Genre Research: Chosen Genre

After researching these three genres, we chose legal drama. The reason why we chose this genre is because we felt that it would be more interesting. Also, we would have more availability to get props and costumes for this film. Legal drama would bring a smart but twisted effect for our audience. We feel that western would be too standard. It is unlikely for us to be able to create a desert looking setting with cowboy hats and guns. For musical, we feel that it wouldn't be that much interesting. We wanted to choose a genre that would have our audience on the edge of their seats. With legal drama as our genre choice, that is sure to happen.

Genre Research: Western and Legal Drama

Genre Research: Musical Genre

This assignment was about explaining what a musical film is. We were given this genre and was told to give examples of camera angles, movements, and shots. Our PowerPoint was to choose pictures and colors that correlated with our genre. 

Since our genre was musical, we used uplifting colors in transitions that would help our PowerPoint pop out, and be more visually appealing. This assignment was to expose us to the fact that there's more to a genre on a film than what is shown on the surface. After this assignment, watching other films and productions made it easy to point out camera movements and angles. I believed the purpose was to do this and it worked. Musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing.

Chosen Pitch

The two pitches that we narrowed the choices down to is 'The Escape Room' and 'Two - Faced'. The reason why we canceled the 'Forbidden Love' pitch is because there is not enough availability for us to film it. It would be too long of a storyline. Even if we tried to fit it in two minutes, it would look very rushed. We also canceled it because Escape Room and Double Deceit would be more interesting approaches, than an African - American and a Caucasian falling in love. Additionally, those approaches have more availability to film. In the next paragraphs, we will explain why.

The first pitch is The Escape Room. This pitch is about a group of people who had their drinks drugged at a party, then they find themselves in a room they must escape from. The storyline that we were going to make for this pitch is how different obstacles are in the room, making it hard for them to escape. What makes it even harder is that the pill that was slipped into their drinks has the ability to impair their thinking. Only one person out of the whole group is going to survive this course. My group and I figured that this would be an interesting film to make. However, there is not enough availability. We would have to make an 'escape room' and all the obstacles to suffice our filming needs.

The second pitch is Double Deceit. This pitch is about a woman who is a lawyer by day and criminal master mind by night. She is defending a woman who is being charged with neglect for the kidnapping of her son. What the woman doesn't know is that her lawyer is the culprit. My group and I decided that this pitch is also a more interesting approach. It also has more availability for us to film. We would be able to incorporate the characters, the plot, and the cliffhanger all in two minutes. We feel that this may be our choice out of both pitches.

The pitch that my group and I decided to choose was Double Deceit. We chose this pitch because we thought that it would be a good way to catch the attention of our audience. There is no proper way to present a cliffhanger, than to have your character playing both sides. We also thought that it had more availability than the other two approaches. It would be easy for us to film a kidnapping, a law type of environment, and more. We feel that the most important part of this two - minute film is to leave the audience on the edge of their seats. Leaving them wondering is exactly what we will achieve by choosing Double Deceit.

Start of Final Task

I know its been awhile and you guys probably already forgot about me. Allow me to re-introduce myself. Hi, I am Janell. Last time you guys heard of me, I was working on filming the music video. By the way, that was a success. My group and I got a B on it. It was definitely a better grade than I expected since we were totally stuck on the editing part. However, it is a new year and I am ready to apply the skills I've learned in the next project we have. As you all know, my group members were Micahia and Jessica. However, we now have an edition to the group, Eric.

Within this half a year, I have learned a lot in this class. For starters, I learned how to blog. Yes, teens of this generations love our phones, but this "blogging" term is not something I did on a regular basis. My teacher has taught me how to structure these paragraphs, and how to get the information to you guys. I also learned how to edit. Believe me, I have not had to edit any type of footage a day in my life. That is until I got into this class. The talent that I am bringing is my writing skills. My group members and I all had talents that we portrayed in the last media projects, but I did most of the writing. Writing gives me a way to express myself and gives others a better understanding of what I have to say. 

A pitch is a term derived from Hollywood that is used to describe an idea of a film. This idea is an idea of the film that is spewed out quickly and simply in 25 words or less. An example of this can include a movie scene where one trying to move their way up in their current job position (an assistant that wants to become team lead), but the boss is too busy to spare more than five minutes of their time. This assistant is on limited time and therefore has to make a pitch that'll hopefully catch the bosses attention. I'm pretty sure we've all seen a movie like this. A recent example is what men want by Adam Shankman. Our 1st pitch: A group of people have their drinks drugged at a party, then they find themselves in a room they have to escape from. 2nd pitch: A Caucasian male and African-American female find themselves in love with eachother and although this isn't the olden days, their love is still forbidden. 3rd pitch: She's a lawyer by day and criminal mastermind by night and she abducted her client's child because she wants to build a family. Only one of these interesting pitches can be the topic of our 2-minute movie. 

Editing Blog

After we filmed on Friday, today in class we edited it our footage. It took a little while to get started because I was being slow, not realizing that I had to get an SD card reader. An SD card reader is what you plug into the computer to access footage on the camera. After I got the SD card reader, I logged into the computer and created a folder. To make sure the footage was not lost, I saved all the footage onto my google drive. I also saved it to my group members drive's. After I had done that, I went back to the folder to review the shots. We had 13 shots in total from our filming. I can admit before I started editing, I got off track laughing at our footages. It got a little challenging as I started to edit though.

In our first shot, it shows us walking up, laughing, and pointing around. I had to try to cut out the ending part to shorten the time. However, I kept cutting out the part that mattered. In the end, I ended up being able to cut the part that needed to be cut and I moved on. I had to delete footage as part of this editing. The shot I deleted was a blooper from one of our scenes. It was funny but we did not need it. For the next shot, I used a split shot, in which there were four boxes. This represents flashbacks of Kelly (the person I'm portraying) thinking about her relationship. It was confusing to get that to work, but I got it.

Moving on, there was another shot that got difficult to cut. In this shot, the guy portraying my boyfriend had to be aggressive with me. He laughed at the ending which is what I had to cut out. Laughing does not show the character of the shot. I cut the wrong parts of the video a few times, but I eventually got it. Throughout the shots, I also added the music. The song is Girl by Destiny Child. It was a little challenging since I had to cut the noise in the background. I managed to get through it all though. Unlike the last project, my group members and I did not use Pinnacle Studios. Another app was used to edit the footage. Our last time filming will be this Saturday.

Filming Blog #2

My group and I got to film on Friday, November 29, 2019. At first, it was a bit of a challenge because we did not know how we would get someone to film the shots that needed to be handheld. However, my group member, Jessica, brung a friend with her to help us. We set up the tripod to create our first shot. This is the shot where we introduce ourselves by walking up to the camera. We had to smile, laugh, and point in directions to make an offguard type of look. It was really awkward since we had people looking at us. Our lighting was the natural sunlight, creating a glowing look on us. The next shot however, was difficult. We had to ask the owner of the establishment to use their tables so we could film.

When we asked, they said no, but we filmed anyway. There was no way we were going to fail this music video. The next shot we did was the shot where my group members had to comfort me, as I am acting as a victim of domestic violence. It took awhile to do because I had to put the hurt and sad look on my face, to pretend like I was crying. However, we eventually got it done. The next shot we did was a challenge also. This shot was where we needed a guy to play my boyfriend, to show evidence of the domestic violence. The guy we originally picked unfortunately could not make it. Luckily, my group member, Micahia, was able to call one of her guy friends to play the role. It was weird since I did not know him, but I had to do what I could.

In the shot, he had to get aggressive with me and grab my shoulders. For a second time, I had to act like I was in pain, to show emotion and meaning. We both yelled in each other's faces to show conflict. The scene was created in a secluded area, against a gray wall. This was to create a discrete type of scenery, like the "I can do what I want since no one is around." The next shot was a representation of the gifts that a guy would give the girl he is abusing so she can stay with him. In the shot, it shows me waiting impatiently for something he's about to give me. It turnd out to be a ring, and I put it on, looking uninterested. This shows how any woman going through this situation is now tired of all that he's put her through, and is thinking about leaving. Because our other scenes are supposed to be created in a home scenery, we have to resume filming next Saturday. It was a productive day of filming and I'm glad we worked everything out, despite the challenges and setbacks.