The Importance Of Education

                      Equipping Myself In Knowing Of Tools I Will Use In Production

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This week has been all about equipping myself with knowledge of the tools I will need to use in order to produce my film. These tools would include Premiere Pro for editing and the camera (Techniques)(although not decided which type of camera I will use yet).


I have been doing workshops with Adrian Butterworth where we have been using Premiere Pro and have been working closely with him and had received great positive feedback from him in the workshop for my ideas of how to Photoshop out objects and my insights on what areas of a picture I should be aware of when performing colour correction.


I feel that colour correction is important as not every shot is going to originally look decent and presentable. Things can go wrong with the shot like it could be very bright on the day when you are trying to create a dark and more dull atmosphere so therefore I would film the scene and then colour tone it down and maybe add rain and mild thunder sound effects to the scene to make the audience feel the intended impression of what the scene was meant to be like.


We have done some masking and replacing with imported photo versions of the scene from photo shop, colour tone correcting, identifying colour faults and general editing, cutting, copy and pasting whilst familiarizing myself with the shortcuts such as I and O for setting left and right locators for selecting a certain piece of the footage for editing. I have been looking into this further by studying a YouTube tutorial for Premiere Pro colour correcting and colour grading which can be found at the end of this post in the reference section.


Steven Spielberg is a remarkable director as far as the world of cinema is concerned and I have been working on understanding his vision of how he sees stories and films and how he draws deep emotions into the hearts of his audiences. This source shows the studies of Spielberg I have been investing in doing my studies towards producing my film.


Spielberg enjoys moving the camera and often moves it as the composer plays the music or a choreographer arranges a dance. Although he may have actors deliver dialogue he also likes to show and explain things with a visual representation for the audience. Steven Spielberg's camera use does not so much observe the scene but rather it interacts with and gather its details.


I feel that I will start deciding on which objects I will use to show and tell my story visually. I may use the character isolated with only a care free animal around which he can use to show his affection to and express his loneliness to show that no one understands him or is on his side anymore to the point where his only temporary companionship comes from an animal.

I am writing my script the way that even if the audio is turned off, the audience will be still able to understand what is going on in the story. This technique was used by Charlie Chaplin to great extent in his movies as most of the story was told through the use of mime acting. I have included a scene which is typical of the style of Charlie Chaplin's mime story telling at the end of this post in the references.


Harvard References

Steven Spielberg's techniques and themes, 2012, 'Steven Benedict, [Video File], [Online], Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uCBYFHRHU0 [Accessed on 25,11,2015] 



Premiere pro tutorials - COLOR CORRECTING and COLOR GRADING - Part 1, 2012, 'Tara arts movie', [Video File], [Online], Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WozBxv9RnY [Accessed on 25,11,2015]

Charlie Chaplin - The Lion's Cage, 2011, 'JoseMonkeys', [Video File], [Online], Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpjEyBKSfJQ [Accessed 25,11,2015] 

                         The Importance Of Education - Casting and Location Decisions

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In continuation with my project I have been location scouting for interesting scenery and have come upon the idea of choosing the new forest as one of my locations as I believe I will be able to film great forest based scenery which will contribute nicely to the idea I have of using the trees as the visual representation of the obstacles of the students confusion and life. In other words, the boy trying to find his way through the woods is a lot like how it works in life when you are trying to find your way to light which in this case is the sun as in the sunshine through the trees.


I have also decided to use areas within the University provided I can get the filming permissions approved for it. I am thinking that the University entrance would be good for the in depth conversation that I want the student character to have with his love interest 'Holly' in the story.


I have been talking to several actresses and auditioning them for the role of this character. Casting is a big part I am working towards right now and I hope to also find a male actor to play the role of the guy who steals the students love interest away from him as the leading antagonist which makes the student start to question the motives of people around him as the antagonist is originally supposed to be the student's main friend which will ultimately become his worst enemy.


So far I am auditioning Char Frost and Becca Hyland and finding which characters would best suit them for this film.The places I search for actors are Star Now and Casting Call Pro and sometimes just typically searching my local area on the internet search engines like google and the word 'actors' or 'actresses'. My ultimate goal at the moment would be to define a script that features all the dialogue that I want to use in the film, a shot list, cast list, decide on all the locations I will use and get permissions for filming on the locations I choose.

                           The Importance Of Education - Pre-Production Stage

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It has come to the point where I am preparing my project for the actual production and therefore producing of the content stage. In doing so I have been attending Script Writing workshops with Resh Somauroo to refresh my mind about the concepts and structures that we should when writing a script.

An example of this would be how the story is laid out where you would have the opening where everything is normal then the problem area which is the middle and then finally the conclusion at the end where we learn the lesson and moral that the film was trying to pass on if any.


I was advised to attend a script clinic where I was asked to produce rough draft of my script which I have now completed and will be sending to them to get it tweaked and they can provide me with advice and guidance on how to improve my use of dialogue and other aspects of the story.



As far as workshops go I have been also attending the editing workshops with Adrian Butterworth who has given us a great inside look at using Premiere Pro and the tools we can use when it comes to editing our film. These would include 'White balance, title screens, colour correction, trim and pasting and matching bit rates.


I have been practicing with Premiere Pro with default footage from the teaching materials to get used to the system of how to edit using this software so that I can do a profession edit when it comes to my own project.



In the following workshops I hope to list the areas in which I feel I need to improve with so that I can go through them with Adrian and simply get trained in those areas. I have taken upon myself to also attend Guy Montrose's camera workshops optionally to gain extra knowledge about camera works and safety of equipment along with the techniques that can be used when creating motion picture.

                      The Importance of Education - Post 6: Sources for Inspiration


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This week I have come to terms with a bunch of great sources that I would use to do my research from in order for me to produce my film more professionally. I have looked into the mechanics of what I would need to learn in order to produce my film and have scheduled different sections of the production that I would need to study and perform research upon.


These being movie composers who style I feel would influence me when it comes to writing and composing the music score for my film and also how to produce music using editing software s in general which I have experience with but I am using this as a chance to refresh my knowledge of it.


I would also look into the filming techniques used by one of my favourite auteur directors 'Steven Spielberg' and Time management tools along with educating myself in ideas of how to write screenplays.


I have found that the film 'Educating Rita' would also be a great influence to base my film on as it supports and shows how the neglecting an education can negatively shape a life as Julie Walters character Rita is tired of living with her abusive boyfriend in a down and out life style and decides she deserves more out of life.


Hans Zimmer and John Barry are music composers whose music are not only just well known by many but their music has the ability to fit with most films which is easy to see why as the music has such dramatic composition of the instruments. I will study Hans Zimmers and John Barry more closely in the coming week and will begin deciding how my shots will look in the actual production.

                         The Importance Of Education Post 5 - Music Score

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In order to produce a music score that would best contribute to the motivational film I am creating, I felt that nothing makes people feel the importance of the message being told in my film better than making them feel emotions and the best way I felt to achieve this would be through the use of the visual elements being both dramatic and somewhat emotional along with a music score that makes the audience feel great emotions from sadness, despair, triumph, hope and relief.

I will take the audience on an emotional roller coaster but will free them at the end by showing how things can be reversed and corrected in order to get back on track in life. The music score artists I have been listening to and paying close focus on are 'John Barry' for his great use of emotional composition movie score music as heard in the soundtrack 'Born Free' as he makes fantastic use of brass and strings playing dramatic melodies designed to make the listener feel drawn in to the conclusion.

I also have chosen John Williams musical scores because he is a composer who I feel brings a great triumphant movie score themes to movies such as 'Saving Private Ryan - Hymn To The Fallen'. I personally love the uplifting strings and use of trumpet which I have come to symbolise as the instrument of triumph in my own personal opinion as it plays a very conclusion based sound, similar to the themes they play when they spread ashes at sea as a sign of respect for brave men who were killed in battle or war.

This combination is beautiful because it shows the two types of movie music I wish to make which are 'Sorrowful but also triumphant' which I believe is in sync and symbolises the message of ''Things may go bad but they can get better in time if you work and stay focused and most importantly, never give up''.  I will be looking into purchasing software in which I can create ny own film score music this coming week.