Equipment (Planning)

The main equipment needed for this project is:

• Camera
• Mini DV tape
• Tripod - this will allow us to have steady and accurate shots.
• Laptop (This will be needed when we upload all the footage we filmed and when we start editing all the shots).

Since there isn't a lot of dialogue in our script/Media product we will not be needing to use a microphone. If lighting becomes a problem we will use artificial lighting to make a shot more visible!

Organising the shoot (Planning)

Organising the shoot involved making a lot of serious decisions that would end up helping us make our final opening sequence.

As a group we all organised the following:

Actors: Tegan Little as Hannah

Locations: Sydenham school (a classroom)

Kirkdale road (For the night scene)

Props: A fake knife, chairs and tables (classroom scene) etc.

Costume: casual teenage clothing to set up the story line.

Lighting: We will be using low key lighting mostly - reasons for this are because it suits the genre and the mood of the opening sequence. During the night scene we will use natural lighting to set the scene and if extra lighting is required, we will use some sort of artificial lighting to make the scene more visible.

Although these are rather brief details of us organising the shoot, I think it provides myself and my group with the key elements needed to make out final media product have a good outcome.

Shooting script (Planning)

Here is our shooting script. Using a shooting script will allow us to be organised as well as keeping up with timing and locations. I think that it will really help us understand what we are doing and keep us on track with filming.

Soundtrack (Planning)

Before producing our media product we made sure we planned out what sounds we were going to use and in what shots/scenes we would use them in.

We will be using both Diegetic and Non diegetic sound. We will be using most of the non diegetic sound in opening scene and this non diegetic sound will consist of instrumental music in the background - it will help build up tension and excitement for the audience. The instrumental music will then continue into the next scene creating a sound bridge (this will be done when we start editing). We will also make sure that the instrumental music suits our chosen genre - Psychological thriller.

Another sound that is required is the sound of a heartbeat. This will be added during the flashback scenes, and once again it will help build up tension and add a sense of a thriller movie. Hopefully this will help attract the audience and keep them focused on the situation as well as creating enigmas throughout the scene.

Although there isn't a lot of dialogue in our media product, we do have a particular scene where Hannah (main character) is being beaten up by her class mates and they are shouting at her and swearing too. As a group we decided it would be best to let the actors improvise this scene to add a more realistic touch to the scene.

Decisions on Location (Planning)

As a group we all started discussing possible locations where we could film the opening scene of our short Film 'Behind Closed Doors'.

To make our decisions we had to base them on our storyboards and where we could visualize an effective outcome, that will captivate our target audience. As our storyline is based around the life of a teenage girl, who begins to suffer from paranoia we wanted to create a scary/thriller type scene.

When we looked back at our story boards we noticed that there are 3 main parts to the opening scene that need to be captured on camera. These 3 main parts were:

- Hannah Running on the street

- Hannah in School

- Hannah At home (Flashback)

As we have now seen the obvious locations that are needed, we are discussing where about we want to film. We certainly know that we want to film at school (Sydenham), but there is still a discussing as to where we will film the other 2 parts.

My Blog will be updated after proper analysis and decisions are made.

Storyboard/Anamatics (Planning)

StoryBoards and Animatics (Planning)

As we started to progress and develop ideas, we came to the point in which we started creating storyboards/animatics. We were given some post-stick notes to draw each shot that we would be using for the opening scene of our film. Louise, Megime and myself worked together and took it in turns to draw out a shot an write about things such as:

-Mise-en-scene

-Sound

-Camera Shot

-Any Dialogue

Creating a storyboard was very helpful, as we were able to put ideas on to paper and keep organised with each shot. It also provided a clearer view of what we would like to add into the scene or what we would like to take out.

As we finished of adding the final shot, we were asked to film and take pictures of each shot to create our animatics. To create our Animatics we will be using 'Movie Maker' as it provides us with different choice of effects, such as transitions from each shot (fade in, fade out etc). It also helps provide background music to add a better sense of creativity and technique. We have not yet completed the animatic but we are working on it during the next lesson and should be finished by then.