Research Into Similar Products

The other day in my lesson we looked at opening titles to three different films, those films were:

• Coraline
• Falling Down
• This Is England

We looked at the differences and similarities that they all had.

Coraline:

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/coraline/

• Contains titles - key personnel.
• Shows who possible characters could be.
• Has a soundtrack playing over the top of what is being shown.
• It leaves you asking questions about what could happen in the film, making you want to watch more.

Falling Down:

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/falling-down/

• It doesn't have a soundtrack unlike most opening titles of films.
• It immediately gets the person watching asking questions about the film
• Shows the possible main character.
• Shows the titles of key personnel.
• Shows very clearly where it is set.

This Is England:

http://www.artofthetitle.com/title/this-is-england/

• Has a soundtrack that represents the people and era that the film is about.
• It doesn't actually show you any of the characters as it shows real clips from the past, but does show what the characters could possible be like.
• Gives clear time period and setting.
• Contains titles of key personnel.

BFI Lecture

On the 13th of November I went on a media trip to the BFI (British Film Institution) where we had lectures on useful things about our main task what we could include in ours to get the best marks possible. We were spoken to by Pete Frazer, Simon Frame and Joe Cornish.

Pete Frazer, the chief examiner of OCR media studies, told us all about the main things we need to make clear in our opening scene. Here are my notes that I made on his talk:

Key Features:

• Genre
• Narrative (enigma) - Don't tell the whole story.
• Character - little clues of the characters.
• Atmosphere
• Setting

Research:

• Start general.
• Home in on specific thing you want.
• Make your own research focused and relevant.

Useful websites, people and useful things to do:

• artofthetitle.com
• Saul Bass (graphic designer, title designer and film directer)
• Title exercise
• Pete's Blog: @petesmediablog
• Doing lots of small things adds up to get you better marks.

Pete also showed us the nine steps that we should take and they were:

Step 1: Take Stock

• Titles and opening of a new fiction film.
• Up to 2 minutes.
• 20 marks research and planning.
• 60 marks constructing.
• 20 marks evaluating.
• Time frame and equipment.
• Build your skills.
• Build up your research.
• Build up your planning.
• Give time to shoot and edit.
• Keep audience throughout the whole process.

Step 2: Set up blog

Step 3: Build up skills

Step 4:

Step 5: Brainstorm ideas

• Possible scenarios for pitches / treatments.
• 25 word pitch.
• Mood board treatment.
• Peer and teacher feed back.

Step 6: Planning

• Experiment with camera and editing.
• Try out different shots of locations.
• Examples of shots, costumes, props etc onto blog.
• Post-it storyboards, animatic, mood boards.

Step 7: The shoot

• People, places, props, costumes.
• Rehearsing, directing.
• Equipment, jobs on the day
• Keep a record of the process.
• Importance of audio
• BIG PICTURE BEFORE FINE DETAIL.

Step 8:

Step 9: Evaluation

Pete also mentioned about Foley:

• Replacing the sound of something in a film.
• If done in the polimanry task make sure it is done properly.
• Remake things for experiance.

And lastly, Pete mentioned 6 common problems that occur in most pupils work:

• They make it seem like a trailer or short film.
• There is insufficient titles.
• There is poor sound, poor lighting.
• And lastly poorly directed actors.

Research Into Similar Products

This is a short film called 'Tell' made by Ryan Connolly:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGgRH7-Qs9g&feature=player_embedded

I thought that it was a brilliant short film, with many great aspects to it.  At the beggining of the film I was very drawn in by the fast moving camera shots moving back and forth from both characters, being very intreged by what the whole commotion was about. Also, I thought the sound throughout the film was brilliently done, it built up the tention perfectly and really unnerved me. The camera shots and angles also contributed to the tention as there were many shots that I thought could be used to scare the viewer but the director waited for the less obvious angle/shot to scare the person watching.

I'd be very keen to know what other people thought about it, both good and bad things.