Creative Critical Reflection

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGhZ2K-4Pgw&nohtml5=False

Final Project!

The Unexpected:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0wD2n7UEx4

The Unexpected.

I have chosen a title! I have decided to call my film opening The unexpected, because there's a handful of elements the film has that are unexpected...especially the ending... I'm very content with the way i'm wrapping up things with my video, I can finally say I DID IT! I created something that to me is not just a project, it's a challenge and these few weeks have made me realize that I really have enjoyed learning about media studies and i'm possibly thinking about creating a future with this because it's something that I love doing and i'm passionate about! But before I start getting ahead of myself, I just wanted to say it has been a wonderful experience and I hope next year ( in AICE Media Studies A level) everything will go as amazing as it did this year. I have truly learned a lot from my teacher and my peers.

I have decided to do a director commentary, I'm going to do a video so you get to know a little about my persona and ill talk all about this journey and how I overcame certain problems, I want to incorporate some footage from the film opening so I can explain some things, as well as some examples of how I got inspired and things i've learned from my project!  I'm going to shoot the video tomorrow after school so I can have time to edit it and add the videos I want to add so everything can be ready before Sunday!

 And so I finish my last post with pride because even though this project has truly been an overly stressing but beautiful experience I wouldn't be happier doing anything else. I hope you enjoy The Unexpected and my critical reflection!

XOXO,

Ivana Diaz

Background Music

Remember when I talked about Purple Planet and how I found the perfect background song? Well yesterday I added it to my video! The track is called "Insidious" and i'm going to reinforce that purple planet is a royalty free music website and that's were I got the song. I love it because it starts off very soft and slow, and it slowly grows into a long sound bridge that will make your skin crawl. It has that high to higher pitch and it gives the video that sense of mystery and "what's going to happen next". In Purple Planet I also found a track called "Hard Trance" which i'm going to use for my flashbacks! For the flashbacks I wanted the music to built up.. and eventually burst in the master shot I have of her and the man.So i'm happy that this track will do the job. I want that shot to key, because that's how she met him and well, that's how she got were she is.

I'm good with time now, I have about 1:56 and i'm leaving it at that. I don't want to change anything so that way I don't mess up the flow of the music in the video. The only thing now is the tittle. I titled my film opening Trapped because she does wake up trapped in the room. But i'm not loving it, So i'm going to give it some thought and see if i can come up with something better. I really want it to represent the film, so it gets stuck to the audience. After all the tittle is the last thing the audience sees of the opening, so I want it to be good.

 Purple planet royalty free music. (n.d.). Retrieved April 06, 2016, from http://www.purple-planet.com/horror/4583971268 

Counting Down!

As this final week approaches, I keep on getting more stressed. I have to edit the video by Thursday so I can start with my critical reflection and I gotta figure out how i'm going to showcase it (podcast, PowerPoint, etc..).

I've shown my peers what I have edited so far and they really like it! I was a little scared that I wouldn't be able to portray the flashbacks in a non-confusing way but I guess what I have done so far has worked! The only thing is I was planning on using the audio from the videos I took at the party but it sounds crappy so i'm crossing that off which sucks because I really liked the ambiance aspect of the sound so I guess I have to look for Diegetic ambiance sound! Another thing I have to see how I can incorporate the credits without interrupting the flow of the video. In my genre the credits usually interrupted the scene and take over one by one or throughout the scene, so I have to figure out a way to do that and make sure it doesn't throw the audience off. 

Something that is also stressing me out is time.. I asked my teacher if we had to make the opening exactly 2 minutes because its not like i'm a long way from 2 minutes but I still have about 20 seconds remaining, and i'm a bit worried about that because I don't want any points off, but i'm not going to let it get to me because I still have to finish editing and add some stuff. I just hope if I finish with time remaining its a minimum of 5 seconds because I really want to take full advantage of the 2 minutes that I have!!

Relieved!

Everything went amazing last night! My actors once again did a really good job and I got really good shots of them, as well as shots of the setting which i'm going to use for my flashbacks! I'm really excited about how the opening is going to turn out, even though my first day of shooting wasn't what I had in mind it came out awesome, and i'm super thrilled on how good the shots I took came out. Now all I have to do is edit, edit and edit my opening and make sure it looks really realistic and gives people chills. I'm just really happy I finished shooting everything I needed, since I want to leave this last week to get everything ready!

Yesterday I looked for more royalty free websites and I came upon Purple Planet, let me tell you, this website is the bomb! I found really good tracks that matched my scene and I'm very excited to use them. As I've mentioned before, I want the non-diegetic sound  to be a really big element of the opening. I also want to put many stings so it can create a built up effect and of course that slow mysteries, creepy track background sound.

Purple Planet Website:

 Purple planet royalty free music. (n.d.). Retrieved April 02, 2016, from http://www.purple-planet.com/horror/4583971268 

Good news!

I am so excited for Friday! My friends and I are invited to a huge sweet 16 party and well what a perfect opportunity to shoot the flashbacks!!! I need to be extremely focused and careful on what i'm going to shoot because obviously after Friday I wont be able to go back in time to shoot any for missing footage or anything like that. Anyways, the reason i'm so hyped is because my dream and vision are coming out perfectly through what I have created so far, and since I in-visioned my main character getting caught by the man at a club.. is a freaking perfect match!

I've been trying and trying to make my background music from scratch BUT its very hard when I just have an iPad. I have Garage Band but it obviously doesn't have all the cool things the computer version has. Today in class we got in groups and discussed our projects for a while, and one of the girls told me about this website called Free Music Archive (FMA) where there's a bunch of royalty free music of every kind and frankly I've been finding some pretty amazing ones. Maybe what ill do is edit it so it can go good with the video and i'll add a personal twist.

So with all of this i'll keep my fingers crossed hoping that everything comes out good on Friday and that I get all I need, let's just hope my actors (...and I) don't get too distracted!

A bit stressed..

So I began to edit about 3 days ago and I realized I need more footage! ugh!! I though I had everything I need it and it didn't take me long to shoot, but after editing, trimming and trimming some more i'm very short on time and I still need to shoot more.. Lets just pray my actors can help me out no later than this week because I really wanted to have at least a week to edit the video. Also something that stressing me out is the transitions. It doesn't look bad but since i'm a little perfectionist I know it can be better and it can come out looking more professional
So far I have decided i'm going to edit the video on my iPad. My computer is very old and I don't want to deal with the video getting deleted or all my editing just disappearing. So i'm going to take it the save way with this one. Some days i'm planning to use the schools computers but i'm just scared that someone will mess with my work if I do get a long way and it will be for nothing. So that's why i'm skeptical about that.
On the bright side, even tho the transitions are okay.. I love love love what I edited so far, it looks creepy and mysteries. I just need sound!! I'm going to look for tutorials on how to make that background music that's always on horror films and if all else fails i'm going to look for non-copyrighted music, to put in my video.

Oh, by the way! Mrs. Stoklosa had us read an article about time management and it really helped! (that's where I got the 2 weeks to edit idea) The article gives you advice on how to manage your time wisely and gives you tips that can lead you to accomplish your plans on time. One of the tips that really caught my eye was writing down all the concerns that are floating thru your head because that helps you remember and helps you take action. I tend to just keep those kinds of thoughts in my brain and I always end up stressed out and trying to figure out what to do. This tip was a huge help and something I will definitely use!!

Time management article:

 Time Management on Long Term Projects. (n.d.). Retrieved March 28, 2016, from http://sas.calpoly.edu/asc/ssl/timemgmt-longtermprojects.html 

Editing options

Since I have a PC I was going to use Windows live movie maker but for some reason the program in my computer is not working. My other options are to use Imovie on my Ipad, Download Adobe premier pro CC and as a last resort ill have to use the schools computer. The problem about Imovie is that after i'm all done, the movie loses its quality, and what i'm scared about the Adobe premier is that it will be to complicated. But either way ill just try it out and hope for the better. My computer is very old and I have to clean it out so lets hope that if I do download Adobe pro, my computer will process it. Also I was playing around with Garabe band yesterday and it's super nice & easy. Since its on my Ipad it doesn't have all the effects and sounds that are on the computer version, the Ipad just has the instruments, but anyways I shall make it happen!

I've shown a lot of my friends and family the footage I have and they really liked it, their comments are usually "wow it gave me the creeps" or "that's a nice ending", which if I do say so myself its pretty cool. I just really hope the editing and the music combine and make it mega awesome!!

surprise, surprise!

So it turns out nothing went as planned! My mothers car died on us on our way to the store and I couldn't go and buy anything. It was around 7pm when I finally got back home and I just had to work with what I had in my house. Instead of using a mattress or curtains I just put towels on the floor for my actress to lay on and when shooting the window was nowhere in sight (obviously the wood boards were out of the picture).Instead of having 3 guys I only had one because the rest couldn't come, and instead of tying her with chains or rope I just used duck tape.And no fake blood :( , I tried melting red lipstick but it just didn't work, I even tried drawing it on her but it looked weird so I just decided to give that up.. But in the bright side, everything turned out for the better because when I started shooting everything blended in perfectly and im super excited about it!!
My friend Shannon was an amazing actress and she only made one mistake! (which is that blooper at the top). She worked fast and anything I would ask her to do, she would do it perfectly. It was a little awkward because I made my boyfriend play the bad guy and well lets just say it gets interesting at the end. But besides all the bad luck I had with getting the things, im super content about how everything turned out and I hope everything goes smooth when I start editing!

When filming I had no background sound,just some noises she made, and now my challenge is to create a nondiegetic background sound that goes with the scene and kinda tells the story, and let me confess, im pretty terrified about it because im not very good at it! Lets just hope the odds are in my favor and that they help me succeed!

Mise-en-scene

Yesterday my friends and I were wondering around the neighborhood and we decided to go in the abandoned house, I know its abandoned because i've been living in my neighborhood for 9 years and no one has ever moved in,and its pretty much stayed the same thru the years.( and also when
I was little the older kids in the neighborhood used to scare us little ones with scary stories about that house). The door was unlocked and it looked like a tornado went off inside and what was the first thing that popped in my mind? This project of course! So as we looked around we found a storage room outside parallel to the front door and I was about to cry of excitement because it looked very similar to the room in my dream!

Im going to start shooting today around 4, and to make the setting as creepy as possible, Im going to buy some things:

• Cheap curtains
• Rope or chains
• Fake blood
• Wood

The cheap curtains ill use for the setting and i'm going to burn them, dirty them and hang them up by the window. I'm debating weather I should buy rope or chains to tie the girl up to the wall because rope looks more savage but chains will make it look more professional. The fake blood will be used to mark the wound shes gonna have on her forehead and also mark some scratches, and finally ill have to find long and thin wood boards and nail them to the window, if it makes the room too dark then ill just leave the window as it is. I want the set design to be as close as possible to my dream!

For the costume design I want the girl to wear party clothes and have it be all wrinkled, have her makeup all runny like shes been crying all night, and her hair to be a mess. For the guys that are appearing at the end, I want them to wear jeans with just plain shirts and leather jackets, I want them to look very "bad ass".

Storyboard

I finally did my storyboard! I'm pretty sure when I start shooting it wont look as neat! But this is the initiative. Let me give you a brief pass through it:

The scene will begin with a close up of her face, the only thing I want to make expression is her eyes. So as you see shes gonna slowly wake up, realize where she is, start looking around, and be terrified.

That will be followed by a quick cut of the first title.Then with a long shot you will be able to see the entire room (gross and abandoned) the only source of light will be coming from the window. And after that it will cut to the second titles. 

She will slowly get up and start feeling pain in her head (Shes going to have a wound in her head), quickly she'll start getting flashbacks of her night, her pain will escalate with every flashback. And after every flashback will see her closer and closer.

 During the last flashback, she will get interrupted by a loud pound after someone opened the door, With an over the shoulder shot we will see a person at the door, and then it will cut to the third title. Finally we see the faces of the person at the door, and his companions getting closer to the girl.

 The scene ends with the girl screaming and the shadow of all of them on the wall, the guys doing something not defined to the girl. The scene will end with the name of the film (which I haven't decided yet!) and her screams.

Making a storyboard helped me sort out a lot of thoughts and ideas! Lets just hope everything goes good and smooth! because shooting this wont be as easy as it seems!!

Planning

In thrillers there are realistic stories and the obviously exaggerated ones. So! I want to create my opening as realistic as possible, something so realistic that it will make people stop and think.. Damn that can happen to me.I searched some real life cases about abduction and human trafficking and it let me to a website where victims tell stories about their experiences and let me tell you, they have literally been thru hell and back. The stories mainly talk about how they were sold to random people, abused of, beaten, drugged and forced to work the streets. After reading these stories I thank God I have had such a healthy and beautiful life, because most of these woman will never recover from the trauma, physical and psychological pain that constantly reminds them of their horrible experience. and I think the topic of human trafficking correlates perfectly with my dream.

I'm going to start shooting over spring break! My "actors" aren't going anywhere so its perfect because that way I have them whenever I need them. Now all I have to do is figure out the setting. I'm thinking of trashing my garage and making it look abandoned, and try to decorate it as close as possible to my dream! ( lets just hope my mom wont freak out!).
First i'm going to make my story board and get my thoughts in order, and then i'm thinking of shooting the abandoned room scene first. Since it will take the most time, and its the main scene. After I finish shooting that,I will take care of the flashbacks, since their going to be a fast part of the opening ill leave that for last. And finally last but not least, I have to start thinking of a title! I have a few ideas on my mind but I want to come up with a really good one. I'm going to search online how to do digital titles because I have no idea how their done!!

Website where i found human trafficking victim stories:

 Survival Stories. (n.d.). Retrieved March 18, 2016, from http://richmondjusticeinitiative.com/human-trafficking/survival-stories/ 

All 'bout Thrillers!

To me, the most important job when creating a film is the editing. Editing can turn a nice shot, into an amazing one, and frankly, editing is a pain in the butt, but it does wonders.
I went online and search the most typical and most used shots in Horror/ Thriller movies and I found my salvation! I found a power point presentation that enlightened me! Now, everyone knows that to make a good piece of entertainment the audience has to feel a connection right? Well in the power point I found, it talks all about thrillers. These are some notes I took from the power point and that will be extremely helpful when i start shooting:
Editing- lots of quick cuts, flashbacks, and fading to black. This makes the viewer stay on their toes
Sound- stings and themes set the mood.
Shots & Movement- Creates tension and realism. Close ups, High/Low angles, fast pace movement are mostly use within this genre and helps to give audience adrenaline.
Mise en Scene- The setting is very important, costume design and props help establish the time and place. Lighting is also a super important element depending on the scene.

There are about 6 types of thrillers, and I want to base mine on Crime/horror thriller, both combined give the perfect definition of what I have in mind: Crime, fear, and power. The hole purpose of a thriller is to keep the audience at the edge of their seats, and to portray a story that"s full of surprises and tension. That's why I decided to choose this genre, because I feel like my idea is the perfect match! I want my audience to feel the adrenaline and desperation of my main character, and i'm going to do that by incorporating all of these elements into something that will hopefully make the viewer's skin crawl.

Powerpoint:

 V. (n.d.). Conventions of a thriller. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from http://www.slideshare.net/yasmined/conventions-of-a-thriller-by-vicky?next_slideshow=1 

Creating a story.

Today in class we gathered in groups and shared our ideas. And let me tell you, the people in my group opened up my mind to new ideas! In my last post I talked about my dream and how I want that to be the base of my story. And I was stuck on how I can create a story based or including my dream. So I created a little summary of my main idea:
Nashi, Ana, Bri, and Ivi are 4 best friends in collage. Bri was going through a break up and had been locked in her room for a while now, so the girls convinced her to go out. After a while of insisting Bri agreed to go clubbing, they got ready and headed on over to have fun. The taxi driver that was taking the girls started flirting with Bri and told her to call him if she needed a ride back. All of Bri's friends decided to go off with random guys, so Bri called the taxi driver to take her home. Turns out the taxi driver drugged her and now she ended up in this dirty room, chained up and not knowing what happened.

So when I told my group my idea they liked it but didn't looked convinced, one of the girls in my group gave me the great idea that instead of having so much of a story, start the film with just the girl waking up in the room all confused, and having flashbacks of the night before and how she ended up in that room. She reminded me that this is a film opening and that i shouldn't have so much of a story. So I decided to take her advice and this is what I have so far:
The girl wakes up in the dirty room from my dream, she has a major headache and a wound in her scalp. She starts looking around and you see her slowly panicking because she doesn't know where she is and why shes chained up to a wall. All of a sudden she starts getting flashbacks of that night. First at the club dancing with her friends, then of her taking various shots and drinking, and her getting in a car. She starts looking confused and the door slams open and there is a tall guy at the door, he comes in followed by other guys and they walked towards her and all you here is screaming and it cuts to the title.

Now this is just a rough draft of the story, I'm going to work on it to perfect it and ill start thinking of the different shots, angles and camera movements that fit into this type of genre and scene.

How I got the idea

I got my idea a while back from a dream, its pretty cool to think our brain makes up all kinds of cool stories to entertain us while we sleep.. but this dream was creepy and I'm anxious to know what triggered this weird dream.

And it went like this: I was in a room, it was a dirty, messy room. The only light that came thru were faint city lights, the windows were closed by wood fences and  just one light-bulb swinging around by an extension cord. I couldn't see clearly but there was a girl, weeping and laying down in a mattress. I do remember her having a cut on her forehead but that is about as much detail of her as i got to see. The mattress was horribly dirty and she was tied up with rope chains to a wall. they're was a can with some sort of food scattered around her, the revolting mush looked fresh, which indicated that she hadn't been here for long and a dog bowl with semi-dirty water. In my dream, I couldn't talk to the girl, I was invisible. I tried helping her by untying the chain of knots that kept her trapped by that wall.. but it was useless. I was basically a ghost. I just stayed there looking at the sunrise outside the window until I heard the door slam. It was a tall guy maybe in his mid 30's. (I realized the only blurry thing about my dream were people because I remembered the room perfectly). He walked over to the girl and spoke to her in another language and she just wept. He chuckled, looked at the time, gave her the "hold on" finger sign, and walked out of the room. And she just bowled out crying.

Now I'm pretty sure your wondering how in the world did I remember so much of a dream ( keep in mind I elaborated the dream in order for it to make sense) and I want to know too, so i did a little research and according to the article "Why some remember dreams and others don't", when a person has vivid dreams they tend to remember them because the brain thinks its a memory. It can also be the possibility that my body kept waking up because of the rush, and that made my brain remember it. Also, the article "What causes those freaky dreams" talks about how dreams are symbolic and they can represent the unconscious (which is pretty creepy considering what I dreamed about). Either way I thank my crazy brain for dreaming about this because it enlighten and inspired me to base my project on this!  

Here are the articles i read about Vivid dreams and remembering dreams:

Gholipour, B. B. (2013). Why Some Remember Dreams, Others Don't. Retrieved March 14, 2016, from http://www.livescience.com/38856-why-people-recall-dreams.html 

Feature, S. W. (n.d.). What's Causing Those Freaky Dreams? Retrieved March 14, 2016, from http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/features/freaky-dreams-what-do-they-mean 

And so it begins..

Hello and welcome to my blog! My name is Ivana and ill be taking you step by step thru my journey on creating my 2 minute film opening! First of all, let me just say how excited I am. I've had this film opening idea for quite sometime and I'm excited I finally get to expose it and see my imagination come to life!

I've been researching many thriller genre movie openings such as The Shinning , Silence Of The Lambs and Psycho  and I've noticed almost all of them start with a establishing shot while the credits are shown... but since these are obviously professionally made, I decided to get some ideas from Aice Media Study final projects i found on youtube , and let me tell you: I was surprised the projects were that good! I watched some and they gave me really good ideas on how i can incorporate the credits, along with the title and all that good stuff. I just hope I will be able to add everything by two minutes!

Videos:

 K. (n.d.). The Shining opening credit. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgCejsyS0t8

 N. (n.d.). Silence Of The Lambs - Opening Titles. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyLI4eL2c_s 

 1. (n.d.). Quite an Opening Scene. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkoXBao7Xno

 K. (n.d.). AS MEDIA Thriller Opening Sequence - Inner Evil. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLsiGGF9DPc