Filming: Day 4

Day: 4

Date: 14/12/12

Time: 4:00pm -6:00pm

Group Members Present: Summer

No. of Actors Present: 1/5 actors

On the fourth day of filming, were working with 1 actor, working mainly on photography and not filming on any particular scenes. 

 Location/Mise en scene 

• We used the industrial estate as location mainly based at the tanker and the wall where our photo shoots are based 
• The tanker was used heavily as the actor was able to interact and climb it

Character head-shots

• We worked a lot on this on this day and took head-shots and body shots for the website/poster as well as taking pictures of the actors interacting with the set for the same purposes.

Complications

• Because we didn't have clearance at this point to film on the streets with replica weapons we could not film the scenes that we had hoped to on this day and so had to add an additional day of filming for this once we had permission

What to do next

• Film final shots with the last actor

Filming: Day 3

Day: 3

Date: 1/12/12

Time: 11:00am -6:00pm

Group Members Present: Summer, Farah

No. of Actors Present: 2/5 actors

On the third day of filming, were working with 2 actors, and this day required a lot of preparation. 

Filming

• We filmed many shots on this day, including scripted dialogue shots and interaction between the characters.
• Throughout the day we made sure we had at least three shots per scene and took stills with the actors throughout the filming including separate photo shoots at the end of the session for stills for the poster and website.

 Location/Mise en scene

• We used the industrial estate as location on this shoot, and used the Barrier animal clinic as a base to give the actors a green room
• We were also able to use an outside spiral staircase to achieve the extreme high angle used in the sniper shot.
• We also used a tanker quad full of industrial material as miss-en-scene which we rearranged for our purposes to film the dialogue scenes.
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Character head-shots

• We followed the theme of the previous week in taking head-shots and body shots for the website/poster.

Makeup

• Makeup was used on the actors to create the bruised and beaten up effect, which was different this time as we were working with different skin tones which required different types of makeup to create the desired effects.

Sound

• We used the zoom recorder to capture the detail of the audio of the shots and used the clapper board in order to sync these in post production.  We also mounted the sound recorder on the camera to record sound in the tracking running shots.

What to do next

• Next week we have one more actor to work with.
• We will focus on the character head-shots for our website and poster, so that all characters have a profile photo.
• We will film many short shots of the actor running, and  climbing on the industrial mise en scene
• We will be working with the fake rifle and so will need to apply for street permission.

Camera equipment

The cameras which we will be using are:

Canon 550d

This DSLR camera will achieve professional quality footage and allows total control over exposure, allowing us to shoot exactly as we wish to. It works with detachable lenses also allowing us more freedom over the shots that we take.

We will use a 18-55mm lens for wide angle, close up to mid shots.

We will then use a 55-250mm lens for mid to long shots. this lens will be particularly useful when taking the high angle sniper shot.

We also will be using a Nikon D6000 for still shots. This is a high quality photography camera that will allow us to capture professional imagery for use in our poster and website.

Sound equipment

When filming our trailer, we will be using a Zoom H4n sound recorder. It has stereo sound, and is light and compact and easy to transport when filming on location. It is also very simple to use but achieves high quality, professional results.

As you can see from the control panel on the side, there is a headphone port, allowing the member of crew in charge of sound to use headphones to have a live feed of the sound they are recording without external interference. This will allow us to be sure we have good recordings before the end of the filming day to avoid the need to refill.

By using a wind sock to cover the cross mics, we will prevent bad quality sound recordings by eliminating wind interference. We can also mount the zoom recorder onto the camera and hand held steady cam mount to record sound in the hand held tracking shots that we will be filming, as it will allow us to keep the mic close to the actors even in running shots.

Experimenting with editing

We have all begun to edit sections of our film trailer; after having problems with final cut, we are now using imovie to initially edit and then Final cut 10. to finish our edit, as Final cut has better editing software and colour editing features.

 

One of the things we have edited on imovie, is this timer. We used a timer to create the idea that there is a time limit for the people in our film trailer, and also to connote a sense of pressure- they are runnig out of time. To add the timer we imported a clip of half an hour of a timer, and imovie split this into frames as shown above.

 

This allowed us to choose different times to include at different points in our trailer, by putting a series of times eventually giving a sense of momentum in the trailer.

 

 

Editing of the poster

Editing process

• We had a variety of ideas for our film poster.
• In order to choose the best one, we decided to produce our ideas as a poster individually to see which one would have the biggest impact.
• Our first idea was very simplistic, which involved the use of a main image of all protagonists in the middle of a plain black background.
• We achieved this idea by using Adobe Photoshop and an online photo editor called 'iPiccy.com'.
• Using Adobe Photoshop, we cut around each individual protagonist and layered each cut image onto one large white background.
• We then changed the britghtness, contrast and colour by using 'iPiccy.com'. We also 'vignette' this photo so that it faded into the black background behind the image.

• Our second idea was to further cut the individual character images into close up shots so that we can only see their facial expressions, which we thought would build tension amogst the audience.
• We then places the cut images onto a landscae black background.
• We took inspiration from an 'X-Men' film poster, shown below.
• Again, we used the online photo editor 'iPiccy.com' in order to place the images onto the black background.

 

• We then came across another idea, in which we used Adobe Photoshop again to produce.  This time, we wanted to see what our poster would be like if it was at the same format as the X-Men poster itself. 
• We used blue light beams to separate each individual character close up while slightly altering the typography to match the theme. 
• However, we came to the conclusion that the theme gave a futuristic feel and did not suit our action-thriller genre, therefore, we did not use this idea as our final piece.

X-Men film poster

• Our final decision was made when we decided to remove the blue light beams, and stuck to simplicity as we have noticed simplicity in many other action-thriller film posters. 
• We continued with the dark background which suits our film genre. 

Final film poster

Website design

Due to the way the photo considered for the background (as shown in  my last website blog post) has been edited, a black border is kept around the edge when applied to the website. 
To test if this was the photo or the website set up I had chosen when I first made the site that was to blame, I have started another version of the website to test out another page set up. 

I have tried using another photo that the group has already edited. I like this photo more as I like the black and white contrast to the enhanced close up. I have also tested a tagline (this is unlikely to be the final one as this was just to see how it could all look) and different fonts. I like how this website looks as it is simpler than the other version (shown below).