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.