Starting To Come Along

 I have been working on editing for some time now and it looks to be starting to come together, which is good because the due date is coming up soon. I have narrowed the video down to 2 minutes and 6 seconds, but still need to do additional editing and removing to meet the time limit. I have also been playing around with the audio and adding in music during certain shots to set the mood for the reader. I found this website called musopen, which has royalty free music for the classical genre. I thought it would be a good idea to set the mood in the beginning of our intro with some classical music, so the audience has no idea that instead of a nice happy story, they will be watching a funny and scary opening that will leave them screaming for more. I will next be looking for some slow horror music to play throughout the main scene of the attack.

Here is a picture of the editing process so far and if you see the audio layers they are starting to pile up with the different sounds I am adding.

I am going to try and finish the editing either today or tomorrow so I can then talk with my partner on things I can fix or make better.

The Editing Starts

I have started the actually editing process this time! Let me tell you guys it was a hassle to download all of the footage because I don't have a mac, so I wasn't able to airdrop the footage. There is another method that I used to use which was to plug in my phone to my computer and just drag and drop the files off there, however all my photos and videos were jumbled, plus I favorited the videos I actually wanted to use so that method wasn't going to work. Lastly, I thought to download all my footage to OneDrive and just download the videos on my laptop through there and that was successful for me. It took about 45 minutes to download everything onto my OneDrive and from there I was able to quickly get it on my laptop. 

When I added all the videos on premiere, I first put them all in order and quickly realized we were going to have a problem. Before I cut any of the videos to the actual parts we would use, the total length was about 4 minutes. I knew we were going to have a time limit problem because the maximum is 2 minutes and there is only so much I can cut from each video to cut it down literally in half. I was able to get it to 2 minutes and 19 seconds, which is still too high though. I know there are a few clips I want to speed up that should help, but in all reality we need to cut some shots from the final productions because it is impossible to include all the shots and be within the time limit. I am just hoping it looks cohesive after we cut those shots that are the least important to compelling our story because right now it is looking kind of choppy, but editing and transitions should smooth that out.

Filming: Done

We finally met up and filmed our entire film opening project and it only took about two hours! I honestly thought that it would take longer, but I guess we were just very efficient. Before we started filming we met up with our actors and decided to record the actor's lines through an app called garageband. We plan to use these audios to replace the sound in the actual footage that we recorded so the audio sounds more crisp. We were worried about getting actors one week ago, but we ended up casting enough actors that were willing to do this project and were actually excited about it, which helped the footage look better because there was that passion in the acting. We also found an actress to play the bystander so I was strictly just filming.

We filmed on Monday at 7:00pm, so in a few clips the lighting is a little bright, meaning in post production now I will edit the videos to look like they were taken later at night. When filming we used all kinds of stabilizers to help steady the shots including, the handheld stabilizer I showed in a pervious post, a tripod (which was our main form of stabilization), and just our bare hands. The shots came out mostly stable and I can make them even more stable through a tool in adobe premiere. The only problem that I saw with the shots we took was the lighting was very iffy in some shots because we had to use a flashlight to shine light on the characters since it was taken in pitch black. A few shots have a glare from the lights outside and our flashlights that I couldn't seem to get around, which is very disappointing. I will try my best to hid the glare, but it seems like it will be there no matter what I do. I will do some research however on how to remove it or at least make it less noticeable.

Here are the forms of stabilizers we used:

I will start the editing process soon and will make sure to update you guys through that!

Starting the Editing Process

I previously said that today I would start the editing process for the few shots that we were able to get and I have to say this brings back major flashbacks to film in 8th grade. I had done previous projects in aice media where I had to edit using premiere, but this project is more similar to the one that I had in film where we had to recreate a music video. I started by putting in the videos in a new project on adobe premiere and the first thing I did after was save it (the most important step) because losing this project when we are further along would be bad. I then researched how to make a video darker in premiere because as I said in a past blog post, turning the clocks kind of ruined our whole plan of shooting at night because most people in our film want to be home in time for dinner, so we have to darken the film to give the effect it is occurring during the night. I found this video that I will share here on this post that I used to help me darken my film and give off the effect I was looking for. 

I took a snip it of my editing sequence on premiere that showed the skills I learned in this video to darken the video and there is a side by side comparison of how it looked before editing and how it looked after.

As you can see, the video helped a lot and the difference is noticeable. I am not one hundred percent set on this look and will play around with the sidebar effects more to get the perfect look and I will record those numbers so I can use it on the rest of the lighter film, so they all have the same look. I wont be able to make it look completely like nighttime, but I can get close enough to get that effect, which is the goal.

More Planning

Since yesterday I have been planning out the filming on Monday and how it would be best to be efficient and successful in shooting in that one day because we only have a matter of a few hours. I have taken the time to think out which shots will take the longest to film because, either we need a certain angle (the fighting scene so no one actually gets punched) or a shot that has a lot of talking because the actors have to memorize the script and we have to keep the camera rolling throughout the one take (one of the beginning scenes of the characters talking about the party). With this plan I hope this time when filming we can be a lot more productive and finish because I rather spend more time editing our project during the break instead of putting it off. 

Tomorrow I will beginning the editing process for the shots we already have. I want to make sure they look okay so I can know if we have to reshoot them or not on Monday. I haven't edited a big project like this with both film and audio since eighth grade, so there will have to be some time dedicated to refreshing my memory of adobe premiere, which is my preferred editing software.

Here are a few videos that I will use to refresh my memory on how to use premiere.

A Start

 Hey guys! So I got together with my partner and my actors today for the long awaited filming of our film opening however, there was a little problem though....one of our actors had to leave pretty early so we were only able to shoot two shots of our twenty two on our shot list, but we have already planned to take the rest of them on Monday. All I can say is that there is going to be a lot of editing to do because of the time change it gets darker later now, so we have to film from sunset to dark, meaning in post production I will have to make the shots darker to give the effect that they are happening during the night. We also finished our entire script so I will post a few screen shots of that here and a few of the shots that we took today. One last update was that Julia had a costume change and we gave her a burgundy shirt instead of a grey shirt because burgundy shows individuality, which is more related to her character. 

Here is our script:

Here is a few of the shots we got today: 

Sources:

Olesen, Jacob. “Burgundy Color Meaning – The Color Burgundy Symbolizes Intensity and Individuality.” Color-Meanings.Com, 12 Mar. 2020, www.color-meanings.com/burgundy-color-meaning-the-color-burgundy.

Finally Found Our Actors!

 We finally found all of our actors for the other best friend and the mystery person, because I will play the bystander. There is a little obstacle being that they can only film this Friday, which means we have to shoot our entire project in a matter of a few hours, but I know if we are productive and plan out which shots will be the most troubling, we can make this work. I am just so happy that we have our actors because that weight is now off our shoulders. My stabilizer that I ordered will come by Thursday, so everything seems to be working out perfectly (knock on wood). The plan to edit basically the whole opening during spring break is still a go and once that is done there is only the CCR to worry about, but I will make sure to write a script out for that so there is no trouble trying to memorize everything. 

I also was given a really helpful website in class on Friday called Chosic. This website basically has a lot of features to help you find audio that isn't copyrighted. The main feature that I am really interested in is a feature where you can put in any mainstream song and Chosic will find a noncopyrighted version of music that is very similar to the one you put. We haven't talked about adding music, but I was think having spooky background music during some shots would be beneficial for creating a mood of fear in our project. Here is the link to the website so you can have a look for it yourselves! https://www.chosic.com/ 

Next week I will inform you guys on the entire filming process and maybe even the start of the editing process!

Can You See Me?

 Hey guys so big update! We officially have a name for our film and it is: Can You See Me? We chose this title because it goes with the plot of our story where the mystery person can only be seen and felt by Julia and Olivia. This title seems perfect to also engage our audience into wanting to watch our movie because it ask a question that the audience will answer. I found this website that included a fact that I found interesting about movies that have question marks in the title. The website said, "In Hollywood, using such titles is considered bad luck and many writers and studios try to avoid using them (with the few exceptions, such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit, often doing things such as dropping the question mark to avoid being cursed)." I however hope this curse doesn't happen on us! I think this title is very effective and we both knew it was the one right when Paola suggested it.

We also started on our script on this website names Celtx. Celtex is a script formator to help organize your script. I have worked with this website previously in middle school film classes so I am experienced with tools it offers, even though I had to refresh myself a little because it has been a while. We are not going to have too much dialogue as we know it will most likely result in us having more difficulties when filming.

Here is a picture of a part of our script that we have made on Celtx.

Sources:

“Questioning Title?” TV Tropes, tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/QuestioningTitle#:~:text=In%20Hollywood%2C%20using%20such%20titles,mark%20to%20avoid%20being%20cursed).

Real Talk!

 Hey everyone! So there has been some issues with getting actors and we still aren't one hundred percent set on who is going to act, but Paola is going to ask her theater class for two people that would be able to be in our project. We have made the official filming date to be on March 19th and 20th next week. This is the closest time frame we have to film because we still haven't gotten our official actors yet. Yes, it is getting close to that due date and yes I am starting to get a little nervous about finishing, but that next week after we film is all of spring break so we will dedicate our break to working on the editing of our film opening. This is the only way we can guarantee we wont get overwhelmed by the due date and leave us plenty of time to do our CCR. 

There are a few shots that will absolutely take many takes to master so we are noting down those shots to make sure we film in a timely manner. For example, the shot of the girls beating up the person in all black will take a while to perfect since we have to shot from a specific angle to make it look realistic, but not let anyone actually get hurt. Next week and that following week will be go time for our project and this is just what we needed to get a lot of work done. We also started the script, which I will go over in the next blog post.

Also, I made a purchase that I think will help us a lot when filming

I purchased this iPhone stabilizer to keep our shots steady so we don't have to edit them to be still. I don't have a professional camera to use, so my iPhone 12 mini will have to do. This wasn't that expensive of an item and I think it will be very beneficial to our project. It comes on the 18th so perfect timing for our shooting schedule!

Why we made changes

 So I am going to use this blog to describe why we made our changes and how this will help us throughout the course of our project.

So the first change we made to out project was basically adjusting the entire plot to something more creative. Initially, we had decided on doing a car scene where the two friends would get followed, but this idea could be hard to shoot in the car, since our angles and room is very limited. This idea also is the classic kidnapping plot that doesn't really create any interest to our target audience. For these reason, we changed our plot to be outside and have the two girls get scared when a person dressed in all black jumps out at them. This was a better idea because we had more room to shoot and it wasn't a kidnapping scene. Our genre is horror/comedy so we added a comedic factor of having the girls be drunk and beat up the person that scared them. We thought we had a solid idea until we had a group critique where I was given very good suggestions on how to make my project better. The problem was mainly how we were going to make the audience laugh and we knew we wanted physical comedy because that would be easier to convey, but we didn't have a solid plan on executing it. I was given the idea of having only the girls see the person, while bystanders couldn't, so it would be funny to see the girls beating up a pole or something. I liked this idea because it added some creativity, but I thought I could take it a step further and have the girls see and feel him when they hit them (because its a horror movie so there will be fighting) and no one else would be able to the person. This idea really stood out to me because it created a whole new look to our project and now looking back I think this is by far the best idea we have had and honestly things could change, and they might, but this idea really stuck out to me and I know moving forward this is what we will be going off of. Now we just need to film the shots and we will be sure to use our storyboard that has the shots listed in order and what camera movements we will includes as well as the angles.

Planning

 So currently we have finished our storyboard and the full plan to shoot our project, so the next step, you guessed it, is to film it! So this weekend we both are busy with family and we are thinking of shooting either next week or the week after that. School right now has kept us both very busy and we are trying to find a good time for both of us but its third quarter, which means a lot of homework. So either next week or the week after that will work out instead because we know that we have to shoot soon in order to have enough time to edit.

We also need to get actors to be in our film. I have taken film in middle school and I have been in creative photography since freshman year of high school so I will be filming our video! Also I'm not that good of a convincing actor. We know that Paola will play one of the two friends and we will have to ask one of our other friends to be either Julia or Olivia. Our mysterious character will have to be tall so we also need to think about a actor to play them. I will make sure to consul with my partner to ensure we pick the right actors to play the character in order to make our project look convincing.

Here is a video I found that shows good techniques to creative effective shots.

Mathieu Stern. “This 10 Easy Steps Will Make Your Video More CINEMATIC.” YouTube, 12 July 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKAACWcbzu8&t=78s.

More changes!

So here's a quick update on the few changes made to our project. Me and my partner talked on Tuesday and used the suggestions we got from our group critiques and changed up our plot a little. The biggest change we made was to make the mysterious character in all black only be seen by Julia and Olivia. To do this we are going to edit the mystery person to be transparent when other bystanders look at them. We added this one shot of a bystander walking by the girls fighting the so called mysterious character and the bystander just sees the girls hitting a pole, but the girls will actually be seeing and feeling the mystery character. This creates the thought, is this character just in their mind and the audience has to figure out how the friends can feel them when they attacks back (suspense...).

We had to adjust our storyboard to include 2 more shots then what we previously had, which was 20 shots. I added one shot to my original storyboard that I showed in a pervious post and my partner created the other 11 shots that had the adjustments to our plot.

Here is our completed storyboard with our new changes:

Our next step is to plan out when we are going to shoot and we have to assign actors to characters. We will discuss these in upcoming posts!