My Method of Working Pt.9 (LOCATION)

Desired Landscape for potential scene:
I want to show three different spaces in this scene as two lovers cycle through Melbourne. It is almost the camera following the two actors from spot to spot on their date. I want there to be minimal if any dialogue and I want the audience to be lead through a visual uplifting and quirky experience.

1. Beginning at her house
2. Cafe
3. Field or outskirts of city, dusk or night

I want all these locations to focus on a specific colour. I have included images that have inspired me in regards to specific shots.

1. First Location (Home)
I really like the idea of showing the two just before their date. The girl would be in her home lying down and the boy will be mentally preparing himself for the date outside.

Kilburn Hanuk movie location2.1Set-Designs-of-Wes-Anderson’s-Movies-Swipe-Life-5

2. Second Location (Cafe)
I want this to be cute but also a little awkward, showing the awkwardness of a first date as well as the exciting hopefulness that it also entails.

cafe-de-goldfinch-in-the-mood-loveDF-01284

3.Third Location (Field,outskirts of city,wharf)

I want to show the final shot of the two away from the city looking towards it. I feel this may be hard to do as finding a location that excellently captures this will be very hard. I feel this landscape idea would enhance the romance of the final shot. 

cityman_102014-10-31 St Kilda & Port Melbourne LJS_9355 copy-Lmoonrisekingdom

In between scenes of the two riding their bicycles to the different locations

The two images I have included show the two cyclists riding towards the camera and I really like the way that looks within the frame.

tumblr_miu0zaxyx91r08eq0o1_500-copyenhanced-buzz-16888-1360805682-8

 

 

My Method Of Working Pt. 7

After today’s 3 minute proposal, I have received feedback in regards to my concepts and need to decide whether I want to write an essay about the theories of colour or shoot a film that puts into practice these theories.
If I made a film I would love to make something that was aesthetically amazing to look at, rather than having a specific idea of narrative. If I wrote an essay, it would be because I want to better my knowledge of cinematography and more specifically that of the use of colour. Because colour is such a broad topic, I may choose to write about two or three colours specifically i.e. red as symbolism in films.
I have two actor friends that I could use to film my scene and I know that they work very well together.
I still have a lot to figure out and need to further develop my own deconstruction of my thoughts.
I need to also consider lighting as lighting has an important role in showing colour.

My Method Of Working. Pt 8

Due to personal priorities I was unable to attend uni this week 🙁 I made sure to keep doing my blog posts because if you miss a week it can build up so quickly so I made sure to keep doing those (Also because I actually do like doing them)

ANYWAY

I wanted to talk about COLOUR and colour motif. For many years designers and directors have understood that colour has a high importance in visually aiding a film in terms of aesthetic pleasure and sometimes even following the plot of a film.
Motif is a recurring element within a work, so a colour motif is a commonly recurring colour within an overall film or artwork. Colour can be associated with a character, place, feeling, timeframe, or even the work itself overall.

I found a colour meaning online (I did not make this) so I have copied and pasted the general meaning and associations with colour:

  • Red is a bright color and creates feelings of excitement and intensity. It is also used to warn of danger and can symbolize anger or passion. In Indian culture (Bollywood) and many parts of Southeast Asia, red is the color of marriage.
  • Blue is the most common favorite color and can create calmness and serenity, although darker blues are associated with sadness. It is also symbolic of masculinity and, interestingly, also femininity.
  • Green is frequently used to symbolize nature. It’s also associated with tranquility and jealousy.
  • Yellow is cheery and warm. However, it can cause feelings of frustration and anger when it is the predominant color.
  • Purple is the color of royalty and wealth, but also of wisdom. It is often associated with the spiritual or exotic.
  • Brown gives a feeling of strength and dependability. It makes us feel warmth, security, and comfort.
  • Orange is, like yellow and red, an exciting color. It easily draws attention and conveys a feeling of warmth and enthusiasm.
  • Pink is associated with romance, love, and the feminine. In Japanese media, pink can be associated with a Cherry Blossom Girl. Pink also has a calming effect.
  • Black is a color (or rather, not-color) of menace or evil. It can also be associated with death and, sometimes, rebirth.
  • White symbolizes purity or innocence. It can also make an area seem bland, sterile, or cold. In some Eastern cultures, white is a symbol of death.
  • Grey is used for mourning, humility and repentance. It can also represent depression, plainness, and lack of life or joy.
  • Gold symbolizes wealth, justice, and balance. It also is associated with wisdom and heroism. The height of a civilization is called the golden age for this reason.
  • Silver symbolizes the moon and femininity. It is also often magical in nature.

 

Found Scene- Week 7

Tyler the Creator’s music video ‘Yonkers’

Now I know i’ve written on a music video before for my found scene, and i’m still not sure if it falls in the guidelines for what to comment on but..yea 🙂
Any how, this music video is Tyler’s claim to fame and has a whopping 74 million + views on youtube. I am commenting on this music video as a found scene because as earlier mentioned in some other found scene’s I love it when a director can film a lengthy shot whilst continually making it interesting which reacquires good actor choreography.

The ‘scene’ if you will is one long shot in black and white. The camera slowly zooms in and out of Tyler as he raps, introducing bugs into the scene from out of the frame. The camera focuses in and out on Tyler throughout the whole video moving with the repetitive beat of the video. Part of Tyler is always blurry and as the camera continually changes focus on the subject. The lighting is a key element to making this video work and forces part of Tyler at certain times to be in black darkness whilst other aspects of him are fully lit up.
More notably the part where he eats the cockroach, the camera zooms out (still changing focus) while Tyler gets sick and throws up. When he throws up his image turns completely black, leaving out the gory imagery of his vomit (I’m also pretty sure the vomit is fake and has been edited in, in post graphics.Part of me also thinks that when his image goes black that could also be done in post editing). It’s not until 2:01 that the shot is cut and another has been edited in. From here onwards, more dramatic zoom and focus altering is used. When he ‘hangs’ himself at the end the image zooms out and the lighting makes his silhouette black again, allowing us to leave out the gory imagery.

It’s just a cool video that has been made by the amaetur OFWGKTA group

Screen Shot 2015-04-14 at 22.44.23 Screen Shot 2015-04-14 at 22.44.07 Screen Shot 2015-04-14 at 22.44.41 Screen Shot 2015-04-14 at 22.46.28

Epiphany Week 7

EXPLOSION EPIPHANY

I must admit, I do love my Batman movies. They are always so entertaining to watch and the director’s always make the film exciting despite the audience knowing what the plot is. There are rumours of the delay in the explosion not being planned and that Heath Ledgers reaction was him being the brilliant actor he is. There are no official reports so I don’t know what is true or not, BUT, I wanted to talk about the planning and intense structure an action film requires.

I’ve never been that interested in making an action drama film but hearing about the rumours behind this film I started thinking about how much harder structuring explosions in films is. Doesn’t sound that hard in theory, but when there you need to ensure you have a demolition team or explosion team ensuring everything that is happening is monitored, and you need to ensure the communication between director, actors, support team etc. is vocal and smooth. You need to make sure camera and crew are in no danger from the explosion. With the cameras, you need to make sure they are protected from the heat of the explosion even if a minor ‘effect’ only explosion. You also need to make sure (because of costs) you get as many action shots as possible using the least amount of takes possible.

Anyways, this is the shortest list of things you need to be careful and mindful of when filming explosions. Some serious research needs to go into explosions as well as some serious dollars, and you need a big team to make sure everything is organised to the point.

I’d love to learn more about explosions and learn the process of shooting something for the big screen or television series.

joker-hospital-why-is-jared-leto-gaining-weight-to-play-the-joker

My Method Of Working Pt. 6

How to develop ideas for location of a film? I’ve decided to start keeping lists of potential locations to shoot films or scenes in. The location of a film is very important to making a film look good and to make the mood of the scene and the message the scene is delivering more impacting.

My Method of Working Pt.5

Throughout my learning in the Scene in Cinema and other courses such as FilmTV, I have discovered through my research that I enjoy colour co-ordinated scenes. I don’t necessarily love Wes Anderson’s fims, but I do appreciate and enjoy the effort that goes into the design of a scene. The colour co-ordination with the landscape and the costumes works so well that it makes his films so much more aesthetically appealing. I think it makes the film a lot easier and more exciting to follow. My favourite Wes film (even though I don’t necessarily love the storyline) is The Darjeeling Limited.
I think the film is beautiful, and that you could play it without any sound and it would still be amazing to watch.

54c14d8704295_-_wes-anderson-palette3.jpg532b62de697ab052ef004597._w.540_s.fit_photo_2249_0-4

 

My Method of Working Pt. 4

When shooting a film I feel at least 2 hours needs to be dedicated to co-ordinating the actors, co-ordinating the camera and tech team, as well as making sure everything can be controlled so that when actual filming takes place the scenes can be filmed smoothly.

I was an actor for today’s class and it was a good learning experience for the perspective of actors. If the team doesn’t know what they are doing you can start to lose focus and judge the team for their inability to perform smoothly. This is why time is needed to be dedicated before hand so that everything will run smoothly.

My Method Of Working Pt. 3

So in my method of working post 2. I decided to organise my ideas better and the other day I had this visual take place in my mind and decided to write it down straight away. It’s pretty messy but I just wanted to write down the general idea of what the short video/music video is and to give me the ability to turn it into something else.
MUSIC VIDEO IDEA

  • rapper is rapping walking through a party from his bedroom.
  •  He is very intense as he is rapping and keeps firm eye contact with the camera. As he is rapping he turns to cough looking slightly sick, rolls his eyes and looks back at the camera continuing to rap.
  • As he walks people pass him his clothes, chains and a beanie.
  • People pass him cups of alcohol after he coughs and he continues to rap.
  • As he is walking he stops saying hi to people, he sits down on a couch, smoke a puff of a joint someone passes him, gets up and keeps walking.
  • He does shots, people all jump around him and he keeps walking.
  •  As he keeps rapping and nears towards the end of the clip his coughing becomes more intense and when he coughs blood comes out of his mouth and he wipes it away, but only smudging it and continues to rap the last verse and blood runs from his nose.
  • someone passes him a cup of water he coughs one last time, the water and blood spit out of his mouth.

Found Scene Week 6

American Beauty

For this week’s scene I have decided to comment on the “I’m very, very dirty” scene from American Beauty.I think the soundtrack for this entire film was done excellently. The music they chose suits the mood and mentality that the director chose when directing this film.

The use of music for this scene is what stood out to me the most. The camera and the audience I guess, follows Lester through his house, from his bedroom into his bathroom at night. This shot is shot medium close up as we follow behind Lester. The music playing over this shot is eery and includes a lot of oriental sounding drum beats. We follow him as he opens the bathroom door, showing only a small section of the steamy bathroom. He enters and shuts the door behind him, leaving the audience to wonder what he has entered into. After he enters the music shifts to an upbeat and slightly Mexican sounding “Something is about to happen” sound.

Screen Shot 2015-04-06 at 13.28.34 Screen Shot 2015-04-06 at 13.47.23

We then enter the room with him, but looking up at him, we are not behind him anymore. This I assume, is so that we can see his reaction as it takes place.

We then shift to his perspective, seeing what he is seeing. We then see Angela in a big white bath, as she turns and looks at him. She seducingly says “I’ve been waiting for you, the music stops. The camera then shifts back to her perspective looking up at him as he reacts to what she has said. The music begins again, giving the impression of a game now as he cautiously walks towards her still trying to figure out what is going on.

Screen Shot 2015-04-06 at 13.52.56 Screen Shot 2015-04-06 at 13.53.07

He walks out of the steamy fog and we see his face clearly. The camera then shifts to a birds eye view angle showing the two of them interacting together, and then to a medium close up of both them in the frame. Every time she speaks the music stops, why this is done i’m not too sure, possibly to enhance the suspense of the scene. When she finishes speaking the quick paced music increases again and he moves forward.

We see a close up of the rose petals and her leg, both symbols of his obsession for the temptation.

Screen Shot 2015-04-06 at 13.53.40

My Method Of Working Pt. 2

So I tend to come up with ideas, not when I actually need them but when I’m driving, on the train, listening to music, watching a movie etc. It’s good and it is bad I guess. I need to be able to start thinking about ideas when I need to. I’ve started writing my ideas down as soon as they come to me on my phone and in notebooks, which is good, but i’ve also got my ideas scattered everywhere, when really, they should be organised into folders and put in the same location for when I need ideas for a project.

I need to start being more organised with my ideas and that is something I need to focus on this year.

Epiphany of the Week (5)

This week I started thinking about soundtracks and how drastically sound effects our reaction to a scene. The music that is chosen needs to suit the style of the overall film, as well as support the emotional state of the characters within the scene and follow what is taking place. We need ques to feel a certain way whilst following the scene and sounds can give us hints as to what is going to happen. For example, in scary films, when suspenseful music plays we start to feel like something is about to happen and we start to sit on the edge of our seat (so to speak). When the suspenseful thing doesn’t happen and the music has led us to believe something will, it can make us feel a big sigh of relief, but make us feel on edge still as we were expecting something to happen. When something sad is happening in a movie and sad music begins to play, we are forced to feel even more sad than we would have without it. Or, the use of no music can also work in benefit to control our emotions too.

My Method of working Pt. 1

So to be quite honest, not truly sure what it is I am to be writing about for the method of working task but I shall give it my best go. I couldn’t really think of what I wanted to write about so I decided to start with the basic, what I want from this semester question.
Whaaaaaat do I want from this semester?

Well, I guess I want to just know more about the process of making films and become more experienced with making films. I feel pretty comfortable with the process now as I am in my third year WOAH! and you would have thought along the way I learn a thing or two. Well, I know for sure I want to pursue directing and editing as a career and I’m enjoying learning through practice.

Research for me tends to be watching other films and music videos and taking note of the style they chose to use to portray that certain script.

I come up with ideas for something I would like to do a lot and I need to start writing them down and storing them somewhere for future use.

Week 5 Found Scene

Thelma & Louise Cliff Scene

http://movieclips.com/hXkEQ-thelma-and-louise-movie-the-cliff/

The scene that I have “found” this week is the infamous cliff scene of Thelma and Louise. There are a lot, a lot, a lot, of shots for this scene as a lot is going in this scene and is the climax of the movie. When watching this scene I realised what Paul had been talking about in terms of every shot being amazing and making you feel an awesome sense of accomplishment. The camera goes back and forth between Thelma and Louise in the car, and then back to the police behind them.
Thelma and Louise are shot mainly in close up shots. The camera is positioned slightly over the shoulder for most of the shots of them except for the final shot from in the middle backseat of the car as they hold hands and ride off the cliff.
I honestly feel every frame has been made so well for this scene and I can imagine the director just being so content and happy with the final product of this scene.Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.45.17

Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.45.03

The car is an “accessory” and a prop in these shots and we see many shots of the car as the focus in this scene. The framing of the car has been as methodically thought about as every other shot in the scene. We see the car from the aspect of the police and them looking at it, we see it from view of Harvey as he chases after it when the women decide to keep on going. We see it close and personal from within the car itself as the women hold hands as they drive to the cliff. We see the car as it drives through the desert and finally as it flys through the air off the cliff.

Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.46.26

Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.46.15

Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.47.01

Screen Shot 2015-04-02 at 10.46.46

 

 

 

 

Props to the director for this scene as well as the stylist (colour co-ordinators etc.), because  by GOD THIS SCENE IS PERFECTLY SHOT!