ruling body from the inside. As his last message plays out, the audio remains as a voice-over while the film cuts to flashbacks of him and his young daughter growing up and shots showing the current state of the world. It is then shown that this message is being watched as a hologram in the daughters bedroom. This is also the section where I'll put the credits.

    Just as he is about to give his daughter instruction to finish off what he started, and the beat drop of the song hits, the message is turned off (second picture). There's even a *click* in the music at this point that I will DEFINITELY sync up so everything goes extra smoothly with the music. There's a moment to wonder why the heck she would do that, and then it is revealed that the person watching the hologram is not the daughter, but another government agent. Now you see that the evil laugh in the beat drop was fitting after all. The agent takes the drive containing the video and shots slowly widen to show that the room has been completely ransacked as all evidence of the mans existence is being collected to wipe out.

    The agent burns the evidence and leaves (third picture), but as she closes the door, a rack focus reveals that the daughter is still alive and in hiding (fourth picture). This will take place at the next "beat drop" moment where the song becomes more intense, and Gambino sings loudly, "Let me in to your."

    The daughter runs to a hiding place within the house and is met with relief to see the copy of the video she had made beforehand (fifth picture). She prepares herself to finish what her father started, and gets up to leave. The title of the movie shows on a blank background.

    Those last two pictures pertain to an idea I had for using a different two minutes of the song which I won't be doing so don't worry about those. This coming week, I will be making the final story board as detailed as possible to flesh out all the bugs in my locales, mis en scene elements, and plan exactly how I'll get each shot in preparation for production the following week.

Inspiration Strikes at Last

     Finally in the series of my latest research rabbit hole, the content pertaining to the cyberpunk genre.

    

    I began with the 2017 version of Ghost in the Shell, not the anime this time, although it follows the original very closely. This movie is the epitome of cyberpunk, and I liked that the beginning sequence of the robots creation lead straight into some action afterwards. As much as this felt like the heart and soul of the genre, I didn't think I'd be able to replicate a scenario like that with my budget apart from perhaps the plot.

    In Aeon Flux, I noted the typical voiceover providing context paired with montage-ish shots showing the state of the cinematic world. I'd only use this method if I can write something truly good for the voice to be saying. Otherwise, I think it'd come off as cheesy.

    The next film, Rebooted, was not on my list. Instead, it came up in my recommended videos after the Aeon Flux opening and something told me I had to click. I'm quite glad I did, too, because this short film gave me a lot of inspiration. Although it didn't end up being what I thought it would, I took away two main things from this film. Firstly, I saw so many different production techniques that could be useful, like using a greenscreen to place characters in a set that you've created in miniature since we might not all have giant bustling technicolor cityscapes in our backyards. This technique was also used in another film I can't find anymore that I investigated when doing my genre research project. There were also parts where the creators animated on top of live-action footage to bring unreal aspects into the real world, which I will most likely emulate to create my tech. Aside from technique, the first few seconds of the film struck me with an idea for how my two genre ideas could come together. The plot of the film ended up being not at all like this, but I got the idea to perhaps have a robot-maker, who narrated the story, to allow for the more story-book feel.

    12 Monkeys showed me audio techniques, as well as a different approach to the narrator, using a sound bridge to lead from an authoritative character on screen into a voiceover. This was interesting and felt more organic than having a narrator excluded from the narrative world.

    Blade runner did a few things I liked. The first, an extreme closeup of an eye at the beginning created a pleasant sense of cohesivity when the eyes were brought up again at the examination table. Secondly, the costuming made the characters roles and context of the story abundantly clear. This is definitely something I could, and should, do to show-and-not-tell my story. I also loved the shocking ending just like Lady Bird.

    The breakthrough of inspiration came upon deciding to watch this YouTube video. I came into it expecting low budget production tips, and came out of it exposed to the film that would change it all. I took note of the thought they put into the characters, down to the boys speech patterns, which reminded me of the characters in The End of the Fucking World (the only show I've ever re-watched). I thought that was extra cool because I remember thinking it would be fun to make something with a similar style of dialogue. Afterwards, I was sold on watching the short film they were talking about, The Manual. Upon seeing that it was about the last man on earth, who grew up being raised by a robot, it hit me that these two movie feels might not be too hard to combine after all, and I immediately got to work on developing my idea.

    In the next post, I'll discuss my final plot and show you some story boards I've started.

Notes on Childhood Wonder

     The next set of content I took notes on were videos and films that pertained to my interests in cyberpunk and childhood storytelling.

    If Beale Street Could Talk gave me some good takeaways as well. I took from this video and this video. I liked the use of a handheld shot when filming the kids, as it makes the clips feel more familiar. The colors in these shots were also beautifully used and didn't require, I don't know, owning a giant pink castle or something, which I appreciated. I thought that I should use plenty of closeups in my film after watching this because they build intimacy, can work to develop details of my character. As a bonus, my zero budget production and editing techniques would probably look better and less obviously zero budget if I focus on small, realistic shots rather than full bodies or wides. I also was reminded of how nice it can be to use lighting to your advantage, not just in terms of color, but also in type, when I saw shots that took advantage of high key lighting and flares, although I'm not sure if I would be able to create those types of lighting.

    Forrest Gump's scene matched my idea of factoring character perspective into shot composition. Low angles showed Forrest speaking to the bus driver, high angles showed the driver, handheld footage produced a shakiness while walking through the bus. The moment it cut to adult Forrest on his bench made me think that a flashback could be a good way for me to include childhood in my story without keeping the main character a child for the entire duration of the film. Growing up could be part of the film rather than its main focus.

    I also watched this video about the Grand Budapest Hotel, from which I gathered the storytelling technique. I liked the idea of an older narrator, not necessarily the main character or a character at all within the confines of the story, and I liked when it was told quite literally like reading a book, with the "he said," and all.

AND WE'RE BACK!!

     Ladies and gentlemen! Young and old! I am coming to you LIVE and a bit hyperactive from my bedroom desk to give you this breaking news on my project.

    As I promised, I've come with my decision as to which movie feel I'll be pursuing further, and the decision is that I'm not deciding :)

    In all honesty, what I wanted most was to combine elements from the two sets of inspirations, but I have a habit of being much too ambitious and felt that I'd better just stick to one if I was going to get this done in a timely manner. Well, I went on a bit of a watching spree on YouTube today. Finding and taking notes on film openings that my teacher recommended for viewing, short films I thought pertained to my genres of interest, and videos I could turn to for help on technique and production methods, and I've come out of it with a vague but resolute idea for the premise of my film. I'll put my notes in here to share the journey that this was, and elaborate on what I took away from these viewings in this post. I realized after rambling way too much out of excitement that I should probably split this up into more than one post for the sake of not making you want to crawl into a hole, dear reader of mine, so I'll probably have a good few extra posts for this week. 

    I started off with the openings that my teacher recommended for everyone regardless of genre. 

    I liked the beginning of Silence of the Lambs, as it introduced the main character and gave context through costume, setting, action, etc. rather than dialogue. This was helpful because I want my opening to focus on establishing the main character and I really don't want to do that through dialogue or a "Narrating I." 

    From Lady Bird, I loved the way that the opening pulled you in and remained pretty calm until a dramatic act at the very end. That's something I might do with my film, as it seems like a good way to introduce the main conflict while allowing most of the opening to deal with character development. It's also a really intriguing way to hook the audience and give them a "promise" (as this Ted Talk on story telling states every film should have, but more on that in a later post).

    Emma was not only aesthetically brilliant, but the way that the music was so in-sync with the narrative world is something I would definitely try to emulate.

    Coming up, I'll show you what became of the battle of the genres, and discuss my final thoughts on what the premise of my film will be. From there, I'll start planning out the technicalities of the story and purpose of the opening. See you soon!

Things #3-5

 Hello!

    Alright, the time has come. The last three things that have been really inspiring me lately are quite a world away from my last post's imaginings. However, under this category, if I play my cards right during filming, post-production wont be nearly as grueling as the cyberpunk idea. Either way, without further ado, my second option for the vibe.

    Coming in at thing number three, we have Studio Ghibli films. Every moment in these pieces enthralls you with a sense of child-like wonder. The studio is notorious for making even the most mundane or unimportant parts of life beautiful. If I could live in one of these movies, I would. I would love to make something that could give others that same feeling, or at least try to.

(Ponyo- a personal favorite Ghibli film)

    As for number four, films centering around childhood, or rather, taking on the point of view of a child. Things like this tiktok series, entitled "Growth," or The Florida Project (the theme of this blog). Again, nostalgia is a powerful thing, what can I say. This route could give me a lot of freedom to play with perspective and almost exaggerate my techniques to appeal to that child-like sense of emotion. Every emotion felt in a film like this is a first.

(a screenshot of the series in question)

    Finally, we've reached thing number five, which is this tiktok. I saw it and was completely transported. I thought it was the cutest thing, and captures the vibe very well. Its comment section was full of references to Wes Anderson, and, admittedly, I haven't seen many of his films. However, from what I do know, I will certainly look deeper into them as he will serve as massive inspiration for this project should I choose to go this route. The use of color and the music in his films holds a story-book magic that I would try to emulate with my work.

(a screenshot of the tiktok)

(An illustration of Wes Andersons "The Grand Budapest Hotel" color palate)

    With all this said, it's time for me to make a genre decision before I delve into further research. This is gonna be tough, but I'll be back in a few days time with the decision made, full speed ahead.

The Final Project

     So far, I've used this blog to talk about several research and production projects I've done in this class, as well as how they'll help me in the future. 

    Well, "the future" is now. From here on out I'll be blogging about my process in creating my final portfolio piece of the course, a two minute film opening. As of now, I've got a few things currently inspiring me that I might want to incorporate.

    Firstly, the cyberpunk genre. I wrote a blog post researching this genre and although I never thought I would produce any content under it, I ended up liking it a lot more than I had before. This tiktok series played a big role in changing my mind. I absolutely loved the look and concept, and the same account has a tutorial posted on how they were able to make it happen, and it seems pretty doable to incorporate a piece of this in part of my opening if I'm responsible. A screenshot of the tiktok is below.

    Thing number two: the song Me and Your Mama by Childish Gambino. This thing has been on repeat on my mind for the longest time and all I can think is how cool it would be to use it in a film. Even if I didn't end up using the actual song, the emotion and the vibe of the music is something I'd want to capture whole-heartedly. Something soulful, passionate.

    Now, don't look at me funny, but things number three through five are sort of on a totally different wavelength. I might mess around and find a way to combine the two vibes, but as it currently stands, the two worlds will need two different postings if I am to do them each justice in my research before I can go about choosing one or getting creative with them both.

    Until tomorrow, stay tuned!

Music Marketing #2

    The slideshow's been submitted, the presentation's been done, but this project is one that's difficult to say goodbye to. That being said, however, it has been quite a rollercoaster getting to this point.

    My group and I started this endeavor off with research and planning. After being assigned to rock and listening to the songs available, we decided to work with "My Name is Human" by Highly Suspect. From there, we split up our research so that each one of us completed one case study and began to brainstorm ideas for our music video. We bounced ideas off of each other very well, immediately agreeing that we wanted to shoot in a dark setting and use colored lighting to our advantage. We came up with a few cool shots and concepts that the music made us think of before stringing them together into a story (ex. we wanted an under-water shot, and one in a car). Eventually, we got together on a zoom call to flesh out the whole story board (below).

    Then came the filming process. Isa and Kim came over to my house to shoot our video as soon as we could all get together. Here, we worked on our website and social media, created some content that we would be posting online, and got to work on filming as much as we could. Our most pressing issue was getting the shots we needed in my pool, since the GoPro we had on hand was borrowed, and we wouldn't be able to shoot with it again. The pool was quite colder than we had mentally prepared for. Below are some photos from that day.

    

    The next day, we came to terms with the fact that this idea including the pool, shots driving, and lighting we may not have been able to set up was going to have to change. Batteries were dying, extension cords weren't working, everything that could go wrong, did. Luckily, Isa had another idea up her sleeve. Again, we arranged a day as soon as possible to film a whole new video. Our time was wearing thin. Upon arriving at Isa's house, we had a brand new story board to bring to life, shown below.

    We spent that whole day filming the new video to the best of our ability. Many things went wrong again but we were able to make it out with most of what we needed. As crunch time quickly approached, Isa took on the editing, while Kim and I called to put together our presentation. We brought all our research, ideas, and inspiration from our shared google document into the presentation. I added final touches on our website, made a merchandise shop, and curated our Instagram page. We pulled the presentation together aesthetically and split the load on who would be presenting which slides. Finally, we were ready to present. We gave it our best, as the majority of us had poured our hearts, and a lot of laughs, into this project. With that, it was over. 

(one of our presentation slides)

After having done this project, I learned a lot of new things. Plan every shot AND how you will get them in as much detail as possible before going onto the scene. Always give yourself more time than needed to film, because things will always go wrong. I learned some new editing tricks because of the techniques Isa wanted to incorporate into our video, and more. In the future, this project will be a great experience to look back on for guidance when creating my AICE portfolio, as I will be able to apply what I learned to have a more efficient planning process, a more controlled production process, and a more relaxed post-production process. All in all, this was one of the hardest, but most rewarding projects I've come to do, but it will be living on in my life in more ways than one.

Here's the link to our final presentation!