My group is Annie and Hartlee. We decided to use Annie's idea. Annie's idea is about a girl that has flashbacks of memories and about her life in a short period of time. The movie starts off as she looks through a photo album which she sees photographs showing memories of her (Aimee) and a girl called Jade. These photographs show memories such as rollerblading, at the beach and at a party. The majority of the film is centered around the memories. At the end of the film, we find out that Aimee has a mental illness and she finds out that Jade is imaginary.
Going through the story, Hartlee and I tried to think about how we can incorporate other ideas into Annie's idea. We thought that we could have a few extra photographs and memories into the short film. Some of these memories are of ice skating, dancing and we even talked abit about super powers (which was from my film).
At the moment, we are currently thinking about shot types, actors and actresses, locations that we can use and changing the story around a bit and the storyboards, just to name a few.
Hopefully at the end, we will have shot many scenes that we can use and therefore edit a good film.
Ideas
Reflection
During this unit, I found it really hard to come up with a story that I liked. I kept changing my items, and sometimes they were not a genre film. Because I couldn’t think of a film, I couldn’t have started my treatment or storyboards. Although, when I had my idea, my character profile helped me to create my main character, Valarie, in greater depth. Creating the character profile helped me to make sure that Valarie’s actions and the way that she acted was constant in the treatment and storyboards. I didn’t complete much plot development or research, but I did research how to create storyboards, and the right use of language for present tense and the storyboard notes and illustrations. I do not think that the activities that we did in class about the ship blowing up, and the extract from ‘Interview with a Vampire’ helped. When we wrote the practice treatment, we were not told that we had to use present tense. It did not help me because the actual exercises were really different to what we actually had to do in the assignment. But, it was helpful to know what a ‘real’ treatment and storyboard looked like, so we had something to aspire to. I think that I could have used more appropriate genre conventions in my film, but I think that if I use the correct lighting in the scenes, it will enhance the movie. I tried to use a zooming drawing technique in one of my storyboards, but I’m not sure how successful I was. I used some film language, although a lot of it was repetitive. When drawing my storyboards, I found it really hard to draw the perspective that I wanted. For example, I can see the shot in my head that I want to be filmed is shot over the girls shoulder so that you can see the diary in her lap, and her bed and ice-cream, with her hair messy in her face, but I couldn’t capture the right angle of my drawing. It was also really hard for me to get a perspective of how big things were in my storyboards, that would be totally different sizes in the real world. I could imagine all of the shots in my head, but sketching them, and writing about them was a lot different to actually seeing them.
During this project, I learned a lot of new formal language such as the shot types, and the names of all the Microsoft word tools that I knew how to use, but didn’t know the name of. At the very start of the term, I learnt how to use a new camera, and how to arrange pictures to make a story. I think that my project is clearly a supernatural film, as the main character experiences supernatural powers. At the end, you also see that the book tells you everything about her powers. Sometimes in supernatural films, the people with the powers are usually the heroes, but I changed mine around, and made it so that she has to preserver to be the hero. I think that with the use of dark and bright lighting throughout the movie will make my supernatural film more realistic and un-natural. I am happy with my final treatment and storyboards. I think that both my treatment and storyboards have enough detail to picture a rough idea of a film in your head that is similar to mine. If I could change and redo my assignment again, I would have spent more times on my storyboards to try and arrange my illustrations to more of what I am thinking, and to try and get the perspectives right. I think that if I were able to draw with more detail, shading and angles, it would have improved my storyboards. I think that I could have managed my time better, but I am still proud of my work, and even if I had more time, I probably wouldn’t have changed much. Next time, I should take less time to think of an idea, and think of one, and stick to it. If I did this, I would have saved a lot of time, and could have started both my treatment and storyboards earlier. If I could start again, I would change my story to a different genre, such a comedy because I think that a comedy would be more fun to shoot, and it could be more entertaining to plan the film in the pre-production.
Ship practice treatment
A huge passenger ship sails into calm seas. The deck is crowded with holiday-makers and the ships captain looks out to the horizon.
The tension builds as we cut between happy holiday-makers and the countdown timer on a bomb in the cargo bay.
Suddenly, BOOM! A gigantic explosion rips the ship in two. Flames and smoke fly hundreds of feet into the air...
Locations/Settings
- School classroom where they are gossiping while the teacher is talking. A regular sized classroom with individual desks in aisles of 4, and rows of 7 with a meter walking gap in-between the aisles. The scene will be shot looking into a corner of a blank wall and window where you see the girls talking and chatting. Use this location twice – once when they are friends after the party, and then later when they are excluding her
- Oval or Running track. A 100m track course so that you can take the shot of them running from about half way to the end looking at the start of the race. And then another shot from the side and watching the girl when the race and not being that tired at all. Must have clear lines on the ground so that they can be seen on the camera. Someone with a stop watch is also needed.
- Bedroom. Where the girl will sit on her bed writing in her diary about her day. Shoot from over the shoulder, above, just on the diary and from the side. Dull lighting. Preferably the bed in a corner. Also where she gets ready for the party, so a drawer is needed where she gets the bracelet out of and a mirror to look at when she is ready and when she is wondering what is wrong with her
- Room where the book will be kept. An old an ancient looking room where everything looks untouched for years and in result dusty and crowded with ‘junk’ Have dark lighting, but then bright lighting at the end of the shot when she finds the book
Major Plot Elements
Act One: A girl is seen having many friends while they are having fun and laughing with typical scenery like at school or at the shops. Getting ready for a party on Friday night, the girl puts on a bracelet that she was given to for her 12th birthday by her great-grandmother. She didn’t think that it was that pretty, but as she was searching for a bracelet to go with her dress it just seemed to fit nicely and she realized that it was actually really pretty. As the girl put the bracelet on she is shocked and a slight slow comes from her for a slight period, but no one (including her) notices the effect.
Act Two: Deciding that she liked the bracelet, she wears it to school the following Monday where they are talking about the party, the girl’s gossip about what happened and realized that an unknown at the party smashed a glass into a wall (little did they know that it was the girl). In class, they continue to gossip quietly. But then the girl tells them that if they ‘don’t stop shouting then they are going to get in trouble!’ But they aren’t shouting, merely whispering and you get the aspects of her super-senses coming through.
At a track and field practice event, she forced into the highest 100m running event and surprisingly beats the rest of the competitors by 5 seconds easily – and beats the school record. When hugging one of her friends, she crushes her arm in-between her and her friend and the friend injures her hand.
*other aspects of super hearing, speed, taste, strength, smell and brains might be added in time or swapped for other ideas*
You see her writing in her diary about what she is feeling and she doesn’t know why all her senses are heightened and starts to worry that she is abnormal. She writes that she is loosing friends. And then have a flashback of her friends leaving her at lunch or in class, and everyone whispering about her.
Act Three: As she cries herself to sleep, she is drawn to the attic of her house where she discovers an ancient book and realizing that it is all about her families’ history, reads it and finds out all of her families hidden secrets and that her powers were actually just the bracelet.
Ingredients and Recipe
Ingredients
- SUPERNATURAL
- Supernatural effects/elements
- Light lighting – when she puts on the bracelet, discovers the story, at the start etc
- Dark lighting – when everything is going wrong, when she is crying, when she is angry
- Sound: laughing, talking, crying, running sounds, cheering, gossiping, whispering
- Props/costumes – bracelet, ancient old book, diary, ice cream
- Setting – bedroom with a bed (where she writes in her diary), attic or some old room where old family items are kept, running track/oval
- Characters – main character who has the bracelet, friends, extras gossiping and giving her weird looks, injured friend
Recipe
The story starts with a group of teenage school girls talking at school, being friendly and getting excited about the party that night. When getting dressed for the party, the girl find a bracelte that her great-grandmother gave to her for her birthday a few years ago. Next, you see the girls talking to school about the party and how there was a rumor about a couple of guys smashing a glass into a wall, breaking the handle of a door and involved in other trouble. Little did they know that the ‘group of guys’ actually turned out to be their friend. From this day, as she continues to wear the bracelet, she breaks the school 100m running record, outsmarts everyone in a mathematics test and having sensitive hearing, taste and smell. Wondering why she is so different, her friends have abandoned her and as she comforts in ice cream and her diary you see flashbacks of other incidents that have happened to the girl. Next, she finds comfort in a room of a house that she never went in, as it was full of old and ‘boring’ family history. But as she walks into the room, she is drawn to an ancient book that beholds all her families’ hidden secrets and she finds out that the bracelet that she has been wearing has given her powers.
New Idea
I chose to go through with this story instead because my other story was too 'dark'.
Rough Draft
Genre: supernatural
- A person has many friends
- When she puts on a bracelet she was given from her grandmother. And it has powers but she didn’t know that.
- She gains stronger senses including hearing, speed, taste, strength, brains and smelling
- She doesn’t realise that it is the bracelet at you see her writing in her diary that she thinks she is un human
- She struggles to act ‘normal’ and ends up breaking a school running record by 5 seconds
- Breaks a pen
- Injures someone
- No one wants to be her friend anymore in case something happens and because she is weird
- She cries in the basement and finds an old book that tells her about her family secrets and the bracelet
Plot Idea
The effects of drugs made a girl crazy. She is tempted to start using again, but then she sees a flashback of what she looked like and felt like after the drugs had left her system, and the worried faces of everyone around her. But then she remembers the good times she had with drugs, and then the bad, and doesn't know what to decide. But then decides to then flush the drugs down the toilet. Starts of with the girl looking at the bottle and then she has a flashback for most of the film, and then finally at the end she chooses whether or not she is going to use the drugs again.
I am thinking that I am probably going to use this story as my film choice. I think that it would be possible to film this, as for the drugs you could just use some hard lollies or something like that. For the flashbacks, it doesn't actually see her taking the drugs, and it would involve someone looking really happy and full of ecstasy one shot, and then someone with really big bags under her eyes which could be easily done by having not much sleep the night before and make up. The other point of views or what she acts like can be told with a few extra characters that are trying to talk to her about it. You could have her looking at people around her that are looking worried in a circular dollying motion. The bathroom scene would be easy to shoot as all you need is a toilet, but i also thought about shooting a scene as the person is looking into a mirror which might be hard as the camera that we would be shooting with would show up in the reflection.
Interview with a Vampire. Storyboard activity.
The millionaire is running around his large three story house, as he comes running up the stairs, he is taken back by the speed of his butler and the only way to escape is back down the stairs again. But this method will take too long. The Butler wastes no time, and as the millionaire realizes this, he tries to run across the staircase to the other side of the house (still on the third floor). But the butler is too quick and pushes his boss (the millionaire) off the floor, and down to the ground level where he is greeted by the alter of his private church. You see the millionaire falling and you see the cross last, as you see the millionaire sprawled on the alter. Dead.