Decisions

I need to come up with a tittle! I have a few ideas that I like but I don't love.

Broken Ties

One of my peers gave me this title idea and I really like it because it basically explains the movie. Sicily knows she's doing something bad but doesn't want to think about it. She knows her family is not on the right path, but she also knows that she can't try to change her family or get out of it because she has been taught by her father that family is always over all. So I like how the title fits with the story and it gives away a bit of what will happen in the movie. (Her finally realizing it and breaking ties with her family) 

Family Business

This title also caught my eye because it has the same effect as the one above, it tells the audience what this movie will be about and what I like most about this one is that I am literally showing you the family business in the trailers and the role that each member of the family. However, I feel like the tittle seems a bit raw and doesn't sound as appealing 

Affari di Famiglia

I feel like this title will give the movie the true Italian mafia feel, affari di famiglia means family affair and although it sounds cool I don't want my audience to think this is an international movie or a movie thats all in Italian. But it also gives the movie a bit of mystery, maybe people will wonder what it means and look into it and once they see the trailers it will attract them. 

The Benedettis

This title indicates that the movie will be about a family, I like the way it sounds kind of interesting and the way it doesn't give anything away, which fits into how Sicily is explaining the roles in her family and the contrast between what she's describing and the actual reality. 

Updates!

Today we met up in groups and I feel a HUGE relieve. After talking to the girls in my group I realized im pretty ahead and although it won't take the stress away I feel relieved. 

We talked about the problems we were having with our projects and I feel like my only problem is sound. I have to do a voice over of Sicily explaining her stuffs and I have to put music and sound effects in top of that. If you know me you know I absolutely love to edit, thats my thang, but when it sound.. I feel like thats my weakness. Obviously im going to try my best but finding good royalty free music is annoying because many are too cheesy or they'll start off good and end up sucking etc.. So lets hope ill find something thats worth it. I've been thinking of a few really good songs I could use, but since they're actual songs by actual artists I have to ask the record label permission which might take a while. To be honest im a bit scared they'll reject my request so im going to leave that as plan B. 

In the other hand my website is coming out pretty cool, I just need to add pictures and content but besides that it looks neat and intriguing. I also like how I found this buttons where when you put the mouse on them it looks like you're pressing down, and a few little details that give it the touch! I need to do the photoshoot next week so I can add the pictures on the website as well as Start brainstorming the poster! 

More shooting!

Yesterday I filmed Anthony's scene and what happened was really funny.
We all met up in the back of Publix and we went right to it. I got shots of Anthony driving his car towards the man he was going to meet up (which didn't come out as cool as I imagined cause of the lighting) and shots of Anthony driving from inside of the car (which came out super cool). Then I had my friend Jordan stand by his car as if he was waiting for him and right after I got a few shots of Anthony getting out of his car and walking towards the man, three big Publix workers came out and started screaming at them to stop! I guess they didn't see me cause I was behind the car setting up to shoot and the men probably thought they were dealing for real! Keep in mind that Sebas aka Anthony was holding the "drugs"!! After I explained my project and showed them that the pills were just calcium pills they relaxed but were still a bit sketched out. Luckily I got the shots I needed and we were on our way soon after that happened.
BUT my problem is that although I shot at night, the big lights that were there made the scene look really bright, and I really want the low lighting to give it that sketchy feel. Im going to play around with color to see if I can darken it up, but if not... then my perfectionist little tush is going to have to film this scene again.

mise-en-scene

Today I filmed some more and it took a lot of imagination. For Frankie's scene I needed a dark creepy place with low lighting and a work table that resembled a cheap lab. Anyways, we used my friends garage and for some reason we found many weird detergents and things that could work for what I was going for. For they lighting I did the same thing as my last years project and just had my friend hold her phone light while swing it around to create that low lighting, and finally I had my actor wear an apron and some plastic gloves. In person the "lab" looked a bit silly, but with closeups and good angles I think it looked believable. Its funny because the audience is going to see Frankie making this potion looking thing and somehow it transformed into pills... *movie magic*

I also started working on my website and I want to make it simple yet intriguing, I used "The man from UNCLE" movie website as reference and for my website im going to create tabs for the trailers, a gallery, background story / meet the characters and social media. I want my audience to feel a connection with the characters so i want the website to give the audience a chance to explore aspects of the movie.

The man from UNCLE website:
http://www.manfromuncle.com/#videos

Finally

My plan worked! I asked my friends aka my actors to come over so we can hang out, when they were all here I pulled out my camera and told them that we were going to film and they had no choice but to go along with it. After we shot some scenes they realized how fun it was and all of them got super into character and gave me ideas. 

However I ran into some problems... My camera died and I had to film with my phone which sucked because the quality is not the same, so im gonna have to redo some scenes. Also, the lighting which is not that big of a problem because I think i can fix it with color correction but I still want to redo some scenes that came out a bit dark. And finally, my last problem was that in a few the actors where laughing or it just didn't look series like I want it to look so we are going to redo the ones that look unprofessional. ( they're going to unfriend me for being so demanding) 

I want contrast between Sicily and her siblings to represent their differences. Although she is in the family business she is a good soul and she doesn't want to hurt people, she's basically brainwashed by her family so her scenes are all bring and colorful to show thats she's somewhat good. While the other scenes are dark and mysterious to represent her families dark and intense life. They do it for money and power and have no mercy or shame, however Sicily is blinded and knows in the inside they are bad but doesn't want to think about it so she goes along with what her father tells her to do.

Updates!

Good news! We got an extra week to finish our projects and thank every holy thing in this world because i did need more time! So thank you Ms. Stoklosa

Its funny how things change, I had this idea for my trailers and after editing and having some problems, trailer #1 totally changed. Instead of having Sicily talk to her target im just going to show them together while she's narrating. Since I didn't use a mic when I shot those scenes, you can barely hear what she's saying, and trying to voice it over will be too hard. SO I just cut out a lot and I like what it come out to be.
In the other hand, Im still waiting for the other actors to be available and yes I know I could use other people, but they're perfect for the part and I really really want them to do it. Hopefully we will meet up this weekend and film.

Also, I was searching for more complex editing software since imovie offers very basic tools and luckily one of my peers introduced me to an editing software called Final cut Pro and its amazing! It has more things than imovie, such as: different editing tools, transitions, cool titles, color correction, sounds effects, and much more and since I got the 30 day free trial I have plenty of time to play around with it and use it up.

Final cut Pro reviews:

"IMovie VS Final Cut Pro: Which is The Better Video Editor For You." IMovie VS Final Cut Pro: Comprehensive Comparison between iMovie and Final Cut Pro. N.p.

Chadwick, Danny. "Final Cut Pro Review 2017 | Pros & Cons | Professional Video Editing Software." TopTenREVIEWS. N.p., 09 Feb. 2017. Web. 25 Mar. 2017.

Research

Relying on people for projects is frustrating! My actors can't meet up today for their reasons and I really wanted to finish filming.. oh well...

I found this awesome youtube account called Film Riot and here, Ryan Connolly gives you tips and tricks in order to make your production better. In the video How to shoot a fight scene Ryan shows an example of an action short film he did and he goes thru the steps showing you how he filmed it. I found this very useful because I want to have a short fight scene in my trailer (lets hope my actors don't actually beat each other up). Also Ryan has videos on how to improvise with props, editing software reviews, filming techniques and ideas and much more that I've found super helpful. 

In one of the videos, How to Make a Trailer, Ryan demonstrates how he created a trailer for one of his short films and I found it interesting that he first chose the soundtrack and then built his trailer off of it. I started looking for royalty free tracks I could use for my trailers and luckily I found a few that I liked. Im a bit nervous on how the ambience sound, voiceover, sound effects, and soundtrack are all going to come out (sound is my weakness) but hopefully it will sound "professional"! 

I went on websites like purple planet and Freeplay to look for the tracks and I really liked parts of some so Im thinking of mashing them up into one. After all real trailers have different songs according to the scenes. 

Film Riot vids and Royalty free websites:

Filmriot. "Realistic Guns for Cheap!" YouTube. YouTube, 21 Nov. 2014. 

Filmriot. "How to Make a Trailer!" YouTube. YouTube, 12 Mar. 2015. 

Filmriot. "How to Shoot a Fight Scene." YouTube. YouTube, 02 June 2016. 

"P u r p l e  p l a n e t." Rock - Purple Planet Royalty Free Music. N.p.

Freeplay Music | Welcome | The best music library on the planet! N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2017.