Another Meeting

So we all met up today, but unfortunately couldn't stay for long, but we did agree on using 'the bombed out church' as our main choice and the beatles story as a backup. We decided that i'd do the treatment for our main pitch, since i'm the director :D, and Alex would help by writing one for the beatles.

So i'm writing the treatment now, or at least trying to, i'm finding it hard to come up with an ending considering I don't know if we're going to be able to film the actual band playing, or where they'd be if we did. Also finding the format hard to write in, but it's all good practice.

We're going to meet tomorrow morning to discuss the treatment and the pitch, which i'm also going to make a powerpoint on.

Also Emma rang up Liz from Urban Strawberry Lunch and she's fine with us interviewing her and she may even be able to get us inside the church which will be great ^_^

Bombed Out Church

Here's the website for the church which i've had a read through.

http://www.stlukeliverpool.co.uk/

Which explains in detail about how it was built, all the aspects of it, including the famous metal framed bell, and how it was destroyed.

It then has a link to Urban Strawberry Lunch, the band that is fundrasing to keep it open. This shows a few clips with their music, gives links to thier different sites and projects including the Finest Hour Project.

This was a project that took sound recordings of interviews from people who were there for the blitz. And there are a few who remember the bombing of the church itself.

So hopefully this is something we could maybe fit in to our project.

I think this could be a promising story for our project ^_^

Meeting

We had our meeting with the group today to go through ideas. Me and Stella were there first, but neither of us had had much luck with finding any interesting articles, was mostly only finding either football or death and violence :/

However with abit more searching we found an article on the 'bombed out church'. Which is known for being partly destroyed during the blitz, with only the shell of the building remaining. And with a bit more research, we found that there is a group called Urban Strawberry Lunch, who run a fundraiser with loads of different events to keep the church open to the public and 'keep the space alive through the arts'

We had a few other options, like Stella found a hidden cinema screening, but unfortunately it wasn't on during the time we'll be in Liverpool. And i'd found a group called Writing on the Wall, which encouraged poetry and story writing and did all sorts of events and competitions to do with that. But again nothing was going on anytime soon so it would be difficult to make an interesting doc out of it.

Emma arrived abit later, but hadn't had much luck either, and Alex and Owen had classes scheduled so we decided we're going to meet up tomorrow to pick one of our ideas and hopefully progress it and start our pitch.

Documentaries Shown In Class

Skateistan


I found this a really interesting piece. Because I don't usually watch documentaries, it was a good introduction into the genre. This was a real heartfelt piece that and what i took most from it was the way it told the story of the war and suffering of the people through this childrens skating community. It's always interesting to hear how children percieve to their situation. I also think the way they didn't show images of the contributors talking, only using the audio and images of them doing different acts, like skating or car washing, etc. I think this was effective in giving it a more emotional level. It also doesn't distract away from the images and the story that's trying to be told.

It's something that will be good to remember for our project.


The Archive


The Archive from Sean Dunne on Vimeo.

This was a completely different type of documentary, but still interesting to watch. The structure seemed quite simple, switching between showing the records and the main contributor. But it was effective in evoking an emotional response, at least for me it was, for the audience to sympathise with this man and his massive life's collection that will waste away after he's gone. This shows that a simple idea really can still make for a good piece of work.

Something also to keep in mind.


The Apology Line



Although I dont think we're likely to take this approach with our project, it's interesting to see how audio dialogue can make a documentary.

Pockets

Pockets from Pilgrim Films on Vimeo.

I think this is a nice representation of different people. The images are really clear and I like the use of rack focus that is used. It's always interesting to see the different forms documentaries can come in. I think the framing of the shots were really effective as well, showing only part of the people, not the full body seems to personalise them more. It gives the impression of us being let in on a secret, kept in their pockets.

Doc Handout

I've read through the handout we were given and it's really helped with my understanding of the different types of documentaries.

The first point I took from it was the fact that although most documentaries are considered to be reliable, truthful and factual information on the world. However, this doesn't mean that documentaries can't have elements of staging to them. I think this could be a thing to keep in consideration when doing our project. If we get them to do something for the specific for the camera it can still be a representation of what they would normally do.

There are 4 types of documentaries genres:

Compilation - images from archival sources.

Direct-Cinema - recording events as they happen, minimal interference from the filmmaker.

Nature - Recording nature, such as insects, etc.

Portrait - scenes from the life of a compelling person.

Most documentaries use one of more of these genres at once.

Another point I took was that there can be a fine line between documentary and fiction. Although i dont think that will be a problem with our short project, its good to make sure we dont cross that line.

There are 2 main Forms in documetnary films: Categorical and Rhetorical.

Categorical Form often begins by identifying its subject. Its patterns of development are normally simple, but because of these simple ways it risks boring the spectator. The Challenge to the filmmaker is to introduce variations and thereby to make us adjust our expectations. Either through an interesting subject matter, unusual patterns of film techniques, or by mixing in other types of form.

Rhetorical Form tries to make an explicit argument. Its goal is to persuade the audience to adopt an opinion about the subject matter and perhaps to act on that opinion. It's a from that centers most consistently on explicit meaning and ideological implications. There are 3 main types of arguments the film may use: realting to the source, to the subject, and to the viewer.
Arguments from Source - Arguments taken from reliable sources of information, like in an interview.
Subject-centered Arguments - Employs arguments about its subject matter.
Viewer-centered Arguments - Makes an argument that appeals to the emotions of the viewer.
A documentary's rhetorical form can organise these arguments and appeals in a variety of ways. One standard description suggests that it begins with an introduction of the situation, goes on to a discussion of the relevant facts, and ends with an epilogue that summarizes what has come before.

Documentary Brief

We were given our new brief yesterday. I'd forgotten about going to Liverpool so it should be interesting filming there and trying to find a story to base it on. I'm not really used to documentaries, but I liked some of the ones that were shown.

We also got into groups of 5, so i'm in a group with Stella, Emma, Alex and Owen. And i'm looking forward to this project because we each have specific roles we have to stick to, and because i came on this course to learn to be a good director, I asked for that position 1st, which no-one seemed to mind. Alex said he wanted sound, which was also fine with everyone and Owen volunteered to do camera. Emma quite wanted to do editing and Stella thought the best role for her would be producing so it all worked out fine in the end :D

Finished

Overall I'm quite proud of our work, we really put a lot of effort into it and I think its paid off. There are bits that could be smoother and it would've been good if we had a bit more footage but for what we had and the time we had I think we made the most of it. We made a good team and worked well with each other.

Final Stages of Editing

It got a bit stressful near the end but we've pretty much finished our editing. Just gonna double check it all tomorrow before finally getting it burned :D

I didn't manage to get as many screenshots as i wanted of our editing progress but I had to do quite a bit of resizing, cropping, speed changes, and other added effects. I had fun trying my hand at stop motion with the dolls. I think it does look slightly more comical than it should but i'm sure to people who have a genuine fear of them it would look creepy.

I actually think that many people will probably find parts of it funny, but to be honest some fears that we've come across during this project have been hilarious.

There is also a bit when emma as a clown comes on camera and I added the clips of what look like red eyes, that move within the frame and end covering emma's eyes and moving with her, so it'd look more realistic. That was quite a challenge because I had to make so many markers and shift them ever so slightly each half a second. But it was worth it I think coz the effect looked quite good, again probably abit comical, but still.

Me and Emma worked together on the last minute, where we wanted it to go crazy, with lots of overlaying images and sounds. In the end we were very pleased with it and I think it was the best part of our film.

Editing

So now we've had our tutorial with Martine it's time to get our editing done. Firstly, the audio needed to be imported into final cut pro, after the initial editing on sound track pro which Emma had already started.

So now we've got our audio on final cut pro it's time to finally figure out an order. I've started today, and added some effects, but i'll be finishing it off tomorrow.

Title

I also thought of a title today ^_^

'What's Yours?'

Emma seemed to like it, so will have to run it by Stella to see what she thinks.

Tutorial with Martine

I was a bit nervous about showing Martine our footage, because I didn't think we had enough and we still hadn't worked out a solid order that we wanted them in, or even how we would connect them. I mean we had basic, vague ideas, but considering it's due in Thursday, it's worrying.

However, Martine gave some great advice, saying how she liked our footage and that we should concentrate on collaborating the sound and images as a team. We knew what we each had, but we were editing them seperately using final cut pro and sound track pro, but Martine said that we needed to start putting it all together and that would help us figure out an order.

She also pointed out that there's no need to ease the audience into anything. She thought that our opening scene of the exam didn't seem to connect with the more obvious images of the fears and thought would be better once the audience knew what our film was about. But the main point I got from this tutorial was that it's ok to just throw the audience right in there, so to speak, and just shock them with our images from the beginning.

It really helped give me ideas about editing and ordering our footage.

Cemetery Shoot Take 2

At the cemetery again. I researched the day for night technique, so we gave it another try. However, due to it being freezing, the battery kept dieing even though it was practically still full. So that got annoying quick, plus having to wait for dogwalkers and randomers walking past, combined with having to set up it soon starting to get drak again. I didn't get as many shots as I would have liked, but hopefully it'll be enough, and if not then hopefully we could edit some of the other footage from the first shoot to do a day for night technique.

Here are some more pics from today.

Now that's finally done time to get down to some serious editing!!

Fun Times Shooting

Went back to Stellas cellar today. We wanted to get the final of our shots for the in black scenes, which included turning Emma into a clown. Stella did the make up and after the base was done we thought we should use the opportunity to film emma as the white mask as well.

After we carried on with the transformation.

Our aim was to make her look like the clown we're using in other shots. I think it worked well!!

This is us attempting to make her look creepy with the dado lights. Again I think it worked well ^_^





We also did some more recording; laughter, saying things that clown might say, I even had to sing!!

Today was alot of fun ^_^

Cemetery Shoot

Well we came to the cemetery in the afternoon to practice some shots so we'd know exactly what we wanted for when it got dark. Here are some more photos of some graves we wanted to shoot. The rest are in the location scouting post.

However, we underestimated how quickly it actually gets dark. We managed to get a few, but it just got too dark to get anymore. Here's the proof.

Stella remembered that she'd seen somewhere where it describes how to shoot day for night so i'll have to research that for our next attempt.

Home to York

Went to York yesterday night so that I could get some footage of porcelain dolls today. While I was there though I thought I may as well get as much footage as possible. So, I got some good shots of my sister's lizard and more importantly it's food, some live locusts :D It was lucky that they were still alive, considering my idea of shooting at the reptile shop in York didn't work. So even if we don't manage to find anywhere else we'll have some footage of moving bugs ^_^ Also tried to get shots of our dogs, but they were actually in a good mood so had to try and just get a shot of their teeth. Don't think it really worked but at least it's there in case.

But the doll shoot went well, think I got some good footage, certainly got enough of it!

Was a bit of rush visit because i'm already back in Sheffield. But I think it was worth it ^_^ Despite having to cart all the heavy equipment around, even managed to take a light, it definately made the scene look better.

Logging Footage

Because we're having to do our filming on separate days, we're making sure to get our footage on computer as soon as possible, using hard drives to store it so we can move between computers without any trouble. This way we can start the editing process earlier. At the moment we're going through the footage we have so far and cutting them down and finding the good shots we're gonna use.
Here's snapshots from some of our footage, (because it takes too long to upload a video).

Pet Shop

Because I was planning to go to York to caprute some footage, I knew of a reptile pet shop that sold all sorts of insects as well, so Emma rung them up for me, because I don't really like talking on phones and I sounded awful coz of my cold. Anyway, turns out that they were rennovated and wouldn't be possible for a few weeks. So we'll have to try and find somewhere in Sheffield.

Stupid Snow!!

We went to Stellas to shoot some footage in her cellar for the scenes in black that we didn't get in the performance studio, then we were gonna go to the Cemetery when it got dark to shoot there and also at the alleyway but it started to really snow. We even had to cut our recording short because Stella lives up an insane hill and we wanted to get home before it got like this!!

Very annoying.

Performance Studio

We'd booked the Performance Studio for this afternoon so we could shoot for our scenes in black. We used Dado lights, which we were shown how to use in our workshops with Dom. This room gets seriously dark so it worked really well and I think the shots will be good ^_^

We used different props like a red balloon, white mask and a toy clown. Emma volunteered to wear the mask because it didn't work when we just tried to hold it up.

We also recorded some sounds before shooting. Using the piano you can see in the photo, and making squeaking noises with the balloon and a few others too. Overall a really productive day and I think the results will be great. 

Location Scouting

Today we scouted for locations for us to shoot our outdoor scenes. These are the top and bottom views of an alleyway that we're hoping to shoot at night.

These are from General Cemetery, where we had a wonder around looking for some interesting shots we might like. We also want to shoot this when it gets dark.

We'll probably also use this location for our wood scene, since it has a nice, creepy wooded path that i'm sure will look good when it's dark.