Genre Research Powerpoint

For this powerpoint/project we researched common aspects of different movie genres. My groups specific genre to research was Musicals. Musicals like movie musicals not theater musicals like that. As a main example for our genre High School Musical and that's what we based our common features of a musical on. We looked at things like camera angles and movement for example. We also took a look at stuff that makes the scenery like common mis en scene and lighting. The project was taken as a group so we decided to split it up among the four of us each taking 3-4 slides. The last feature we placed on our project was add music to create emphasis.  

Genre Research Movie Opening Scene

For my movie which I've chosen a stalker story that will portray a sense of scaredness and suspension. I decided I want to go with a Horror genre to open my movie as I feel like it will entice viewers the best. Using something like a romance or a comedy wouldn't entice viewers as easily and quickly. Horror is a genre in which I can easily come up with new concepts to chance, replace or add into my opening sequence. Whilst many other genres must be carefully thought out before they are able to film them. Like action, comedy, romance, musicals, country etc. I also feel that with the horror aspect I can leave where’s wanting more creating suspension.

Genre Research 2 New Genres

A very common genre that has been becoming more popular lately is Horror. A horror film is a film that seeks to elicit fear for entertainment purposes. It was initially inspired by literature from authors like Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker, and Mary Shelley, horror has existed as a film genre for more than a century. Common camera angles in horror include: Close up’s in these types of genres are used to see reactions on the actor/actresses face. Tilt shots add a lot of dramatic tension to shots, and could simplify a supernatural being, for example, pushing or moving the camera. Low angle shots are very powerful in the way they can emphasize just how scary or intimidating a villain is. This shot is taken from the point of view of the character. Mise En Scene: Typically, in horror films, the setting is in a dark, rural location or somewhere deserted where nobody would be. Most places are abandoned and isolated. This creates a mystery and suspicion throughout the film. Common Editing: Common transitions that are used within horror trailers are usually fade to black and straight cuts. Fading to black gives the trailer a mysterious and tense feel and may make the audience feel at unease. They suggest fear of the unknown giving the audience what they may experience in the film and tell them not everything is right, even when it seems to be. Straight cuts are very basic but allow for fast paced shots and potentially jump scares. On the following slides are trailers that feature the fade to black transition effectively. Elements: Mystery, Imagination, Suspense, and Fear. Examples of Horror Movies are, It, Us, Get Out, Doctor Sleep, Ready or Not etc.

Another common genre is similar to Horror is Thriller. Thriller is a genre of fiction, having numerous, often overlapping subgenres. Thrillers are characterized and defined by the moods they elicit, giving viewers heightened feelings of suspense, excitement, surprise, anticipation and anxiety. Successful examples of thrillers are the films of Alfred Hitchcock. Common Camera Angles of Thrillers are: Close up and extreme close ups, High angle shots, Low angle shots, Canted angles, Wide shot, Panning shots. Mise en Scene: Weapons are one of the most common props in thrillers as there is usually a fight scene between the antagonist and the protagonist. Weapons convey danger and violence and so are commonly used to create tension and suspense in scenes. Common Editing: fast and slow paced editing in their films. This is very good at creating suspense, tension and also conveying emotions and/or representing characters. Most commonly, thrillers use fast and slow paced editing specifically to create suspense and tension within a scene. Elements: uses suspense, tension and excitement as its main elements. Thrillers heavily stimulate the viewers moods giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra- heightened expectation, uncertainty, surprise, anxiety and terror. Examples: The Dark Knight, Heat, Speed, Dirty Harry, The Rock Action etc.

Picking my Movie Pitch

For this project I have noted my three ideas for my movie down to two. Those being the stalker one and the love story gone wrong. I feel that even thought my top two are somewhat generic the murder mystery is something everybody can come up with quickly. I want to take my own spin on the stalker and love story gone wrong and already have ideas for how to do them. Other than the murder mystery being more generic it seems as thought that’s what’s portrayed now in large movie studios. Someone dies, police investigate, person continues to kill, series of movies is made. For example, the Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and evening It series are all movies that fit into murder mystery “ways”. Of course they all include some stalking and the stereotype movie murderer identity but it’s all about killing and creeping. With my two topics I want to stray as far away as possible from that stuff which is why I chose them and why I feel they will be the best fri for me as a director, producer, editor etc. as well as the fact that I already have a vision for how I could film those helps greatly. 

My first of the two options is a stalker type thriller movie. I want it to be more of a kidnapping stalker than just someone being watched. I want the viewer to be left hanging with suspense at the end of the two minutes I have. I feel this is very important especially with the type of movie that I am making because if you can’t entice the viewers and leave them wanting more then you’re not setting a good precedent for the possible rest of your movie. I see ways in which this could go wrong as there are t.v shows/ series like the Netflix Original YOU and other shows that are similar but in the ways that I want to put my own twist on it per se I think I can make it less generic than most movies of the sort. Knowing the ways in which my plan could downfall plays very well in my favor because it gives me a basis on what to think about when i’m filming and casting. It shows that I am aware of what could potentially go wrong and gives me the opportunity to fix my mistakes before I make them. This also goes for my other idea and contributed to my decision when I pick which of the two I want to do for my project. 

My second idea for my final project was a love story gone wrong. This would be more of a couple that’s deeply in love and one beginning to get distant whilst the other one begins to notice but doesn’t understand why. The one getting distant is starting to scare the other in ways in which they threaten to leave etc. However what the threatened one doesn’t realize is that these are all tactics into getting them to stay. This toxic relationship has gone downhill fast and is not boding well for one of them. In the end of my two minutes I want to show a passage of time from happy to sad in the couple. Leaving them on a cliffhanger of what’s to happen next as one of them is dragged away. We don’t know exactly what happened but if the movie was to continue it would start from the beginning of their story and all of the events that lead to the toxicity. 

After deliberating and finding different ways to portray each idea I have decided that I want to go with the stalker story. I see how both my ideas are possibly in portraying and i fell like I have a sold basis for both. However, the stalker one I have more of a vision of it in my head. I am already thinking of locations in which I want to film and the people I want to include that could act out the story the wya I want it to come across. I am very hopeful for the near future of how my project will go and hope this analysis works with he for the better and not for the worse. 

Start of Final Task

For this project, where we are working on the first two minutes of an original movie, I have decided to work alone. I chose not to work with a group because I find myself as a worker who likes to have full on control and don't want my ideas being questioned by other in a group. I am scared of the amount of workload in which I am going to have to handle myself but I am confident I will be able to portray what I want without hesitation and reliance on others. I do doubt myself in a few factors of getting everything done in a timely manner as well as not procrastinating. However, with the way in which I want to film and get everything done I'm sure I will be able to manage my time wisely. I see myself as a hard independent worker but I do have my downfall in some areas which it a worries me splitting from my group. I chose to split because on my past projects we never truly worked together and I as well as my other partner Macy were left with majority of the decisions and workload. Therefore, if I could handle it before I feel as thought I'll be able to handle it now.

Throughout my journey working and creating other projects like a commercial and a music video I feel like I've learned how to work with a camera to portray what I want and how to manage editing studios. For filming, instead of using the school issued camera and tripod I've been working and filming on my phone. Doing this has made it easier for me to film in some ways but also harder in others. I've learned that tilting the camera and moving different ways can express different types of scenery and events. However, it makes it harder to do tracking shots and moving ones because you don't have much of a sturdy base as you yourself are holding the camera. For now thought I am excited to see how I will handle working and editing on my own and the ways in which ill be able to direct others.

A pitch is a Hollywood term used to describe an idea where a film is encapsulated in 25 words or less. Usually said in once sentence and often referred to as an elevator pitch since they're commonly short and entice the listener very quickly. For me I want to work on some horror or thriller themes that are easy enough to work with and can entice an audience quickly. They also are easy to work with as you can leave anybody hung up with some suspense. I have three ideas/ topics that I think I could work with and portray really well. The first one is a murder mystery where a murder has been committed in town and the murderer is lurking around looking for its next victim and you don't n]know who exactly the murderer is while investigation is looking for him/her. My next idea is a love story gone wrong, two lovers, one gone insane goes on a hunt to kill the other. You follow the murderous one on their journey to find the other and kill him/her. Lastly, a stalker following and kidnapping its prey. The victim is just walking home from clubbing one night and suddenly gets kidnapped by the towns most unexpected person. You'd think everything could be fine but it turn nasty pretty quick.

Editing Blog Music Video

For the editing process of this music video my group and I encountered some problems but found it to be a lot smoother than last time. Some of the major things that we faced was not having the content. When we went out to film we thought we shot a lot of good clips that could be very usable for the music video itself. However, all of the usable footage that portrayed the storyline that we wanted only sufficed for 36 seconds of the music video. we also found that a lot of the footage we had was very similar. Most of it was either pans or scenic shots. We still were able to manage with some of the footage we had and make part of a music video. The editing process for us was a little confusing in the beginning. We began using pinnacle studios but encountered the same problems as last time. Pinnacle studios was running slow and we were not able to work as quickly and efficiently as we wanted. for that reason we decided to use iMovie on our iPhones. Pinnacle studios was not running as we wanted it to and noticed that some of our classmates were using iMovie. iMovie moved and functioned a lot quicker and was a lot easier to use. Inserting different clips and shots blended them together cohesively and with the music. The only problem we encountered using iMovie was that it wouldn’t let us insert an audio file. What we had to do was record our song as a voiceover to have it fit into the music video itself. Pretty much everybody in our group was helping out with the editing and different parts of it. However we found it it was a lot easier for each of us to edit a music video and pick the best out of the four. Overall I can say that this editing process was much easier than the last. As well as I will begin to use different software’s more often. The hardest and most surprising part of our music video editing process was figuring out the order of our clips. We did have an order set in mind already, however when we put them all together it did not look cohesive. We spent a good 45 minutes deciding on what order to put everything in from scenic shots two shots that portrayed our storyline. We also found it a little bit hard editing as we didn’t have all the footage we needed. We clearly did not get to finish our music video the day that we edited. We obviously need to go back out to film a couple extra shots. As well as our very conscious that we need a good 30 to 40 more seconds of usable footage that will work with our story.

Music Video Filming pt.2

Due to the fact that our last attempt at filming and plan we made didn't happen within our group we clearly had to turn to something new. For that reason we decided to take our thanksgiving break and turn it into filming time. Throughout all of break we made sure to film most if not all of our music video. We do know there is one little clip we have left to film but want to place it into the end of the video so are not too worried about getting that finished. Anyways we filmed over the course of 5 days and got a good minute- 2 minutes of footage. we wanted tot make sure we got as much footage as possible because we wanted to have room to edit. Our entire filming process began around 3 and ended at around sunsets so 5-6 ish. We went to the beach nearest to all of us with a pier and everything we wanted to include in our video. For example, good view of the sunset and lighting. A few little shops and a small routes where we could take car and turn shots. We had a few people star in out video, bu mostly just two as our main characters. We chose to make a love story as our song was titled sunset love. The song was instrumental so it gave us some leeway in our creativity and ideas on how to develop a story. We had a girl, Kelly, and a guy, Sam star as our two "lovers". Kelly was a sister of one of our group mates and sam was just a friend. At first we were gong to make this a 2 woman romance but ended up changing last minute. Either way we got most of the footage and were able to portray the love story we wanted through the shots and clips we took. My ob in the filming process was filming and taking some shots along with my group mate Macy. Her and i took different shots and angles of the same scene to see which would fit better and look more cohesive with our story line. we wanted to ensure that all the footage we to, once placed together looked smooth and good. Therefore ensuring we got a different perspectives of the same thing would work best. I also made sure that everything in the car shots we used was safe and god to use. As well as made sure anybody in the void was ok with it and was aware of what exactly we were filming and why. My group and I wanted to make sure that everything we were doing wa legal and fell impart with our story. Everything we filmed did fit into the requirements for our video and made sense when put together with added sounds, music, and etc.