Tuesday, 30 April 2013
Monday, 29 April 2013
AS MEDIA PRODUCT TITLE SEQUENCE FINAL PIECE
This is our final media product that me, Alexandra Higgs and George Nolan created.
Wednesday, 10 April 2013
Characterisation
Our main character 'Veronica' is a central character to our film is the only main character that we introduce in our Title sequence media product. She is introduced with the accompaniment of Diegetic music which helps indicate an Urban scene, the police sirens indicates the type of area which our protagonist is in, which is a run down urban area with American Inner city connotations. The non diegetic soundtrack which runs through the whole opening helps set the atmosphere and representation of the narrative. The Mise-En-Scene is a lowlight, dull, gray urban environment, which assists with the construction of the narrative. This can reflect as an indications of the characters outlook on life. The camera pivots around veronica and does a closeup of her face to show her expression, she sighs like she is exhausted from the stresses of live and there is an blurring editing effect used to transition between scenes which indicate the blurriness of her mind and life as she has a flashback.
Closeup Before the Flashback
Establishing Shot:
Influences and Comparison
One film which hugely influenced our film project is "KidultHood' by Noel Clark. Teenagers are clearly targeted as the film contains generic conventions of an Urban Drama film. This includes having teenage characters, and encoding issues which are specific to teenagers into the narrative such as drug abuse, violence and teenage pregnancy, our media product shares these themes and youth subculture themes.
Our films share similar camerawork techinques, such as high-angle shot in KidultHood is used to show 'Katie' after she has been pushed to the floor by Sam. This positions the audience to look down on her, which conveys how weak and defenceless she is towards her oppressors. This causes the audience to feel sympathetic towards her. This is a similarity within our film as there is a scene where Veronica is being pushed around and beaten by her pimp Rodney showing her powerlessness and fragility.
Lots of close-up shots are used to portray Trevor's facial expressions when he is cutting the man's face. These help to convey how traumatising it is for him and how scared he feels. Our film also uses close up shots to help magnify the emotions Veronica is feeling.
Another film that greatly influenced our media product is 'City of god'. Again it also shares the same Urban drama film which shares the similarities of being set in a foreign country.
The City of god is a crime movie infused with a gangster action film which is set in a poor run down area of Rio de Janeiro so it shares the same basic mise en scene with our film.
Ill Manors has influenced our film as it share the same themes and represents the same form of gritty realism we want to achieve. It has really hard hitting scenes that move the audience emotionally and draw the audience in to empathise with the characters. It shares similar themes in the mise en scene as our media product mainly in the urban areas. It also shares some of the same basic camerawork.
Film Proposal - Land of the free
Name: Land of the free
Plot:
Veronica is a young teenage girl from a refugee family living in Chicago, USA. She been abandoned by her family at the age of 13, the state do nothing to help her and she spent alot of her life all alone and isolated. Unable to work or find a job as she was too young, Veronica turned to prostitution to survive until she was 15 until where one of her clients kidnapped her and brought her to his boss, Rodney. Rodney is a london born and bred crimelord who came to America to get away from people who wanted to escape from his enemys, and begin a new crime syndicate based on mass import and export of drugs and prostitution. Veronica was taken to Rodney and was offered protection and a place to stay in return for being pimped out by Rodney. Due to Veronicas desperation she accepted. Veronica spent two years under the thumb of Rodneys criminal organisation, having no one to turn to and nowhere to go she was virtually alone. Over the two years her anger and resentment grew towards Rodneys organisation for what they had done to her. She discovered where the money from rodneys criminal misdemeanours was kept before it was laundered. She had always managed to take a couple of notes when they werent fully focused on the duffle bag filled with money. Her emotions got the better of her and she struck out at the men watching the bag, grabbed it and made a run for it narrowly escaping by jumping out of a second story window. Thanks to this she essentially painted a bullseye on her head and subsequently Rodney sent his hired 'Goons' to go after her, kill her and get the money back. Veronica hidden her money in a place of great emotional sentiment to her as she knew it would be safer there than carrying it around with her. Veronica begins to spend her money on alcohol and drug fuelled night when she has a sad moment of clarity on a comedown from her Methodrone high at the end of the weekend. She realised how alone she was and how empty her life is. She realised she now had the means to make something of herself and do something valuable. She spent the remaining money she had on her on various bus tickets to get her to Los Angeles in California. In the early hours of the morning she made a dash to get the duffle bag of cash and to begin her new life. When in California she met a social worker who was the first person she opened upto for the first time in her life and who she begged for to help. She was directed to some people who ran a charity called 'Children of the night' which helped child prostitutes be taken away from that lifestyle and dominating pimps. After having been helped by the charity, Veronica realised that the money she had stolen would be better put to use donated to the charity. The Charity was so grateful for the donation they wrote an article about her on their website http://www.childrenofthenight.org/index.html, It was through this became getting famous on national television, telling her story to the millions who watched and being a source of inspiration by the fact that she overcame her hardship. One night when Veronica was coming back from a fundraising event to her apartment. She hear the click of a pistol being cocked directly behind her head, and she died that night.
Length of film:
We want to keep it to be a shortish film as we want to have a sense of constant intensity through out the film without having any scenes which are unnecessarily elongated, and also due to the fact that we are a small and independent production company we simply do not have the budget to afford the extra time of camera equipment rentals and actors wages.
Budget:
We are working with a relatively low budget of £300,000 due to the fact we are a small production company but also because the style of movie we are using is relatively inexpensive to make as it is done mainly with handheld cameras in urban environments to give the narrative a sense of gritty realism like you are right there with the main actor Veronica throughout her journey. We will apply to Film4 commissioning department to look for funding as they tend to try and support upcoming British directors and production companies.
Genre:
The genre of our film is a gritty drama which encompasses characteristics and narrative conventions of other films and genres. The text of our film will fulfil some generic expectations of the genre, for example life or death situations, urban scenery, portrayal of a journey of a character development and the dramatic storyline that is supposed to move the audience emotionally.
Target Audience:
We are aiming to target young adults, as there will be aspects of the youth subculture, but the narrative of the film makes it accessible to people of all ages and social classes.
Our film will most likely be rated and 18 by the British Board of Film Classification. This is due to the fact our film contains alot of senstive topic, themes and graphic scenes. Our film contains: Discriminatory language and behaviour, Very strong violence, frequent strong language, strong portrayal of sexual activity, discriminatory and offensive themes.
Main Characters:
Veronica - (Protagonist)
Veronica is a teenage girl who has had a tough upbringing which began with her family fleeing from Poland due to political tensions in her neighbourhood of 'Ursynow' between her father who was head of the local communist party, and the local Neo-Nazi political group who chronically vandalised her family home, they finally fled when her house was petrol bombed and her father was brutally beaten. After this her family fled to Miami in America as they had family living and working there. As Veronica entered her teenage years she began to experiment with drugs and alcohol, once her parents discovered she had developed an addiction to Methodrone, Her family spent their life savings sending her to a top treatment clinic in Chicago, which she escaped from in a desperate state to score some more Methadrone. She from then on severed connections with her family and spent the last few years of her life alone and fending for herself by living in abandoned houses and industrial estates, being left no other option to make money Veronica reluctantly turned to prostitution as her only means to fund her addiction.
iLL Manors was a huge inspiration in the construction of the character of Veronica, The story of a teenager getting an addiction to Hardcore drugs and becoming destitute is not an uncommon one, which we felt was well portrayed in iLL Manors as the character Michelle was portrayed as a stereotypical drugs addict in the form of most of her behaviour (eg, prostitution, petty burglary, etc) but also shows a different side to her which is unexpected and widens our views on her due to breaking the typical behavioural conventions of a drug addict. Below is a short clip of the actor who plays Michelle explaining the fundamental factors of her character.
Rodney - (The Crime Lord)
Rodney is the leader of the crime syndicate that has main control of the criminal underworld of chicago. He was born and raised in the Eastend of London where he became a notorious drug kingpin who was responsible for most of all the cocaine, cannabis and firearms in London. He is third generation Ghanaian and he started his criminal life when his uncle used to send him on little 'jobs' around his area (delivering pay as you go phones to his uncles contacts). As Rodney grew up he started taking bigger jobs and climbing up the criminal hierarchy until his uncle was kidnapped from his home by a rival gang and executed. Rodney then started taking over his uncles position when he reached twenty five and became the notorious man to fear by the time he was twenty eight. He expanded the business from drugs to firearms which he was arranging to be brought in from the west indies and latin america, but while inspecting a shipment of automatic weapons from Peru a rival gang stormed his warehouse headquarters and killed most of his men and left Rodney with bullet wounds to the leg, arm and a punctured lung. The rival gang soon took over his business killing all Rodney's associates, and putting a price on his head. Being too dangerous to stay in London he fled to the United States and settled on Chicago as he had associates who were controlling the synthetic drugs trade in from the Canada to the north of the United States. He started recruiting within the Chicago crime syndicate and he and his new crew executed the Bosses much like the rival gang had back in London and took control of the operation. He started to branch out into pimping prostitutes to bring in more money and expand his drugs market. He has remained anonymous by bribing Political figures within the Chicago sector of the government, police officials, DEA agents and executives who control the press. He is rarely seen by anyone except his second in command, he never directly handles anything in his business unless absolutely necessary to prevent what happened in London happening again. He has built a small army of hired thugs, who wear the black suit and with no tie as an inconspicuous uniform to make his presence know in the criminal underworld.
The film iLL Manors shares many of the same narritive characteristics and the character 'Kirby' has also had a great influence on the construction of the character Rodney. They share alot of the same personality characteristics and desires.
Plot:
Veronica is a young teenage girl from a refugee family living in Chicago, USA. She been abandoned by her family at the age of 13, the state do nothing to help her and she spent alot of her life all alone and isolated. Unable to work or find a job as she was too young, Veronica turned to prostitution to survive until she was 15 until where one of her clients kidnapped her and brought her to his boss, Rodney. Rodney is a london born and bred crimelord who came to America to get away from people who wanted to escape from his enemys, and begin a new crime syndicate based on mass import and export of drugs and prostitution. Veronica was taken to Rodney and was offered protection and a place to stay in return for being pimped out by Rodney. Due to Veronicas desperation she accepted. Veronica spent two years under the thumb of Rodneys criminal organisation, having no one to turn to and nowhere to go she was virtually alone. Over the two years her anger and resentment grew towards Rodneys organisation for what they had done to her. She discovered where the money from rodneys criminal misdemeanours was kept before it was laundered. She had always managed to take a couple of notes when they werent fully focused on the duffle bag filled with money. Her emotions got the better of her and she struck out at the men watching the bag, grabbed it and made a run for it narrowly escaping by jumping out of a second story window. Thanks to this she essentially painted a bullseye on her head and subsequently Rodney sent his hired 'Goons' to go after her, kill her and get the money back. Veronica hidden her money in a place of great emotional sentiment to her as she knew it would be safer there than carrying it around with her. Veronica begins to spend her money on alcohol and drug fuelled night when she has a sad moment of clarity on a comedown from her Methodrone high at the end of the weekend. She realised how alone she was and how empty her life is. She realised she now had the means to make something of herself and do something valuable. She spent the remaining money she had on her on various bus tickets to get her to Los Angeles in California. In the early hours of the morning she made a dash to get the duffle bag of cash and to begin her new life. When in California she met a social worker who was the first person she opened upto for the first time in her life and who she begged for to help. She was directed to some people who ran a charity called 'Children of the night' which helped child prostitutes be taken away from that lifestyle and dominating pimps. After having been helped by the charity, Veronica realised that the money she had stolen would be better put to use donated to the charity. The Charity was so grateful for the donation they wrote an article about her on their website http://www.childrenofthenight.org/index.html, It was through this became getting famous on national television, telling her story to the millions who watched and being a source of inspiration by the fact that she overcame her hardship. One night when Veronica was coming back from a fundraising event to her apartment. She hear the click of a pistol being cocked directly behind her head, and she died that night.
Length of film:
We want to keep it to be a shortish film as we want to have a sense of constant intensity through out the film without having any scenes which are unnecessarily elongated, and also due to the fact that we are a small and independent production company we simply do not have the budget to afford the extra time of camera equipment rentals and actors wages.
Budget:
We are working with a relatively low budget of £300,000 due to the fact we are a small production company but also because the style of movie we are using is relatively inexpensive to make as it is done mainly with handheld cameras in urban environments to give the narrative a sense of gritty realism like you are right there with the main actor Veronica throughout her journey. We will apply to Film4 commissioning department to look for funding as they tend to try and support upcoming British directors and production companies.
Genre:
The genre of our film is a gritty drama which encompasses characteristics and narrative conventions of other films and genres. The text of our film will fulfil some generic expectations of the genre, for example life or death situations, urban scenery, portrayal of a journey of a character development and the dramatic storyline that is supposed to move the audience emotionally.
Target Audience:
We are aiming to target young adults, as there will be aspects of the youth subculture, but the narrative of the film makes it accessible to people of all ages and social classes.
Our film will most likely be rated and 18 by the British Board of Film Classification. This is due to the fact our film contains alot of senstive topic, themes and graphic scenes. Our film contains: Discriminatory language and behaviour, Very strong violence, frequent strong language, strong portrayal of sexual activity, discriminatory and offensive themes.
Main Characters:
Veronica - (Protagonist)
Veronica is a teenage girl who has had a tough upbringing which began with her family fleeing from Poland due to political tensions in her neighbourhood of 'Ursynow' between her father who was head of the local communist party, and the local Neo-Nazi political group who chronically vandalised her family home, they finally fled when her house was petrol bombed and her father was brutally beaten. After this her family fled to Miami in America as they had family living and working there. As Veronica entered her teenage years she began to experiment with drugs and alcohol, once her parents discovered she had developed an addiction to Methodrone, Her family spent their life savings sending her to a top treatment clinic in Chicago, which she escaped from in a desperate state to score some more Methadrone. She from then on severed connections with her family and spent the last few years of her life alone and fending for herself by living in abandoned houses and industrial estates, being left no other option to make money Veronica reluctantly turned to prostitution as her only means to fund her addiction.
iLL Manors was a huge inspiration in the construction of the character of Veronica, The story of a teenager getting an addiction to Hardcore drugs and becoming destitute is not an uncommon one, which we felt was well portrayed in iLL Manors as the character Michelle was portrayed as a stereotypical drugs addict in the form of most of her behaviour (eg, prostitution, petty burglary, etc) but also shows a different side to her which is unexpected and widens our views on her due to breaking the typical behavioural conventions of a drug addict. Below is a short clip of the actor who plays Michelle explaining the fundamental factors of her character.
Rodney - (The Crime Lord)
Rodney is the leader of the crime syndicate that has main control of the criminal underworld of chicago. He was born and raised in the Eastend of London where he became a notorious drug kingpin who was responsible for most of all the cocaine, cannabis and firearms in London. He is third generation Ghanaian and he started his criminal life when his uncle used to send him on little 'jobs' around his area (delivering pay as you go phones to his uncles contacts). As Rodney grew up he started taking bigger jobs and climbing up the criminal hierarchy until his uncle was kidnapped from his home by a rival gang and executed. Rodney then started taking over his uncles position when he reached twenty five and became the notorious man to fear by the time he was twenty eight. He expanded the business from drugs to firearms which he was arranging to be brought in from the west indies and latin america, but while inspecting a shipment of automatic weapons from Peru a rival gang stormed his warehouse headquarters and killed most of his men and left Rodney with bullet wounds to the leg, arm and a punctured lung. The rival gang soon took over his business killing all Rodney's associates, and putting a price on his head. Being too dangerous to stay in London he fled to the United States and settled on Chicago as he had associates who were controlling the synthetic drugs trade in from the Canada to the north of the United States. He started recruiting within the Chicago crime syndicate and he and his new crew executed the Bosses much like the rival gang had back in London and took control of the operation. He started to branch out into pimping prostitutes to bring in more money and expand his drugs market. He has remained anonymous by bribing Political figures within the Chicago sector of the government, police officials, DEA agents and executives who control the press. He is rarely seen by anyone except his second in command, he never directly handles anything in his business unless absolutely necessary to prevent what happened in London happening again. He has built a small army of hired thugs, who wear the black suit and with no tie as an inconspicuous uniform to make his presence know in the criminal underworld.
The film iLL Manors shares many of the same narritive characteristics and the character 'Kirby' has also had a great influence on the construction of the character Rodney. They share alot of the same personality characteristics and desires.
Permission to use the 'J Dilla - Runnin' Soundtrack
A member of our group George Nolan contacted Universal Music Group to inquire permission to use the J Dilla - Runnin Soundtrack in our media product. We have yet to receive a reply. We outlined it was not for profit use and to use for educational purposes.
Tuesday, 9 April 2013
Imovie editing help
For example this Video Taught me to use the Ken Burns Editing Effect, Colour Grading and Text Effects.
I have been mainly consulting Matthew Pearce's Youtube Channel where he has lots of youtube tutorials giving tips and explaining how to use iMovie effectively, it has helped me greatly when troubleshooting and to help give the media product some variety editing wise.
Here is a link to the YouTube channel I have been using:
http://www.youtube.com/user/MattsMacintosh/videos?sort=dd&view=46&tag_id=UCQqCU9HtbaWyWIXKoro8Fqg.3.imovie
Sunday, 7 April 2013
Applying The Concept Of Genre To Our Film
The genre of our film is a gritty drama. The narrative takes us into the topics of abandonment, isolation, abuse and high level crime which can be upsetting to some viewers as we hope our narritave can cause empathy for the protagonist Veronicas situation. The text of our film opening will fulfill some generic expectations of the genre, for example life or death situations, urban scenery, portrayal of a journey of a characters development and the dramatic storyline that is supposed to move the audience emotionally. Much like in other Films sharing the same genre as ours, the heart of the drama is conflict. Our narrative structure is structured with climaxes and anti climaxes to keep the audience emotionally attached and the tension ongoing. The mise en scene of our film overall is grey, dull and lifeless. We have chosen this to help portray the narrative text of our film and help solidify its place as a drama genre. Genre wise our film shares a commonality with the drama film titanic in which it breaks a convention of a drama film because it does not have a happy ending which is unusual in a drama text which we hope will have a profound effect on our audience. Our drama text has a combination of genres which combine to achieve our intended narrative, for example incorporate some aspects of 'Slice of life' genre which is a phrase describing the use of mundane realism depicting everyday experiences in art and entertainment and the incorporation of a biographical genre which is a detailed description or account of a persons life. It entails more than basic facts (education, work, relationships and death), we believe the use of handheld camera and addition of mundane diegetic sound played a key role in this combination of genres. We believe these adaptations of the Drama genre is now the norm. This is due to genres having to adapt in order to survive, for example westerns. This development yet familiarity of genres help build a relationship between audiences and producers which help minimise the risk of financial failure as they help meet audience expectations as a whole but also include some originality within the genre which attracts the audience and helps the movie distinguish itself. We belive we have achieved this as we still incorporate a set of characteristics recognised by the audiences over time, eg iconography, narrative, mise-en-scene, themes and representation.
Production Companies That May Distribute Our Film
We also researched Film4 as it is a well known and recognised UK institution that funds and commissions a lot of UK films. It is an attractive distribution company to us as it targets to develop (new) British talent and to be a leader of innovation in the british film industry so there is a high likelihood that we can receive there backing as we are a new british production company. We believe our film has some distinguishing features that can be seen as innovative for a British film which is what Film4 tend to look for. Another reason we decided to research Film4 is because it is has a huge audience and distribution channel. They commit to showing all their films on either Channel 4 or the Film 4 channel, these channels are on all TV cable/satellite distribution companies eg, Virgin, YouView, Freeview and Sky which indicates their huge audience across Britain. Channel 4 also has a good ethos which attracted us to them which sets them apart as a commercial broadcaster as its primary concern is to fulfil public needs instead of making its shareholders money.
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