Codes and conventions of film openings

Today I will be analysing Codes and Conventions of film openings and explain what the terms mean.
The Codes and Conventions of film openings are what film makers use in order to create the perfect opening sequence in order to set the scene of a movie. A Code or Convention could be to make sure that you show the setting in the sequence so that the audience knows where they are when the film starts, it could also be
-Establishing a main character
-Including a plot or just an introduction to show the characteristics of the film
-Genre of the film
-Titles  
When it comes down to titles we will see things like the distributer e.g. Warner Bros who help to market and distribute the film around the world. Then we your Producers who handle finances and marketing with your Directors who actually watch over the film and make sure that everything is being done correctly.


Here are a couple film openings in which I have deconstructed

1. Spectre (James Bond) 

This opening I watched very recently and it is by far and away on of the best opening sequences to film I have ever seen. For almost 5 minutes the first shot comes from what looks to be one camera filmed by a drone flying over a festival and following a character into a building. This must of taken so long to do as everything had to perfect for 5 minutes straight, that's lighting, sound, actors, Mise en scene and camera work this all needed to be perfect for it even to be counted as a take the only point at which the camera editing changes is when James Bond points his gun at a building. The lighting and sound was all diegetic this means it was all natural and makes it all look and sound like you are there in this "Day of the Dead festival" The skeletons in this opening sequence could be a reference to earlier bond movies such as Live and let die which also featured this unique festival. It could also represent death that is bound to come in this film as it has an action genre.

Here we have a still of the long opening sequence in which James is approaching his target you can see that the rule of thirds has been used in order to direct the audiences attention to James in the foreground with the festival and buildings in the background.
However there are not any titles through this sequence so that the audiences attention can be directed straight to the sequence and also because James Bond has that signature music scene when the bond song is played and we get an idea of what will happen in the movie. The festival opening is there to show to the audience who this main character is and what he does.
 

2. Hot Fuzz (Simon Pegg and Nick Frost)

I thought it would only be appropriate to include an opening of a Simon Pegg and Nick frost film. Despite this film being a parody the opening sequence is very good for its "Played Genre"
The first shot we get lasts for around 10-15 seconds ad it involves a man walking toward he camera. The lighting here is very good as from a distance we can only see the persons outline as he is a silhouette. This hides them from the audience giving them a scene of mystery as they don't know anything about this man yet. The sound diegetic so all you hear is the sound of the mans footsteps this is very atmospheric as it is very simple and helps the user immerse themselves in the film. The camera shot starts out as an extreme long shot however as the character gets closer and the camera slowly zooms in it digresses to  a long shot to a medium long shot to  a medium shot to  a close up shot, technically that's a lot of depth covered in one shot. This helps to create suspension plus the serious face adds to this effect. The rest of thee sequence is fast paced with quick editing and non diegetic of the narration. 

Ok thanks for reading hope this deconstruction on the Codes and Conventions helps along with the examples.

Analysis of a Film director: Simon Pegg and Nick Frost

Hello again!!! 

Today I'm going to analyse film Director Simon Pegg and actor Nick frost with their movies that they collaborated together to create. As our theme for our main task is under the genre of comedy we thought that it would be appropriate to see why famous comedy producers such as this duo are successful. Most of their work consists of parody's of famous movies or TV series'. A good example of this would be Shaun of the Dead which was a parody of the walking Dead which is an American TV series based on zombies with over the top gore and drama. The way that Simon and Nick made this funny though was by adding in the "British Version". So as you can imagine in America as guns are legal so everyone had a gun but in the UK we would have to be very creative and have to use other things such as a Cricket bat, part of a stair well and in one case a mans arm that had been ripped apart. What the essentially did `was take the piss out of themselves and the British public in a way that no one could get offended as it was true and quite hilarious. 


Another famous parody they released was "Hot Fuzz" which was a parody on the British police force (service sorry). In your usual Cop film you would usually expect big tough robbers with guns stealing money from a bank whilst the "cops" try to stop them. Instead as its England it takes place in a village with what it seems harmless pensioner vs. Two police officers One who is a good police officer the other is just hilarious and as it turns out the pensioners are criminal masterminds with guns and artillery which is the last thing that you would expect, this is why it is funny as well as references to American Cop films like Breaking Point and Bad Boys 2. So for our task film references might be a good idea to use.

Film editing workshop (Title sequences)

So recently we were visited by an EX-student of the Kings School called Sion Roe. He right now is a professional photographer based in Exeter and he came into our lesson to help us out with editing film opening sequences specifically the titles.

 In this image we can see a still from our finished title sequence experiment that we did ONLY FOR THE LESSON not for our task even though we may use some of the techniques that Sion taught us.
We went through fading, opacity, colour, layers and artwork in order for us to have all the tools we needed for our title sequences.
In the image you can see that the title is surrounded by the main recording whilst another recording is playing within the faded letters which really added up for a great effect and is certainly something that we can use in the future.

In order for us to gain this style of title we had to select a style from the tool bar called "Track matte Key" this allowed us to put the title in without any boarders or text boxes blocking our view.

In this image we can see the opacity settings that allowed the title to fade in and out and expand in and out. This was a very nice effect as it could open up various ideas about how we could combine various ideas from the film into the title sequence so that they could work together.
We can also see the time line at the bottom which allows us to show when we want the title sequence to start and the layers of video that we used.
The workshop was very useful however I found it very difficult and I think premier pro will take some getting use to it. 
It REALLY helped me with sound though as I now am familiar with the sound effects and transitions. So hopefully the sound/audio should be amazing in our actual task.

Media studies story boards for 60% task

He we have our 60 marker story boards which we will plan to base our short film opening on. This will tell us as we are filming our chosen camera angles and motion of objects /characters. They will also allow us to put our task together in a structured way so that it makes sense to the audience without diverting away from the subject. 

Pinterst moodboard

Quantitative and Qualitative research

Quantitative research is when information is gathered by large companies gather large amounts of information. This means getting information from many audiences to get their opinion on their product. In doing this they can get a wide range of opinions on how to improve or how to target a particular audience. They would usually do his with surveys and questionnaires done over the phone or Internet questionnaires that appear as pop ups.

Qualitative research is when the companies interview there individual customers to find out their opinion and feeling for their product and also how they would talk about it to their friends. It is a very direct and personal opinion compared to quantitative research. Its about getting inside your customers head and seeing how you could improve your product. It produces accurate and local results so that the company can tailor that product to a tighter audience instead of a wider one.

Audience Profile

This is Fred. Fred is in his 2nd year of university. He enjoys spending times at the zoo and travelling to savannah's in Africa in his spare time as he likes to get away from the constant life of studying and research for his chosen subjects. when he's not at the zoo or Uni he enjoys watching films. Especially indie style films. When he listens to music he likes the Hard Rock genre.

Fred is a prime example of my target audience. As he likes indie movies he isn't particularly bothered with big name actors or directors only the story of the film and the moral only matters to him. 
With sources such as IMDB and BBFC he has access to lots of indie films that he might want to watch with other people reviews and opinions. This will heavily influence him on what films he will want to watch. This means the film industry's can find out why people like certain films and how they can implement these ideas into there own films which for me as a film maker is very useful.
If Fred was to see a film at the cinema he may bring friends/ family with him acting as a secondary audience.

Analysis of natural sound from opening scene of a film

The opening scene that I shall be analysing is from the film Hancock.

The sound in the first ten seconds or so is mainly implemented with the sound of guns, sirens and racing cars along a freeway this is all non diegetic sound as it has been planted into the footage to make it more exiting and absorbing for the audience. What I really like about this scene though is that you go straight from dramatic loud and violent to quiet calm and laid back, as the scene immediately diverts to Hancock (Will Smith) lying on a street bench with the natural sound of your typical suburbia in the background i.e. distant cars and people talking. This is added with the faded sound of the news broadcast and the conversation the audience has been directed to follow between Hancock and the child in front of him.

Research into a film opening #2

2. Casino Royale 



The into to Casino Royale is your classic Bond opening sequence with the barrel over Bond with him turning around and firing his gun (Walther PPK) at the audience. However this particular opening sequence is quite different to the other Bond movies in the past. Instead of your classic Bond  opener with hints at the storyline and the sexual appeal with the girls that you would normally see instead we get this violent kind of cartoon fight scene in a casino. This is very unique and very iconic in Bond as this is the first Star of Daniel Craig the 6th Bond. This shows his "different" style on Bond in this violent adrenaline ride which  we were not really used to so this would definitely would be a full on action movie. The story of the opening sequence all takes place in a Casino style set with your cards and roulette tables in nearly every shot. This implies that money and gambling will be a big part of this film not just for wealth but gambling for your life. The camera angles are always moving around the subjects to magnify the explosive action of the fighting so we get close ups, High to low angle shots and plenty of establishing shots. These are used to help the audience keep up with the sequence and not get confused. 
As for the titles we get the classic bond one beginning with the author of the books Ian Fleming with the main character James Bond followed by the title Casino Royale. This immediately sets the atmosphere and the audience now feel familiar with what they are watching.
Then we get the cast list beginning with Eva Green then Mads Mikkelsen, Giancarlo Giannini these are the main characters set aside from Bond the rest after this are all grouped together to show that they play of a smaller significance to the main characters so they were put in groups to save time, then we get the name of the stuntman (Free running), this is mentioned very early on as it is very important as in an action movie you need a stuntman to do the dangerous stuff the actor themselves cannot do (even though Daniel Craig does most of his own stunts). Then weirdly we get a main cast member Judi Dench as M this is a big name and a big role so this was in this order to catch the audience out. Then we get a list of nearly everyone behind the scene with the names of the producers, camera operators, assistant directors, script supervisor, Publicity and marketing, promotions, and other people like wardrobe supervisors and photographer etc. Then we get some bigger roles like the editors, production designers, musicians with the name of the bond song and who it was written by as this is a big part of the Bond franchise with the theme song. Then we get the names of the main Producers and the name of the director. The reason why the titles are in this order are so that the audience can find out who stars in the movie however as the sequence progresses the writing gets smaller when we get to the backstage crew as if to draw attention away from it towards the amazing animation. The writing only gets bigger when we see more important names flash up towards the end when the scene slows down to draw the viewers attention as the names are seen to be "more important".   
To watch the opening sequence of Casino Royale click the link below
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1AMUmkj-ck

Research into a film opening

1. Lord of war

The Lord of war opening sequence is truly unique when it comes to camera work and editing. The sequence all takes place from a bullets perspective right from when it was made to the moment it was fired. The genre of the movie would come under a Crime, Drama, Thriller as the audience are shown action from the criminals point of view we also feel for those involved and in some cases an emotional bond like the child for example as children usually represent innocence and when we see him die we immediately think "Oh no that child was probably harmless with his whole life ahead of him how cruel" the story of the opening sequence shows the life of a bullet. As the sole subject is a bullet it creates a powerful message as the bullet from a gun is technically what kills the individual and so it represents death on a much longer journey than we imagine which is from the barrel to the target instead we see that is much longer. The locations vary from a factory where the bullet is made to the gun it is fired from to a basket in which it is knocked out from to the back of a truck riding through a tropical landscape. The first camera shot is taken from behind a factory worker as an establishing shot however it soon zooms in to  a extreme close up on to the manufacture process of the bullet itself. From there on the camera is always behind the target as if to show that the bullet is always heading forward to its final destination.
The first title that we receive is a well known actor as in Nicholas Cage so immediately the audience can relate to the film as they probably know the actor from other films. The second title is the film title Lord of War just as the bullet takes shape as this is what the movie represents... war.
Then we get the name of the actors including Jared Leto, Bridget Moynahan, Ian Holm, Eamonn Walker, Sammi Rotibi and many others then we get the caster which is Mindy Marin C.S.A which appears when the bullet enters another room to indicate the change in jobs. Then we get the Musician (who wrote the music) Antonio Pinto as the music is very important in this film as it creates the atmosphere so his name I one of the first when it comes the behind the scenes. Then we get the costume designer Elisabetta  Beraldo this again is mentioned earlier in the sequence as it is very important in the Mise En Scene of the film and makes it look authentic. Then we get the editors name followed by production designer, the  director of photography, followed by various executive producers and then at the very end we get the directors role as if to conclude the introduction with the most important role.  
This helps me understand the film industry in how important each role is e.g. a film could survive with a missing camera man or two but it needs its Director so the directors name is usually shown on its own to show its significance. THE REASON WHY THE INDUSTRY DOES THIS IS SO THAT THEY CAN PROMOTE BIG NAMES TO ATTRACT AN AUDIENCE THAT WILL BE INTRESTED THIS ALLOWS THEM TO MAKE MORE MONEY.
To watch the opening sequence of Lord of war click the link below.
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LUEiKs2UAo

Evaluaton of Peliminary task

When we started to brainstorm our main ideas to each other our first idea was an interrogation sort of style scene with one person already sat down and one standing to show the difference in dominance over the sequence. However after this we began to experiment with other ideas with the idea of a mental therapy session in someones home as if the therapists had bee called over on short notice.
Jack, Chris and I then began to develop on this idea and we gradually began to come up with a story line. However in doing this we realised that we had over complicated the whole story as we had added in to many factors that were difficult to understand from the audiences perspective. So we had to go back to the basics which wasted an entire days filming. However once had come up with an easier storyline to read we got filming again and it was much easier from then on.
When it came down to lighting the kitchen lights in my house did the job of illuminating the subjects face without it looking like we had installed some advanced lighting equipment.
However when it came to sound the large room made speech echo quite a bit, this didn't make the speech difficult to understand in fact it was quite clear... it was just that it was an imperfection that you do notice. We also had the problem of a mirror in the background which in some shots we noticed that we could see the camera and those operating the camera in some cases so we need to look out for this next time. Plus at one point with one shot we did break the 180 degree rule which was really quite a stupid thing to do especially considering that we didn't notice it until we finished editing it.
Our mise en sine was used to create the atmosphere of someone calling over a group of therapists on short notice with a sense of urgency, so we made some mess on the counters in the background and I had a lot of family photo's which helped create this homely environment, however there was to much going on in the background which drew the viewers attention so the viewer instead of looking at the characters was drawn to the images in the background and would struggle to keep up. In terms of costumes the two therapists dressed quite smartly in white shirts and waist coats. Where as the patient wore a Black hoodie with dirty jeans to show that he hadn't made much preparation for the others arrival, this helped to represent the patient in a negative way but the therapists in a positive way. However there is also a sense of mystery about the patient as he continually has flashbacks that are short and snappy as if he has tried to forget them or if he doesn't remember them that well anyway but that is for the audience to figure out for themselves.

 

Here is a photo of the preliminary video showing the entire task.

As you can see the Mise en scene terrible as we didn't prepare for the actual filming. So we still had family photos and furniture lying around which didn't exactly make sense for a mentally deranged patients home.  

Finished Video

Here is the link to the finished video enjoy!
 <(^v^)>

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7DnJykWmPc#action=share

Peliminary Task Bloopers

So this is our preliminary tasks "moments gone wrong"
This short video will show you all of the things that went wrong whilst filming the video over the course of 3 DAYS!!!!  
It was fun making the bloopers video as it reminds us on the challenges that we faced in making the film. It also allows an insight to the audience in what filming the film was like behind the scenes.
Hope you enjoy it
just click the link below to watch on Youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWRNgtrHns0

School lighting class

Earlier today our Media studies class was lucky to get hands on experience with some high quality lighting equipment and receive some quality advice and techniques when it came to how to create the perfect effect when it came to setting the mood.  Here we were experimenting with lighting to one side of the model in this case Felix. This effect allows us to light up one side of the subjects face and shadow the other side. This can be used in low light areas to give off a sense of mystery to the character as we cannot see all of his face.

 

We also did a little bit of work with small amounts of light that would illuminate only one part of the body In dark conditions. This is usually used on the face for extreme close ups as it only shows the face. However in such low light your average camera will struggle to pick up any light. So here in this image you can just about see the subjects face and nothing else.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Skins Comparison to Bad Education

Skins:

Skins is a British program based on youths in an area of Bristol. It was written by a father and son who based it on events that had actually gone on in the area. The show mainly focuses on your typical stereotypes of teenagers as being disruptive rude and always getting into trouble with the law or school. The Mise En Scene was in less developed run down areas of the city so as the viewer we get a sense of a lack of wealth in an area however some areas like the college and some of the richer students houses show the other side of that society and so it represents the characters as being quite ungrateful as teenagers are in your stereotypical society.
However some of the characters seem to escape this judgement. However each character seems to escape this typical view in each episode as we get to know them individually. The show is aimed at an audience of around 16+ of years.





Bad education:

Bad education is also based on stereotypes which is what makes it funny. It is much more of a comedy than Skins and aimed at a younger audience as it is more immature. Again all together we look at all the characters and see them as quite disruptive in school as we think however similar to skins as we get to know all the characters we get to like them and how they all represent different things for example the typical bully and nerd. However some characters could be seen as represented as different more complicated matters like the Gay character could be seen as represented how free you are to come out these days compared to 20yrs ago as back then being gay was seen as quite a bad thing and It wouldn't be seen in a school that often at that time either.