FINAL

My contributions to the production process.

• I came up with the original idea for the narrative (phone the stops time). With the help of the rest of the group, we perfected the idea and drew up the storyboard.

• Originally I was the main character and actor (Jimmy Hopkins), this was for the first lesson of filming. We did not get all the shots done and the next lesson I was absent due to medical reasons, meaning Ahren took my place as Jimmy.

• In the editing process I have done most of it with small contributions form Ollie. I have cut the shots and fit them together while adding effects such as slow-motion. I had problems with the diegetic sound when cutting the shots together and overcome these problems by fading out the sound at the end and start of shots or just keeping the sound quiet.

Marking Criteria self-Assesment

Holding a shot where appropriate-

Nearly every one of our shots had movement yet there was one that was placed on a tripod to keep the shot steady, this is when Jimmy is looking at the information on the wall. We held it there as he was not moving around.

Framing a shot including or excluding elements where appropriate-

This was done with the shot where jimmy enters the classroom and finds the phone. We went for a long shot frame as this would show the whole room being empty.

Using a variety of shot distances where appropriate-

Close ups where used at the start of the film to establish the character, we then moved on to use other shots, such as mid – long range shots.

Shooting material appropriate to task-

Our film is appropriate for a U rated film.

Selecting mise en scene-

We done this through our research and the detail of our storyboard, allowing us to make decisions on props and clothing.

Editing so meaning is apparent to viewer-

We have only done basic editing at the moment, meaning has not really been added yet, but will be.

Using varied shot transitions and other effects selectively and appropriately-

Only basic editing has been completed, (cut transitions).

Using sound with images and editing-

Diegetic sound is being kept but we are also going to add music in the background for certain scenes.

Using titles where appropriate-

We have not added titles yet but they have been designed in our storyboard.

Last lesson

On Thursday we completed basic editing, (cut transitions), while Ahren worked on the music that would play in the background at certain scenes. Next lesson we will complete the editing and add effects. This will hopefully create meaning for our film and make it appeal to our target audience.

My contributions to the production process.

Planning. My my contribution to the planning process was mainly the production of a storyboard as the rest of my group did the rest of the planning, however i also played a role in deciding what our film sequence would be about and helped to develop on our original idea once we had decided upon it. 

Acting. In our final sequence i play the role of a person frozen in time and also that of an antagonist to our main character.

My contributions:

•           Helping with planning, character movement, camera movement, and use of props. My help with these things were mainly during filming as the storyboard provided for general actions but allowed flexibility of setting upon necessity. However my help with ‘use of props’ is not included in our final feature as this was before the second lesson in which our main character was absent.

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•       Acting as main character. As mentioned above, our main character was unavailable on our second lesson so we re-filmed with me playing ‘Jimmy Hopkins”. The final result was missing certain scenes but the general theme remained. 

Target audience and market

 The target audience for our short film would probably fall under male children between the ages of 4 to 9. This is partly just- for reasons I can’t fully explain- because I would imagine that boys (especially young boys) would take more delight in the concept of being able to manipulate time. Secondly, there is no female presence in our film this would both be a deterrence for girls and a plus for boys, for at that age group, they typically share the judgement that girls are “gross” (and visa-versa). The film has very childish themes and also allows small children having experienced someone bullying or being mean to them, to identify with the main character thus making the film more appealing to them.

The target market would definitely be the adult parent of a young child, they would be encouraged by their children to take them to see the film and also view the underlying themselves, and (hopefully) come to the conclusion that it would be suitable for their infant to see. The film itself though would only vaguely appeal to adults though, as there are no subtle suggestions of adult humour. The film would only offer itself as a form as entertainment for the sake of being entertaining but would mainly be directed at young children.

Film inspiration

The film Toy story has influenced me in making our own childrens film, i watched the opening for previous homework and found that the bright colours and soundtrack made a big part of the scene and created a very appealing scene for the target audience of 5 - 12 years olds.

BBFC lesson

In this lesson we learned about U and PG film certificates. We learned and understood the guidelines for each and created mind maps about these guidlines. The guidlines are very accurate and strick, for example a U film must have no sustained horror and no violence. This lesson was helpfull for planning our U films as we know what guidelines to stick to and when we are over stepping them as we must keep it as a U certificate.

Back to the future lesson

The lesson started with us watching the opening scene from back to the future, we took notes from it about mise-en-scene, cinematography etc. I wrote about how the clock set the scene, they connote the genre and narrative of the film. We then reimagined the sequence in a storyboard to get a better understanding of shots etc. This storyboard helped in creating our own by giving ideas and shot types that were used in the storyboard for our own.

Target Audience

Our target audience for our childrens film, will be Familys (Children and Parents), Because the parents are most likely the people taking the children to see the film at the cinema or to buy it on dvd. As the film is a U it will focus on children aged around 5-6 and there parents, who are most likely to be 25+.

BBFC lesson

In the BBFC lesson we looked at the classifications 'U' and 'PG' for films. We researched different guidlines for the classifications because our childrens film has to be a U film. So this will help us because we now know the guidelines for U films, for example in U films there should be very little mild bad language and Drugs should not be mentioned unless the film teaches that drugs are bad.

Back to the future storyboard lesson.

In the back to the futur storyboard lesson we watched the opening scene to the film ‘Back to the future'. From this we created a storyboard of what shots and cuts were used in the opening sequence. In my book I took notes on what theme was set by the long duration shot of the clocks. In our storyboard we drew what the set looked like and added arrowsd to show where the camera was going to next or what shot was next. We also showed where about the main character was moving and what he was doing.

Progress report

So far We've found the planning and production process to be relatively straightforward however we have encountered a few small problems, for instance on the day of the second part of our filming, the main character was absent and as we had to have completed our filming that day we had to overcome the problem by restarting the filming with another actor playing his role.
Our plan for after half term is to commence with the editing of our sequence, one of our main priorities for this segment of the project will be adding a title sequence to our footage to make it seem a little bit more like a real film. We will do this part first and then the editing of the actual footage, followed by the soundtrack work that is still to be done, this is so we know exactly what will be going on in each scene and will be better able to line up the music with the video when we come to do the soundtrack stage.

'Back to the future' storyboard

In this lesson we watched the opening scene to ‘Back to the future’, took notes and created a storyboard of the scene.  I wrote how the imagery of clocks connotes the general theme of the film, also, how a sense of place is created by the long duration shot that runs along a large part of the house. In our storyboard we drew an interpretation of the house and added arrows and labels to show which direction the camera goes and where the main character moves. We then drew the close ups of the dials being turned and finally the main character standing in front of the large speaker.

Film influence

The movie that influenced the opening of our children’s film for me was the film ‘Like Mike’. The movie is about a small child who lives in a foster home with cruel and unreasonable man and many other children. One of the boys is a clear nemesis to the main character. This is demonstrated through a grudge match of basketball resulting in the nemesis character winning. The main character finds a pair of shoes previously owned by basketball legend: Michael Jordan. He uses these shoes (that turn out to give the boy ‘superhuman basketball skills’) not only to achieve stardom but also to get his comeuppance on the court, against his foe. This relates to our idea because our main character (jimmy Hopkins) begins as a social pariah and a general underdog of his school, with a clear bully making his life at school difficult. He then finds a phone with the power to stop time giving him the ability to cause mischief and retaliate. Unfortunately, due to complications, we had to re-film our sequence and were only able to establish the phone’s power and Hopkins’ social misfortune, leaving out the revenge he takes on his bully.

BBFC lesson

In this lesson we looked at clips from a few movies with certificates of either U or PG and decided whether we thought they were either one. We also looked at the BBFC website and researched the criteria for PG and U certificate films. This showed what we could and couldn’t reference in our own children’s film and also (when we were watching the clips) how certain elements of the criteria have changed over time, for example, ‘Watership down’ is comparatively gorier to ‘Harry Potter’ even though it is a U and ‘Harry Potter’ is a PG. This is due to the fact that the BBFC will have had different opinions on what would have been suitable for children in the 1970s to now.

Home work Up (U)

The very beginning of the film starts with a black and white, old fashioned clip dedicated to Carl Frederickson's (the main character) idol, Charles Munts. Munts is an explorer who discovers a lush and mysterious land called paradise falls. Emphasis is put on Munts' function in the film as he becomes a clear child hood role model for the Carl. This is highlighted by reaction shots between Carl (who is currently a child) and the movie featuring Munts. The next scene introduces and presents the new character: Ellie, a character who dies almost as quickly as she is established. She starts off meeting Carl in an abandoned house that she uses to replicate 'The Spirit of Adventure' (Charles Munts' air craft that he uses for adventures), very quickly the audience gets to know the character of Ellie through the short interactions between them at a young age. After this, A montage displays the entirety of Carl and Ellie's life together, showing the picturesque good times and the miserable bad times. This is a good and quick way of displaying their unbreakable relationship, also- as Carl gets a job as a balloon vender- provides an explanation for Carl's use of balloons to up root his house and take off, later in the film.

Homework

Toy story opening scene

From the first few minutes of the film, many clues are given about the rest of the film, including characters, genre, themes etc. This films target audience is immediately recognisable as a 5 – 11 year old range. This is shown through the first scene being a small boy at the TA’s age playing with his toys in his bedroom. This introduces the first character, Andy, the boy that is playing with the toys. Introducing this character so early on as a happy-go-lucky child gives us clues and ideas of how other characters will act. We think of a mother figure that will care for Andy and we also think about the personalities of the toys that we have been shown. After a post title sequence of Andy playing with his favourite toy named Woody we can judge the connection between Andy and his toys, and we can judge the toys characteristics. This sequence can give us clues about the films themes and genre as well as characters. It tells us that it may be a comedy/drama aimed towards children with themes such as friendship, love, adventure etc. These ideas can be backed up and supported by the colours used in these scenes, very bright and vibrant colours emphasize the mood and expected themes. The narrative can also be guessed at from this short clip as an adventure film, probably involving the separation of the boy and his toys. The fact that Andy is shown to love his toys so much spells disaster for the narrative.

Up Opening Scene

The opening scene to the film Up shows the realationship between Carl and Ellie and brilliantly sets the scene for the rest of the film, It shows them building a life for themselves only to have Ellie die at the end of the sequence leaving carl alone. This creates a setting for the film which helps the viewer to believe that Carl would attach Baloons to his house and travel across the world in search of the adventure that he had with his wife. Perhaps the best thing about the sequence is that it manages to express in just a few minutes, with almost no dialogue, the love between the two characters.
However it's not just sad, the opening scene also shows some of the comedy that's present throughout the film, for example the larger than life character of Ellie when she was a child, and lines like "South America, it's like America but South," show that the film is light hearted and comedic while also an emotionally deep film.
It also hints at some of the main themes of the movie, for instance the use of baloons throughout the scene and the Adventure book, the colours in the film are bright and vibrant which show that it's for children and is quite a crazy and playful film which isn't supposed to be realistic.

Storyboard of final idea

Final idea

When a young boy finds a phone, he tries to play music but sees that it is already playing a track, after pausing the music the boy realises that the phone has the ability to pause time! He then proceeds to play pranks on the people around him.

Finding Nemo. U.

When you watch the introduction of Finding Nemo you can tell that it a family film even though there is a little bit of violence.  The first thing that hints the rest of the film is when nemo swims out into the ocean and gets captured by scuba divers. Another thing about the scene is that it hints something about a Character, Marlin(Nemos dad), that he is very over protective. This leads to Nemo who wants to be like all the other characters, swimming out into the deep ocean to 'prove himself' to the others.

Also when you watch the introduction of Finding Nemo, a mood is set that it is a upbeat and adventurous movie because of the music. The tempo of the music is quite fast. However, in some parts of the intro such as, when nemo swims into the deep ocean and gets captured by the scuba diver the music is slower to set a more tense mood.

Characters.

Four characters, The main character is 'Little Jimmy Hopkins' played by Ahren. His dad 'Mr Hopkins' is played by Ollie. 'Sally Stevens' Jimmy's love interest and Jimmy's best friend 'Roman Bellic' Will be played  by two other people from our Media class.

We watched this trailer of back to the future and feel it is a good representation of time travel and we may do something similar in our children's film. However, the target audience is much older so we would have to make it less complicated and more child friendly.

Preliminary task.

Ideas for the childrens opening film task

One idea I thought of is having a young boy buy a small watch in the opening and then he discovers that the watch can actually time travel, or take him to other worlds. - Joe, George and Ollie.

Ideas for the childrens opening film task

We thought about including small animals like rabbits or cats and dogs. We thought to add these as small children enjoy animals but it was unrealistic as we cannot easily add an animal without the help of green screen, which could get quite complicated if we try to interact with the fake animals, this idea was abandonded. - Joe B

Storyboard of Back to the future

Joe and Ahren

storyboard

george, oliver