Genre + Sub Genre

Binary Oppositions for our film opening:

The three main binary oppositions that will be used in our teen opening are:

• Sociable VS Unsociable
• Traditional Values VS Modern Values

Types of Editing for our Teen Opening

 

Asking Teens Their Thought!

Today I walked around the college and asked our target audience their thoughts about our storyline. Here is the response video:

This will be added on Monday 17th March when we get back to school as currently we do not have access to the footage.

Re-view of January the 29th lesson

In today’s lesson I helped to draw and annotate the story board for the teen opening. This was fairly easy for me as I had done something similar during my media gcse coursework. After I asked my teacher to explain creative commons, while I got one of my group members to video it.

After college I and my group met up at the workshop in order to finish the shot by shot re-make of the breakfast club. When this was finished I upload a director’s talk of me onto the blog explaining what went well and what didn’t for the re-make.

Key Problems While Filming & How to avoid them:

Not Filming enough footage is a recurring problem in all practical projects also most often the shots do not link together. In order to prevent this me and my group will insure enough planning is done and we have:

- incorporate a variety of shot types from a range of distances

- incorporate camera movement

- We will use lots of close ups in order to set the scene and create professional looking film opening

- 2 minutes + 5 seconds shots = 24 shots minimum

- We will use a good shot composition - rule of 1/35

Top 10 Teen Films

In order to create a successful teen opening, I looked at most popular teen films by reading an article online by the Guardian. (Because the slideshow is really large, here's a link: http://app.emaze.com/246068/top-10-teen-film)

Music & Sound

Music and sound contributes to a film in many ways, it is used for:

Dialogue: dialogue is a diegetic sound meaning that its sound that the source of origin is visible on the screen as the action is happening. Unless your doing a film without dialogue, dialogue is used so that the audience can understand what is going on or to tell the story. 

Background sound: background sound is a non diegetic sound that is added to a film at post production. the use of background sound can alter the mood, and change the pace of the film for example an orchestra can change the pace dramatically if it was an action film. 

Foley sound: foley sound is also a non-diegetic sound meaning it is reproduction of everyday sound that is also added to a film in post production. The use of foley sound adds emphasis to something for a example someone walking in a scary movie, making the sound of the footsteps louder creates suspense and fright onto the viewer. 

For the film opening me and my group are going to use, music and sound as the key to engaging the audience, the type of music we use has to reflect what we're trying to do and to make sure that the right pace, and type of music/sound is used at the same time. 

Character Ideas for opening:

Today is the first day of our planning for the opening. We have come up with a range of characters suited for our film:

 

We have decided to go with the princess and the pretty ugly girl as we feel for the other characters will not be able to put a western twist to it. This would mean its target audience would lowered as only Muslims or eastern cultures would want watch it as others would feel it does not relate to them. 

 

 

Micro analysis of Snow white and the Huntsman: (own research)

Snow white and the huntsman clip micro analysis

The clip (trailer) I have chosen to analyse is the fantasy, action, adventure genre: ‘snow white and the huntsman’ by Evan Daugherty Lewis. The main parts of the clip I will be focussing on analysing are the cinematography and mise- en -scene. This clip is composed of editing techniques, and cinematography which makes this trailer, invigorate, and gripping for the viewer.  As it is a very long trailer I will be focusing on a little bit (0:08- 0:42 seconds)

The clip starts with an extreme long shot, which is an over view, of the castle, this prospective allows the audience to see, where the film, is based , the camera slightly zooms in, releasing anxiety , towards the viewers, which allows the viewers to see exactly what is going on within this view. As the view of the castle slowly fades away, straight after, the character queenRavenna fades in, with a close up, showing her face and her shoulders, she is looking towards the camera, with her eyes slowly rolled up towards her eye lids, showing her devilish look, which creates tension for the viewers, as the viewers can’t yet see what she is up to. Straight after, the camera cuts to a close, another shot is taken on the mirror, the mirror, melts and bleeds down the steps, as it does, the camera cuts, and the camera takes another shot of the stairs which is close up, which shows how slowly the mirror melts, this scene slowly creates tension, as the viewers do not know what it is. The camera cuts to close, and the mirror, morphs into to a human form, as it does, the camera cuts, and starts with a close up of queen Ravenna, showing her facial expressions, her face shows, how powerful she is as she is saying “mirror, mirror on the wall who is the fairest of them all” as she said this, she looked as if she knew, what the mirror was going to say. The camera cuts to a close, and another extreme long shot is taken, of the queen and the mirror, which is formed as a human.

The mise-en-scene of this scene conveys the setting of the throne room. The colours that are used are mostly metallic, this compliments the theme of fantasy, and this colour helps develop the mood that the castle creates. The mirror also helps create the mood, as most mirrors, you can see your reflection, but however, this mirror, is metallic and almost looks as if it was some kind of shield. The lighting used, is mostly artificial, as the lighting is only used at the centre of the room, the rest of the room, is shadowed. The light is coming from the left; this is because the shadows are casted to the right. However there is some natural light, from the window, showing a ray of sunlight.

Themirror is the narrator, as he speaks, the scenes move as well. When the mirror says “My queen you have defined nature” the scenes starts to moves, with a close up of shot of queen Ravenna’s back, she is taking her gown off, the camera cuts, and straight away comes in another close up, but showing her right side of her body, so it shows the viewers what she is doing. The camera cuts to a close, and takes another close up, with her back again, she is covering herself in white goo, as she is drowning into it. The shot fades very quickly, and as it does, another shot emerges from the previous shot. This shot is an extreme close up, showing her face as her body, and face, drowns into the liquid, as this occurs, the shot fades away, and the camera cuts to a close. The camera takes a shot of the outside of the castle during the winter, the camera moves from left to right very slowly, showing the audience what they are meant to be looking at.

The mise-en-scene, which is the castle in winter; there is pure thick white snow, glued on the edge of the walls, crystallized with ice, this may symbolise how the castle had been poisoned, through the eyes of queen Ravenna. The colours that are used are mostly black and white, which shows how dark, and gloomy, the castle creates.

This shot then fades away, and as the mirror says “on this day there is one more beautiful than you” the camera fades in with a 2 second close up of snow white, showing her back, the light from  the window slowly creeps in,  in front of her and the camera cuts. Another shot is taken of snow white’s face (close up) which the light is shining on, show the viewers how she’s been locked up in a tower for years. The camera fades in, the camera goes back to the previous scenes, as to when the queen was under the white goo, the camera is at a low angle, with a close up, of the queens face ( side shot)coming out of the goo very slowly, the camera cuts very quickly and takes  another shot of her standing up, as she does this , the camera speed up the process (fast motion), of her standing, after a second, the camera slows down, which freezes her movement.  The camera then cuts to a close by fading into the blackness.

Above all thanks to GraigFraiser the clip contains several techniques, e.g. camera angle shots, cinematography, and lighting, which contribute to a successful trailer.

The Journey through Teen Films:

Reflective Blog

Our Inspiration for film:

Our film was inspired by Bend it like Beckham & Mean Girls.

Mean girls inspired us it has the similar storyline of a girl turning from good to bad just for the attention and to try and fit in with the stereotypes of being cool. Also it contains so many of the conventions and binary oppositions you expect in a typical teenage movie such as cool VS uncool and Smart VS Dumb. We will use some of these binary oppositions from this film as we think it strongly relates to the teenage audience and expresses what we ourselves go through at school/college. This will hopefully make our film more memorable as it connects strongly with us and our audience.

Bend it like Beckham is what played a major part of basing our teen movies around Islamic and culture stereotypes. We feel most teenage movies are targeted at only genders and not a specific culture or group. I personally think that this is a good thing as it allows us to create something different rather than just a plain teenage movie.

Films with good cinematograpghy:

Best cinematography films from madihah-hussain50

Possible Risks While Filming

Most common risks while filming occur from the followings:

Time Pressure:
Rushing to finish in time is when hazards get missed, or people start to take risks.
If this does happen while we are filming we will take a moment to calm ourselves and each other down. If time is really against us we will try to think of ways in order to lighten the work load: can we cut out some shots or set ups to give us the time to get the most essential stuff for the film without panic?

Tripping hazards:
This could happen very simply for example if someone is asked to run down hill repeatedly to get the scene right, for example, the risk of them tripping and falling on their face is increased with each time they do this. If the hill is pavement rather than grass the risk of serious injury is increased. This hazard can be cause be tripping over minor things or cables as we will not have any running involve in our opening. But in order to prevent from tripping over objects etc we will move or tape down cables and objects that could be tripped over

Shots that look illegal:
Shots might look illegal if you didn't know a camera was there. This could cause distress to members of the public or cause a police call out. In order to try and prevent this we will let everyone in our surrounding area know that we are filming and that no body is in any possible danger.

Before shooting our film I will carry out a risk assessment. I will do this by looking at each shooting set up or location individually and think of what exactly could go wrong. Once I have identity them I can then try and find ways to avoid it.

Who's Doing What? (Pitch)

Filming dates:

The filming dates are: 12th Feb- 26th Feb. we'll be filming in lessons and over nights.We will  also be filming during half term from 18th- 24th February.

Brief outline of our movie:

For our teen film opening, we decided to base it on a typical Muslim girl who lives in a religious household. However, when she starts college she gets influenced by the wrong crowd. This leads her to act rebellious and go against her cultural values resulting in serious consequences.

Camera analysis: Shots, Angels and Movement.

Camera from madihah-hussain50

Our movie title: research:

We had originally decided to name our film Two Lives but had come to a discovery that this title name already existed. As a group we were extremely fond of the name so we agreed on keeping it but changing the Two into the number 2.

Submarine Opening: Final

Here is my completed video of the Submarine Opening:

Sumbmarine Opening

Below are a series of images explaining how I added non-diegetic music to the opening of Submarine

 

                                          Submarine sound from Str Spook

How to Use Creative Commons

(Video made by Tahmina Rahman)



Researching music and sound- Creative Commons:

Searching through creative Commons, I have found a variety of music, soundtracks which helps develop a opening scene. It's not just used for teen films, but also the majority of the Film genres out there.

There are many types of sub genres for teen films, e.g. horror, sci-fi, fantasy, religion based etc.

Here are some music, I've found from Creative Commons, it's a variety of music for different types of sub genres.

The first one is Alive by chase and Status.

This is a great way to open a film sequences as it's catchy, catches the audiences attention and has good beats that the vast majority of the public would like. It goes well with the teenage film industry as the title is called arrive- which can be seen as a metaphor. 

 

                                                                                              

I looked at the film, Step up 4:

The music used is very up beat and works really well with the openign seuqences considering it's a dance film. The music is in a rap style and gives you a little taster of what's to come. 

Anuva Hood is also another film I looked out with a good song attached, the song is known as Pass out. 

The theme of this music is up beat and is also rap, which also gives an insight onto what the films about. -Gangs etc.

Kick Ass starts off different, it starts of with a narrative, which gives a little more depth to it. The music is heroic so acts well with a teenage superhero movie. The music is light and calm, but goes louder every time.        

Research: Music-

I've done my own research in what type of music is used in teen films. The music genre varies within different types of films. For example if it was a Horror teen movie like scary movie, the music is more explicit and is pretty much freaky. 

This is contrasted to other film genres- teen films have pop, hip hop and R&B music.

Creative Commons: 
Creative Common is a site where you can search for music which is copyright free.

1. Go to http://www.creativecommons.org.uk/
2. check both boxes under the search menu
3. Choose which service provider you like
4. Download music/sounds
5. move to appropriate folders and convert to AIFF
6. Drop it to final cut pro

Director's Talk:

This is a quick video from the director explaining what went well and what didn't in regard to the shot by shot remake of the breakfast club.

Shot by shot: Comparing our version with the original:

When we created our own remake of the Breakfast Club Opening sequence, we tried to make it as similar as possible so people would be able to identify where it came from. Despite this, there were some changes/differences to the original one due to the props, location and other things we had.

Similarities:

• The 'remake' of some of the camera shots, e.g the locations and props f the school
• The script-we had a copy of this from the film so we knew what we we were going to say.
• The order of the title sequence
• The same music for the opening
• The same voice over (but with our own voice)
• Created the same company again
• The same timing of shots for the school

Differences:

• There were two shots of the school that we forgot to film
• Instead of using actual humans as our actors/actress we used puppets.
• The timing for the conversation and shots were different  
• We used our own name for the title sequence rather than the same name in the film as we were the ones who created it. 

Shot by shot: Final-

 

Shot by shot- Editing:

When we were editing the remake of breakfast club, as a group we did have some issues. We needed technical support, and time was running out. However we learned the main things of how to edit, which makes are work more successful. 

Shot by shot- Filming:

I feel that our filming went well  and we managed to get most of the scenes that we needed in order to make the shot - by - shot remake. I feel that the time constraints which we had when filming played a big role as everything was more rushed than we would have liked it to be planned and has more time to perfect our filming and also re watch the clips and also time to re shoot any scenes which we feel could have been done a little better.

Shot by shot- Planning: Breakfast club

As a group we have planned out where, and what type of shots will be used in the remake of the Breakfast Club. 

From home, we bought our own props, and are own costumes which helps us re-act the opening sequence of the film. 

We decided to make the characters into paper puppets; It's more unique and conveys creativity.

Travelling and Arriving:

Travelling and arriving, plays an important role in the opening of a teen film. It helps separate characters from one another and make them individuals as well as showing a bit more about their character. It helps set a scene in which different characters communicate with each other for example: A popular character is likely to come in a car, and a nerd- school bus. This can cause conflict which then creates tension with other characters. 

Characters that walk to college or school, tells the audience that they may not be popular, in a sense that they don't have their own car.

Teens that are shown to arrive to college in a car, shows to be more popular, they are likely to boast about it and also be rich. It's stereotypical of popular teens to have their own ride, it promotes their popularity.

Students that arrive in school buses are those of which who are bore likely to be considered as boring or ''average'' which contrasts to the popular teens. They are more likely to be unsociable and bullied.

Breakfast Club Character Development

After watching the opening, I decided to watch the whole film and see the whether the characters changed or not. (Because the slideshow is large, here is another link: http://app.emaze.com/245221/breakfast-club)

How to use creative commons:

Transport In Teen Movies

Most common ways of transport in teen movies!
Teen movies which are set around the school environment tend to show the characters arriving to school. This is done in order to establish the location and in some cases establish the characters personality. The three most common transport for arriving in teen movies are:

Cars:

Most commonly characters who travel in cars or their own private transport such as a motorcycle are the jocks. They take pride in everything they do including their transport type as arriving to school is the first thing they are seen doing, by their peers.

Buses:

Students that arrive to school by bus are most commonly the ones who get bullied. These students and likely to be boring and considered a geek.

Walking:

Characters who walk to school/college always tend to be the least popular or the budget one. This is because having a car is seen as characters having a hip and cool style also as cars are expensive most often in teen movies you will always see the jock arriving in one.

@medgroup23

Keep up to date with our research & planning through pictures by following us on Instagram @medgroup23

Blog Design:

We have tried to keep our blog design simple in order to reflect our group as we are all about simplicity. On previous attempts we have used template designs but change it as we thought other groups may have it. We settle on using the background of our blogs as.

Previous Blog Designs used:




Current Blog Design used:

Breakfast Club Storyboard

Shot By Shot Remake Task Sheet

Aliens in the attic: Analysis

Explanation of Order of Titles

Order of Titles (Time toast): The Roommate Opening

Holiday Task: An Analysis of a Teen Film

Order of Titles - Timetoast

Opening title sequence of Pretty In Pink

Order of Titles - Explanation of order of Titles

Explanation for Order of Titles

I have looked at the opening of pretty in pink in order to help me explain the order of titles. The very first shot the audience see is the main production such as Paramount in this case. Following from this the individual productions are then shown for example ' A John Hughes Production'.

Next we see who is starring, the most known/famous actress is shown first or in some cases the actress/actors with the main roles. This is then followed by the title of the film which in other films sometimes come at the end depending on choice. 

After we see the cast, costume designers, make up designers, props and lighting designers, music proposers get mentioned. All the titles have the same amount of screen-time, in this case each title is 3 seconds long.
Finally, editors, production designer, director of photography, executive producer, producer, writer and director get mentioned last usually because it is the main title they want the audience to memory.

Holiday Task

jThe teen movie I have been watching during the holidays was Hungerj jGames and Hunger Games: Catching Fire.j

• The genre of this film is Fantasy and Adventure as well as a bit of Romance.
• It contains and follows the typical genre of a teen film because the issues and themes raised in the film relate to teen life, for example:

These two Gif Images of the left shows that the Hunger Games film contained romance between the characters. This follows a typical genre of a teen film as love and relationships are common themes used in the storyline of a teen film. The effect of this is to attract the female teen audience as it is a sweet and feminine storyline.

In this film, romance is also used to make them question who the main character (Katniss) really loves.

The two Gif Images placed on the right illustrates that the film also contains friendship. Friendship is always essential in a teen film as it motivates the main character to find the solution to the 'problem' or  'dilemma' in the film. In this case, Katniss makes new friends to help her survive in the new challenge she has to face.

The theme of siblings is also used in the film. Sometimes it can be sibling rivalry where they both fight for popularity and among their household and their parents to favour them more. in this case, the older sister (Katniss) cares about her little sister's (Prim's) wellbeing, health and safety. Again this is common in teen storylines as older siblings can tend to get worried over their younger sibling.  

Peer Pressure is also shown in this film (Gif Image on the bottom right). Peer pressure is common in teen films and the plots caused by peer pressure varies (drugs, alcohol, sex, education, earning money, gaining popularity). In the film, Katniss is pressured by President Snow to be in a relationship and not side with the civilians.

Despite the themes used in the movie, the location does not fit in with the typical genre of a teen film as it is not set in high school. This is because it is a fantasy film, therefore the setting used are all made up and are not based on reality, e.g the Districts  they use instead of towns and at one point in the film they are in a  forest, where the characters have to complete a difficult challenge. Again this is not like a typical teen movie as we do not have to face the same hardships that  the characters in The Hunger Games have to do in order to survive.

Weird Science: Stereotypes

Representation Task: Identification of Stereotypes in Teen Films

Genre & Convention

Shot By Shot Remake Task

Task - we are going re-hoot the opening of the film The Breakfast Club. we will need to make a digital storyboard which conveys shots of the re-makes of the breakfast club which we will be featuring in.

At the beginning of the scene the audience captures the setting which is a high school. We also see cars lined up against the pavement therefore showing us the five main characters.

The first character that we see is stereotyped as the princess due to the fact shes in a BMW car who is wearing attractive clothing and also a shopping bag which indicates the has the money to look good.  

The second character is shown as the ''Athlete'' we see him wearing sporty clothing, addressing to the viewers that he's a jock and possibly the popular guy in the group. He arrives in a car, with his dad, who's interested in about scholarships to do with sport as well that, the car looks like a jeep, indicating a more sports-like personality.

The third character is known as ''The Brain'' straight away we can tell he's the smart one out of the group, he arrives in a car, which is small compared to the others. There is not that much difference while comparing the cars as they look similar. The mise en scene with him in the car is that he's shown with his younger sister and mother. Clearly we can tell that the mother is very disappointed in him, as she thinks it'll ruin his career and life choices. From this scene, the audience may think that he's raised by a single mother- as they are all relying on him.

The fourth character that we see is known as the ''Basketcase'' We simply see her walking out of the car, which the parent then drives off without saying anything. This could mean that she may feel neglected, which them moves on to her being the weirdo kid.

The fine character we see is known as the ''Criminal'' Judging my the name we can tell that he's a criminal, or the mischievous kid. He however walks, it m,ay be that he doesn't have the financial parts to come by bus or car.

So four of the pupils come by car whilst one of them walks. It''s set outside the school, which then moves inside the school.

Travelling and Arriving Blog Task: Donnie Darko

Donnie Darko Blogging Task

Location and Mise en scene
Druing the opening a number of locations is used such as the school hallway, the outside school surrounding area, the school court yard and the classroom. These locations are the typical conventions used in teen movies related with school life. The costumes creates the difference between the student and the teachers as the students wear the typical white shirt to school whereas the teachers tend to dress in dark dull clothing.

The outside school Surrounding area

The school hallway

The school court-yard

The Classrooom

Editing and cameras:

From the start we see a tilted position of the school bus in which the characters come out of. This may be used to show disorientation and also gives the setting a funky look.

  We then get to see a wide shot, showing the school, which shows us the main setting. 

When we get introduced to the charceters, the camera speeds up before slowing down, as we get to see the charcter in mpre depth. This shows us more about the charcter and gives them more screen time as well as expressing to the viewers that they are the main charcters.

This is an example of a three shot, which is a mid close up shot of three the students. We can aslot see the way in which the students act around each other, some look mean etc. Their chracters are designed around the way in which they act, which the camera work and editing strongly conveys.

When we see a new character, the camera does a quick rapid pan, making it look more experimental and also gives a audience eye level view. It's shot at eye level- POV shot.  This shot happens through out the clip, we're like the camera. Slow motion is used several time, to help keep time on focus as well as speeding up. We see speeding up as it is used to condense time, for example:

The background characters are speeded up as the main charcter is on focus, giveing more depth within the main chracter.

Order of titles- Explanation of order of titles

Explanation of order of title: 

To explain the way titles are represented, I've looked at the opening scene of Juno.

The very first thing the audience see's is the first indent- The main production of the film, for example; Columbia, DreamWorks, Fox Searchlight, Paramount, Universal, DC Comics, LionGate. 

After this, individual companies that promote the film such as ''A Jason Reitman Film'' There are many of these small companies that give/contribute to the main institutuon for the film. 

A few seconds go past, we start to see new characters form, it's always the main actors/acress which name comes first. After that, we manage to see the rest/major actors/actresses which are featured in the film. These actors that are shown first in the titles may present how much money they get; Higher paid wages. Also, when titles such as ''AND...'' Tell us that they may only feature less in the film, but are really well known so they also get paid a lot.

Straight after we see the cast, costume designers, make up designers, props and lighting designers, music proposers get mentioned. However, they are there for a few seconds- getting less noticed.

Finally, Film editors, production designer, director of photography, execuative producer, producer, writer and director get mentioned last, before the film actually begins.