Location shots

These are different pictures of my house where the filming will be taking place as it's quite old fashioned i thought it would be a good idea to have my 1920's movie set here. The location was very big and has a lot of room to maneuver. Also as I am comfortable where everything is and it is easier to light the room in the right way and have the blinds shut so that no light is sinking in. However there is building work going on at the moment so i am going to try and not have that shown on camera when i film my silent film. 

Motives

Bella - Your motive for killing:
You were always being shadowed by Drinka she was a better dancer than you and much prettier all the boys wanted her and then she was picked to be on national television as a professional dancer and you couldn't take it anymore, are you the murderer?

Phil R.Upp - Your motive for killing:
You have just found out that your wife is pregant you are overjoyed however you remebered that your wife can't get pregnant as you have tried many times. Has she been cheating on you? You don't know and you are confused are you the murderer?

Adam Phooled - Your motive for killing:
You have cheated on Liza and have slept with Drinka she is now pregant and wants to tell everyone she wants to run away with you and be a family but that is something that could jepordise your whole life. Can you let this happen? Are you the murderer?

Eva Lution - Your motive for killing:
Drinka took your baby when you came to live with your aunt and uncle she treats you like dirt and walks all over you, to her you are an unfit mother and you have no priveledges to see your baby. Can you let your baby grow up not knowing you as it's rightful mother? Are you the murderer?

Ginger Brettman - Your motive for killing:
You have been visiting eva quite a lot and you have a certain fondness for her however Drinka keeps on reminding you of your arranged marrige and threatens to ruin everything you have worked for if you continue with this infactuation. Are you the murderer?

Liza Lote- Your motive for killing:
You have found out about Drinka and you suspect adam as he went missing at his firms party only to have your acusation confirmed by Drinka herself. She is blackmailing your boyfriend and has runied your happy care free life. Can you stand back and watch her take Adam away? Are you the murderer?

Dee Fender - Your motive for killing:
Drinka is constanly flirting with Ginger and keeps on suggesting terrible things you are fighting for his love and life is getting harder and harder Drinka boasts about her money and is always putting you down. Can you carry on with this bullying? Are you the murderer?

I made motives for each of my character except a Robin and Drinka as they all have to hsave a reson for kiling and i found that when I had these the script was easier to write. I thought that as I am doing a murder mystery i wante to be thourough with my research and my planning so that everyone knew what was going on.

Shooting schedule

October-
26th - Filming
27th - Upload the footage to the laptop
29th - Start editing

November -
2nd - Take photos of all cotumes and props
3rd - Storyboard the animatic
7th - Start developing poster ideas
9th - Storyboard the title sequence
14th - Do the animatic for the storyboard
16th - Edit the footage
17th- Look at the text boxes for my film
19th - Design my own text boxes
22nd - Film the title sequence and shoot the poster
22nd- Upload the poster ideas
23rd - Blog
24th - Blog
25th -Blog
29th - Upload the animatic to youtube
30th - Get music ideas

December -
1st - Put in the music to go with the fillm
2nd - Put in the text boxes
6th - Edit the title sequence
7th- Go through all the footage and put in the final touches
8th - Upload this draft onto yuotube get some audience feedback and then change things/ polish things before it is finalised
10th - Polish blog make sure everything is in order
14th - Blog
16th - Break up for christmas and start handwriting the evaluation

The script

i made three separate scripts even though there is to be no dialogue i wanted to make a script so that my actors and actresses could work alongside it and be able to act.

Script 1 -
In this script there was hardly any stage directions and too much waffle it was taking a long time to get to the point of the story and wasting time. Also as Drinka is our victim having her at the beginning of the piece would slow things down. Although a lot happens in the script it was very dry and the way the script was panning out I was finding it harder to fit everything in under the five minutes alloted time.
  Moreover as Drinka is in the beginning the audience would have time to judge her but then I thought about it and decided that it would be better to show her later on in the film so they will get the view of the other characters so their characteristics can shine through.

Script 2 -
The second draft was pretty much the same although this is where I started to develop my ideas. I switched some words around and played about with the script to make it more vague and mysterious and not tell the audience who the killer is and eave it as sort of a blank page. This way the characters could be left very vague as well however their characteristics will be shown when I start filming and editing. At the beginning of the short film I wanted to make it apparent who was what but at the same time leave a lot of un-answered questions.

Script 3 -
With this version of my script I feel that there is a real mystery and get's the audience engaged with who actually committed the deed. I have included more stage directions so that when i start filming i have a clear image in my head of what I want it to look like. As this is a silent movie the script won't be heard but it gives me and the actors a stable foundation for the piece itself. This script definitely allows the actors to be able to act well with the words which is where I think I lacked in script one and two.
   Lastly this script reveals the murder but instead of just making it known to the audience by the character being dragged out we have a flashback of the death. To me this makes it more apparent to the audience what exactly happened and the reason behind the murder.

Throughout the stages of making these three scripts I think I have improved the way I write for characters and how to make a script engaging and following a storyline. Although all three scripts were well written I think that when writing a script it has to be engaging and thorough so the audience knows whats going on especially with a silent movie. You have to show a personality through words which was probably one of the hardest things with my project.

1920's fashion

fashion

target audience

I have sent out 20 questionnaires to anonymous people by doing this it will help me target my audience and market my short silent film accordingly.
1) Age?
The majority of people that took part in the questionnaire were 17-25 years old. This will help my research because as murder mystery's are normally aimed at 30+ it will be a challenge to market a silent murder mystery film at this age group. Also this age group have grown up with colored T.V this means that trying to market a black and white silent movie is going to be hard for the audience i am aiming to attract.

2) Gender?  
As the majority of people that took part in this questionnaire were females this makes the data unreliable however this could also be a plus because I can target my audience easier but also help me make decisions and try and attract a male audience and entertain them with what women have put forward as ideas. A male audience will probably be more harder to target because they probably won't take this sort of film seriously this is something i am going to try and target in my film.

3) Have you seen a short film?
Most of the boys answered yes that they had seen a short film but they were disney animations so very upbeat funny and colorful. I decided that in my short film I can make it upbeat and funny to keep that attraction however color wasn't going to be in it at all and no dialogue so making the audience engage with this film was going to be tricky. Surprisingly most of the girls had watched a real short film and not a disney animation or both so this was good news as my target audience was becoming more easier to target specifically.

5)Would you want to watch a silent film?
Strangely enough two thirds of the people that took the questionnaire would happily watch a silent movie this made me think that maybe I underestimated my age group and that they were all quite willing to watch a completely new type of film and try and engage with it. However everyone had their own ideas of what genre they would like it to be or wether they wanted it to be a hybrid moreover what they expected from a silent short film. The genre that most people voted for was a murder mystery comedy. So to keep this age group and have them engaged and looking forward to this film and thinking wow this was really good I had to make sure that it was comedic but also stuck to a murder mystery outline. The audience expectations were that they wanted it to be engaging have a some bad acting so they can laugh along with the bad drama and have music to set the atmosphere and tone of the movie but also having it quite upbeat so that it doesn't become to serious.

Questionaire

Age:

Gender:

Have you ever watched a short film?

If so what were they about?


Would you ever watch a silent movie?

If you were to watch a silent movie what would you expect from it?

What genre would interest you more for a silent short film?
Murder mystery?

Action ?

Romance ?

Comedy?

Characters

Bella Thabawl -
Looks - Very pretty short brown curly hair
Age - 24
Aspiration - Marry a rich man and have children bt before that become a professional dancer
Relationship status - Divorcee
Personality - Snobby woman, flirtatious with other woman's men, very smart woman likes Adam Phooled


Phil R.Upp -
Looks - Handsome, mustache, short brown hair
Age - 34
Aspiration - Professional sportsmen, cricket
Relationship status - Married to Drinka Upp
Personalty - Jolly, fun, quite dim but very rich since his fathers death


Eva Lution -
Looks - Pretty young woman
Age - 20
Aspiration - To become like her sister Bella however is her Uncle Phil's maid
Relationship status - Single mu no love interest
Personality - Very fun, she has one child aged 2 she was sent to live with her aunt and uncle for her lust for love.


Ginger Brettman -
Looks - Ginger handsome, Charlie Chaplin mustache
Age - 23
Aspiration - musician
Relationship status - Single, but betrothed to Dee Fender, Loves Eva Lution but can't have her
Personality - Very angry and sarcastic man

Adam Phooled -
Looks -

Title ideas

I have come up with a few ideas for the title of my movie.

As i want it to be set in a stately home and the characters to be having a dinner party when the victim is murdered I thought that a few good names were:

- Murder Party

- Death at a Party

- 13, Lonesome road

- Razzle dazzle dead

Out of these titles I have decided to go for 13, lonesome road as this is where all the events are going to be taking place also it has connections with death. The number 13 is symbolic of death and also is considered a very unlucky number.
Lonesome has a connection because it is lonely to die, you don't know what will happen afterwards and your scared of death in itself just as you are scared to be alone and have no one with you.

Chicago Soundtrack 2002 - 13.Nowadays / Hot Honey Rag

This is the type of music I want to have in my piece it is the same era and has a good jazz feel to it. I think that as this film's story line is about jail, murder and deceit it fits perfectly with what I am trying to do.  The music is very upbeat and keeps some fun and mystery into the short film. 

Planning process

For my next parts of planning i need to come up with and create the following things:

- Title for my piece
- Invitations for my party guests as I want the to have their characters and be dressed to act as son as they arrive
- Clue cards
-Round booklets for each guest so the can interact with each other as they are acting.
-Character profiles
-Group evidence sheets
-Costume suggestions
-Party rules
-Alibi's for all characters apart from the murderer

task 1 editing

This is a rough cut of my video there are several things that need to be adjusted and changed and improved.

- One thing that needs to be improved on is the video itself at first I wanted to put in static noises at each dip to black.

- Add titles I need to put in the titles at the end of my 50 second movie.

- Lighting, the lighting was a bit off on one of the shots in my final piece as I am doing a black and white film it won't matter as much.

- When I do my final piece I will change the way I film it and be more creative with camera shots, in this piece I wanted the actress to be looking at the camera and making a home movie.

- Another thing I would change is the style of filming although this was comedic I want to go for a serious comedy with aspects of violence.

Overall I was happy with my short movie I thought it kept to the task guidelines which was to re-create a film we already had on our blog. I chose to do mine on child net movie, this is a very serious act of bullying that affects a lot of children but I wanted to make a statement and the message I wanted to get across is that people are bullied for their likes and interests and so I made my recreation on a stereotypical outline of what a geek is someone who makes jokes about something they are passionate about and people who are so into t.v programs/ actors and actresses that they are bullied for this.

As the bullying route is one I am not taking anymore I can take the criticism and comments to my final piece and make sure I don't redo the same mistakes.

A Murder in the 20's - Silent Film

This is how I want my film to be.

- The sped up moves

-1920's style

-A murder for vengeance

-Black and white with the tape effects on the video

-Screen cuts to show what they are saying or keeping the audience in the action

-Over exaggerated deaths

-Quick, melodic and excitable

murder on the orient express

This was directing by Lumet and this also shows the sort of murder style I want to follow. I like the idea of the generic mystery films e.g. the characters.

I like the way all the characters are over the top and that there is always a steamy love scene even though there has been a serious crime.

This helps with my research because I can see how Lumet has directed some shots and how the characters personality traits show themselves, the task for me will be to get this across with just background music and over exaggerated moves.

Sidney Lumet

For my murder mystery film I am going to study how Sidney Lumet puts together his movies. He began his career as an off broadway director then became a highly efficient television director. He started by directing drama's then moved on to crime drama. Serpico and Prince of the city were some of his most famous crime drama's. He was responsible for leading the first wave of directors who made a succesful transition from television to movies.

Lumet had a realistic and energetic style. He captured New York's vibe in his film like no other because he saw it and lived it and breathed it. He went out and had to re-create this vibe very much like a documentary, he insisted on using the most natural light and making offices look ugly and bureacratic as he knew they were just lairs to the people that worked within the walls.

Lumet made his films realistic by trying to recreate the chosen location as it is by keeping everything as it would be and defining the meaning by what society was.

This relates to my research as it gives a specific style to keep in mind while I do my murder mystery and to also create my own style when I am directing mine. 

Silent films

A silent film is a film with no synchronized sound and no dialogue. A silent film is very pantomime and exaggerated. The only text in silent movies is the title cards that comes up during the film.

Crime fiction

Crime fiction is a genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, motives and the criminals behind them.  Crime fiction has several sub- genre's such as detective fiction, legal thriller, courtroom drama and hard boiled fiction.

Crime fiction was considered to be a serious genre only around 1900.

The Kid - Charlie Chaplin

This is a video that shows the generics of a silent movie. 

- There is no talking but is sound effects

- The movements are sped up 

- Body language is emphasized 

This more of the sort of comedy i want to achieve during my silent movie. I will stick to the generic conventions of a silent film however I am going to push my self to completely revolutionize short film.

Change of plan

During my research I was thinking more about the style of filming I was going to choose. As i went further on in researching different styles of filming i became more drawn to the idea of a silent movie and basing it around a murder mystery. This idea took hold and I started being less confident in my bullying film and more focused on silent movies. I have had a lot of thought about changing my idea and how i will develop my new idea more and focus on how silent films are made and the use of camera and angles and the music played in the background. More research will have to be done over what music to put in the background of a murder mystery film.

Pixar's Knick Knack Original Version 16 x 9 720p

This is one example of a disney short film this sort of short film would appear at the beginging or in the adverts between tv programmes and films. An animation film I am not keen on doing becasue i can't draw however it is good to see how short films can be so vast and varied.

History of short film

Short film has a history as old as cinema. All the primitve films were shiort films until the featyre length film rose and became all-powerful. Short film was then reduced to a low status within the industry not least in the minds of crtitics and audiences. Today the term 'short film is applied to any film of a less standrad than 100 minutes.

The academy of motion picture arts and sciences defines a short film as 'an original motion picrure that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all credits.'

Before the 1920s longer films were rare this meant that length based catergories had little meaning. By the 20s a ticket purchased a varied program including a feature and several supporting works from catergories such as a second feature, short comedy, 5-10 minute cartoon and newsreel.

Short comedy's were especially popular, and typically came in a serial or series such as our gang films and the many outings of chalrie chaplin. Although there was no set realease date these series bacame more like a modern tv sitcom lower than feature films but still very popular.

Animated cartoons were and newreels were defined as short subjects. All mayjor film companies had units assigned to develop and produce short films.

Short subjects in the modern era
Pixar is one example of a major film company still distributing short films. These contain the classic characters and childhood companions. Since disney aquired pixar in 2005, disney has also produced animated shorts since 2007. These include:
- Jack attack which was a spinoff short film from the incredibles
-Mickey mouse
-For the birds
-Chess etc.


Short films are becoming increasingly more well known however will never match up to the feature film. Short films also are a genre in their own right. There are several short film awards and festivals where people showcase their short films and get awards from directing or acting in them.

The Diary - (anti-bullying short film)

  

This is an amateur short film going towards an anti bullying campaign. This is an example of what I want to happen in my short film. I love the idea of a diary however in my short film there is to be no talking just a voice over with background music. The aim is to have the parents of the victim reading a diary and the victims voice telling his story. 

Five Miles Out - Dakota Blue Richards

This is one shirt film i looked at for some ideas on how to shoot my film and how they work wether they leave cliff hangers and how it generally works. This was only 4 minutes of the short film its running time is actually 6 minutes. 

This short film is unlike mine however the music and they way the lighting is creates tension within the short film itself. For my short film i can take some different ideas from the short film and see how they have filmed the scenes and wether tension between the boy and girl is shown through the camera angles. 

http://www.film4.com/videos/article/film4-shorts-five-miles-out

Different types of bullying

Bullying comes in 5 different ways:

Verbal 
Verbal bullying is when someone is called names, threatened or made to feel bad.

Physical 
Physical bullying is when someone is hit, punched, pushed or have their personal items stolen and any other kind of physical aggressive contact. When someone has some physical signs of bullying like cuts, bruises, torn clothes or personal belongings missing they just put it down to over active play or childish games. Many times this isn't the cause and people who are bullied will not tell an adult or someone they trust as they believe it will make the bullies mad and make the bullying a lot worse. 

Social 
Social bullying is when someone is left out of games, deliberately ignored and has bad things spread about them and made to feel like an outsider.

Psychological / Mental 
Psychological bullying is when someone is stalked or intimidated

Cyber
With the technology age a new type of bullying was born; Cyber bullying. 
This type of bullying can be chat rooms, online, instant messaging, on a mobile phone or even e-mails.

Childnet International - Cyber Bullying

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNumIY9D7uY

This is a video on youtube i found on cyber bullying. This is a short film on a boys life going through school and facing bullies. However he is being bullied for being briny which isn't a crime. Nothing that children get bullied for is a crime and this is what I want to put across in my video. 

initial ideas

Ideas for a short film 


I have thought about a few ideas for a short film all mainly based on documentaries instead of story lines however when I thought about different ways I could present the particular social issue in a new an innovative way instead of following a documentary style short film. These are my ideas for short films :
- Kidnappings
-Bulling. How it affects
- Cancer
- Fairies
- Addiction
-Teenage pregnancy
-Life

Out of this i chose three ideas that i thought would be good for a short film and listed a story-line that would work well turning it into a story instead of a documentary.
Life - A story following different peoples lives and how they live. People from different cultures and religions.
Bullying - film about a boy getting bullied for his appearance and his music taste e.g. metal/ rock and then taking his own lie because he can't handle the pressure of trying to fit in and he feels he is worthless.
Kidnapping - This was going to be more of an awareness then a story but still following a story-line. A thriller about a girl who is being stalked for months then is kidnapped and found weeks later.

Out of all these ideas I felt that the bullying idea was going to benefit me the most as bullying affects nearly everybody and the aim of my film is to show that you are not worthless, that the bullies are the one with the problem not you.

Brief 3

Breif 3
A short film in its entirety, lasting approximately five minutes, which may be live action or animation or a combination of both, together with:

• a poster for the film
• a film magazine review page featuring the film

The brief i have chosen is brief 3 (short film ). I have chosen a short film because i feel that this would challenge me the most on making up a script and editing and putting effects in the short film myself. Also the poster will be easy as i have already handled photo shop and know what to do and how i want my poster.