Thursday, April 12, 2018

Film

https://youtu.be/chS0N3Up7RE

This is the link to our film opening. Enjoy!!

(Note: The war is now between the U.S. and Russia.)

Sunday, April 8, 2018

Oh Boy!!!

              It is Sunday and instead of watching the final round of the Masters I went to Robert's house to film. He made the executive decision to change some of the aspects of the plot due to the fact that we have to much content for the given amount of time which is 2 minutes. This is what we changed...

              He have not changed the idea of the dog tags for the opening credits for the opening scene. We decided to change the date to the birthday of the main character. The second clip of the opening will be the main character pulling in his drive way with his new car he got for his birthday. The main character will turn the radio on and the news will be playing where he eventually hears the broadcast about the war. The third clip is the main character walking to the mailbox to open up the mail. In the mailbox of course is the draft letter telling him to go to fight in the war. The fourth clip puts emphasis on how upset he is to go to the war. The main character will walk in and put the draft letter on top of his birthday cards he just got.

               Tomorrow we are going to discuss our dog tag idea. After talking about this idea we will begin editing to polish our new film. Make it the best that we can. We are taking a big risk changing some aspects of our movie at this point but I believe that we can pull it off.

                 Image result for 18th birthday
             

Thursday, April 5, 2018

School Filming


          Today at school Robert, Alex, and myself walked around school filming for our opening scene. We filmed the main character who is played by Robert, walking into school all the way through him walking to his class. We will film some more aspects of his school life during the next class such as him listening to his teacher.
Image result for teacher clip art
        We also applied our feedback from the other day that were given to us by our peers during our peer review session from Tuesday morning. We tried to focus on not making it seem as if it were an anti-war film.
Image result for anti war     VS. Image result for pro war

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Peer Review

       Today in class we met up with other kids. We reviewed our projects in groups of 5.

      For about 5-10 minutes I talked about my project. I got some awesome feedback from my group too. I was told that our idea of the lighting change when our main character opens up the letter was a good one. Based off of the lighting change though my group asked me a great question...

      Is our movie an anti war film?
 
      That got me thinking. I answered with no because we are just showing how someone got drafted in the war and his story of going into that particular war. The group that I was apart of really liked our plot and thought that we should not change any aspects of it.

Image result for group clip art  Image result for rain

Saturday, March 31, 2018

Action part c

                      Today, we began to film our final clip of the opening scene. We will be filming our school scenes at school withing the next week so we have time edit and change things if we need to. Robert went ahead and purchased Adobe which is helpful for our production. The last moves continuously as there are many cuts of the main character and him opening the draft letter telling him that he has to go serve in the war.

                        Our film opening will end with a fade into a dark green screen. We apologize, but due to the lack of funds we can't film anything about the violence or war. I am expecting by the week of April 2nd through April 9th, everything will be done and be edited.

                       We meet for 2 days during school next. We will be using these 2 days for the filming parts having to do with school and in the classes. We are coming close to the due date so we need to work hard and focus the last few weeks. We choose close up shots when the main character is working and being at school. This also shows that this child is normal and offers a realism perspective. This type of thing can happen to any normal child in America.

Image result for trump Image result for kim jong un

Thursday, March 29, 2018

Action part B

                 Following our filming from the other day, we decided to attack a smaller problem of our project. We wanted to include the date so the audience knows when our film is taking place and can easily follow along. We chose the date to be May 3, 2019.

                 Keeping up with our last filming session, we still filmed our main character getting dressed and getting ready for school. After he is ready to go, there are quick cuts showing him and his father talking and having a normal discussion about that news dealing with the war. Our broadcast tells the audience that there is a war between the United States and North Korea. We decided to use mid-shots to allow the audience to focus their attention on the conversation between the two characters.

                 After that clip we are going to film the main character walking to his car so he can go to school. We went with a low angle shot here. After this we are going to insert a clip that we filmed at school showing the main character having a normal teenage life. We will be filming this clip sometime during class in the next. We chose to go with an establishing shot of the school so the audience can see where our main character goes.

                 We filmed the last scene at the same time as the other clips because it takes place at the main characters house. The last part of the opening scene is when the main character goes to the mailbox to get the mail and finds the letter that is drafting him to the war.
Image result for war draft letters Image result for mailbox

Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Action part a

                 Today, we started to film our opening scene. The beginning of the scene starts off with an establishing shot of the house where the main character lives. The image of the house will immediately follow the opening credits. Our idea for the opening credits is put the names of the people or groups of people that we are giving credit to on dog tags. We haven't started this yet because we do not have them yet.

                 Image result for dog tags
                 
               We decided to choose an establishing shot so the viewers can see the main characters normal and common environment. Following this part of the opening, we have decided on a close up of the main character turning off his alarm clock. This beginning of the scene ends with the character brushing his teeth and getting ready to go to school.
Image result for toothpasteImage result for alarm clock
                 Our filming for the day ended when our main character is brushing his teeth, the audience can hear him ask Google to tell him the morning news for that particular day. This is when we play our homemade broadcast.

Saturday, March 24, 2018

1

                         Today, Robert and Alex began to film. Now, I was not there (because I am in California) but I was still able to converse with my 2 partners. So we decided to go with Robert's iPhone 8 as our recording device. Robert has it, it is easy to access, and it doesn't cost us anything to us.

                          The first part of the opening scene shows the main character acting as a normal high schooler. Getting ready for school, brushing his teeth, eating breakfast, etc. This is the first scene of the opening film and also it is another scene because our opening scene is two parts. Moreover, we have decided to push back editing until we have all of our clips finished. Fingers crossed, we are striving to finish filming by the first couple days we get back from spring break. This will give us plenty of time to edit and change nay ideas about our project. If we feel like changing anything, getting the filming done by those days will allow us to make any wanted changes.

                           For the letters, we made the decision to label the letters with the dates on the bottom. The first date n the letter is June 6th.`We are dancing around the idea of having that be the main characters birthday to add a juxtaposition to the bad news of going to the war. However due to the time constraints, we do not know if we will be able to add that element to our plot.

Friday, March 23, 2018

2

                          Greetings from Los Angeles, California!!

                           As a result of being so close to movie central, Hollywood, I decided to explore different movie studios. I visited the Warner Bros. studios in southern California. I learned about different movies and television series that this production company produces. I learned about props and some of the different techniques that professional directors use in their movies and/or television shows. 
Image result for warner  bros 

                           I used the knowledge that I obtained from the tour and used it as inspiration for our film. Simple things like be persistent and patient to finding good props  and the different sounds and editing techniques that the directors use.
Image result for warner  bros

Monday, March 19, 2018

3

               
                        Uh-Oh!! This next week we have to cancel filming. Due to spring break, my whole group is going to be out of town all on different dates. I am gone from Friday to Friday, Alex is gone from Friday to Sunday and Robert is gone from Friday to Sunday also. We will have to resume filming after spring break.

                         However, just because I am gone does not mean that I am not helping my group from my vacation. Today we finished the news recording for the film opening. The voice behind the news broadcast was Robert. If we find anyone better than him we can always change that aspect of our project. The voice describes what is going on in the movie. More specifically, what is happening in the war . We are going to edit the broadcast so it synchronizes with the the movie. Th script is as follows...

                          "Hello and welcome to the 7:00 edition of America's News. There is breaking news this morning, it has been stated this morning by president Trump that the United States declared war on North Korea. I repeat the United States has declared war on North Korea. There will be a military draft  by selective service to fulfill efficient troop numbers, first since 1973."

                           This broadcast hides what is going to be happen in our film as a whole in the fact that the audience can assume that our main character is going to get drafted into this war.
                       

Sunday, March 18, 2018

Mirror

       

                      Hello there!!!

                       Today my group and I took some time to look back and see if there is anything wrong with our movie. You know, anything that we want to change, add, or get rid of completely. If we want to change the genre again or stick with it and make it work. We reflected upon the little things that have a major impact.

                       My two partners and I are supposed to meet up this Saturday and/or Sunday to further our film. Add more dates to the schedule, review the schedule to make sure that we can all be there 100%, and things of that nature.

                       In class earlier today we did face 1 MAJOR difficulty. We cannot come up with a name for our film. We are thinking of naming our film a synonym for greatness and glory or we were going to name the name of the group that our main character will be involved in.
Image result for Dunkirk
  Movie names such as these that kind of foreshadow what is going to happen and how it is going to happen. Like if the war will be won or lost.

Wednesday, March 14, 2018

Schedule

                     Hey guys!!!

                     I am really excited today. Today my group and I finally made a schedule to start productions. Here it is...


                    We figured that this schedule is best suited for us. We picked the times that we were all available. As you can see we are trying to get our film finished as soon as we can so if we need to, we have time to polish it up and make it look nice. 
  
                     By March 20, the storyboard will be complete so we can start to film our opening scene. We picked the days and times based off of can we go after the allotted time period. The hours are a goal so we stay focused and don't fool around. 

Monday, March 12, 2018

Story Time

                    Hello everyone!

               Today in class my group and I really got to work on our film opening. As you will see below we started to develop our storyboard. We believed that it was necessary to develop our ideas and illustrate them so we can try and figure out what the opening will look like.

As you can see we only have the first part of our storyboard filled out. We found it really hard to expand and try and make our film opening as close to 2 minutes as possible. I believe though, that we will have the rest of the story board finished in no time!

           Have a Great Day ;)

Sunday, March 11, 2018

Scheduling

              Hello again everyone!!! Tonight I will be discussing the scheduling for our film opening. The first hurdle we will have overcome is the baseball team. One of my partners, Robert, is apart of this years baseball team. They have practice for a long time and they practice almost everyday. However, when they do not practice, they have games. So for fixing this minimal bump in our road I think that we will just shoot our film opening on the weekends. In addition to Robert having a hectic schedule, Alex and I also have a crazy schedule. Both of us are involved in many extracurricular clubs outside of school hours that keep us occupied on both the weekdays and the weekends. Again, I believe that we will resort to filming on the weekends after all of our other activities.

                As I posted yesterday evening, we have decided to do an and drama combination film opening. The film will be about a boy who get drafted into the war. We have not yet started to design a storyboard or any drawings due to the fact that we are currently developing the plot. Developing the plot first we feel, will point us in the right direction for everything else. I do think though, that all of our designs, storyboards, etc. are coming soon so I will keep all of you guys posted and up to date.

Saturday, March 10, 2018

T.A.

             Tonight I started my research on target audience. I started on action. The target audience for an action consists of males. Males enjoy the violence that  is presented in action movies. Males are usually the main characters for this type of film. The target age group is 15-40. The teens in this age love the bursts if adrenaline that are produced during action movies.

             Now onto the drama genre characteristics... "Drama film is a genre that relies on the emotional and relational development of realistic characters. While Drama film relies heavily on this kind of development, dramatic themes play a large role in the plot as well. Often, these dramatic themes are taken from intense, real life issues. Whether heroes or heroines are facing a conflict from the outside or a conflict within themselves, Drama film aims to tell an honest story of human struggles." We will try to appeal to a more mature audience. because of this information.

https://thescriptlab.com/screenplay/genre/952-drama/

Friday, March 9, 2018

Finally!!!

             My group and I finally chose a genre. We are going to do an action and drama hybrid about how a young boy gets drafted to the Army. The young boy will be played by Robert, one of the members of my group. The opening scene will begin with Robert waking up and hitting his alarm clock. The alarm clock will be buzzing at 6:00AM. He will then proceed to go through his daily routine, which is wake up,shower,go to school, go to the gym, than go to baseball. The first day will be completely normal, and we may or may not show the date for the first day. Then, there will be the second day, this is when the audience is introduced to the main conflict of our movie. Robert will be going through his daily routines for the second day. However, in the morning when he is putting his clothes on there will be a news broadcast saying the United States has initiated war on North Korea. The broadcast will include that there is now a draft for the military. Following this Robert will then go through his daily life again in the exact same order. When he gets home from baseball, he will open the mailbox and find a letter saying he has been drafted from the Army, and he has to serve in the war vs North Korea.


            The inspiration for our genre comes from super hero movies. More specifically the Dark Knight Rises. These movies are an action and drama hybrid kind of movie. They keep the audience on the edge of their seats with the drama while entertaining them with the action.

Image result for dark knight rises

Tuesday, March 6, 2018

Research

                 Hello there!!! So now we have decided to change our film from a comedy to a drama. My group and I thought that the switch would make the film more entertaining. We are trying to model certain movies that break the fourth wall. Popular movies such as Deadpool and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. We figured that if the main character is talking to the audience that it would be entertaining for them and more relatable.

Image result for ferris bueller            Image result for deadpool 





                   As of now Alex, Robert, and I are using movies such as those listed above as inspiration to  create a film opening that mimics the ones above. We did some more research and found out that movies that break the fourth wall are not very common. However, some of the movies are very successful such as Ferris Bueller's Day off.