Film day

8th February2012:
Today we went to the location in which we filmed our main task- bathroom in a house
We had planned a lot before today ( see post below) which enabled us to be able to film all in one day making it easier for continuity reasons when editing the piece. We filmed scenes more than once in order to be able to use different pieces if something doesn't fit well when we are editing it.
Overall, the day was a success every member of the group was involved and we come up with new ideas whilst filming and. I hope this shows in our final piece.

Final plans for Main Task

We have finally come to the decision of using the murder in the bath idea, however watching the previous video i posted it still doesn't seem like an opening to a film as too much is happening. Eg- the knocking on the door this happens to sudden and i don't think this much action would usually happen in the opening credits.

Looking at the 'Se7en' opening it gave me inspiration and ideas on how we can change ours to look more professional. In the 'Se7en' opening credits nothing really happens, it is very straight forward and there are only tiny clues of the film could be about, none significant happens as there is no action and kept very simple. I really like the idea of having a girl cleaning a bath full of blood however i think we should take the knocking on the door scene out and just stick to one location- the bathroom. Like the Se7en opening i think it would be effective if we don't show the girls face and this will also add suspense. We plan on filming at night so the lighting wont be bright when filming which will help show what type of genre we have decided to use. Another reason i dislike the previous video i posted was because of the dialogue, they often don't have dialogue in an opening unless its a 'cold opening', this is due to the fact it would be giving too much of the story away in such a short space of time. I like the idea of using backing music throughout, this gives us an excuse not to use dialogue and i believe if we find something well suited to our piece it could make it look better than using dialogue anyway. However, we still want to use a typical convention of thriller, we have decided to film a  two shot mirror scene where the girl looks in the mirror and sees a figure of some sort ( the person she killed) Tayler will play this role, i think it will be appropriate to do this as the rest of the film is going to be simple and focused on the amount of blood in the bath.

Final plan:
Actresses - Shaiane Gallardo (me) & Tayler Osborne
Director- Kona Rogers
Camera Operative- Kate Morris-Millar
Editor- Tayler Osborne

Costume
I'm going to be wearing jeans and a dark coloured t-shirt, we want it to look natural as if I've killed someone in my everyday clothing.
We will add blood stains to my t-shirt and jeans
Mascara smudged round my eyes as if I've been crying
Hair tied in a loose bun
Tayler is going to wear a baggy white t-shirt that has been soaked in water (murdered in the bath)
Hair down dripping in water
White makeup to make her look really pale

Equipment
Camera
Plastic Screen

Props
Fake blood
Vodka bottle
Cigarette
Incentse (to create smoke around the camera)
Cloths

Location 
Bathroom in a house

New idea- rough video of 'bath'

After planning more of the storyboard we have realised that this wouldn't be a very realistic opening as there are two many events taking place. After watching a few openings of films such as 'juno' and 'se7en', I've noticed that an opening is mostly titles and gives none of the story away. If we did it completely like a real film i don't think this would give us a chance to show off many techniques, so we are going to keep it as basic as we can with maybe having just one typical thriller convention.

We filmed a rough draft of our new idea. We didn't use any props or costumes and we also didn't film when it was dark, but we will definitely film at night for the final piece. We plan on doing a  full rehearsal which we will post. We didn't use the previous idea at all, we started over and came up with a new storyboard. Our idea is that we have a girl who is cleaning a bath which is covered in blood, she also has some splatters of blood on her clothing, this will cause suspense, who's blood is it ? is she a murderer? We want to use lots of different angles whilst she is doing this, and hope the blood mixed with the water will give a nice effect. There is then a knock at the door and the girl panics, we use a point of view shot which personally I'm not too keen on, as i don't think it flows very well. The shot of my hands on the sink we think will be really good when we use the fake blood as it will be much more dramatic and have more of a purpose, this is followed by the point of view shot which will build character as you can see the fear on the characters face. I like the shot of the girl walking to the stairs when she is filmed through a half open door, this gives the impression that she is being watched which will add more suspense. When the girl is walking down the stairs we decided to film just the girls feet as it makes it suspicious the same reason goes for why he filmed from behind when she opens the door. We edited the woman's voice to make it seem as if the girl is in a daze and isn't paying any attention to what she is saying, i think this works really well. To end it we plan on the woman noticing that the girl has some blood on her hand and asks her if shes ok, the girl then tries to cover it up and just shuts the door. I think this idea will be more successful than our previous idea as we aren't giving too much of the story away. 

Below are some pictures of our new location, as you can see the bathroom is very small which i think will be convient to our storyline as the character will feel as if she is almost trapped and cant escape what she has done. The walls are very plain and with the wooden fall it has potential to show a cold feeling about it, which will really set the setting for our gene. We will clear the bathroom so it is empty. The white walls will have great contrast with the blood that we intend on spreading everywhere.

Group presentation

This is our group presentation, we talk about the ideas we have for our final piece and what films have influenced us.

Storyboard of first idea for the main task

An establishing shot of the carer brushing the main characters hair, this also gives a clear view of the location, we like how it is dark all around and then dim light shining on the action.

The camera slowly zooms into the girls face creating a close up shot, she is looking up at the attic which implies she is thinking about it. The character looks in a trance which could also be implying she is mental.

The carer then goes to answer the phone leaving the girl on her own, this makes the audience feel suspicious of something bad happening. We used a long shot from behind as she isn't a significant character.





We went to Konas Grandmas house to make a short storyboard of an idea that we have and hope to develop. We thought of having a character who appears to be psychologically disturbed. She has a carer who comes over to put her to bed and give her her pills. Creepy events happen and she ends up hearing a nose in the attic. She goes into the attic which creates suspense for the audience but she is interrupted by her carer who tells her to get down. We like this idea as it also brings mystery to the film, is she mental ? is there something in the attic.

The girl then goes to get her medication, we used a close up shot as this is an important part, this is clarifying that she is actually mental as she has so much medication. This cupboard has a mirror attached to the front which later comes in use.










The girl flushes her medication down the toilet, she does this quickly as she doesn't want to get caught by her carer. The birds eye view makes the girl seem venerable it also gives the audience a clear view of what she is doing.

The girl shuts the cupboard door, she sees a figure standing behind her on the mirror, this two shot lets the audience witness the figure at the same time as the character causing empathy for her. This should make the audience want to carry on watching, as they want to find out what it is she is seeing.



We then have a point of view shot as the girl looks behind her to see that nothing is there. This confirms she is mental.









This is when the girl is looking up into the attic as if she can hear something coming from there. This angle is good because it makes her look small in comparison to the space around her, which makes her look venerable. However, its from a low angle which could make her look powerful and this isn't what we want, so when filming we would use a high angle.

The girl then walks up the ladder to go into the attic, we used a high angle shot to show her venerability. As there is no light around her this builds up tension for the audience and they may suspect something bad is going to happen whilst she is up there.

Plan

We are going to Konas Grandmas house (potential location for final piece) we hope to take pictures and rough bits of footage of what our story line could possibly be, we have a few ideas but nothing has been decided, we hope we will be able to develop these ideas whilst at the house. We really like the idea of having a character who is mentally ill so i think we will stick with that.
Equipment needed:
- Camera
-Tripod
-Lamp (to make some scenes lighter, or to be used as a spotlight)

Costumes:
- Girl dressed in a long nighty with wet hair
- Her carer in a blue or white and black uniform

Props:
-Medication
- Hairbrush