Monday, 21 September 2015

'Choice' - Production Schedule


Date
Task
What we going to do?
Equipment
Cast and crew
21/09/15 – 16/10/15
Pre production
This will be the pre production part. We will finish the scripting and storyboarding. We will also do Recce’s, risk assessments, shooting schedule and develop print ideas.
Macs
Charlie Bell, Tony Cash, David Cuff
19/10/15 – 02/11/15
Filming days
This is the time we are going to film. We will have about 2 weeks to get everything filmed multiple times to make sure we have enough footage.
JVC 3CCD 
Camera Stabilizer
Camera Dolly 
4x Tripods 
2x Rode Boom pole 
2x LED Lights  
2 x 5in1 lighting reflectors/diffusers/flags
Charlie Bell, Tony Cash, David Cuff, James Brookes, Kelly Davis, Ashley Edmonds
02/11/15 – 18/12/15
Editing and print product
This will be where David Cuff and Tony Cash will editing ‘Choice’ while Charlie Bell Will be focusing on the print Products
Macs
David Cuff, Tony Cash, Charlie Bell
04/01/16 – 29/01/16
Final Evaluation
This will be where we evaluate the Productions and Do directors commentary for ‘Choice’
Macs
David Cuff, Tony Cash, Charlie Bell

'Choice' - Character Study


‘Choice’ Character Study (Internal)
Eric

Eric Matthews


Eric Matthews was born on October 20th 1996 to a Samantha and Paul Matthews. As a baby Eric constantly needed fuss and attention and would constantly be the start of arguments for his parents.
 
Samantha always wanted a girl and has never let Eric live it down, she blames his fathers ‘Inferior’ genes and that she ‘should’ve married that Oakland lad from college’. Eric father Paul saw straight through her passive aggressive attitude for some time.  Eventually he spent more time at his local pub than with his wife, much to her detest.
 
During his early childhood Eric was in the forefront of this conflict constantly trying to impress his mother and ending up questioning her actions to her father. Paul loved Eric more than anything in the world, He knew he wasn’t perfect but he always blamed the war and his wife for his actions.
 
Eric was 13 years old when Paul first hit him. It was a drunken mistake he professed, however Samantha fault different. This event would shake the Matthews household for some time. Everything Eric believed started to get manipulated, Paul became more aggressive and he would always tell Eric it was his mother’s fault.
 
Eric began projecting his worries in the form on an imaginary friend who he never named. In psychology reports Eric said that the friend always shown him the answer and that he hasn’t been wrong since. His mother thought he was crazy and his father took no notice.
 
When Eric was 17 his parents were in the midst of a divorce, it was then that Paul Matthews struck Samantha and put her in the hospital. After doing so he ran away from the consequences leaving Eric with a choice of what to do and who to go to.
 
The film carries on from here.


Friday, 18 September 2015

Pitch feedback


By filming the pitch you are using digital technologies which will give an insight into your creative journey. Your pitch allowed you to talk confidently about progress, plan and the development of ideas. Your project shows great promise and ambition in use of technology. You have researched film-making techniques and show a real passion for learning about this medium which comes through in your pitch.  It was well prepared and the script was provided to your peers.

Influences  are clearly identified and I like the Edgar Wright links, make sure these are shown on the blog.

Upload your own film made as practice and discuss its strengths and weaknesses. Provide me with a copy if possible.

Describe the drafting process of the script and outline what you have learned.

Develop ideas for print products. 

Explain how you are using lighting using images.

You could have read the script with the group to allow them to understand the narrative

Document the work done on back stories and character biographies and all the planning covered. Ensure this goes on to the blog and is fully evidenced.

Very promising hitting aspects of level 4.

Ensure that your cretaive journey is reflected on the web-log.

Friday, 4 September 2015

Task 3 - 'Choice' - Mind map

This is the mind map for the film. We have gone through loads of ideas and narrowed it down to this. We feel that this is a good idea for the film because it incorporates loads of our ideas into a short time for the film. We will more than likely make some slight chances to this as something that we have planned might not work. But I will be updating all of these.



The basic Idea for the film is that we have the character 'Eric' who's mother is in hospital because his farther abused her. Now Eric must choose between an abusive Dad who always loved him or a non-abusive Mom that didn't love him. Eric's 'friend' tries to help him make the decision to go with his Mom because deep down she did love him she just didn't show it. The Friend is actually Eric's subconscious mind that doesn't want Eric to go with his farther because he will abuse Eric. However this isn't said in the film and s left to the audience to work this out or make a decision about his friend on their own. That is the unique selling point to the film is that the audience makes the decision.

Friday, 28 August 2015

Task 2 - Lady Gaga - Bad Romance - Analyisis



Lady Gaga Bad Romance Video Deconstruction

In the music video for Lady Gaga's Bad Romance it has lots of imagery in there for innocents. At the very start of the video Lady Gaga is sat in the middle of a lot of people on a throne. She is dressed in gold whereas all of the men stood around her are in black and the woman are dressed in white. This makes you automatically focus on her because she stands out. The camera zooms in on her and this makes it certain that the video is focused on her. She is wearing metal glasses with razor blades on them, this shows that she is dangerous and she shouldn't be messed with. Then it cuts to a shot of her with her finger on the play button on a Parrot iPod speaker. This is product placement and it happens throughout this video. There is also product placement for Russian Vodka called Lex Nemiroff. This could show that the guys in the video are Russian and this could have links to the Russian Mob.

The next part of the video there is 4 pod like things on the floor and one of them has "Monster" written on it and it has a cross on it. The religious themes run through this whole video and this could mean several things. These pods are in a white bricked room that looks like a prison cell. The next shot it has red text that says "Bath Haus Of Gaga" now this is just like a communal bath house in Russia but it Russia these can often be associated with Whore Houses, this gives us an idea of what the video is about.

The next shot is of the pods opening and people coming out of them. This looks like the Aliens from Alien and this is linking Music videos to films. This happens quite a lot in Lady Gaga's videos. Then when they are out of the Pods they are wearing white latex clothes and the dance that they do looks like the Thriller dance for Michael Jackson and this is showing that she has taken influences from a very influential dance. Form this the video cuts to her in a bath. Lady Gaga is wearing white clothes and she has very wide eyes, this shows her innocents because she has an innocent look about her. With this there is cuts to her stood in front of a mirror wearing black. This could be that she is innocent but she always has a dark streak in her or it could be foreshadowing the end of the video.

On this part of the video you can see her spine through her clothes this shows that she is being mistreated at this Bath Haus. But she is still wearing white showing that she is still pure. After this she is sat in a bath and a man and a woman come up to and force her to drink some drugs or vodka. Even though there is a woman in power she is still being controlled by man. This substance they give her to drink makes her comply with what they want her to do and this makes links to money and that if you give someone money then they will do what you want. She is then stripped down out of her clothes in the video and this is showing that she is stripped back to basics in the media world and re built as what the men what.

She is made to dance in front of men and this shows that the media is run by men and that female artists are made more to look sexy for the male gaze rather than for the music. The women dancing in front of the men are all still wearing white and this shows that they are still pure but that will be take away very soon. In this part the men are all wearing black and this shows that the men are the more powerful people and that they aren't pure and that they are transforming women.

In this video there is lots of references to the imagery of a cat this shows that the females are more used as "pets" in the males eyes and that the women are just used as something nice to look at more than a person.

Lady Gaga is now starting to have bits of black in the clothes that she wears and this shows that she is starting to transform into what the men what and this is is bad for her because she is conforming to what the media people want and not being her own person. There is a few shots throughout this part of the song that she is in a cage. This is her showing that she feels trapped and that she can’t get out of what she has got herself into. The next bit is her surrounded by men and she is in the middle with a load of diamonds and jewellery around her this shows that if she conforms to what the men want she will make lots of money.


The very last scene in this music video is very graphic because she is laying on a bed that she has just set on fire and burnt and she is lying next to one of the men out of the video that has been burnt and is now just a skeleton. This shows that she has beaten the men and got to the top but because of what she is wearing you can tell that she has no innocence left and this is bad for her because even though she has beaten the men she has lost all of what she wants to be.


Monday, 24 August 2015

Task 2 - Lady Gaga - Paparazzi - Analysis



Lady Gaga Paparazzi video deconstruction

In the very first second of the music video. The opening transition looks like you are looking through a camera lens. This automatically makes you think that you are the paparazzi, this is coupled with the cinematic shots of the flowers that follow makes you think that you are looking through a camera. The feel of the music video right at the start isn't like a music video it’s more like a film. Then it cuts to pictures of an Italian Rivera style house that it massive and it makes you thing that the person that owns the house has a lot of money and that it is there private house. On one of the cinematic shots of the house some titles come up. These titles look more like a Pulp Fiction style titles. This adds to the movie feel of the video. Then it cuts to shots of in the house and there is money and diamond jewellery everywhere. On the money there is a picture of Lady Gaga herself, this shows that she is the one with the money because she has her own currency.

When you finally see the people in the video they are on the bed about to have sex. They are surrounded in empty bottles and money. This shows that they might have had a party beforehand and this is the aftermath of it. This is confirmed from the shot of the balcony where you see a table full of alcohol and food. This shows that they had a party before the video. When the 2 people are lying on the bed they speak to each other in Swedish. This shows the regional identity of the 2 main people in the video. This links to the wider world and will draw more people
from different countries into watching the video.

There are statues around the house and this represents art which is something that Lady Gaga is big on. She is a big fan of art and she is art herself with some of the dresses she wears. At this point the 2 characters are on the balcony and then you see the guy look off into the camera and there is some snapping noises like a camera and the effect looks like this is pictures being taken. They are being watch by the paparazzi. This is used to show the struggle that all celebrities have because they can’t do anything in there private life because the paparazzi will catch them because they are always being watched. Then in the video the guy pushes Lady Gaga off the balcony but this is caught by the paparazzi but it looks like Lady Gaga falls off. This is done to show that if celebrities are caught doing something in their private life they will be "slaughtered" by the public because it will get out. But on the flip side of this there is the Guy who is with the celebrity and this give him exposure and makes him famous.

After she hits the floor the paparazzi just crowd around her taking photos of her but no one helps her. This shows that the paparazzi don't care about the celebrities that they are exposing. There are newspaper articles that pop up on screen then and these all say about Lady Gaga not being about to sing again. Then the video cuts to her being in a wheelchair and 3 girls helping her. This can be takes 1 of 2 ways, she is either making fun out of people in wheelchairs, or she is supporting awareness for people with disabilities. Either way it makes you feel sorry for her. After a while she stands up on crutches and this is her way of saying that nothing is impossible and even if you get knocked down from the top you can always get back there again.

Throughout the video there are different flashbacks of dead bodies that look like the people have committed suicide and this could be linked to the paparazzi and that they have drove the people to do this by exposing their private life and making them have a down fall. This could be one of the reasons for the images that flash up. It could also be linked to the fact that if someone is famous then they can get away with murder and Lady Gaga could be connoting that this is wrong and it shouldn't have to be this way. Furthermore it could connote the pressures of women in the entertainment business because all of the images of the people are of women and this could be another meaning of the graphic images.

Intertwined with the flash backs of dead bodies. There is Lady Gaga sexually moving around on a sofa. This could be done for multiply reasons. One of which is for the Male Gaze aspect of it. This would draw men into watching to watch the music video. The other reason could be to show what people expect from women in the entertainment business and this could be something that Lady Gaga is trying to promote that this shouldn't happen.

Towards the end of the video she has a split in her hair colour. Part of it is white and part of it is black. This makes her look like Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmatians. This could be done to show that she is going to do something bad at the end of the video. The hair colours could also connote that she is have good with a dark streak with in her. The dark streak could mean that is going to do something bad. Her back is mostly against the wall and this shows that she has been a victim of the Paparazzi. At the very end of the video she poisons the guy from the beginning and kills him. She gets arrested but then there is flashes of newspaper headlines that say she is innocent. This shows that if you are famous you can get away with murder and it also shows double standards because when she was nearly killed it was her fault for falling off but when she kills someone it’s not her fault.

All in all the music video is more like a film in the way it is set out and the way it tells a story but it all links in to the music. Celebrities these days don't get a break because they are constantly in the eye of the public and the paparazzi will be there if they make a mistake. But this video also shows that if you are famous that you can get away with murder and this shouldn't be the case. It is an issue raised in this video and it is something than needs addressing.