Film Schedule

Where? : It will be filmed in one of the offices in the school and in another area possibly in town.


When: 5 days in December

Continuity: We plan to shoot it on 3rd, 5th, 8th, 9th and 11th of December. This will incorporate some time after school and free periods.

Once done we will use media lessons to edit our film.

Synopsis of the main film

A victim of economic downturn, John Smith is made redundant and is plunged into severe debt. The only method for him to survive is crime and this changes his life causing him to be constantly under pressure and stress. It starts with minor crimes like shoplifting, but then it evolves into more serious crimes like burglary and bank robberies. His intention is never to hurt anyone physically. He is someone who just takes the goods and goes, he’s not a killer.
During an armed robbery a person appears who’s not expected and falls victim to the startled Smith. When investigating into the murder starts, Smith is not found to be one of the suspects. However, due to being in the wrong place at the wrong time an ex- convict, who has turned his life around, is found guilty and sentenced for life. Smith runs away and one who knows the truth searches him out looking for revenge unless Smith confesses. Smith can’t go back or he’ll be caught and maybe face worse consequences.
After 7 years of running Smith is run over by the one who knows the truth and left for dead, but he is saved and the experience is a turning point convincing him to turn himself in. It shows that there was still a part of him that contained pity and regret. He is jailed for life and can’t turn back time and save the person who he killed, but at least he has regained some self respect and no longer feels the guilt of leaving the innocent person to rot in jail.

Film Project Pitch

Thought provoking thriller set in the suburbs during economic collapse. John Smith, a previously average man, is separated from society by the tragic events from his past. Can he rectify his mistake and find forgiveness or will he be overcome by the guilt, tragedy and self pity ?

uploading the storyboard

This was very frustrating, because I couldn't do it as a powerpoint or slideshow. I also couldn't upload the A3 version as it wouldn't be able to scan properly. I, therefore decided on word to create a table and pasted the images into it to make an A4 version of the storyboard. The finished product as you can see has come out well, although it did take me a while to get the scanner to get the image perfect. After I did the A4 version I printed it off and placed it faced down on the scanner and saved it in my pictures as an image and was therefore able to upload it onto my blog.

My storyboard for the preliminary task

Match on action between slides 10 and 11

Evaluation of the preliminary task

I filmed my preliminary task with 3 other people: Jesse Lloyd, Robyn Furtado and Lily Joyce. Our film was about someone who got a bad haircut and paid a visit to the hairdresser to complain about it. However he was killed by being blown off his chair after threatening to sue the hairdresser and is stood over by death at the end of the video. I have uploaded the video to my blog and it can be accessed by clicking on the image above my posts on the video bar. Our video is on Youtube after Jesse uploaded it and can be accessed by typing “The Drying” into the search engine. We edited the video using Apple Macs and this was very useful in making our finished product as good as possible.
The positives that we got during our preliminary task were that we managed to edit our film on the Macs very successfully and on Youtube it turned out very well. It was important that we got the hang of using them in preparation for the main task. It was also very simple uploading it to Youtube again a useful skill to have prior to working on our main task. The film was also planned out well and we were also able to incorporate the techniques match on action, 180 degree rule and shot reverse shot which we need to include in our main task in order to get higher grades for the coursework. As well as this uploading it to the blogs was easy and planning out the storyboard was relatively straight forward after we added in the photos.Me and Jesse were also able to help out other groups with the technology.
However using the Macs was stressful at times and isn’t easy to do. Also it’s hard getting rid of unneeded footage whilst being careful not to delete the footage that you need.
To analyse this Preliminary task it could be said that we incorporated the key concepts into our film very well, using match on action, 180 degree rule and shot reverse shot as well as representing injustice, violence and irony in the film. We also signified the dangers of business with the one to one meeting between the two main characters, the use of a gun in the storyline connotes crime and death is significant as it represents the end of your life on Earth and possibly the start of something new.
To conclude I think that the preliminary task went very well overall, because most of the steps, such as the uploading were completed very easily and successfully and I learnt a lot in preparation for doing the main task. For next time I would try and complete more work in lessons and to use better pictures for my storyboard.

In our video we've used several important techniques, including 180 degree rule, match on action and shot reverse shot.

clear progress

Me and my group have now uploaded our video onto youtube and it's now available on my blog. It's such a relief to have finally done that. It can be accessed by clicking on the image above the posts. ENJOY !!!

Film making experience

It's difficult to make progress when you don't have the equipment. I've found that out as my hard drive has not arrived yet and that has prevented me from uploading the film onto my blog or Youtube yet. Also our group haven't done our photo storyboard yet, but hopefully we'll get it done by the end of the week (fingers crossed). Hope we can make progress tomorrow so we have less pressure on our shoulders !!!

The new series of Heroes is showing on BBC 2 Wednesdays at 9 and 10 on BBC 3. This is a good drama to analyse for your drama log.