Risk Assessment

Risk assessment is a fundamental part of managing health and safety and helps you to identify hazards and control the risk they create for those involved in your production.

 Above, is the forms you have to fill out and the requirements you have to meet in risk assessment.
The process requires you to:

• take the time to systematically look at your activities
• decide what hazards they present
• assess the risk of people being exposed to these hazards
• find ways to either eliminate or control them

Me and Sophie will be filling these out right before we start to film.

Mine and Sophie's animatic storyboard- FPP

This is from our lesson yesterday, looking through and choosing which photos to use for our animatic storyboard.
 
Sophie and Emily FPP Animatic from Sophie Mace on Vimeo.

This is our final storyboard. Cal and Elliott are not the chosen actors to play our anti-hero and villain in the actual opening scene, but the were there at the time when we needed someone to play these characters for our storyboard. We haven't got this in our animatic storyboard but at the start there will be the House name and the production studio's name.
00.00-00.04: The femme fatale (who will be played by me) is running away from the killer, this will be a long, tracking shot. I will be wearing a long dress with heels, my hair will be curled, messy and down, and my makeup will be red lipstick and mascara running. The location will be a cobbled street in the city. Fast-paced music will be playing, with ragged breathing, a fast heartbeat and quick, heeled footsteps. It is night-time.
00.05-00.10: The femme fatale trips and falls to the floor at the killer's feet. The shot will be a close up of her body to see her on the floor, upset and in pain. The music will stop at the point where the femme fatale falls.
00.11-00.15: The shot will be looking down on her so it feels like the audience is looking from the killer's perspective.
00.16-00.20: The camera will be looking at the floor where we can see the killer's shadow (not on the wall, we couldn't get the lighting in the right place to take a picture of his shadow on the floor, in the filmed piece we will have a streetlight which will provide the right lighting for this).
00.21-00.35: This is a tilt up the bottom half of the killer's body to him holding a gun that is pointing at her, from this the audience will be getting her perspective. We may have some kind of music playing in the background to build up tension. The killer will be wearing a suit.
00.36-00.40: We will have a close up of the gun, looking up the barrel of it, so the audience feel they are the femme fatale looking at it. The gun will be a small, black pistol gun.
00.41-00.45: A long shot, showing the both of them, the femme fatale at her feet and the killer pointing a gun at her heart (it is crucial that he points the gun at her heart because it shows there is a relationship between them, as he has chosen her most vulnerable point for both her and him).
00.46-00.50: The camera will be behind the anti-hero, tracking him running towards the femme fatale and killer. He will also be wearing a suit and running down the cobble street, there will be no music, just his heavy breathing and quick, heavy footsteps.
00.51-00.55: The anti-hero stops running as soon as he hears the gunshot, we are still behind him and do not see his face. Everything is silent.
00.56-01.04: The scene fades into the opening credits, which will have the name of the film (we have still not chosen this yet) and names of people to do with making the opening scene. It will have a black background and white writing.
01.00-01.12: Still with the black background and white writing. The final title says '18 hours earlier'.
01.13-01.18: The camera will follow the anti-hero into the wedding shop, he will be wearing the same suit as earlier. It is now day-time. It will be a mid shot of him from behind.
01.19-01.23: A mid-shot of the killer, femme fatale and the woman working in the shop, them finishing their conversation (helps the audience realise the femme fatale and killer were together and buying a wedding dress for their wedding). The anti-hero will say something to the woman working in the shop (this will help the audience to understand that he is the manager of the shop). The killer is quite rude to the lady working in the shop.
01.24-01.27: The killer pushes past and into the anti-hero. Mid-shot.
01.28-01.38: Eyeline match between the anti-hero and the femme fatale. To show what has caught her eye. She is wearing the same clothes as in the night-time scene but her makeup and hair is all in place.
01.39-01.48: Over the shoulder shots, over both of their shoulders so that the audience get both of their perspectives and can notice the attraction between them as she strokes his chest/neck when she walks past.
01.49-01.52: A focus pull, of the anti-hero watching the femme fatale walk away, to show what he is focusing on.

Animatics vs. Storyboard

Animatic vs Storyboards from emlouiise

The main reason why me and Sophie chose to do an animatic over a storyboard is because neither of us are particularly that good at drawing, due to this we thought it would look better and be clearer to understand if we made an animatic storyboard instead.

Example of an animatic:

Example of a storyboard:

Story Summary

The plot to mine and Sophie's opening scene for our film noir is the beginning of the end of the film where the femme fatale is being chased by the villain and he is wanting to kill her, and is also being chased by the anti-hero so that he can save her, but there is a mystery as to whether the villain catches her and shoots her or not, so the audience understand there is an attraction between the anti-hero and femme fatale for him to be chasing after her worriedly. After the credits, it goes back to earlier on in the day with the femme fatale and the villain in a wedding dress shop looking at wedding dresses, so the audience now understand that the villain and the femme fatale are together and soon to be married, however the anti-hero owns the shop and when he enters you see the attraction between them start.

The overall story is that the femme fatale and villain are due to be married, but the villain is abusive towards her and she is not happy in their relationship, when the anti-hero comes along and she sees the attraction between them and how much he likes her she seems him as her hope and escape to get out of the relationship with the villain, because she will run away with the anti-hero and he'll protect her. However, the villain finds out and follows her as she goes to meet with the anti-hero, he is possessive so he is easily jealous, he believes if he can't have her then no one can which is why he chases her and he kills her by shooting her in the heart.

Different audiences and the target audience for mine & Sophie's film noir

The different types of media audiences:

Audience pete buckingham what people go to see from Elaine Humpleby

Mine and Sophie's target audience for our OTS, after discussing what media audience we think would be most appropriate for our film noir, we have decided that Film Fanatics is most likely to be our choice of a target audience. Film Fanatics are male and female, under the age of 25, who plan to go to the cinema and plan what they are going to go see, and people who read reviews about film and decide from them whether they're going to go or not.

First lesson of planning for our opening scene

As of our first lesson of planning, me and Sophie have come up with out plot for our opening scene and the whole story of the film. We have also decided on location, actors to play the three characters and costume for mise-en-scene. We decided on what shots and camera angles to use, how quick the transitions would be and where they would fade in and fade out, which scenes we wanted music in the background of, the script for the opening scene, what non-diegetic sounds we would add in afterwards and where the opening titles would feature.

Straight away after this lesson we went to Billie Bell, a fellow student in our year and asked him if he would mind creating a piece of fast-paced music that would go with a scene of someone scared and running. He said he would see what he could find for us.

Next we would need to create some sort of chat on facebook between me and Sophie so we can always keep in contact with new ideas or any changes or where to meet and when. We could also have a chat with both of us and the actors in so they know what they need to bring and what they will need to do and where beforehand of shooting the opening scene. Also we need to come up with a name for our film.

Continuity Task

Night stab from Cal Ives-Keeler on Vimeo.

In the continuity task we struggled again with timing which explains why we do not have any sound or transitions, because we did not have time to add them in once we'd put it together. In our group was me, Sophie, Cal, Elliott and Ruby. Cal was the cameraman, I was the director, Ruby and Elliott were the actors and Sophie helped me with where they should be and what they should be doing.

Editing techniques in film noir

IMG 5030[1] from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

Experimenting with Foleying

After doing some research with foleying, me and Sophie have decided to experiment with foleying for possible noises for our opening scene for Silent Temptation.

Here we are experimenting creating footsteps:
















The recording of the footsteps noises that we made while foleying:

I am wearing heels while recording this because I will be wearing heels in the actual scene of filming, this way we can make it sound as realistic as possible.

Here we are experimenting creating heavy breathing:











The recording of the heavy breathing noises that we made while foleying:

For the heavy breathing noises I made sure that I'd done quite a bit of running beforehand of recording it, this way it sounds more natural than if I hadn't.

Foleying Research

Miss Humpleby has posted a bit about foleying onto her blog, and after reading into it me and Sophie are considering doing it. We;re not 100% sure that we will include in our final edit of the opening scene to our film noir, but we may play around with it anyway just in case. If we choose not to include any foleying into our final edit, then FindSounds will be helpful.

Research on foleying:

Neo Noir

Typical Film Noir characters

Typical femme fatale

A woman of great seductive charm who leads men into compromising or dangerous situations and an alluring, mysterious woman. There is a sexual attraction between her and the anti-hero, however he is more obsessed with her than she is for him, this usually what leads to both of them being punished in some way. The femme fatale most often dies. They are usually trapped in an abusive relationship, most likely with the villain, and their life is tragic, they see the anti-hero as their escape from this for a better life. 

Typical anti-hero

The anti-hero is a leading character in a film, book or play who lacks some or all of the traditional heroic qualities, such as altruism, idealism, courage, nobility, fortitude, and moral goodness. He usually has some kind of flaw, but manages to attract the femme fatale of the film, however he falls for her more than she does for him which usually leads to a heartbreaking end when she dies. Usually working-class, being working-class ad ordinary he is someone the male target audience can relate to or wish to be like him, he is an 'everyman'. He has a checkered, messed up past. 

Typical villain from film noir

The villain is quite often psychotic and detached in some way. He sometimes is in love with the femme fatale, and as soon as he is worried or gets wind of her leaving him he is determined that no one can have her, especially not the anti-hero so he decides to punish them both, he ends ups killing the femme fatale. These villains are not your usual villains, they are two dimensional and are just plain, black and white nasty.

Sometimes there is a supporting character, often known as the Girl Next Door, who offers a conventional and domestic portrayal of what women should be like. She usually helps the anti-hero investigate and work out where the femme fatale has gone and how she died, she sometimes ends up in a relationship with the anti-hero which is better and more genuine for him.

Identifying the conventions of film noir

Film noir codes & conventions from jonsaward

This slideshow highlights the basic conventions of a film noir, but after looking through it I have gone into more depth as to why some of them are the key conventions.

Low key lighting and the use of venetian blinds - this is to show the contrast of dark and light, which represents that there is a bit of darkness and light in everyone.
Everyday urban locations - urban locations are used because they are cities, cities always have lots of different people there which means there is usually lots of crimes there; people find it more scary and intimidating to walk about cities at night because they are more likely to be hurt or get attacked in a dark city by themselves.
Sound - this is important for film noir because there is always, usually a  romance between the femme fatale and anti-hero and music plays in the background to reflect seduction and romance. Heavy breathing and footsteps build up tension, because you know someone is running because they are scared and afraid because if they stop they will be attacked. Voice over of protagonist, so the audience understand and know who the lead character is and who's perspective they are watching it from. 

Analysing the opening scenes of Sin City and Double Idemnity

Double Idemnity

Sin City

Research: Textual Analysis

The writing in bold is a quote in one of
the reviews about Double Idemnity on
imdb.com

Double Idemnity (1944)

1. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036775/

• The blonde wig that Barbara Stanwyck is wearing throughout the movie was the idea of Billy Wilder. A month into shooting Wilder suddenly realized how bad it looked, but by then it was too late to re-shoot the earlier scenes. To rationalize this mistake, in later interviews Wilder claimed that the bad-looking wig was intentional.
• The door to Neff's apartment opens away from, rather than toward, the apartment. This was a violation of the Los Angeles Fire Code.
• [first lines] Building attendant: Well, hello there, Mr. Neff.
• Referenced in The 55th Annual Academy Awards (1983)
• Bill Wilder also directed films such as, Some Like It Hot (1959), Sunset Blvd. (1950), The Apartment (1960).

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Indemnity_(film)

• James M. Cain based his novella on a 1927 murder perpetrated by a married Queens, New York woman and her lover whose trial he attended while working as a journalist in New York.
• An immediate hit with audiences despite a campaign by singer Kate Smith imploring the public to stay away on moral grounds.
• Double Indemnity was nominated for seven Oscars, but did not win any.
• Double Indemnity was adapted as a radio play on two broadcasts.
• In 1945, Producers Releasing Corporation, one of the B movie studios of Hollywood’s Poverty Row, was set to release a blatant rip-off titled Single Indemnity starring Ann Savage and Hugh Beaumont. Paramount quickly slapped an injunction on the cut-rate potboiler that remains in force to this day. PRC eventually edited its film down to 67 minutes, re-titled it Apology for Murder, and sold it to television in the early 50s as part of a syndicated half-hour mystery show.

Our analysis of Double Idemnity

Understanding audiences

Above are the different types of audiences that you come across.

Understanding narrative theory as linked to genre

What is the difference between niche and mainstream?
Mainstream is often termed as 'broadcast audience' who consume popular texts, such as soaps or sitcoms, and a niche audience is much smaller but influential. Examples of a mainstream audience; friends, TopGear, 'heat' magazine and 'Guardian' newspaper. Examples of a niche audience; 'All Out Cricket', 'Birds', 'RaceCar'. The difference between these two audiences is that the mainstream targets a very large group of different people, while the niche target a smaller group of people with a unique interest.

Media Audiences an Introduction from alevelmedia

Propp theory
Vladimir Propp was a critic in the 1920s, he was essentially interested in the narrative of folk tales. He noticed that folk tales were similar in many areas, and that they were about the basic struggles and appeared to have stock characters. Characters have a narrative function; they provide a structure for the text:

• The Hero - the character that seeks something
• The Villain - who opposes or actively blocks the hero's quest
• The Donor - who provides an object with magical properties
• The Dispatcher - who sends the hero on his/her quest via a message
• The False Hero - who disrupts the hero's success by making false claims
• The Helper - who aids the hero
• The Princess - acts as the reward for the hero and the object of the villain's plots
• Her Father - who acts to reward the hero for his effort

Examples of this theory: 'The Dark Knight', 'The Dispatcher', 'Avengers Assemble', 'Batman and Robin', 'The Amazing Spiderman', 'Batman Begins', 'Spiderman'.

Todorov theory

Izetan Todorov was a structuralist linguist, he suggested that stories began with an equilibrium or status quo where any potential differences are in balance. This is then disrupted by some event, which sets the chain of events, the problems are then solved so that order can be restored into the world of fiction. He suggested that conventional narratives are structured in five stages: 

1. A state of equilibrium at the outset
2. A disruption of the equilibrium by some action
3. A recognition that there has been a disruption
4. An attempt to repair the disruption
5. A reinstatement of the equilibrium

Levi Strauss theory

Claude Levi Strauss studied hundreds of myths an legends, he found out that we as humans make sense of the world through people and events by seeing and using binary opposites, he found out narratives are arranged around the conflict of binary opposites.

Examples of binary opposites:

• Good vs Evil
• Black vs White 
• Boy vs Girl
• Peace vs War
• Civilised vs Savage
• Democracy vs Dictatorship
• Young vs Old
• Man vs Nature

Genre

Conventions of Film Noir - Psycho

• Psycho has a piece of music that is used all the way throughout the film but is mainly recognised for the iconic shower scene, in Film Noir the music is mainly string based e.g. violins.
• Filmed in black and white, the limited colour range makes it feel more sophisticated, but creates a more tense atmosphere when it comes to crime scenes and the killing of the femme fatale.
• Mainly set in a less likely city of choice, this could be to make the film more disorientating as its not a well-known city, for example the city in Psycho is Phoenix, Arizona.
• Sex is usually featured in Film Noir's.
• A murder.
• There is always a femme fatale who is usually the one who has the sex scene and who gets murdered. Also, they usually have dreams that have not been achieved but are what drives them, for example the Femme Fatale in Psycho wishes to get married to the man she is cheating with and to settle down instead of having to cheat with another woman's husband.
• The man she's cheating with has money and is a liar, e.g. says he wants to get married to her.

• Everyone always have cigarettes and alcohol.
• The femme fatale has an idea which may help her to have her dream but it involves doing something wrong that will get her into trouble.
• There is something that interrupts her plan.
• Always filmed with low lighting to create a dark atmosphere.
• The narrative is typical Film Noir, the audience know the basic outline of what will happen, there will be a crime, the anti-hero and femme fatale will fall in love and the femme fatale will die. Film Noir audiences like knowing what's likely to happen, yet they don't know how it's going to happen and this is what entices them.
• Psycho has the famous shower scene with the violin piece of music in the background to go with it. This has affected a lot of films that have come after it and that are being made in the present time, it has given some films ideas for other iconic murder scenes with their own branded background music to go with it, however the idea has been inspired from watching Psycho's famous shower scene.
• The film fits the experience of what a Film Noir audience are looking for, it has all the key conventions of a typical Film Noir.

Review of the Sweded film we watched in class

My group and I have not got round to finishing and uploading our Sweded films yet but it should be completed shortly. In our last media lesson we watched some other groups Sweded films and from watching these I learnt that:

• It doesn't need to look/be perfect; just a rough, quick 4 minute video, shots/scenes could be shot once and that's the copy which will be used.
• Planning and explaining any mistakes or things you had to learn while making your Sweded films must be posted to your blog to earn more marks.
• The title of the film should be shown in the Sweded film.

After watching these Sweded films and seeing that they don't have to be absolutely perfect before they are uploaded to our blogs because we can upload them and change, edit or add something to them at any point if we state that we have done so. I am also feeling more confident with my groups Sweded film and am hoping to have it complete or as much as we cand do up on our blogs soon.

The other groups sweded films that we watched were:

1. Sam S, Sam B, Chris and Georgia's - Sweded Ted

http://asmediastudiessamshepherd2013.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/sweded-film.html

    2. Courtney's - Sweded Les Miserables
http://codonnellasmediaproductionschs2014.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/my-sweded-film-les-miserables.html

   3. Morrighan's - Sweded Avengers
http://morrighanasmediaproductionsschs2014.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/first-project-sweded-films.html

Sweded 21 Jump Street

So far, my group have filmed over half of our Sweded film of 21 Jump Street so we still have to complete and edit that. I also need to teach my self how to embed a video to my blog instead of pasting the links to them in a post.

Again, as I have taught myself how to embed the video to my blog, I able to do that and it is easier for anyone looking on my blog to view it.
Media AS swede from Sophie Mace on Vimeo.

The task was organised by me, Sophie, Cal and Ruby. Sophie was the camera woman, I was the director who organised where they stood what they said and how they did it, Cal was one of the main characters. We came up with the script together. However, one of our challenges was that we had asked James to be our other main character but he did not do media with us so it was hard to find time where we all had spare time to film the sweded film. Another problem was that we were trying to make it too perfect in such a limited amount of time, a sweded film is just a rough copy which you could do in one take. A creative idea that we had was t have me and Ruby stand behind James and Cal in the graduation scene (00.43-00.47) so that it didn't look like only those two were there when there is meant to be a whole class of them.

Typical film noir images

Our version: The woman is shown in a light brighter than the man so I tried to increase the brightness but also the contrast so that more of the shadow fell over Cal's face like in the original photo. With the organisation of this photo Cal is brought to the front and the camera focuses on him more than it does on me like in the original photo, this is to show the males importance and dominance over the woman. 

Our version: In the original picture the woman stands out in contrast to the background, I have tried to do this in our version by focusing the saturation on me so that the background blackens out and I have tinted myself so that I stand out from the background. With the mise-en scene, the woman has a plain background, hence why I have a plain black background behind me, this is so we are not distracted from her, the lines of shadows from where the lights were faced makes both of us stand out more so that people are more able to focus on our bodies more.

Our version: In the original photo, the mans shadow stands out so in our version we had to set up the lighting so that we could catch Cal's shadow in the photo, to make his shadow more noticeable I made adjustments to the brightness. Having the cigarette in his hand shows his power as a man, cigarettes are quite an expense to pay for so it shows that men have money.    

The Avengers Opening Sequence Analysis

The Avengers Opening Sequence Analysis

This is a slideshow of my analysis for the opening sequence of The Avengers, I had to copy the link into my blog post as I created the slideshow on Slideshare.net but I have not yet learned to embed a slideshow onto my blog from this website. My next step will be to learn how to do this myself.

I have taught myself how to embed slideshow and videos onto my blog, I did this just by playing around with it until I worked it out, it didn't take too long for me to work this out and this is now easier because anyone viewing my blog can look at the slideshow/video there instead of having to click on a link that will take them to a different website to view it.

The Avengers Opening Sequence Analysis from emlouiise

Health and Safety

We looked into the health and safety of using VDU's, but at this moment in time we have not yet started filming on locations, although we will take a look at health and safety when the time comes to it.

The Codes and Conventions of an Opening Sequence

Activity 1

How successful are they at identifying conventions?

The first ‘Conventions of an opening sequence’ from emiliefreddie and the second slideshow ‘Codes and conventions of opening sequences’ from kcasmedia (http://asmediaproductionsschs2014.blogspot.co.uk/) were the most successful at identifying the key conventions of an opening sequence, every slideshow stated and identified the main ones, but the first and second both went into detail and explained what each convention meant and where you would see/recognise it in the opening sequence.

Who is the audience?

The audience is Media students and for people who have an interest in the media and films/TV programmes.

What is the purpose of the presentations?

The purpose of these presentations is to give the audience an understanding of what key conventions should be in an opening sequence, to teach people who are wanting to create a film, TV program or an opening sequence, so that they have all the correct conventions in their opening sequence.

Is the format successful?
The format for most of the slides was simple and clear to read, making it easier to learn the key conventions. The third slideshow 'An Analysis Of The Opening Sequence Of Vertigo' from Media Studies had a horrible, messy format which made it complicated and boring to read.

Did they identify ALL of the conventions accurately?
Again, most of the slides did identify and describe the key conventions accurately but the third slideshow kept going off the topic and didn't get straight to the point by explaining what they key convention was in a way that people would remember.

Activity 2
The core conventions of an opening scene for a film

• Title of film
• Key cast members names
• Producer 
• Distributor
• Director
• Editor
• Executive producer
• Sometimes accompanied with music

Activity 3
Analysis of the opening sequence of the film Se7en (link here). There are very obvious key conventions met in this opening scene; one of which is the cast members and production/directing/distributing/editor team names being shown, the second key convention met is the music playing throughout the opening sequence which reflects the genre of the film which is Film Noir/Thriller and there are no lyrics in this apart from right at the end of the sequence where the artist sings "You bring me closer to God" which is a hint that religion plays a part in this film, and scenes being shown in the opening scene are ones of where a crime/murder is being planned, also the persons hand being shown who we presume is the murderer is writing in journals and there are close ups of the words being written which mention the 10 Commandments and what is wrong such as homosexuality etc, so the opening scene helps provide a clue of what the film might be about but doesn't give enough away for you to know which entices the viewer to watch more. Unusually the title of the film is shown but not for very long and not very clearly so you 'might miss it if you blinked'.

"the opening sequence is considered one of the most innovative of its era"

I agree with this statement. I agree that this opening sequence is innovative because it was very thoroughly thought out as to how it would be filmed, the producers of this opening scene decided that they wanted it to be as realistic as they could make it, the journals which are featured in this opening sequence belong to a murderer so they decided they wanted it to be written by hand, "He knew that he wanted it to be drawn by hand, because it was from the mind of the killer, and I was taking that further, wanting it to be like the killer did in the film opticals itself." this was innovative because most films would have taken the easy, cheaper option of just getting the journals printed whereas they were all handwritten in Se7en.