Final Draft

Film poster

This a film poster that Libby designed for our film.

Conventions

A typical convention of a teen genre would be: 

Themes

• a romance between a girl and boy best friend 
• cliques (cliques are staple to any teen drama)
• out caster
• 'hating life'
• peer pressure

Characters

• nerds
• cheerleaders 
• jocks

Settings

• high school
• the houses of the characters  
• the mall 
• sometimes universities 

The typical conventions for a teen drama are shown above and they feature as a big part of any film. A genre convention for teen drama is usually an over dramatized teen issue such as boys or looks. The titles usually appear in a creative and girly style like being written out in lipstick. They also contain a voice over of the character speaking about his/her life. We have included a voice over in our film opening to convey the genre clearly to the audience. We also styled our titles to appear in a creative way. The setting usually follows the main character involved and you get to know them and their importance within the film. In our film opening we follow the girl on her journey on the train. 

Storyboard

Final Music Change

Taking all of our feedback into consideration, we changed our music to a piece that still fits in with our opening but also isn't that well known. We chose 'Stay Alive' instrumental.

Moodboard

This is our moodboard for our film opening. It has pictures and ideas in it that gave us inspiration for our film opening.

Script Changes

When receiving our feedback, we got told our script wasn't long enough. They also commented on the fact that it was too early on in our film opening and people might miss it and our dialogue is essential for our film opening and without it, the film would be quite confusing with it. We re recorded it and made it slower and put it further on in the film.
Previously our script was:

'The doctor said brain activity should be maintained, he said looking at old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help'. 

Our voice over is now:

I'm on my way back from the neurology unit at the specialist hospital in London. There was only a single thought running through my head that afternoon. The doctors that brain activity should be maintained. He said that looking through old pictures and going through my everyday routine would help. This was my first therapy to help with the retrieval of my memory and i was determined to make it work'

Feedback

Here are some pictures of feedback we got from our classmates.

Using Premier

When using premier to edit our film opening, I learnt a lot of new things, I learnt how to use different effects such as the zoom in shot and using the black and white effect and how to change the brightness and saturation.
I also learnt how to crop shots and how to freeze shots, I used youtube to help me. These are the videos I used:

This video helped me understand how to crop shots, me and Frankie worked on this because some of our shots needed cropping to fit in with our film, as they would look a bit odd if they hadn't been cropped.

From our feedback, We got told that we needed to incorporate the whole memory and scrapbook theme more, so we got advised to freeze shots and make them look more like pictures so I looked at this video and this helped me freeze shots.

Music Feedback

We have had a lot of changes with our music, we used the song Don't you remember by Adele, we used a cover for it but we then discussed that it was too sad and didn't really fit with our film opening, and also it was a very well known song. We then used the song the XX- intro cover, and we all thought this was a good piece of music for our film opening and we used this in our first draft and from our feedback we got told that the song didn't fit with the genre and it made it feel like a thriller and that someone was following the girl in the film.

When we were editing for our final draft, we kept the song in there and we added a cover of let her go by passenger, and we thought this song fit in really well and we also used bits of the intro cover by XX and we thought this worked well, however when our teacher was watching it, she said that the song let her go was very well known and that we couldn't use it because we get caught for copyright, so we all looked at so many other songs to use but we felt they were too sad or romantic.

Titles

We have 9 titles in our film and from our feedback we were told to add more titles, our 9 titles were:

• Libby Collins 
• Runner Productions 
• Frankie Edwards 
• Katie Harragan
• Title of film  (Amnesia)
• Directed by Simon Hull
• Edited by Julie Walker
• Executive Producer Andrew Lavin 
• Sound Effects by Debbie Ellis 

We added 4 new titles which are:

• Music by Philip Round 
• Casting by Jacob Odd
• Production designer Melanie Smith 
• Costume designer Leanne Clark 

Marketing Campaign

Audience Research

As our genre is a teen drama we have decided that our target audience would be from the ages of 12-18,  also we feel that the gender is important and because it is a film about three girls and a scrapbook and memories etc, we think that the audience would mostly be female. I think the target audience we have set for this film is appropriate as the film would appeal for them as it girly and exciting. We also think that the age is appropriate as if we set it to younger ages, they wouldn't understand the concept of amnesia which is a our main theme.

Synopsis

What will we need when filming:

A place for memories to be filmed: Southend, beach, amusement arcades, rides.
A train station.
A train.
A scrapbook.
A bag.

Characters: We have three main characters which are Daisy played by Libby, Elyza played by me, and Naomi played by Frankie. Daisy is the girl that is suffering from amnesia and Elyza and Naomi are her two friends.  We go through Daisy's memories.

Location: Our film opening will be located in Southend using the attractions available, we are using the beach, amusement arcades and the theme park. We are also going to be located at chelmsford train station and on a train.

Costumes: The three of us will be wearing normal everyday clothing as we are showing memories of special day to day things so we feel we don't need anything special or unique to be worn.

Audience: We have decided that our audience will be from the ages of 12-18 however it can be viewed by anyone if they wish to watch it.  The certificate is a 12A.

Production Logo

We chose to use Frankie's logo for our film as we felt it was creative but also simple which means that the whole focus and attention won't be drawn to this which is what we want as we want the attention to be on our film.

Past student film openings

Past student film openings

These are some film openings that I watched to get inspiration, they were all very good and interesting.

Blog reflection

Technology - Have you learned new online programmes for showing off work? Have you tried new premiere effects that you haven't told us about

What mark out of 20 is it so far?

Where could you be a little more thorough or a little less complacent?

Is it fun to look through?

Is the learning journey (blaaaghh) evident?

Three targets to improve blog - research or planning (have you thoroughly covered all key media concepts - forms and conventions of your film , audience, institution, representation

Technology - We got introduced to a programme Prezi which is a programme where you can create power points online and share them. I found this programme quite confusing and prefer using normal powerpoint, however it is useful when making presentations to post onto my blog. I have learnt to use many effects on premiere: how to speed up shots, how to adjust the audio, how to add titles on to shots, the black and white effect, the ghost effect. I have played around with many effects to see what they look like but i have not used all of them in my editing. 

Mark - I think my blog is 12/20 as I have tried to keep up with the tasks set but I think there is loads more I need to post on my blog and I need to incorporate more detail into my posts. 

I think my blog is fun to look through as its not just text and it has videos and pictures on it to which are enjoyable to look at.  It has some colour which makes it exciting too.

Throughout this first term of being in media studies, I feel that I come a long way in my understanding and knowledge of the subject, I have learnt many skills. I have learnt about all different genres, mis en scene, different camera shots, how to use premiere and how to use different effects on it.

My three targets are to incorporate more depth into my posts, complete all the tasks, and to cover aspects such as audience and representation.

Recce Shots and Locations

Frankie took the recce shots and she chose to take them in places she thought were appropriate.

This is our first recce shot as this was a main location where we were filming. It is chelmsford Train Station. We filmed at the barriers, on the platform and getting onto the train. 

We filmed a lot of our footage on the train, including the shot of libby getting on, looking out of the window, looking at the scrapbook and getting of the train.

This is on the viewing platform looking at the sunset, we filmed some footage on here.

This is also the viewing platform looking down on the area where we done most of our filming.

This is the lift on the viewing platform where we filmed a shot.

This is the amusement arcades where we film the memories of the film.

Practice Titles

These are some pictures of our practice titles that Frankies mum wrote out for us. We liked the fancy writing however it looks boring because its got no colour or decoration on it. Also when filming it and editing it, it didn't work out how we wanted it to. We decided that we would decorate the scrapbook and make it look more genuine and then we discussed how else we could present the titles, we decided to use stick on colour letters.

Title Fonts

This is the font we are using for our film opening, we think that this font is easily readable by the audience and is a simple font but not too simple that it is boring, our titles aren't their to be distracting, we don't want the main focus to be on the titles so that is why we chose this font.

Feedback

We received the following feedback for our first draft from Miss Brookes:

- She liked our lift shot.
- The way we presented our titles were good, especially the one that gets wiped away by a train.

The feedback she gave us to improve on for our final draft was:
 - The black flashing effect is good but we used it too much and it created the impression of something bad is going to happen and that it gets annoying after a while.
- The shot of Libby walking across the platform is too wobbly and that we need to find a way to make it still otherwise it will lose us marks.
- Some shots that she liked should be enlongated like the shot of libby sitting on the train.
- We need to include still scrapbook shots to fill more time and to also present the significance of it in our film.
- The effect on the tea cups is too dark so we need to adjust the brightness and saturation of it.
- The film title needs to be earlier on in our film as only trailers have the title at the end.
- We need to make our film longer as it needs to be a minimum of 2 minutes.
- The voiceover came in to early, people might miss out on it and then be confused what the film is about.

When editing for our final draft we will take our feedback into consideration and hopefully improve on all of these things to ensure our film opening is up to a good standard.

First Draft

This is our first draft of our film opening, we feel we can do loads to improve it before we give in our final draft.

Shooting Schedule

 This is our shooting schedule, however it isn't completely accurate as we couldn't film on the 25th November due to bad weather conditions so we decided to film on the Saturday instead.

Institutions Research

New line cinema was founded in 1967. It produced the Oscar Award winning The lord of the rings film trilogy. The studio is credited with revitalising the genre of R-rated comedy. Successes of the genre was Wedding Crashers and more recently, Horrible bosses. New line is one of the few film companies that still works in the horror genre being widely known for A Nightmare on Elm Street and Final destination Franchises.
New line cinema most successful films are The mask, Hairspray, Rush Hour, Elf, Sex in the city and the Austin Powerstitles.
New line became a unit of Warner Bros in March 2008. They maintain separate development, marketing, production, and distribution but coordinates with Warner Bros to maximise film performance.

New line's 2014 releases include Tammy, Into the storm, Horrible bosses 2 and The Hobbit: The battle of five armies, the final film in Peter Jackson's The hobbit trilogy.

 I looked at Legendary Pictures as well, it is a company that co-produces and co-finances with Warner Bros. In 2011, the company introduced the creation of Legendary Television to focus on developing TV programmes. Legendary Pictures have produced 34 feature films. 

• Batman begins
• Superman returns
• Godzilla
• Watchmen - Paramount was a distributor as well as Warner Bros.
• Inception
• Man of steel
• Intersellar - the most recent film

Film Script

This is our script for our film opening, we haven't included much speech as our main priority is to show what Daisy is doing in and out of her memories. The dialogue we have chose to include is going to be presented as a voiceover, we thought this would be creative and effective.

Student film Openings

I would give this film opening 49/60. I thought it was quite clear what was going on however the end confused me a bit, how they went straight from a party to laying in a middle of a field with blood on their hands, this makes the genre unclear but i would assume it is a mystery/thriller. The ending of the opening is intriguing cause it makes you want to carry on watching to find out what happened. I liked the way the opening started with the titles of the people in it and then showing the people. The party scene was very realistic and looked like an actual club whereas when the girl and the boy were laying on a field/bench with what was i assume was fake blood over them wasn't very realistic as it looked like paint. The dead body looked very real and showed good acting skills, They demonstrated good camera skills as they used a range of different shots. I liked the music and thought it fit in well with this opening.

I would give this film opening 47/60. I thought it was very unclear, the beginning gave me the impression she was being bullied or something, the use of a voiceover was good however the tone and the voice seemed like she was sad. I liked the way the titles was presented and they were very clear and easily readable. They showed a wide variety of different shots. The way they played different music when she put her headphones in was creative. I think they could have made the ending clearer and make it more intriguing as it doesn't leave me wanting to watch the rest of the film. They had a good choice of music to make it almost a girly film.

Amnesia Research

Amnesia is when you lose your memories and can't remember them, Amnesia can be very severe or only minor. Amnesia can be caused by a damage to the brain but it parts that are vital for memory processing. A temporary episode of memory loss is known as transient global amnesia which is a case of minor amnesia. Amnesia can also be permanent. There is no medical treatment for amnesia, but techniques are suggested to help enhance memory. Psychological support can also help.

The two main types of amnesia are:
Anterograde amnesia which is the impaired ability to learn new information following the onset of amnesia.
Retrograde amnesia which is the impaired ability to recall past events and previously familiar information.

Most people with amnesia have problems with short term memory - they can't retain new information, recent memories are most likely to be lost.

Causes of Amnesia
Amnesia caused by brain injury is known as neurological amnesia. possible causes are:

• Strokes
• Brain inflammation
• Lack of oxygen in the brain, e.g. heart attack, carbon monoxide poisoning or respiratory distress.
• Long term alcohol abuse
• Tumours in areas of the brain that control memory
• Seizures

This picture shows where amnesia and memory loss occurs.

Amnesia related films

I looked at films that Amnesia themes in it, so I did some research and came across a film called Long  Kiss Goodnight which is about a mother and teacher in Pennsylvania who was found, washed up on a New Jersey beach, pregnant, injured, and suffering from complete amnesia. The film itself has been given an action film genre but a sub genre of amnesia which is why this film is good for us to look at because it gives us a clear idea on what to include in our final film opening, also it gives us a better understanding on Amnesia itself.
Long Kiss Goodnight

I watched the trailer to see what the film was about, the mother is suffering from a bad case of amnesia and can't even do simple things like cut food up, but then it takes a sudden change and she starts to remember and she becomes overwhelmed that she can remember, she remember that she was an assassin which is where the film takes you; into an action packed scenario. 
Spellbound
I looked at another film called Spellbound which is about a man who suffers from severe amnesia and runs off to New York trying to get the bottom of his true identity. Spellbound tackles the theme amnesia but also it is widely considered the first mainstream film to truly tackle to subject of psychoanalysis  I tried looking for the trailer but unfortunately it had been terminated due to multiple third party notifications of copyright infringement.

Finding Nemo
I came across a film that i wouldn't assume would be associated with Amnesia, Finding Nemo is known as an animated children's film. The amnesia aspect is shown in the character Dory, she is a fish that suffers from short term memory loss. This is used for comedic effect but it is a clever way of dealing with such a serious issue in a children films

This scene shows Dorys short term memory loss in an amusing way, it shows that nemos father is confused in why Dory doesn't remember showing him the way to the boat, but the Dory explains that she has short term memory loss. This is a good film to look at as it gives us an understanding on short term memory loss whereas the other films show servere amnesia.

Mis en scene

In our film, myself, Frankie and Libby are wearing every day clothes to represent that libby is experiencing her every day life. We are wearing casual clothes that any teenage girl would wear.
The locations we have used in our film are interior and exterior, we filmed outside at the train station and on the way to the amusements, we film inside the train and inside the amusements. There weren't many props needed, the main prop we used was the scrapbook which was the main focus of our film opening. The scrapbook was full of memories and pictures that Libby had experienced throughout her life. The type of lighting used was high key lighting to show that it was a happy time for libby when experiencing her memories. Also some of the shots are outside where it is sunny so high key lighting is used then. However we used the black and white effect to show that this film opening is also serious and sad and that amnesia is a serious thing that people should be warned about.

Font research

Libby had done research on title fonts and these are the ones she came up with.