Evaluation

We began by researching movie genres so that we could choose a genre and base our movie on it. We chose to do a thriller movie. Then we researched thriller movie openings and found out more about the conventions of thillers. We also looked at the titles and music in thriller openings and found that many had quite tense music. We looked at popular recent film '28 days laters' and chose to create a similar storyline to this film. Then we had to research target audiences and chose who we would aim our film at. Our group then decided to have our target audience as 18 to 25 year olds. As well as this our group had to choose an age restriction for our film. We decided to have the age certificate as a 15 because although our film may have some violent and creepy scenes we did not want it to be too scary or gorey. For our film we chose to have a storyline that a girl has a dream that the human race is wiped out and then her dream slowly happens in the film. Our two minute opening would be of the girl having the dream. Then we had to decided who would be the main character in the movie. We decided to have nancy being in our two minute clip and that she would be the main character. I think that our research went well and we found out a lot about the genre of our movie. The researched helped us to think about what sort of font to use in our final product. It also helped us think about the storyline and how to make our two minute opening successful.

We then had the task of choosing a name for our film. From looking at other movie titles we firstly felt that we should make the title short so that people would remember it. Also by making the title short it makes the movie sound more professional. Thinking about the genre and storyline of our movie we came up with the name 'Extinct'. We thought this worked well as our title as it looked short and gave the audience an idea as to what the film was about. However, later whilst editing our film and adding the title we decided to change it to 'Extinction' because we felt that this was not so sharp and looked better on our final product.

The next task was choosing costumes and settings. We decided to make Nancys character a young teenage girl who may be quite vunerable. We decided to make her young because our target audience is young people and watching people similar to their age would appeal to them. Therefore the clothes we chose her to wear were high street fashion clothes. I think that the clothing we chose are quite effective although they are plain. I also feel that the costume we chose would show the audience the type of person that she is. Originally we wrote out many places that we could film which included parks, shops and roads. I think that the places we chose to film were good although we should of filmed more in different locations to make our film more realistic.

We began filming using a flip camera which we found was very simply to use. However when uploaded the shots we had taken we realised that the quality was not very good and also the shots were shakey. Therefore we chose to use a digital camcorder for filming. I think that this was a good choice as are shots are now much better quality and as we used a tripod most of our shots have no shake in them. Also we made sure the lighting in our shots was good. We wanted to show a difference in lighting between the clips outside in the daylight and the shots of Nancy in bed. However we had problems trying to film in the dark room so we had to use a lamp so that you could still see clearly in the dark shots. As well as the lighting we had to make sure the weather was the same in all of our outside shots. We wanted to make all of our shots in the daytime and wanted the weather to be dull. We had some problems when it snowed and rained because we could not film outside. I think that we ended up with shots that all had similar weather and therefore I feel that it looks more professional and like it is all on the same day.

We recently had trouble when our edited movie was deleted. However we have began to edit it again using pinnacle and our clips. We have had to begin cutting the clips again and moving them around. We will also need to add the titles and any music and sound effects we may need. We have finished our filming now and all that we are planning to do is edit. We also have began to plan our directors commentary. We are going to discuss how and why we did different things in our two minute clip. Then, we will evaluate our piece commenting on what we think went well and what went not so well.

Recent Filming and Editing

During the last week we have faced various weather problems which have meant that we have not been able to film any empty shots of places outside. Due to the snow we could not film outside because the rest of the parts we have filmed have been in dry weather.

However we have managed to do some more editing and have thought about out titles and credits. I have looked at some thriller film openings and focused on looking at how the title and credits appear. From this I found that in most film openings the font of the titles is fairly small and the colour of the font is usually black. Therefore we decided to make our title and credits in a black font and the font we have chosen it quite scary which we feel suits our opening and movie. We are going to have the credits and title in the bottom corners of the film as we feel this looks professional and does not take too much of the focus away from the opening.
As well as editing we have been able to film a few more short empty shots. We have now filmed a few empty places. The places we have filmed are: the canteen, a classroom, roads, a field, a park, a forest area and an alleyway. We are going to make sure we film many more empty shots to make our opening believable and more realistic. We hope to also film in a church, a shop, more roads, a river, a highstreet and a babys room.

Problems We Have Faced

During filming we have began to have some different problems. Whilst trying to get shots of empty places we have often had to wait for people to go past. We also have had to make sure no moving cars are in the shots because our two minute piece is supposed to have no people in it other than Nancy. Also, we have had to delete some shots when uploading them to Pinnacle because we noticed people in the distance. Another problem we have had is the weather. We firstly started filming when it was sunny, but then decided that the bright weather did not suit our film. We then began filming when it was cold but not raining. We have had problems when we have planned to film but the weather isn't right. We had to cancel filming on sunday because it was raining and we need the weather to be about the same in all of our two minutes. Also, we have had problems making sure the shots are not shakey. We started to film using a flip camera but found it difficult to use and the shots were shakey therefore we decided to use HD Panasonic camera and a tripod to make it more clear and less shakey.

Filming Continued

This week we have contunued to film and upload parts of our two minute piece. We filmed some of our piece on tuesday afternoon. We firstly filmed a clip of Nancy walking through a forest typed area. We used a tripod for these shots and found it made it easier to film. The tripod also helped to make the shots more still and not shakey. Also on tuesday we filmed Nancy waking up in the road and used a close up shot of her waking up and then a long shot. Then we filmed some clips in a park of a swing which we felt when we added to our piece it would make it feel more creepy. Finally, we filmed Nancy twitching when she was asleep and her waking up in her bed which will be the clip we use at the end of our two minute piece. We filmed her twitching so that it gives the idea that she is twitching.

Once we uploaded these clips we saw that they were all of quite good quality compared to the other shots we have done. We found that the shots were not as shakey and were very clear. We then began to edit the clips but cutting them to the right time so that they looked professional. We now have about 1 minute of our piece complete. Now we need to plan to film again and film more empty shots of places to complete our piece. We also need to add sound  and edit it more.

Filming

In our film there are not many social groups and in the two minute opening there is only one girl. She is a teenage girl and we are representing her as a fairly scared and vunerable person. This means that we are showing teen girls to be vunerable and easily frightened.

So far, we have began to film some shots in school and around the school. We firstly filmed some pan shots of the playground and Nancy running into the school. However, once we had uploaded these to the computer, we realised that the lighting was too sunny. We decided that the bright weather did not suit the mood of our film because it is supposed to be fairly scary. Therefore we re-filmed these shots. I have found filming quite simple, however after re-filming the parts in school we realised that the shots were quite shakey at times. We decided that we would therefore have still shots and that we would use a tripod when filming. We filmed Nancy going through the woods and for this we used match on action. We felt this worked quite well however we are going to re-film this because it was quite shakey.

Filming Schedule

Before we started filming we planned out our filming schedule so that everyone in our group knew when and where we were going to film.

Monday 1st November: We filmed Nancy through the forest.

Wednesday 3rd November: We recorded class rooms and a close up of a clock.

Wednesday 10th November: We filmed more shots inside school. We also went out of school to film to film shots of roads and a park.

Friday 12th November: We will film the retake of Nancy through the forest because our original shot turned out to be shakey.

Sunday 14th November: We will be filming in Gillingham and Rainham starting at 12:30 in the afternoon. We will be filming most of our shots on this day.

Monday 15th November: We will take a few more shots of abandoned places.