Directions Unit- Finished video

Here is my finished 4 minute film; "A Journey Through Freedom."

Directions Unit- Director's Statement

Directors Statement

Directions Unit- Casting Decisions and Characters

Below is an outline of some of the characters that appear in my 4 minute film "A Journey Through Freedom" as well as a brief discussion about why I selected each actor/actress to play their particular parts.

Andy Cox

Andy Cox plays my main character. The main character is a citizen in a world which has been taken over by the evil Kayge Corporation. He is a member of a rebellious group of individuals whose goal is to bring down the corporation and win back their freedom.
Andy's goal throughout the film is to meet with an insider at the Kayge Corporation and collect a set of blueprints to one of the organization's buildings. Although I don't explore the reason as to why Andy wants these blueprints, it is safe to assume it is to organize some sort of attack on the building to bring the corporation down.
There are several reasons as to why I chose to cast Andy as the lead role in my film. Firstly, I have seen Andy perform in other films whilst I have been on this TV Production  Course, and so I know he has the ability to act and pull off a character. Also, since I have become familiar with his work ethics, and since I can almost constantly keep in contact with him, it would not be hard for me to get a hold of him for re-shoots or to record voice-overs, and I know he is unlikely to no-show a shooting day or back out of the production last minute- something I have seen happen with some of the other students on my course.

Chris Sarmiento

Chris Sarmiento plays the insider at the Kayge Corporation. The insider is a very enigmatic, mysterious character, and since he dresses differently to the citizens that live in the world (none of them wear a suit) and since he is obviously a member of the Corporation, Andy is at first intimidated by him, and is not sure whether or not to trust him.
Chris' character delivers the Kayge building blueprints to Andy and then leaves.
I chose Chris to play this role, as like Andy- I have seen him act on camera before, and I knew straight away that he would be a suitable person to play the character I wanted to show on screen. Chris also has a very good work ethic, and I have never known him to no-show a shoot or back out. He has been very helpful on shoots in the past and always has advice to offer, and thus was a valuable asset to have on the shoot.

Sam Mckeown

Sam Mckeown plays another member of the Kayge Corporation, however unlike Chris- Sam plays a character that is fully dedicated to the corporation, and isn't an insider at all. Sam's character is introduced from the other side of a 2 way mirror, and is shown to be watching Andy's character as he washes his face after not long waking up.
Sam's attire was based off the typical "Corporate Man", which fits fantastically with the kind of character I wanted him to play in my film.




Aimee Saunders

Aimee plays another member of the corporation. Much like Sam, she is not an insider, and is fully dedicated to doing the work that the company gives her. When she is briefly introduced in my film, she is overseeing Andy and Roxanne leaving the flats.
I have never seen Aimee act in any films before, but since the role I wanted her to play required her to simply oversee the other character's leaving the home, she simply had to stand there and watch.
I had Aimee wear smart clothing for this role to reflect the fact that she was a part of the Corporation.








Roxanne Meats

Roxanne plays another citizen, much like Andy. I had her wear the same kind of white shirt as Andy to reflect that she was very much like him. When she is introduced, she is walking by Andy, and he follows while Aimee oversees.
Much like Aimee she does not have much experience with acting in films, but i did not think this was particularly important for this role, as Roxanne's job was to simply walk from one side of the scene to the other.

Directions Unit- Editing Process and Sound Choice

Something I have noticed about my film is that I have not used much non-diegetic sound at all. In a way I feel that this adds something to the film. Since my film is supposed to be set in a gritty futuristic world, I feel that the addition of music would simply hinder the product, making it look too manufactured and controlled, as opposed to what is supposed to look like an "insight" into the life of one of this futuristic world's citizens.

With this in mind, I have mostly used diegetic sound and simple eerie non-diegetic sounds in my film, and kept the use of music to an absolute minimum.

Directions Unit- A Journey Through Freedom ROUGH CUT

Here I will discuss a very rough cut of my film "A Journey Through Freedom".


As I mentioned, this is a very rough cut of my film, and so it won't won't be neccessary to discuss colour correction and stabilization and such here, as I have yet to apply these effects.
In my film, I wanted to evoke a sense of insecurity and loneliness in some scenes. I did this by making sure to film in very cold-looking areas where whites, blues and grays were the strongest colours. Costume design also played a part in this, as I gave Andy a bright white shirt to wear in all his scenes. White is of course one of the crispest, coldest looking colours, and in some scenes, Andy in his shirt blends into the background, particularly the stairwell scene where the walls are white.

 Something I could do to vastly increase the sense of coldness in the editing process is by applying colour filters and increasing the brightness or exposure to levels which slightly distort the image. I would have to be careful with this however, as there is a possibility the image may become washed-out and look strange when played on larger screens.

The above image is highlights one of the problems I came across during some of my film shoots. As you can see, the image  looks incredibly dark, which under some circumstances would be quite effective, but for this particular scene, it was not. In the scene Andy (The Main Character) passes a new character played by Aimee. Aimee's character is supposed to be a part of the dictatorship that has taken over the city and is overseeing Andy's character moving from his home to a different location.

I wanted to show that Aimee was a part of this dictatorship by having her wear clothes that were different to the clothes worn by other characters in the film. Therefore she wears a very smart blaizer, which contrasts greatly to Andy's and Roxanne's (another character that appears in this scene briefly) plain white shirts.

However, due to the brightness settings of the camera I was using at the time, Aimee can hardly be seen, and what she is wearing cannot really be identified either. This is something I can attempt to fix in editing through adjusting the brightness and contrast and such, but this may cause the image quality to drop a lot, and so I will have to take this into account when deciding what to do with this particular clip.

Directions Unit- Colour Scheme, tone and mood explaination.

During the filming and editing process of my film, I have been carefully studying the overall colour scheme and style of my own film, and trying to come up with a suitable style for each particular scene, in order to evoke a particular set of emotions.
Firstly in the main character's home, I wanted to use a dark, yet warm colour scheme. I hoped this would create a sense of coziness or safety, which is of course the kind of feeling one would expect when being inside their home. I did this by using low level lighting when actually filming the scenes, as well as adding colour filters and more during the editing process. There is an example here:

In contrast to this aforementioned sense of safety I wanted to present, I also wanted to create an atmosphere in other scenes which would make the viewer feel uncomfortable and make it seem as though the area in which the character's congregated would be cold, unsafe and a generally unpleasant place to be. Some examples of ways in which I achieved this include filming in outdoor areas which would cause bright colours in the shots to appear washed out and "dreamy" and also by applying cold colour filters in Final Cut Pro.

It also helped to film in areas where there was a lot of white and light grey back-drops and things to make the area look as sterile and uncomfortable as possible.

Directions Unit- Difficulties during filming. (And fixes.)

Yesterday was the 3rd shoot for my film "A Journey Through Freedom." Although I am confident that I will be able to complete all my work on time, I did come across quite a few problems during the filming process which I had to overcome.
Firstly, my original idea for the scene in which I wanted to film at the Maidstone Television Studios was that I wanted the scene to be filmed in a corridor close to one of the studios. The corridor itself was perfect for the shots I had in mind, as they are bright white and look very sterile, which was what I wanted for this particular scene. When I went to film the scene however with my actors Chris and Andy, I found that the corridors were locked and inaccessible, meaning I would not be able to film there.
I managed to come up with a similar idea however, using a stairwell in the studios that were also bright white. Although I wouldn't be able to pull off some of the shots I really wanted to create in the corridors, I still managed to collect a lot of the visual material I was after.

Another problem I came across during filming, was that the equipment I was using (A Canon 7D with attachable Rhode Mic) didn't seem to record any audio for a lot of the scenes I shot. This could have been avoided had I been viewing the footage as I recorded, and I would have been able to make the appropriate changes to the equipment settings, but since the time has passed for this, I feel that a voice-recording session and some foley work may be able to cut it.
Another problem that occurred during the shoot was the weather. Originally, I wanted to film a scene where Andy's character receives some blue-prints from Chris' character (the package), but since I didn't want to re-use the stairwell set, and since the script we were originally provided with clearly states the package scene takes place in an exterior, I felt it was appropriate to film outside. Outside however- it was raining. This provided quite a few problems.

• Rainwater gathering on the lens, obscuring shots and potentially damaging the equipment beyond repair.
• Inconsistencies with the characters clothing (wet one minute, not so wet the next etc.)
• General uncomfortableness for everyone involved.

Since the costume I provided Andy with was nothing more than a thin-white t-shirt, I am sure he was very cold and uncomfortable during the shooting of this scene.

Andy's costume.

I feel I have learnt a lot about problems that could occur during shoots in this stage of the project, and I feel that I will become a much better film-maker because of it, and take a lot more care and precaution at checking I have all the footage that I wanted to collect in future shoots.

Directions Unit: Filming and Editing

Yesterday was the first day I began the filming of my own film; A Journey Through Freedom. I thoroughly enjoyed the film shoot, and found that a lot of the crew and actors had some fantastic ideas and imput to make my film better. Some difficulties I came across however was the fact that the weather outside was abysmal, and so I could not film the outdoor scenes that I wanted to film.
Another problem I came across was the fact that we were tied down by time constraints. A lot of the crew and cast I used for this film also had to create films of their own, and so they couldn't stay long for the shoot. This means that we were rushing slightly, and I suppose it is possible my rushing may have affected the quality of the film somewhat.
Today I began the process of editing my film, which I find to be the most exciting and rewarding part of the entire film creation process.
A lot of the editing I have done today is simply sorting my footage out in final cut pro, ordering them so I know which clips are missing and which material is useless or needs to be re-filmed. Luckily, a lot of the footage is usable, but there are one of two inconsistencies with my film, such as the position of characters or props, which I did not notice at the time of filming. I have done my best to hide these faults however.
The editing process has also allowed me to see what resources I still need to collect for the actual editing, such as transitions and also possibly titles which will be used at the start and end of the film.

With the deadline for this project fast approaching, I hope to have my filming finished in the next few days, and hopefully my directors statement and the films editing will be completed before the Monday deadline.

Directions Unit: Experience in Acting and Crew.

Recently I have been assisting a lot of my class-mates in their film shoots. I have done this on multiple occasions in the fast, and acting is something that is fast becoming one of my favorite things to do. I have also found that it has made me a much better director than I used to be, as I can relate more to what my actors and crew members have to deal with when it comes to doing their jobs.
Below are just a few photographs of some of the sets I have worked on, each featuring the respective crews and directors.

I have found every shoot to be a new experience, and despite each director using the same script for each of their films, I have found that each one interprets the script in a completely different way, allowing me to experience playing a brand new role in a brand new creative world- while using the same lines and situations that I have for every other film I have been in or worked on.

On a related subject, today's shoot will be the 16th film I have acted in since beginning this broadcast media course in September of 2013.

Directions Unit: Gathering Props

I have learnt from my previous experiences (in both a directing and acting capacity) that it can be extremely frustrating when the day of a shoot arrives, and there is an essential prop missing, or there is still work to be done on a prop or costume. As such, I have taken it upon myself to begin creating and crafting my props a long time ahead of my shoot so that I have plenty of time on the day of the shoot to focus purely on the directing side of things, and so I am not rushing around.

The identical shirts that the main character and the "prisoners" will be wearing.

The above photograph shows some shirts of varying sizes I have purchased which will be worn by quite a few of the characters, as well as the main character. I decided each shirt will be branded with a certain number, much like prison uniforms, and so I also had to purchase an appropriate fabric pen.

A close-up of a practice with the fabric pens on an old shirt of similar material.

Personally, I do not like the way the fabric pens make the figures look on the shirt, and that is probably because they were only cheap pens. However, I am hoping that they will appear fine on camera. This is of course also only a practice- the actual numbers on the final shirts will be much bolder and thicker.

This large piece of paper I purchased will be an essential prop in my telling of "A Journey Through Freedom." Although in the image I have not begun work on it yet, the final prop will be of a large blue-print floor-plan of a building. This will also be the "package" that the character is given by the mysterious character they meet in the film. Originally I wanted the blue-print to literally be a blue piece of paper with white writing and pictures on, but because the store I visited did not sell paper in blue, I had to settle for white.

Directions Unit- Propaganda Poster Props.

In my 4 minute film, I want to convey the sense of the government or law enforcement using subliminal (and not so subliminal) messaging and advertising in order to control and brainwash the world's inhabitants into living exactly the way they want them to.
A way in which I want to reflect this fact is by inserting several poster designs throughout the film. These posters will be placed in backgrounds outside, and even in the character's home. In order to create realistic, glossy-looking posters, something I can consider is getting them professionally printed at a print-shop or ordering prints of them online.
This will of course depend on the price that the posters will cost, and what size I require.

I will be creating my own poster designs using Adobe Photoshop, but here are some examples of some of the designs I want to create:

Directions Unit: Stanley Kubrick and The Shining.

In a previous blog entry, I wrote extensively about a particular shot I wanted to film for my 4 minute piece "A Journey Through Freedom." The shot itself was about the camera "passing through" the wall of a particular set, and appearing on the otherside, revealing that there was a large room equipped with a video camera behind what appeared to be a normal bathroom mirror.

It just so happens that by chance, I was watching the classic Stanley Kubrick film "The Shining" with a fellow classmate, and came across a particular shot that mirrors what I am after exactly.

Please forgive the quality of the video.

Although I will definitely not be able to pull off the kind of shot Kubrick managed to, since the sides of the wall the camera begins and ends with in my film will not be in the same set, this video gives a very good idea of the kind of effect I am after with the reveal of the 2-way mirror.

Discovering this shot has made me realize that Stanley Kubrick has used a lot of the kind of shots in his films that I would like to use in my own, and so I think it would be a very good idea for me to watch some more of the Kubrick films, such as "A Space Oddessey" and "A Clockwork Orange" to see if these films give me any more ideas about how I would like to shoot my own film.