Storyboards: part one.

In order for me to gain a rough idea of what my film will look like, I decided to start creating some rough storyboards detailing what shots will be included.

 

This is the first page of my storyboards, showing the first scene in my film. The scene is of the main character getting dressed in the morning and when she looks into the mirror, her reflection is no longer there. She then leaves the room and as she goes to walk through the door, a family member walks straight past her preventing her from leaving and ignores her.

 

This is the second page of my storyboards. This follows on from the first page and continues on with her day, where she leaves to go to school.



Shot list

Before I can begin filming for my short film, I need to work out what shots I want to include in my film.

I have created a shot list which contains a series of shots that I know that I want to include in my film.

 

 

1. The first/one of the first shots will be of the main character doing her hair in the mirror in the morning, and she pauses to look at herself and sighs.

 

2. The next shot will be of her getting up and grabbing her bag, going to exit the room.

 

3. As she goes to walk out of her room, her younger sister character will walk straight past her from the bathroom to her bedroom, completely ignoring the main character.

 

4. She then just ignores this and walks downstairs to leave the house. Just before she leaves, she shouts goodbye to anyone that would be in the house and she gets no reply.

 

5. The camera will then cut to her walking to school.

 

6. Whilst she is walking to school, a group of girls will walk past her. The main character will call to them and ask them to wait for her, as they are her friends, but they don't acknowledge her request and carry on walking without her.

 

7. There will then be several shots in which the main character is seen walking by herself whilst there are groups of people around her, like when she is walking into the school building and walking through the corridors.

 

8. Whilst she is walking through the corridors, people bump into her and there are shots catching her reaction to it.

 

9. There will be a shot of her walking into the common room and she sit's down next to her friends, where they then ignore her when she sits down. She just shrugs it off and pulls out a notebook to do work, until someone else walks into the room and her group of friends turn to greet them. At this point, she gets frustrated and leaves the room.

 

10. She then goes into a classroom and sits down next to her friends. There will be a shot of a class photo at the front of the room which will include the main character, and there will be a dissolve shot where Laura will then disappear from the picture.

 

11. Further on in the film, there will be a shot where she returns home and her parents are in the sitting room, but neither of them acknowledge her. There will then be a shot of a photo frame including a picture of Laura, with tea lights and sympathy cards placed around it. At this point she becomes extremely frustrated that nobody is acknowledging her and exits the house to go on a walk.

 

12. On her walk, she spots her friends in the graveyard so she follows them. There will be a long shot of the group of friends standing holding flowers. The camera will then cut to a shot taken from behind her grave where they put flowers down, and the camera will then cut to a front shot of the grave, which reveals that it is a grave for the main character. The follow up shots will show the reaction of the main character and the emotions of her friend group. 

Short film questionnaire results

  

In order to make my short film suit the needs of my target audience, I decided to create a  questionnaire to find out exactly what my target audience will be expecting from my short film.

These results will help me decide what changes to make to my film when I start filming, and gives me ideas to keep in mind when filming.

From my questionnaire results, I have found out that 87.5% of the members of my target audience that answered my questionnaire do enjoy short films.

For the next question, 4 out of the 7 people that answered it mentioned that they like the short film to be interesting, meaning that my target audience would like there to be an extra twist in the film in order to make it more interesting. Another thing that I noticed when people answered this question is that some participants mention about the film having a deeper meaning behind it, which suggests that the audience want something that will give them an emotional tie to the film, and it will help them understand it more.

 In the next question, most people said that they think that the short film should be 5 minutes long. This gives enough time for me to get the storyline across to the audience and make them understand what the plot is about.

 In the next question, I asked participants what kind of film genre's they like to see in a short film. They had the option to choose multiple genre's, and it turns out that 75% of participants answered that they like dramatic films. This proves to me that when making my short film, I know that my target audience will enjoy it.

In the next question, all participants answered that they do enjoy watching a tragic drama short film.

 

Short film questionnaire

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Week 3

Casting

Before I can begin to plan filming for my short film, I need to decide who I want to cast for my film. I gathered four different girls that I feel as though would all be good candidates to be the main character in my film.

 

Candidate one: Ellen

 

Candidate two: Laura

 

Candidate three: Nicole

 

Candidate four: Rachel

 

I have decided to use candidate two; Laura, as my main character for my short film. I feel as though she will be good to use as the main character as she will be flexible when it comes to filming the different scenes and she fits the description of the character perfectly.

 

Although I have picked Laura as my main character, I still feel as though these candidates would still be perfect to be included in my film. I think I will use candidate four; Rachel, as the main friend of the main character. I also plan to use the other two candidates as extras.

 



Little White Lies film review analysis

As well as my short film and film poster, I also need to create a film review for my short film. Before I could begin to create this though, I needed to do some research into the features of a film review so that I could make it look legitimate.

 



 

Short film research - background music 2

As well as trying to find music for the end of my film, I need to find other music that I can use throughout my film. I want to find soft, piano music that I can use for the beginning and the middle of my film. The music will still need to fit the emotions of the film, but I am still unsure whether I want any singing in the music that will be played throughout the beginning and middle.

 

So far I have looked at two piano covers of two different songs that I feel as though will fit the style of the film perfectly.

 



I am still undecided on whether I want to use either of these piano covers. I'm unsure whether to use a piano cover of a well known song, as I'm not sure whether a normal piano song would fit the theme of the film better. However, if I did use a piano cover of a well known song, my target audience would recognise the song and could be more interested to watch it. I will conduct further research into background music before I decide which to use. 

Short film research - background music.

In preparation of making my short film for my media coursework, I decided to look for different possible song choices that I can use as background music in my film.

 

As my film will be a tragic family drama, the music needs to be slow and soft to fit with the emotions of the film.

 

I first searched for a song to use at the end of the film, as that is the piece of music that needs to correlate with the scene perfectly and trigger the audience's emotions. It came down between two songs that I was toying between using for the end.

 

The Hardest Part - Nina Nesbitt

 

Little Do You Know - Alex and Sierra

 

I have decided to use 'The Hardest Part' by Nina Nesbitt. The reason that I have chosen to use this song over the other one is because I feel as though this song sets the mood of the end of the film much better than the other song, as it is a bit slower and the lyrics match what is going on in the scene that it will be playing on. I feel as though this song choice will help trigger the emotions of the audience and help tie the scene all together, and it will give the audience a better understanding of what is going on in the scene.



Short film pitch

Film title: Invisible
Target audience: Teens/Young adults
Tag line: Absence makes the heart grow fonder
Unique selling point: Based on the best selling novel 'Forgotten Girl' by Emily Watson.

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