Independant Work Towards Targets

For improving our team organisation we have been have regular meetings in which we discuss what we are going to base our opening sequence on, the topics we have been reseacrching and talking about are ;

1. The genre of the opening sequence. 
2. Will there be dialogue in the film?
3. How many characters will be involved?
4. Why we have chosen that genre?

This has helped our team organisation a great amount as we are organised now that we know what our producion is based on and that we have a brief plot.

Choosing Your Genre

All-Time Worldwide Box Office

Rank	Title	Worldwide Box Office
1.	Avatar (2009) -	$2,781,505,847
2.	Titanic (1997)	$1,835,300,000
3.	The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)	$1,129,219,252
4.	Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006)	$1,065,896,541
5.	Toy Story 3 (2010)	$1,062,984,497
6.	Alice in Wonderland (2010)	$1,023,285,206
7.	The Dark Knight (2008)	$1,001,921,825
8.	Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001)	$968,657,891
9.	Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007)	$958,404,152
10.	Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)	$937,000,866

From this table it is evident that top genres for a box office hit are Adventure and Action. It can be seen that it is not the genre in which makes the film a box-office hit but its down to how well the film is created and produced.

Top-Grossing Genres 1995 to 2010

		Movies	Total Gross	Average Gross	Market Share
1	Comedy	1,612	$42,813,948,427	$26,559,521	24.15%
2	Adventure	454	$34,688,763,042	$76,406,967	19.57%
3	Drama	2,795	$31,890,090,423	$11,409,692	17.99%
4	Action	508	$30,052,075,103	$59,157,628	16.95%
5	Thriller/Suspense	475	$13,201,944,104	$27,793,567	7.45%
6	Romantic Comedy	359	$10,469,385,103	$29,162,633	5.91%
7	Horror	292	$8,566,863,507	$29,338,574	4.83%
8	Documentary	879	$1,957,283,447	$2,226,716	1.10%
9	Musical	104	$1,692,747,789	$16,276,421	0.95%
10	Black Comedy	72	$741,364,700	$10,296,732	0.42%

Whereas in this table it shows that comedy has the greatest market share by a significant amount, with adventure in second place and action down the ranks in 4th. This research shows that even though the top films of all time are Action/Adventure, Comedy still has the biggest reaction to the past and current audience, this is backed up by the amount of movies in which are catergorised as comedy and also the market share in which it holds. Other information that can retained from this research is what genres to stay away from because of their week attraction to recent audiences, these are genres such as Thriller, Documentary and Musical.

As a group we put together a questionnaire in which we handed out to find out what genre audiences wanted and why they wanted them, the questions asked were;
1. What is your favourite film genre and why?
2. What is your favourite film and what genre what you catergorise it under?
3. What do you expect to see in an opening sequence?
4. Is there a genre you would like to see more of?
5. What makes you interested in a film?

Conventions of an Opening Sequence

The two opening sequences that I have chose to summarise are Halloween by John Carpenter and This is England by Shane Meadows. Two films in which are of completely different genres.

Halloween
The main conventions that are used in the opening sequence of this film are all related to Gothic in one way or another. The dark background with an eery orange font stands out to the audience to create a sense of fear, this also lets the audience know what genre the movie is going to be. The intense high pitched piano in the background builds the tension for the audience as it is continuously building, getting louder and faster tempo. the zooming in of the pumpkin also builds tension for the audience as at the beginning it is zoomed out but as the credits role the pumpkin gets closer and closer building fear for the audience as they are waiting for something to happen. The flickering of the candle inside the grinning pumpkin gives him human characteristics, the audience want to get away from the frightful look but as it gets closer and closer more fear is created, this emphasizes the overall Gothic genre of the film.

This is England
The main conventions in this opening sequence are for the audience to understand how united kingdom used to be, how it was ruled and what was happening. With the majority of the opening sequence being of old clips its shows the audience how England used to be with the women of Greenham Common, the Iranian Embassy Siege, the nationwide miner’s strike, a bolstered Thatcher and Reagan and of course, Roland Rat all being included to represent this. The font of the credits is the font used on the dog tags of all British soldiers, the rolling numbers are the id's of all soldiers that passed away because of everything that was happening in and around the 80's era. The music that is played in the background is a famous 80's song in which can be seen as making the audience happy but at the same time, because of all the disturbing images it can lead the audience into distress.

Targets

Most of us are aware that the SMART target setting system is the most congressive technique when wanting to improve in a specific area. The target areas in which i am going to improve my knowledge in are;

• Lighting - To improve lighting i will practice filming in dark and light rooms and adjust lighting to see how effective light can be. From doing this i will be able to create more effective light in our opening sequence giving it a better overall look and hopefully improving the quality of the film. This target is very important as poor lighting whilst filming can lead to a dull and bleak look in the poverall film, if done correctly this can improve the quality of the shoot dramatically.

• Team Organisation - To improve team organisation it will help our group to be motivated and also hopefully we will be able to complete the process in the given time. as a group we were not as organised as we could be in the pre-liminary filming, this could be improved by meeting at least once a week to asses the work we have completed and also complete work that we need the whole group there to do.

• Setting - To improve setting we will have to spend more time seacrhing for the best possible location, this will help us as a group improve the quality of the film as setting it crucial in any film. With setting i am including the props that are going to be used, have to be of a good quality to make the film look as dramatic as possible. This will mainly be achieved with patients of finding the best possible setting available for us to use.

• Editing - To improve editing i will have to get used to the editing suite, i can do this by editing small films as part of my independant study, this will help me progree in editing and also it will help the group complete the process further.

• Blogging - To improve my blog i will have to spend more time on each post, this is to ensure that everything in the blog is understandable and also of a high standard. Another blogging point i need to improve is the structure of the post, to make it look presentable i can make as many changes as needed until it looks of a high quality. This can be done by previewing the post regularly to make sure that the images and texts are positioned correctly.

The way that i am going to improve my knowledge in these area's is going to help me a great amount further along in the course as i will be able to relate back to my independant study for revision and help on the specific area.

Evaluation of Skills Developed

Overall i feel that the first and second attempt of filiming i have learnt a great amount in which i will use to continue to progress my knowldge in the subject. I feel that as a group we worked incredibly well and we were very organised in our filming and set design.

Throughout the preliminary task i have progressed skills that i already have and have also found new skills in which i have learnt from the task so far. The key areas in which i have developed are;

Technical Skills - I have developed a vast amount in this area, as i have had no experience in filming i was able to learn a lot from my first pre liminary task. I learnt how to position the camera for the most effective angle for our shots throughout our filming.

Creative Skills - I also developed my Creative skills a substantial amount, i was able to create the scene and setting so that the viewer can see clearly what enviroment we are trying to create. Another way in which i improved my creative skills is the editing of the film, as a group we was able to choose what we wanted to be in our production and what we did not want. The music we added gave the intetnsity to the overall production which makes the filim a great deal more dramatic.

Personal Skills - Just from completing the preliminary task i have improved my media and technological knowledge a huge amount. I have learnt how to use the handheld camera and also i have lernt how to edit a shot on a computer. Other things i have learnt from the pre-lim task are how to stick to the role of thirds and continuity. The main problem we occured was that in our first attempt we did not enforce the usage of shot-reverse-shot, we was able to correct this with a second shooting and we learnt from our mistakes very well.

Production Report

As a pre-liminary task, the shoot as whole went very well, apart from the amateur acting the filming was a success the second time around. There were a few problems that the group encountered throughout the filming process, the main one was that the first time we filmed we did not shoot from correct angles, we was not able to create a shot reverse shot because of the narrow width of the room. This meant we would have to re-film the sequence to ensure the shot reverse shot has been used. The second problem was the smallness of the room, as the room was so small it was tough to get the camera angles in which we was looking to shoot with. Although, we were able to manoveur as a group and succeeded in the filming, capturing a good amount of strong footage. The second problem was that we had several continuity errors in which made the editing really tough, we were able to over-come this by re shooting parts in order to make the final production improved. As a team i feel that we worked very well, we looked at angles to film from as a group and if one of us was nto happy with a shot then we would re-shoot.

The footage that we have shoot as a group was of a good quality, there were some parts which looked strange but with small editiing this was over comed. The main area in which we could improve in is the efficiency of our shooting angles, we had many problems becuase of the light being provided from the room, from one side of the room it was dark whereas when we filmed towards the door the light was bright. This can be over comed by small editing of the light in the filming. We abided by the rules of continuity well with only the smallness of the room giving us our main minor problem.

Overall the filming went well, As a group we were able to move props around in order to create the space we needed to create the shot reverse shot that we did not have in the 1st time of shooting. After learning from our mistakes we knew what was needed, after shooting a 2nd time round the footage we shoot was very good.

Pre-Production Documentation

Location Recce:

 

Technical Recce: As the room we are using is of a small size there were no reastrictions ion shooting. for the look we wanted we had to add a few features into the room such as a table and a chair, as these were our largest props.
Risk Assessment:
If there was a fire there are 3 exits out of the room, one is the main entrance, the second into a second room and there is a third door leading into the 3rd room.

There is a table in the room and somebody may bump into them causing themselves injury, to avoid this, all of the crew need to be warned about the hazard and act sensibly at all times.

The chairs could be tripped over if they are not tucked away properly; all chairs need to be moved out of the way once they have been used.

Power supplies could be a risk if they are left on and touched. All power supplies need to be noted and all the back stage crew and actors need to have a wear of where they are.

We need a risk assessment so that we can see what risks there are during the filming and how we can avoid any injuries.

Shooting Schedule: Our shooting was organised in a lesson and we decided as a group that we would shot on tuesday in our second media lesson. The location was organised previously and we started filimg at 11 o'clock. We shot the scene and we finished filming at 1:30, the shooting was successful.

Mise-en-Scene:
Lighting:
In the TC block corridor there is a main door which will provide manmade natural sunlight, this will brighten the room enough to make it look cell like.

Props:
There will be one table acting as a bed for the patient with a duvet over the top, we will also need a black curtain to cover over the door that comes into shot.

Costume:
LIAM- Lab coat backwards to look like patient.
JACK- White lab coat, with black trousers.
With these costumes it fits the theme of the characters and more authentic.

Hair and Make-Up:
LIAM - Hair will be messy, face will look tired.
JACK - hair will be formal, maybe glasses to emphasize character.
LIAMS hair will be messy to make the audience see that he is a troubled person. We have made JACK  wear a lab coat to show his doctor characteristics.

Set Design:
The room is spacious and sets a good atmosphere for a cell. It has 2 door windows at the ront of the room with a dark carpet. There is one light on the roof which will provide needed light.

Character Movement:
At the start of the filming JACK walks down the path and then through the wooden doors, he walks to the chair and sits down. LIAM is already sitting in his bed, as the dialogue continues both characters remain in the same posistion. At the end of the dialogue JACK stands up and walks towards LIAM in order to offer him medicine, LIAM bangs JACK's hand and drops the object, JACK picks the tablets up off the floor and walks out of the room.