Film Opening - Final Product

Our final film opening with the final changes to contrast and brightness.

Evaluation - Question 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I was going to do this one as a video, when I say 'Wearing this shirt actually.' I showed the shirt but as sound clip that's pretty pointless

My voice sounds weird

Evaluation - Question 2

Answer to Evaluation:Question 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Evaluation - Question 3

Evaluation - Question 4

Evaluation - Question 5

Evaluation - Question 6

Evaluation - Question 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

Looking back at our preliminary task piece I now realize how stupidly simple it was, we used very, very simple editing techniques that I took care of at home on Sony Vegas Pro 11, techniques limited to literally cutting down clips and adding in music. I also looped the noise of a cricket for too long and held still frames. for our preliminary task we used side angle shots, we had a big close up on a door handle, wide angle shots and and incredibly shaky panning shot done by putting a camera on my skateboard.

We thought a lot about how to present each of characters through mise en scene and lighting especially but also through the use of editing and sound in our film opening. However during the making of our preliminary task piece we didn't really think about any of that, instead we just focused on the representations of costume, whereas use of lighting was very important for use especially during the villain scenes which needed to be dark with one small, low key, white light source. I feel that body language and facial expression were presented quite well in our film opening as we had to concentrate on making our hero and villain completely opposite in every way. However in our preliminary task body language was not important as all there was, was a small amount of dialogue in which and a small amount of pacing, this was fairly easy to create.

The editing I did for the Preliminary was very basic and i feel I have really stepped up my game when it came to editing the film opening. I feel I've learnt a lot from editing the Film opening because if you compare the editing techniques use from that with the techniques used in the Preliminary task you can see I have matured greatly from that. Previously I used Sony Vegas Pro and edited it all together in a mere hour and a half whereas the editing for the Film opening took weeks to complete. For the Preliminary task all I did was trim shots and put them together. I managed to hold still frames and add in cheesy sound affects both downloaded from youtube. However for the Film opening I used Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 and learnt loads of different techniques.

We relied solely on dialogue to get our plot across to the viewer in our Preliminary piece as there was little other sound and there wasn't much important mise en scene, sound or camera techniques to focus on except for the fact that it is obvious that our main character is a young girl in a classroom and the fact that she is on her own, this is also emphasized by the used of the cricket chirping sound effect as it dramatizes the fact that the plush toy not responding as it is not alive.

I think we have come a long way and have learned a lot and gained a lot of skills from creating our Film opening by using with more advanced editing software and using more editing, mise en scene, sound and camera techniques. 

Editing - Contrast and Brightness Levels

 

 Here you can see how I made changes to the contrast and brightness levels for the seperate clips. All I did was select the clips individually and change the contrast and brightness levels manually with the sliders in effect controls


Film Opening - Pre-Contrast/Brightness Changes

Our final film opening without the final changes to contrast and brightness made as I  decided after this was uploaded that I needed to make final changes to contrast and brightness levels to brighten up some of the more boring scenes.

Editing - Shots

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Planning - Shot Timings

• Opening shot of Matt putting costume away - 4 sec
• Wide angle shot of Matt, action match from previous - 4 sec
• Close up of clock - 10 sec
• Villain with pocket watch - 5 sec
• First shot of Matt with breakfast - 4 sec
• Peter looking at news clippings - 10 sec
• Over the shoulder shot - 8 sec
• Back to Matt eating - 3 sec
• Girlfriend enters - 4 sec
• Matt gets up and goes after her - 3 sec
• Conversation, shot revers shot - 25 sec
• Girlfriend walks out the door - 4 sec
• Matt walks out of the shot - 4 sec

We have had to allow some time remaining as between the shots of the different personalities we intend to add in a edited effect, these will vary in time from 2 - 5 seconds.

Film Opening - Character Names

Ma'at is the Egyptian Goddess of justice and order, so we thought Matt would be suitable for the hero's (secret identity) name as he brings justice and order to the people of his city.

The Egyptian God of chaos and war was a bit more difficult to interpret into an English name. His name is

Apophis, also known as  Apep. After some thought we decided that Peter would be the closest.

The Girlfriend of Matt's name  was never really finalized however it sort of has to be Ashleigh as it is written on the back of the door in the first scene because we used my sister(Ashleigh)'s room for this scene as I don't have a wardrobe, just drawers.

Film Opening - Script

We decided the only Matt and his girlfriend would be speaking our opening. This would emphasize how socially withdrawn Peter is in comparison and make him much less likable. The Dialogue is a simple every day conversation to connote that Matt has no idea of anything being wrong.

               (Girlfriend appears in doorway)

Girlfriend - I'm going now, I'll see you later.

               (Matt gets up to see her off)

Matt - Ooh, wait!

               (Conversation in hall)

Matt - We got plans tonight?

Girlfriend - Yeah we're going to that meal tonight with my parents remember?

Matt - Oh right, yeah, have a nice day.

Girlfriend - Alright, I'll see you later.

Planning - Mind Over Matter

The development of the title began by taking a comment from the facebook comment in which someone suggested Day and Night. Although we liked this title we as a group didn't think it linked in enough with the concept of the film because the idea that he is the villain at night and hero in the day didn't exactly make sense. We quite liked the idea of having the title use two specific words which convey both the personalities. 

One idea we had was Black and White. This to connote the good and the evil in one body, however Imogen thought it linked two closely with the Three Faces of Eve.

An idea Imogen had was Mind and Matter connoting how the two minds are within one physical being. I suggested this to the group who really liked it, then I came up with the idea of Mind Over Matter which  works better as it suggests the abnormality and the bazaar concept of having two people within one. 

Editing - Titles

We decided on production company names simply by looking round the media classroom and picking words from the wall displays. We decided to used a plain background and bold writing as this is commonly done in action films. to make the writing easy to read i made it white on a black background, this was also done because the white represents purity and cleanliness like the hero character whereas the black connotes a darker, meaner side to him; the villain personality.

I found out how to add titles, it's simple, you go in the source window on adobe premiere pro then at the bottom click new item and select title. For the 'LexisFilms Presents' title i made the writing black and gave it a white highlight around the edges. I then had the idea to make the text change colour to being white with white highlights, making the writing appear fully white, I layered one of these titles over the other in the sequence and made the top one; with the black writing, slowly fade out showing the fully white one making it look as though the writing simply changes colour. This worked as the titles were placed in the exact same place on the screen. To fade from one to the other i had to add key frame tabs on to the timeline and drag one down so that it made a diagonal line with the opacity of one of the titles which makes it fade out

The title for Expectation productions was done in the same way, however instead of making the title change colour, it simply faded in from black then  stayed in ad the first scene faded in. It then faded out leaving just the scenes with no titles.

For the other titles in the opening I had to pay attention to the background colour so that all the writing was readable, I did this by using dark titles over the light scenes and vise versa. To show off a little bit I made one of the titles bridge from a dark scene to a light scene and in the same way as the first title made it change colour to adjust to the change in background colour.


I wrote 'Starring Aaron Weir' and 'Imogen Renshaw' but i figured films usually have more than 2 famous actors/actresses in them so we decided i should put in some random names so I decided to add in random names, I added 'Rodney Mullen' and he is my favourite skateboarder as he invented almost every trick skateboarders know today I also add 'Rob Dyrdek' as he too is a very inspirational person for me as he is a pro skater and entrepreneur, he was on my mind as I was watching a programme with him in before school that day.

For the final title, the film title 'Mind Over Matter' I simply made it fade in then fade back out however I took particular care when doing this so that it didn't stay up for too long, just long enough for everyone to read it. It had to fade in and out gradually to make it appear as a passing thought which is funny as we almost forgot to put the film title in, we had a long time where it was just black and you could hear the ticking noise and this was pretty effective but Miss Jarman pointed out it might be an idea to put the title of the film in there.

Film Opening - Music

Kirby and Imogen  searched free music sites for appropriate music to use for both the villian scenes and the hero scenes

They used a website called Jamendo to download both the score for the Hero and the Villain. The Hero's sounds really care free and upbeat, connoting that he assumes nothing is wrong. The song is by someone called Brad Sucks and the song is called "Fixing My Brain", ironic considering the plot of our film.

The score of the villian is very contrasting to this. It is a very ominous and foreboding sound. It makes you feel tense with threatening expectations. Kirby and Imogen also found this on Jamendo. The actual song "Mother Fonker" by Ogg Vorbis. After the first 15 seconds the song becomes more upbeat and the tone changes to being more relaxed. These first few seconds however are perfect for setting the mood of the scenes including the villain personality. 

Whilst editing i decided to find a static sound for the moments of static  in the film opening, for this i simply Googled 'Tv Static noise' and found a site called Soundjay where you can freely download the static noise in different lengths, i used the 5 second static noise for most occasions that the static is used, however there's a time where the static lasts over 5 seconds and looping it made the sound stop and start so for this I downloaded the 20 Second version.

Filming - Day 4

Filming - Day 3

Filming - Day 2

Filming - Day 1

Fourth Scene Setting and Props

For the villain's secret hideout room we need a small space as it's supposed to be somewhere in the villain/hero's house that only the villain persona knows about. we walked around the school to see if there were any places we could use for filming. It needed to be somewhere dark so as to connote that the villain is a very dark character.

After a while we decided the best place to us would probably be the theatre as it it's completely black in there with all the lights off.

We are using a spacious corner of the theatre as we need a corner to show the villain ha pictures up of the hero and pictures of clocks all around the room. The excess space isn't an issue as we can use lighting and camera techinques such as different shots and camera movements to make the place appear smaller and more contained.

We stuck pictures on the wall of me as the hero character along with pictures Imogen stalked off of my facebook. We also ripped out pieces of newspaper and printed headlines relating to heroic activities such as 'Hero does it again!' an 'Baby saved from burning blaze!' this has been done to show that the villain is obsessed with the hero character and and to connote the fact he knows about the hero and also captivated by the hero's personality and his life. On the adjacent wall we have many pictures and technical diagrams of clocks to indicate that the villain is interested and fixated with time as he is trying to obtain the hero's power to speed up, slow down and stop time.

On the table there were notes, as if scattered around by the villain, in the picture you can see a picture of a clock this has been done to further show that clocks and timepieces are always bouncing around in the villain's scattered mind. The villain's table has been scattered with papers and notes to show that like the table, his mind is a scattered mess.

Another prop we used in this scene, in addition to the papers on the walls and on the table, was an awesome brass pocket watch lent to us by mine and Kirby's friend John. The watch was important to the piece as it further indicates the villains  attraction to and obsession with time. It's also needed as we see the villain in this scene attempting to stop time, in fact we see the watch before the villain showing this is what he does, this is his life.

Third Scene Settings and Props

 

In third scene the only prop that we use is Imogens handbad, it is important as it shows she's not just popping to the corners shop to buy milk but instead going out as it to work. However their are also backing props such as shoes on the floor and coats hanging up.

We used my hallway for this scene as we needed a house with a hallway because that's what we had in out storyboard and I was the only one out of us three who had a hallway in their house.

Second Scene Setting and Props

 

In the first shot of this seen we see the hero putting his costume away into the wardobe we used my sister's for these shots as she has a wardrobe in her room with good space infront of it with a lot of good natural light

We got two angles of this area as we ar going to do an action match of my character putting the outfit in the cupboard, the match on action with start from side on and then moving to a shot from behind me. Hopefully we will be able to make this action match smooth like we did with the scene where Kirby sat down in our preliminary task peice.

An important prop used is my sister's alarm clock which never seems to get her up despite going off loudly enough to wake me up from the opposite side of the house. This prop links the two characters together with time as the hero has the power to control time and the villian is trying to also get this power.

Harry Webber's morphsuit is what we used for our hero's costume and he's awesome for letting us borrow it. The costume is good because it show the cliche of heores always wearing spandex it's also good as it breaks the colour connotations we've built up ie. the hero is shown wearing white and the villian wearing black, this costume is interesting as it is the superhero's costume but it is black, not white

First Scene Setting and Props

The Hero is shown in this scene to lead a normal life, The Hero is on screen eating his breakfast and reading the newspaper.We've chose to film this scene at the dining table in the dining/living room. We decided to use my house for the film as it most fitted with the storyboard.

In the picture to the right we can see the props used in thebreakfast scene: The Sunday Times Newspaper, a plate of toast and a glass of apple juice, although I drew the storyboard with orange juice in mind so apple juice wasn't as good but I had to settle as we didn't have orange juice. I was really craving some citrussy goodness that morning, however I had to settle for apple juice, which was probably better for me as I have a really sensitive tooth and the citric acid in citrus fruits such as oranges edrodes tooth enamel potentially making the sinsitivity of my tooth worse so I guess apple juice was better for the occasion despite my orange juice lust.

Feedback From Our Peers

 

Kirby wrote on facebook our general idea, asking for feedback and for ideas and suggestions for the name of the film. I think it was good idea to do this as it gave us a chance to alter our plot if people didn't like it and it also gave the public a chance to feel more involved with our film opening. As well as this it helped us get a further understanding of our audience, we see that the feedback is mostly possitive and is coming from teenages, this shows that our target audience of teenagers is met and they like the idea and would be interested in watching our film

 

Imogen pitched our idea to our class and teachers. Everybody like the idea although people said that although it is a good idea it's going to be hard to represent that the two characters are the same character and it will be complicated to show our concept

Planning - Costumes

The Hero's and villain's costumes are supposed to look completely identical despite this colour of the shirt. The costumes are this similar to indicate these 2 people have the exact same style as they are in fact the same person.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The shirts are different colours to inicate the differences between good and evil; The hero is wearing white to indicate purity and hope whereas the villain is wearing all black to show his dark life and cruel intentions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Hero's girlfriend is shown in a simple black dress with tights and high-heeled shoes. The costume along with curly hair and a hangbag make her out to be feminine. the shoes and tights indicate she is going to work like she would on a normal day.

Planning - Camera/Editing Storyboard

Click the pictures to enlarge

 

 

 

 

 



Research - Sound Design

David lynch once said "Films are 50 percent visual and 50 percent  sound" However Mr Wallis disagrees and said he thinks that 40 percent visual  and 60 percent sound is more accurate.

 

Mr Wallis showed our class this video on monday, in this video we see the importance of sound and sound design and we also see some of the ingenious ways in which sound production teams can manipulate every day objects such as slinkies to make effective sound effect such as lasers.

 

 

Sound design is everything you hear in a tv programme or movie including backgroud noise, dialogue, score, sound effects, ambient/drone noises and every thing else that you can hear (this also includes silence)

Sound design is just as important as the images on screen, if not more important. Sound can change the mood and feel of a film of programme completley.

Planning - Opening Storyboard

Editing - Screenshots

     

Here are some screenshots taken during the editing process

American Classification Categories

Comic Film Classification

Most Comic-based feature films, both DC Comics produced and Marvel Comics produced, are classified as 12A. Films under this category are considered to be unsuitable for very young people. Those aged under 12 years are only admitted if accompanied by an adult, aged at least 18 years, at all times during the motion picture. However, it is generally not recommended that children under 12 years should watch the film. Films under this category can contain mature themes, discrimination, soft drugs, moderate swear words, infrequent strong language and moderate violence, sex references and nudity. Sexual activity may be briefly and discreetly portrayed. Sexual violence may be implied or briefly indicated.

 

Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and The Dark Knight Rises are just some examples of 12A Rated Comic-adapted movies

UK Classification Categories Continued

Futher information on the BBFC

The BBFC was created by the film industry in 1912, long before anyone had even heard of Steven Spielberg or Star Wars. It wanted to make sure that all of its films, (videos and DVDs had not been invented then), were checked on behalf of the whole country. Local councils, who were, and still are, in charge of cinemas up and down the country, grew to accept the BBFC's decisions, although even today, for films shown in cinemas, councils still have the power to ignore any decision made by the BBFC. For example, in 1993, the comedy film Mrs.Doubtfire was given a 12 classification by the BBFC. Some councils disagreed with this decision and gave the film a PG!

An important change came with the arrival of video in the early 1980's. In 1984, a new law was passed, The Video Recordings Act, which put the BBFC in charge of classifying all videos for home use. The law asks Examiners to make sure that works are classified in line with what they contain and make sure that they show nothing that might be harmful to people.

What does all this mean exactly? Well, for example, very scary and gory horror films that might upset younger children are unlikely to be found at U, PG or 12A/12. As for harmful material, the BBFC has to note any dangerous or criminal activities on a video or DVD, such as scenes that show, in detail, how to hurt people or how to break into cars. Such moments may even be removed from the video before it's released to the public.

The Examiners at the BBFC also have to be aware of other laws, such as those which protect children (The Protection of Children Act, passed in 1978) and animals (The Animals Act, passed in 1937). It is against the law in this country to show films or videos in which an animal has been harmed during the production. The owners of any film showing such a scene can be asked to remove it before a certificate is given.

(Source)

Iron Man - Information

 

 

Spiderman - Information

 

 

Analysis - Spiderman (Timeline)

[First 2:30]

 

 

 

Columbia  00:01-00:18

Marvel  00:20-00:30

Columbia Pictures presents  00:34-00:37

A Marvel Enterprize/Laura Ziskin production  00:40-00:43

Spider Man  00:48-00:52

Staring Tobey Maguire  00:54-00:57

Willem Dafoe  00:59-01:02

Kirstan Dunst  01:03-01:07

James Franco  01:09-01:12

Cliff Robertson  01:13-01:17

Rossmary Harris  01:18-01:21

J.K. Simmons  01:23-01:26

Gerry Becker, Bill Nunn  01:28-01:31

Jack Betts, Stanley Anderson, Ron Perkins  01:33-01:37

Casting by Francine Maisler and Lynn Kressel  01:38-01:42

Co-producer Grant Curtace  01:44-01:47

Music by Danny Elfman  01:51-01:55

Costume Designer by James Archeson  02:00-02:04

Visual Effects Designed by John Dykstra Asc  02:05-02:09

Edited by Bob Muraski and Arther Coburn A.C.E.  02:10-02:14

Production Designer Neil Spisak  02:15-02:18

Director of Photography Don Bergess ASC  02:20-02:24

Executive Producers Avi Arad, Stan Lee  02:27-02:31

UK Classification Categories

DC Universe

DC universe was founded in 1934 and along with Marvel is one of the biggest comic book publishers in the world. They to have created many characters that has survived the test of time. Heroes such as Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman and villains such as Joker, Penguin and Catwoman.

DC's films often show the characters in much more in a much darker Gothic light. Batman for example goes against the stereotypes of the typical hero. Batman being dressed nearly entirely in black, and Joker wearing the bright more vivid colours shows how DC like to eradicate stereotypes. Also with DC they make the villains likable, unlike Marvel. We still connote them to be evil, but there's something about their character that we can't help liking, going back to The Joker he is a fun, zany and outgoing character that, if he weren't evil would be a fun guy to have as a friend.

DC's logo instantly makes us think of the comic book heroes. When the logo appears before a film starts we think back to how good the other films we have seen and assume this one will be just as good due to brand trust.

Marvel

Marvel comics first began as Timely Comics in 1939 and since then it has signed up with Walt Disney and has become a multi-billion dollar corporation

Marvel comics are the creator of many of the well known superheroes we know today. Characters such as Iron Man, Hulk and Spiderman are some of Marvels creations along with teams such as The Avengers and The Fantastic Four. These characters are known and loved by millions, children and adults alike. Action comics attract possibly widest audience range of all the film genres. As children we often dream of being a superhero and performing the stunts that our favourite characters do.

When we see the Marvel logo we instantly associate the film to be an action film, not the aggressive and danger associated with the likes of Die Hard, but instead with more fun-loving characters that we can relate to emotionally. With Marvel films, they have made the difference between the hero and villain very clear. Everything we see of the superhero, the colours, lighting, his whole character influences the audience to like them and be on their side.

Film Opening - Planning

Our main, end of year media task is to produce a film opening for one of the following genres

• A "relationship" comedy/drama made by an independent production company, aimed at young adults.
• Science fiction British adult audience.
• A mainstream action film that will appeal to both 15-25 year old males and females, based on a comic book. (The comic can be either real or fake as long as it has not already been made into a film of course)
• A film that is based on real event from the last 10 years, that appears to be independently funded.

We are allowed to do pretty much anything we like as long as it fits within one of these genres, here are our ideas for each of the genres

1.We tried to of different story lines for this genre rather than stick to the common RomCom convention of 'Boy meets girl...' For example I proposed the idea of a bromance themed film similar to 'I Love You Man' (possibly the funniest film in the world). We also discussed the idea of a relationship between gay people or even the relationship between an owner and his/her pet. We're trying to be different and expand the relationships genre by thinking outside of the box.

2.Although we wanted to be seen as different when presenting our film opening we wanted, with this genre to take this subject extremely literally by using stereotypes, codes and conventions to show things such as space and technology. We would like to focus on something related to either aliens, space or time travel as we think this would make an interesting and exciting film opening. We would have to seriously consider our settings and costumes to make our genre choice as obvious as possible and to make our story line clear if we were to choose this genre. 

3.When we thought of action within comic-adapted media I immediately thought of the old Batman series with Adam West, I suggested we could include creativity into the film opening by making our own sound signs of things saying "pow" and "wham" in a sort of pop art technique. We then started to think about using stop motion and create a comic book sort of layout or have scenes with comic book images in to give you the retro action superhero feel. Imogen being a Psychology student thought back to something she learnt about Dissociative Identity Disorder/DID (formerly know as Multi-Personality Disorder/MPD) and suggested we could create a typical comic book superhero with a twist, he has DID and is also the villain but doesn't know, however she later told us about something else she learnt about, The Three Faces of Eve, in which a woman, Eve had multiple personalities some of which knew about the others. We decided that if we picked this topic our hero would also be our villain but only the villainous personality would know about the disorder. We haven't thought much into the powers or names of the villain or  the hero but we can decide this at a later date. We have to try to make this so that it isn't at all funny as it could be seen as mocking DID and people with DID.

4.We like this genre as we have thought of a lot of story lines and techniques we could use to present scenes and can even indicate that flashbacks happen. The story line we have came up with is an ex mental patient who had a diary during her time in her ward. If we choose this genre we'll use an inner-monologue to make a personal connection to the audience as she tells her story. We then want to include cut away shots of the scenes she is talking about which had previously happened in her ward to give the impression that she is having flashbacks and is often thinking about the events that took place during her time on the ward. We'll also have a councilor character so that we can see the events from two perspectives.

Analysis - Iron Man 2 (Poster)

TA - Avengers (Timeline)

Click the image below to view 'The Avengers' opening credits

Comic Adapted Films List

 

All Comic Based films on IMDb