Workshop 2 - Sound

For this workshop we focused on the use of sound and we also looked at the effect of cinematography without sound, sound without cinematography and both together - to see which was most effective and more enjoyable for an audience.

Why is sound so important?

- It creates certain atmospheres
- Can help to portray specific emotions and feelings and help the audience to emphasise with characters through the music
- Without sound the movie would be quite boring and many people would lose interest, as we found when we watched an opening sequence of The Ring without any sound.


A clip we watched was of two men describing why sound is so important and how to use it. They explained that sound "gives emotional residence to the scene" and it "adds to the realism" of the film. They also said that you can control a lot more with sound once "you're able to recognize it as a stylistic device."
The most important issue they raised was that an AUDIENCE WILL TOLERATE UNCLEAR VIDEO BUT THEY WILL NEVER TOLERATE UNCLEAR SOUND. This was proved when we experiemented with a clip that had exactly this and everyone became annoyed and lost focus of what they were watching. Pirate dvd's are also a good example of a situation where audiences will put up with unclear video but if the sound is out of sync or muffled they will turn it off.


We then did another activity where we listened to the soundtrack Memoirs of a Giesha and were asked to, just by listening to the soundtrack, come up with our own storyline.

My interpretation:
There is an establishing shot of a huge field which leads into a forest and in the field are two children, not too young but not yet reached their teenage years so about 10/11 years old. They're running around happily together, chasing each other and laughing all throughout the part where the music is calm and free, there is high key natural lighting to reflect this good mood. However, when the music goes quiet at 2.48 minutes into the soundtrack something goes wrong for the children and they are suddenly being chased by someone or perhaps a group of people. This might be the farmer who's field they are trespassing on or perhaps a villain. As the tempo increases and becomes full of tension and creates an atmosphere of suspense the children are running through the forest, in panic and fear, the camera shots are extremely jumpy and fast, switching between the girl and the boy and close ups of their frightened facial expressions. They appear to be losing each other - dark lighting and minimal colours. They finally escape from the forest and are back to safety having out run their pursuer. They continue running through the fields and then back home.


After doing this activity I realised that music creates a certain atmosphere and it's important that the music matches what is happening on the screen. For instance if the Harry Potter theme tune was the background music for Elizabeth's speech in Pirates of the Caribbean 3 it wouldn't be a good combination at the film doesn't suit the music.


.High school musical

This disney film is a perfect example of cinematoraphy that goes perfectly with the sound. The song is very upbeat and jointly and the bright colours reflect the happiness and wholesomeness of the song/film. This is another film similar to ours, regarding the cinematography as we want a quite happy/teenage look to our film which this movie portrays perfectly

Workshop 1 - Camera/cinematography

What is the importance of cinematography to a film?
As a class we discussed what we thought was the significance of cinemtography within films ;

- It's the way to convert a story into a film - turning what you see into an actual picture

- Lighting is essential as is sets a certain atmosphere, for instance - ambient lighting may perform a 'homely' and cosy mood whereas high key lighting may illustrate more of a happy tone

- It sets a specifc theme - The way a particular picture looks on the screen depicts what kind of programme/film it is. i.e. if there was a media product with very bright, primary colours and simple shots it will automatically portray that it is a children's show.

- It brings the diegsis of the film alive

- Don't have to use dialogue all the time - cinematography can help move the story along without the need of words. The angle of a shot, the type of shot, the movement of the camera, lighting - it can all be a part of telling the story.

- Everything in the frame needs to mean something




We watched a short indian film called
Colours and were asked, individually, to take notice of the effect of the cinematography within it.

At the start of the film you are able to see two silluettes who have absolutely no dialogue but you are able to see that there is an arguement or disagreement between them and the slow motion and darkness of the characters add to the sad atmosphere and help to set this gloomy mood. You then see a contrast with the first scene, there is now brighter natural lighting and the shot is in colour, with the green making it look more fresh and free creating a lighter mood and this time their body language suggests they are at a more intimate stage in comparison to the first shot of them.

For the next character, who is sitting alone in what appears to be a corridor or hallway, the camera is positioned in between two walls which create a sense of being trapped and isolated, being positioned within two boundaries. Again, the dark colours and natural lighting set a gloomy and depressing atmosphere and effectively shows the loneliness and seclusion of this person. With the camera moving closer and reaching more close ups it emphasises the troubled facial expression and immediately portrays that this person is unhappy and something is on her mind. Once again the same character is then seen in a different setting, with high key natural lighting and the shot is in colour. The close up of the girl allows the audience to see the wind slighty blowing her hair which is more uplifting and illustrates a more content atmosphere.

The film 'Colours' is a sequence consisting of flashbacks of people when they were their happiest, but are unfortunately experiencing bad times at the moment. This whole idea is portrayed through cinematography hand in hand with a soundtrack. It's a prime example of showing how important cinemaotraphy is to a film as it creates different effects and the audience will react to what atmosphere is created. The specific mood you are trying to creates is very dependant on the way the film looks and particular lighting.

Props List & Costume

Props:
- Gold lamp
- Glasses
- PSP
- Hair gel
- Scissors
-School bags
- chocolate bar
- books

Costume:
They will all need a slight change of costume to show passing of time... perhaps just the top half as there shouldn't be too many long shots


- Genie costume - belly chain, trousers, shoes, top, headband,
- Quite 'uncool' clothes for Luke at the beginning
- Very smart, unqiue clothes for Olivia
- 'Cool' costume for after Luke's makeover
- Smarter clothes for Genie when she becomes a student

Cast! - Friday 2nd October 2009

"Casting is a vital area of film making" - quoted from BBC Film network
It's important to find cast who are reliable and dedicated as if these qualities are absent, it may prove to be extremely hard to shoot a successful film. Last minutes canellations, constantly missing rehearsals and having no passion for the film are a few difficulites that may be run in to. Therefore it is vital to find cast who you trust and know you can work well with.

We chose to use year 12's as this is a more realistic age to be in a situation like the one in our story. We couldn't have Luke as a young student because it's not likely that a little kid would 'fall in love'. However we didn't want him to look too old as this would make it unbelievable that he would believe in genies.

For our cast we asked a drama teacher if she would mention to her year 12's that there are year 13's in need of cast for their A2 production however she told us that there was high demand for him as other groups were also asking for boy's and there is unfortunately only one in her class.
So we resorted to asking people who we knew personally to see if anyone was interested.
We managed to get 3 boys and 3 girls for auditions which will be held sometime next week when we have had confirmation on our script.





Tuesday 6th October - We have had a change in cast as we recieved feedback explaining that our film doesn't suit an older age range and has a younger target audience than year 12's. Therefore we have decided to collect cast from year 9's or year 10's, and are currently in the process of doing this. We have spoke to Miss Entwistle - Drama department and have asked her to mention it to her classes.
Visiting her year 9's there were 2 girls interested in taking part but unfortunately no boys wanted to do it. So we are going to revisit her while she is teaching year 10's and hopefully obtain students from there.

Script 2

After recieving our feedback from our first script we were told there was simply too much dialogue and the story could be told through actions rather than words. So we had another look at it and took out, what we thought was, the uneccessary dialogue.


Our teachers feedback;

"i only really have one which i think you need to look at and then i will look at the script again.basically your script comtains too much dialogue to tell the story. go back to what we learnt last year about how to use dialogue. use actions and visuals to tell the story and show character.this is what cinematorgraphy is for. so look at this again. ask a few others in the class. watch a few more films to get ideas. have you seen an old american sitcom called bewitched? still shown on tv sometimes and probably also on yutube. do some research yourselves and find out. then re-script and we will go from there. good luck."


Script 1
INT. MEDIA HALLWAY DAY

LUKE is walking through the corridor and stops at a classroom, staring admiringly at OLIVIA in the room who is acting
[Sits down and plays on his psp]
OLIVIA comes out and he stands up to speak to her, she ignores him and walks away.
She drops a lamp and LUKE picks it up. He stares at the lamp for a minute and looks up to see she’s gone.

LUKE
Argh! I wish I wasn’t such a loser!
[hangs his head]
GENIE
Is that an official wish?
LUKE
What... Who are you –?
GENIE
Oh! Hi I’m Genie, and that’s (points at lamp) my lamp
[Goes to shake his hand]
LUKE
[looks confused and doesn’t shake her hand]
GENIE
I’m YOUR genie now Luke
LUKE
[A bit weary]
How do you know my name?

GENIE’s body language and facial expression as if to say “Well i am a Genie”
LUKE
[raises his eyebrow and then turns to walk away]
GENIE
So why do you think you’re such a loser?
LUKE
What? How did you –

GENIE smiles
LUKE
[Shakes his head/rolls his eyes and walks out]
The GENIE runs out after him
GENIE
I can prove it!

[LUKE pulls a facial expression to say “go on then”]

GENIE makes a chocolate bar appear
LUKE
[Fascinated]
Wow...
[They smile at each other]

EXT. IN SCHOOL. DAY

LUKE and GENIE are walking around together talking
LUKE
So after you grant someone a wish, you have to leave them?

GENIE
Yeah enough about me though, what are you going to wish for?
LUKE
Well... There’s this girl...
[Smiling and thinking to himself]

As LUKE is speaking, they are in different locations, and time is moving on, fading shots with background music]

She’s really cool, and so beautiful...
And when she looks at you!...
But I don’t think she even knows i exist.
She’s so kind and gentle, and has the most stunning smile! I’d love to just walk up to her one day and tell her that I –
[LUKE bumps into OLIVIA and knocks her books on the floor]
OLIVIA
Well pick them up then!

LUKE picks up the books and hands them back to her smiling but she takes them and walks off]
GENIE points to the girl and looks at LUKE
LUKE
That’s her! Olivia!

GENIE looks shocked and slightly confused
GENIE
That’s the girl you like? Erm okay... Well she looked right through you so maybe we should make you noticeable to her first! I know just the thing...

INT. IN A ROOM. DAY

GENIE gives LUKE a mini makeover, removing his glasses, cutting his hair etc.
They also laugh and joke together, playing psp,
LUKE comes out with his new look

GENIE
Wow! You look... great
[Something in her facial expression suggests that she likes LUKE]
LUKE
Really, do you think she’ll like it? I mean... like me?
GENIE
She’d be mad not to
[Her tone goes quite poignant and she looks away]

INT. GEOGRAPHY BLOCK. DAY

LUKE walks towards OLIVIA, and looks back at the Genie and she gives him a thumbs up but once he looks away her facial expression saddens
A slower shot of his walk showing he is nervous
LUKE
[Clears his throat]
Olivia...

OLIVIA turns around

LUKE
I erm...

OLIVIA
[Looks at psp]
What’s that?

LUKE
Oh its my psp, you wanna play?
[He smiles]
OLIVIA
Erm, No! That’s so nerdy!

LUKE reacts to this and suddenly looks towards the genie who is sitting alone on a bench.
LUKE
You know what... I gotta ...
[He walks away from OLIVIA and goes over to the Genie]
LUKE
Genie! I’m ready to make my wish!
GENIE
[Looks sad and is hesitant to grant the wish]
Oh. Are you sure... You don’t wanna wait and s –
LUKE
No no... i know exactly what to wish for

GENIE beckons him to make the wish, with a sad facial expression
[Looks down and gets ready to grant the wish]

LUKE
I wish you weren’t a genie!
GENIE looks up shocked
[She looks up at him and smiles – they both realise they like each other]

INT. CLASSROOM. DAY

LUKE is sitting at his desk waiting for lesson to start. There is a shot of a girl’s feet as she walks into the room, the camera tilts up to reveal GENIE. She takes her seat next to LUKE.

Script 2 - Feedback

After recieving feedback on our first script we were told there was too much dialogue to "tell the story" and we should resort to actions rather than words.

" here are my comments on your script i only really have one which i think you need to look at and then i will look at the script again.basically your script comtains too much dialogue to tell the story. go back to what we learnt last year about how to use dialogue. use actions and visuals to tell the story and show character.this is what cinematorgraphy is for. so look at this again. ask a few others in the class. watch a few more films to get ideas. have you seen an old american sitcom called bewitched? still shown on tv sometimes and probably also on yutube. do some research yourselves and find out. then re-script and we will go from there. good luck. "
Miss Nair

Location Recce

We chose to base most of our film within school and have parts of it filmed at my house, for the makeover scenes as it will allow there to be logical causality for why she has the utensils she will be using and it would seem random for her to have these things at school. We wanted to find areas of the school which suited the cinematography of our film, high key lighting and preferably colourful settings.
In the end we chose to use the media hallway, the geography corridor and just outside the media block. These were ideal for our film as they are bright areas and the locations outside are painted blue and yellow, to help emphasise the ‘colourfulness’ of our story.

These are the doors we wish to use for the beginning of the film, where Luke is walking through a doorway and see’s the “Aladdin rehearsals” sign and walks on to discover Olivia in the classroom.

This is the rest of the corridor we plan to use and the stairs being where Luke waits for Olivia to come out of ‘rehearsals.’ The empty hallway will be ideal for the shot just before the genie appears where there is a pan of the area and Luke establishes to himself that there is no one around.


Why this location?

We chose this particular location as it suits our film and the brightness of the lighting also adds to the effect we want to create, reflecting the ‘fantasy’ and happy side of our story.
It’s a suitable location to film as during lessons these hallways are usually empty, allowing easy filming.
The door allows us to create an interesting shot to reveal the rehearsals sign, perhaps opening the door to display the sign as opposed to just taking a boring shot of the sign on the door.

Problems?

- Students walking past may be a distraction however we can control this by keeping an eye out before taking any shots and preventing any students interrupting the film.
- The music room is just above the corridor which could prove to be a problem as the sound will be noticeable within our film.
- The bell, of course, will be an interruption in any location but we will simply pack up 10 minutes before it rings, allow people to disperse and restart our filming.

The drama studio is where we plan to have the shot of Olivia acting with the gold lamp. This is because it is within the media corridor so will help with continuity. The only problem we may encounter with the room is that there may be a lesson during the time we need to film. If this is the case we may have to arrange the shot to be filmed after school hours when the room will empty or find a moment when the room is free.

For the shot when the genie follows Luke outside, and makes something appear from nowhere, we plan to use this location. It’s just outside the media blocks and suits our film again due to the colours however filming here will be dependant on the weather conditions. If it is impossible to film here we will resort to a location inside the building, most likely within the media corridor as it will continue from where he meets the genie f or the first time.

Problems?

- The weather conditions, rain, strong wind, will prevent us from using this location as it will be very difficult to film and will spoil our film.
- People walking past, will always be an issue but again we will keep an eye out and try to stop anyone getting in the way of the film.

This is a location we plan to have parts of the shots where Luke and Genie are ‘getting to know each other.’ The colour of the paint will reflect what we are trying to create, in relation to cinematography. The bright colours will emphasise the childish aspect of the film and the happiness.

This is another location we decided to use for the part where the genie and Luke are spending time together, as it continues the outside theme and is also a quiet area to film with hopefully no distractions.

These locations are also quite close to our first one, preventing us from wasting a lot of time on moving around and moving equipment.


Problems?

- the basketball court is inside the doors so if there are people training in there the noise may affect our film. However the shots of them ‘getting to know’ each other are not supposed to have dialogue in them and we were planning to play music over the top so hopefully this shouldn’t be an issue.
- People walking past.
- Weather – if the weather is too bad for us to film here, the ‘getting to know each other’ shots are most likely to be relocated to my house.
- There may be another group filming in the second location as we bumped into them while creating our recce, however this can be easily solved by scheduling who will film there first.

This part of the geography block is where we plan to have our final scenes. The scene where Luke approaches Olivia and the scene where he makes his wish.

Problems?

There are a set of chairs in the way but we will receive permission to relocate them for our filming and the location will be fine apart from the usual problems such as students walking past, the bell etc… which we already have solutions to.

Monday 5th October - There has now been a slight change in one of our locations, there rose issues with the location of my house as an adult needed to be present due to us using year 9's or 10's now. This created problems with safety therefore we had to resort to another location and are now going to use the drama rooms 'Green room.' This is ideal as it has mirrors and is spacious enough for cameras and sound equipment, but will require us to empty it out and replace things how we found them. However this helps us as it means we don't have to travel off site with expensive equipment, which may have proved risky, and it prevents us wasting any time moving locations etc...

We spoke to Mr Edwards, one of our deputy heads, in order to recieve the 'okay' for all of our locations. The drama department were more than happy to allow us to use the studio and the green room and Mr Edwards was perfectly fine with the locations we had chosen. Therefore that is one thing done and out of the way - locations are fine and there are no problems!