Edting Update

Now we are in the process of using the footage we have to create our opening sequence. It differs quite alot to our previous idea however the main plot is there. Editing a sociol realist drama is very hard because you are limited to the amount of editing you can do to the footage. It was quite hard to make the clips all run smoothly together because of the way we filmed the clips were a bit out of time.
We have to edit some shots to make it look good however we are not glomorising any shots by brightning/contrasting shots. Asher is now working on the music and that is going well we have lots of tester ones to come to a conclusion of the general sound genre we want to work on. Weve thought of mixing RnB with classical to find an obvous contrast that compliments each other well and in the end fits in with the scene. We will try and rythmical edit the music to go with the shots i think this will give the sequence a nice effect that will impact on the audiences reaction to the final piece.

Fonts

We need to keep the font simple so as to keep to conventions. We have been looking at www.dafont.com to see if there is any fonts there. Here is some ideas....

Music/Soundtrack

This is a screen shot of the music we have been working on. At the moment we have lots of different instruments and beats playing so we still need to work on making everything fit and sound professional.

Micro Elements!

Lighting

• All natural, Inside the lights are turned off but natural lights shine through.
• No editing the brightness/contrast so as to keep to realist element.

Make-Up

• We used no make-up because only boys were used in the filming.
• We didn't want a Hollywood glossy look on our film because we want to keep to the conventions of social realism.

Sound

• After listening to several tacks we have got some inspiration for our piece.
• Using garage band we have used several instruments and beats we heard in other music. in our own. These include; Guitar, Drums, Beat and Strings.
• We aren't going to have any specking in our film only the background best.

Oh Dear

Whilst filming we ran into a few problems. Due to the weather and lessons it was very hard to find a suitable time to film. We had to film the scenes separately so Onder was filmed at the beginning of the day and Asher was filmed later on. Lighting wasn't a big problem as most of Onder's filming was inside. However when filming at the park it started to rain and get dark very quickly. We managed to film all of Asher' scenes although later we have to film both boys together to get the other films. 

We had to film in a different location because of train and bus services being interrupted by weather. We ended up filming at a park on mill road. It was convenient because beside the park was some flats we could use to film Asher coming out of. 

Our Sound Inspiration

Since our project has been heading towards a 'London-underground-scene' type theme, we decided that we should use a well known artist from London's hip hop scene called Sway as an inspiration.

This video is an instrumental to the song 'Up your speed'. I feel like this song can create the utmost perfect tension in such a grimey atmosphere because of the gradual tempo used in this song. So for our opening sequence project, we intend to use a soundtrack that is heavily influenced by the use of beats and the heavy bass guitar and such instruments.

Log feedback

During the course of our media lesson the students in our media class had to analyze each other's blogs. Many people had suggested an area for improvement in the blog and they had to also make positive points which is aimed at improving our overall score of marks in our opening sequence project.

Positive points of our blog

• Detailed call sheet - it is really good
• Plenty of posts and a lot of information to go with them
• Lots of pictures, videos and examples etc...
• Excellent location intake, clear images reflected
• Unique Ident
• Good location research
• Really in depth research and good preparation for filming
• Good genre research
• Strong shot
  

Areas for improvement

• Needs a couple of images
• Test footage needs to be improved
• Have not yet defined all the film types and their conventions
• Animatic sequence, could have information (how you came about creating it?)

So how can we improve our blog? Well we welcome every constructive criticism because our aim is to figure out every flaw in our blog and improving it. As we aim to reach the highest amount of marks available, we are going to have to consider what our audience think could be done to upgrade it. This can be achieved by including more images, give the audience a visual image of our intent of producing our project and by being more descriptive in our thoughts whilst writing our blogs.

Comparing our opening sequence blog to our last thriller project blog, I believe, there is a huge difference because when writing our thriller blog, it was our first time doing such a task and took a while because it is like writing in a diary. However we believe our current blog has got much more potential to please our audience. Also we are going to aim for winning the blog-of-the-week title.

By Önder Köyel

Call Sheet

Title: ??????????????????????????
Producer: A.J Lycam
Director: David Filys
Phone: 07867382037
Day of Shoot: Monday 9th Febuary 2009
Crew Call: 16:51 at Cambridge Train Station
Shoot Call: 17:30 at Bishop Stortford
Break: 18:50
Shoot Ends: 19:40
Nearest Hospital: Addenbrokes Hospital Cambridge, Hills Rd, Cambridge, CB2 0QQ

Shots 1-6 (17:30-18:00)

Cast: Asher and Onder
Locations: Ashers House, Two Seperate Rooms.
Props: Stray clothing and empty cups for mess effect in Boy 1's room.
Costume: (Boy 1) Baggy jeans and Dark hoodie. (Boy 2) Casual jeans and jumper.

Shots 6-21 (18:00-18:50)

Cast: Asher and Onder. Also a few background characters will be included.

Locations: Estate Flats and surrounding enviroment onto road.

Props: Mobile Phone, School Bags

Costume: Same as what boys were wearing before.

Shots 22,23 and 26 (19:10-19:25)

Cast: Asher and Exras

Location: Trinity Park, Bishop Stortford

Props: School bags, (Cigarettes?)

Costumes: Tracksuits, Hoodies, Dark Clothing, (Caps?)

Shots 24 and 25 (19:25-19:40)

Cast: Onder (maybe class mates?)

Location: Class Room (Long road VI College?)

Props: School bag, Desks, Chairs

Costume: Same casual jeans and jumper as before.

Other Sociol Realist Directors

Our film ideas are very simular to 'Sweet Sixteen' a film directed by Ken Loach in 2002. Like Boy 1 in our film the main characters friends have also gone agaist schooling prefering to hang about a get into trouble. Like our film the actors are teenagers who are coming of age and making important choices about their future. Like our film there is another character trying to make a better life for themselves. I think this contrast is really good in a film because it brings more edge to the plot because you can compare the two different endings.

Another film directed by Loach is 'My Name is Joe' (1998). This is another example where there are two poeple who have taken different roads in life. One has fallen in love whereas his troubled friend is an alcholic. This film was filmed in the slums of Glasgow and filling small roles with local residents which fits the convention of Sociol Realism. We also will use local residents of Bishops Stalkford such as Asher.

Actors

When filming the opening sequence we will use onder and asher as the two characters. The fist character will be dressed in tracksuit bottoms, this will give them a stereotypical look and the audience will recognise him as belonging to a certain stereotypical group. The second boy will be dressed in smarter clothes. He will be wearing jeans and a t shirt with a casual jacket on top. This will give an impression of a perhaps less popular person because of the way he is dressed compared to the other character. The audience will never see the less popular boy with any other people or in a social environment, whereas the other boy will be seen in social environments with his friends.

Locations for filming

I have looked at some pictures on the interent to help give a visula idea of where we are going to film.
Heres where the first location. A small room with conventional mise en scene such as posters etc.

Whereas Boy 2 will have a cleaner room to make a contrast. The next scene you would see the outside of their enviroment which is an block of flats/estate.

Quite a lot of the next scenes are set in the park such as the one shown below.

The other scenes with Boy 2 will be set in a normal classroom like the ones in Long Road.

Animatic Sequence

Here is our animatic sequence but i think we made need to edit it due to weather and transport issues. We came up with these shots by looking at other social realist dramas and taking some shots they used. The boys at the park and close of shots are inspired by other realist dramas because it represents how the boys live and their characteristics as a person. This helps the audience to relate and understand the actors  making the film more effective.