Fiction Adaptation: Prayer

Dear God, 

I wanted to thank you for all that I have, I don't want to be greedy and am thankful but I wish that my family all come for christmas and travel safely this year, it would be lovely to have snow so the kids can make snow angels while I have drinks with the adults. I just want you to help aunt Maggie to not burn the dinner. I am thankful that I have a job and a warm roof over my head while others struggle and are not as thankful. 

Amen. 

This is the prayer that will be a voiceover while my main character walks down the aisle of the church, this will be in the background for the whole time he is walking until he walks into the side room with the candles, I am not sure about the words but they are not selfish and asking for stuff but also thankful and talking about family. I am getting a male to do the voiceover as I feel it would be more appropriate as all my actors are male and I feel it will give a better effect as men tend to not show emotion as much.  

Fiction Adaptation: The Shoot

On the day of the shoot the church told us to be there for 12.30 so just after the sunday service. Me and my 2 actors arrive early at 12.20 so we could be punctual and make a good impression, we met the reverent Carolyn and went over where we will be filming so she was briefed and so was my actors.
Carolyn asked how long we would take as she would need to keep the church open for us, she was hovering around and making us feel pressured as she was watching waiting to close the church to go home, so I had to do the inside scenes first. This only took us about 45 minutes as there wasn't much I needed to film inside the church I just needed to make sure I got all the camera angles needed so the POV and following the actor but also just the feet walking towards the altar and POV of the feet.
We then did the outside in the graveyard with my little boy actor this we had plenty of time for and didn't feel rushed but we managed to get it in 2 takes and I took several different angles to give me more coverage, this was all done on the shoulder rig and I felt like it was still a bit to shakey and will need stabilising in the edit.
The field bit at the end I decided to do on the tripod instead on a follow shot as it was beautiful with the sun and lens flare plus you then get to see the actors head event hough they are wearing a hood as I didn't want to give away the actors identity so the audience can be in suspicion instead.

Overall I am happy that I have filmed and still have time to edit but I felt a bit rushed at the beginning and could of been a bit more stable with the shoulder rig, if I would of had the choice I would have rather filmed all on a tripod as its more stable and the audience won't feel ill and not want to watch because of the shaking but this was a learning experience that I know I won't be doing again in a hurry without more practice with the should rig and making it more stable.

Fiction Adaptation: Shot List

• POV with me holding the camera all the way through 
• POV of actor's shoulder all the way through
• Actor walking into the distance over the fields
• POV on feet walking over the fields 
• POV of feet walking over the fields as an extra close up 
• Actors hands in pocket and camera follows in front 
• Feet walk from left to right on the screen
• Over the shoulders where actor not in focus 
• Floor shot walking through the church and field
• Small shots in the church so not much is seen
• Close up shots of hand opening doors.
• Sunset
• Actor picking up a flower and letting it drop
• Close up of a candle flickering 
• Wide shot of loads of candles flickering 
• Shot of ripples on a lake 

There is not a lot that happens in this film as its a silent and emotional piece in only a few locations so there is not a lot of shots that are needed, I have wrote down as many different shots as I could think of that would make it easier to edit an cut and not make it all POV. I feel that there is enough variety of shots that I could film so make should I get all the coverage and have more to work with.

Fiction Adaptation: Locations

I am now filming in St.Marys church in Broomfield, Chelmsford. This church has a graveyard which surrounds the whole church so there is plenty of places in which I can film the boy crying over a grave, and there is a walkway with an archway leading to the entrance of the church via a couple of graves where I would prefer to film as it would fit the film perfectly and make it easier and better to film.

This is the archway in which I would like my main character to walk through and up to the door and as you can see there is graves and not a long walkway in which I would have room to cut the footage if necessary. 

Fiction Adaptation: Candles

This is my test with candles for a scene in my film, my main character walks into a room full of flickering candles to represents the soldiers. So I layer out nearly 100 candles on my living room floor as this is the biggest room in my house, this took a while to light them as there was so many. I did have a problem of my thumb starting hurting so I used a already lit angle to light the rest and I accidentally got wax on the carpet so should of probably done this outside. 

I experimented with lots of different shots, I did close ups like this and then blew a little at it to show movement and a breeze I also tried blurring it and depth of field shots so I could cover lots and have more to work with in the edit. 

This is who many I used, I rounded them up after blowing them out and moved them and this is how many, it doesn't look like a lot and i pictured more in my film but in the dark filming them flicker it was good and I feel like I got some good shots just needed more speed out and more on the left of the room. 

Fiction Adaptation: Test Shot

This is the test shot I did with my brother down our corridor to test the shoulder rig, we did several shots with following him and feet shots, so I put the camera on the ground and he walked away and also a POV of his feet while walking. These shots are practices of the shots I want to do on the day as they give me more to edit with rather than just POV just in case its not steady enough.

Fiction Adaptation: Cast and Location Change

Unfortunately I have had to change my location and cast for my film as the people who applied to be in my film on the starnow website did not fit my main character and my location fell through, so I decided to go back to my home back in Essex to call on some people to help and I found an actor in my family quickly and the young boy is a friend of the family as was very happy to star in his first film, the church location worked with me to organise a day in which to film and was happy to help out. This I felt was a quick turn around but worked well and I managed to get good shots which I am happy with, I had to cut 2 locations and only really film at the church and in the field but I feel that I will have enough footage and hopefully won't struggle.

Fiction Adaptation: Alex Boorman Workshop

We had Alex teach us for the day and he wanted to see our skills so asked us to create a sequence of short films, about 30 seconds each on angry happy and sad.
We was given 3 hours in which to make edit and have lunch, we was in groups of 3 and had to come up with ideas for each.
For angry we thought Roxanne would be better to act it but we wanted to get a shot of revving a car and Roxanne wouldn't do this so I was in it trying to be angry. The idea progressed for the revving idea, we was worried it wouldn't be long enough but it was our longest one and was over 45 seconds.

There was a few things that cold of been changed and done differently but we didn't have the time to have a prefect edit, I was the one editing and there is a few things I would have done if I had the time like smooth transitions from shots and the shot of me reaching for the car door handle wasn't edited properly so i reach for the handle twice. The sound in angry jumps when we change shot which I should have smoothed out.
The sad piece was no way good enough or long enough but we ran out of ideas as it had stopped raining which we wanted but know for next time to have filmed it first, the idea was to get rain drops and raining on a puddle etc, but all we could get was the rain drops on the car window as it stopped raining when we finished filming angry.

Digital News Production: Critical Case Study Channels

I have chosen to do my essay on the news form 2 news reports on Thursday 13th of November from Channel 4 and BBC. Here are my notes from watching the two 1 hour long programs:

4 news:
Starts with a sum up

• London news - Mayor selling docks to Chinese company 
• International - Ebola and the containment 

Next is the intro with images if upcoming news in the show.

A guy walks up to Boris Johnson and asks him a question, then jumps to John Snow in the studio.

• London/international news of the selling of the docks 
• space story - rescue of rosetta 
• Economics with parliament story of Ed Miliban's Labour speech 
• International - Ebola and how they are containing it 
• Local - Women accused of terrorism 

correspondant live at the London docks.

Interview with Boris Johnson live - looks at the floor and avoids the question asking 

Interview with expert 

Interview with Chinese company over the phone 

Reporter at tower bridge 

back to the studio with John Snow 

Presenters talking about the space story of Rosetta 

Some landing footage with V/O

John interview expert from studio 

He then cuts the guy off while talking but maybe due to the delay

next story- Ed Miliband standing up talking about what Labour are going to do if they win the election

Foxpops in Essex on Milibands opinions 

Live to Rochester for interview with Nigel Farage - he wouldn't let presenter talk and was very defensive 

Ebola story live 

Interview with uni student (scientist)

Interview with bricklayer - hard to understand what he said

Interview with Royal engineer 

Interview with head teacher about the closed schools

Statistics on Ebola in the neighbouring countries 

Interview with women - strong accent so struggle to understand

Sports story- world cup bidding 

Interview with Fifa 

Reporter asks part of the bidding team questions on what happened

Interview with the accused terrorist/smuggler 

Facebook messages of threats

Shots of her music video

Tagline and shots form the program 

To me this is a long program that jumps a lot and has a lot of fast editing to fit so many stories into the hour but not sure some are necessary and feel a bit rushed and copied from other days, the big story about the docks isn't really surprising as its the local big story of the day but there was a lot of conspiracy and interviews where nothing told us what they really found out. The other conspiracy story was the Fifa bidding which England was gutted about and no one understand how Russia won they are staying it was fixed. This program has a lot going on in different orders from the studio to live to interview its a bit confusing. 

BBC: south east 

Sum up 

• Fifa bidding war
• Space - Comet Rosetta
• Politics - Ed Miliband 
• International - Sira war - Libea 
• Local- Dad shot daughter 
• protection for winter weather 

Intro of the studio 

Presenter standing talking about the Fifa corruption 

Fifa chairman speaker 

David Cameron + prince William talking 

Statistics 

Interview with England bidder (bribery) 

Interview with FA(Fifa Association) same as channel 4 

Interview in studios with sports editor 

Space - same footage as 4 but more of it 

Immigration - live from parliament talking about splitting form the EU 

Political - Ed Miliband same as channel 4 but more

same UKIP footage with Nigel Farage 

Paedophile story in detention centre with interview with worker and patient 

Sum up again pan of studio 

Syria's war presented in the studio (standing) 

Reporter on location - guy smoking but is a refugee, no where to go but to smoke in a park with their families 

Footage of Syria with V/O

Footage of France where they keep moving around

Children dancing and interview 

Sky sports footage of cricket (V/O in studio) 

100th year of studios production at the studios that made eastenders coronations street and many films

footage from different productions made there

interview with Steven Spielberg 

weather in studio 

Thats just the end of the first half which is the world news the next 30 minutes is the south east news so more local stuff which was mention in the sum up at the beginning, I think this should all be one program and not sure why in 2 halves unless for an advert break. 

Starts with story on the dad that killed his daughter and her mother outside there house

interview with charity

archive footage of interview with the mother 

reporter live on location but nothing happening 

protection of weather measure are being sorted after last years power cuts 

interview with a victim and archive footage

Statistics 

Copying the same piece of footage of a man cutting a tree

Interview with an electrician and a member of the british red cross 

coming up - debt classes for kids 

interview with child abuse and a surviver 

studio- drug place, murder

Live at dover talking about protests for jobs, so ferry travels will be cut 

Euro star increases its trains to 200mph 

Interview with CEO of Eurostar 

Sum up again - top story of man killed daughter 

Battle for votes in Rochester and Stood 

Interview with health secretary at muslim place and at pharmacy and bookers

Live at Rochester but nothing happening 

wed site with Facebook and twitter feeds 

presenters moved to sitting on a sofa instead of a desk

children paying money into "banks" to learn the value of money and debts 

Interview with head teacher and students plus experts 

Foxpops interviews 

weather 

I feel like much more was happening in the BBC news as there was more notes but that the Channel 4 was quicker and more confusing, the footage and stories from both channels are fairly similar even the same footage in both. The BBC has a brighter vibe to it as it used white in its back ground which gives a better feel to the program rather than the red in channel 4. There can be a lot to talk about in my essay with all these notes and why each channel picks which stories and why it leaves some out plus the way they present each story.

Fiction Adaptation: Star-now Applicants

Here is a screenshot of my listing on star now but with the up to date applicants. I am very please that i have so many applicants so quickly the only thing is at the moment is I don't have enough applicants for the extra's females role, I was hoping for 4 girls standing outside the theatre chatting but if I only receive 3 good people I can work with that if needed. I am happy with the composers and male actor applicants I just need to go through them and choose. 

Fiction Adaptation: Research for Locations

After writing my script and knowing what sort of location I will be looking for I then went to Ren and Mike who have lived in Maidstone for years and described what I wanted to see if they would know the place/places.
I described my church scene to them, so I need:

• A church in the middle of fields and isolated so I could see it from a distance and walk towards it as the person.
• A graveyard, this is to represent the all the dead from the war, plus I have a quick scene where Joseph walks up to a big who is crying over their relative or loved one.
• An isle to walk up as described in the script, long enough and so I can have someone at the end praying.
• To walk through/past the graveyard to the church doors and the same on the way out.

Mike was the one who came up with St.Margarets in Barming, Maidstone. So I looked this up on the internet to see pictures and where it is etc. From there  found the numbers and emails for the reverent and I contacted him to see if I could have permission to film there, I felt this is a bit of a sensitive matter as it could be disrespectful as it has a graveyard, which I do not want to see the names but if I do get them I will blur.

Fiction Adaptation: Script

Fiction Script

This script is not the final version but just a rough to hand in and check I am on the right lines.
I am happy that i managed to create a story line as I only had bullet points on what I wanted to go into the script but not the order. However I am not happy with this script as I haven't used final draft in a while so I couldn't remember how to show the words on screen in the script so I just wrote on screen which I feel is wrong, I also feel that I didn't write this properly as I am not so good at writing and have no interest in script writing so I feel that Helen would be able to give me loads of good feedback that I can improve on.

Fiction Adaptation: Alex Boorman

We had a special guess come to the studios to teach us, Alex Boorman who is a camera operator and editor, he is here to teach us about the industry we want to join soon.
He went through his carer and how he got into media and how he landed his job.
This is his show reel to show some of the amazing stuff he has created in his couple of years.


Alex Boorman Camera Operator | Video Editor Showreel 2014 from Alex Boorman on Vimeo.

From Alex teaching us I learnt a few things which was very useful to join the industry. I learnt that it good if you have your specific field you like but its better if you can do more than one things as he is a camera man and an editor, so where I couldn't decide whether to be producer or editor I now don't need to chose but to develop my skills in both fields so when I do join the industry I have more chance of getting a job.
Alex also helped me with my main problem for filming my fiction adaptation which is the POV and following the character with out all the camera shake as the camera has to be face high and be as steady as possible as no one wants to watch a shaky film so he suggested either a fig rig or a shoulder rig which should take out all the bounce from my hands.
Ales showed us all the films he has worked on as a camera man so we could get to see what sort of things a new film maker joining the industry would have to take on and his stuff wasn't as good as his stuff now but I feel that I could start at where he started even though I don't think I want to be a camera operator.

Digital News Production: Channel workshop

We was given a task to compare 2 different news channels front he same day in groups, this is similar to our essay so was a good exercise plus it helped me to figure out exactly what to look for and compare, the better channels to compare are Channel 4 or BBC as they have more going on and have different rules and standards to live up to. In my group was Danny and Chris and we chose to compare Channel 4 and ITV and these are our notes:

ITV:
Starts with reporter
Then V/O with remembrance poppies in London
Presenter in studio

• Worldwide news
• Space

Intro 

First story is the remembrance poppies 

3 children talking about war

2 reporters same story one in London one in France

Benefits story with no reporter but V/O 

Statistics all politics and no emotion

Interview with MP

Back in the studio 

Local news on paedaphile (London)

Interview in studio, statistics (Economics)

worldwide (negative/death) India statistics and interview

Space (positive) 

back to remembrance 

Weather 

Channel 4 news:

Sum up - remembrance, Ebola

Intro 

Live in London at the poppies - reporter has no name 

children talking about the tribute 

Studio - sum up 

Live at location on the Ebola story - interview with Tony Blair 

Studio - remembrance with interview 

Lots of switching between John Snow live and in the studio which is quite confusing and distracting 

Local news about paedophile - statistics and interview 

Benefits - same footage and story as ITV but has David Cameron as well

Sports story (negative) 

International story - south Korea and the ferry tipping 

Live at poppies but talking about a different story about cystic fibrosis 

Interview with a sufferer 

Back to poppy scene but again a different story 

Story on 3D inappropriate story 

Interview with artist

Poppies story and interview with army cadet 

weather 

There is a lot of difference between these 2 shows as I feel Channel 4 had a lot more stories and is more fast paced with the editing and hurrying. The itv seems to care less on what they say and how they portray the stories plus they don't need to cover as much in the half an hour slot. Channel 4 seem to have more struck rules to what ITV have and can say etc. 

Fiction Adaptation: Script notes

In order to write my script I felt I had to write down an order in which the poem would fit with what is happening on screen as I know what I want but not in which order so this is the rough nots I wrote before writing the script:

Start by walking through a field up to a church which is on the horizon.
Once we get to the church the bells chime for midday and we hear gun fires (maybe he jumps and ducks)
First paragraph ( 2 lines of the poem) appear on the screen.

Walk through the graveyard and look at all the gravestone to see how many people have died.

Walk inside the church
Seeing a man saying a prayer at the altar
Start paragraph on screen
then hear the choir ( maybe even see them)
starts to fade as walks out over the graveyard and sees a boy crying over a loved one

Last paragraph
Walk towards town passing a group of girls outside a theatre/cinema
Then pass flowers looking miserable and dying in someones garden
Walk across another fields towards the sunset

This is a very rough idea of the script on screen but I wrote what I thought should be using the poem I will obviously put a lot more detail into the script when writing it but this I feel is a definate helpful staring point rather than starting without any ideas.

Fiction Adaptation: Casting - StarNow

This is a screenshot for my listing on star now, I created 3 listings one for my male actor which we will barely be seeing on screen just probably the back of their head etc. as it is all POV shots and some with the camera following the main character. This is my main role but technically is still an extra's role and I am hoping someone fits my character role. One of the other roles is extra's for my females meeting outside the cinema/theatre, I was thinking i would have 3 or 4 people for this and then maybe slide to a flashback of when he was a teen and this is da ja vo. The females I don't necessarily have specific requirements but roughly the same height and all slim with long hair. 

I also need a composer as I am doing a silent piece so I need specific music to fit what happens as the story goes on. 

Fiction Adaptation: Edit workshop

Adaptation of the music video by Mr Probz, this is my version of the adaptation.
I feel if i had more time and footage i could create something better but i am happy withe the final result seen as it was completed in about 3 hours. Footage came from youtube.

Fiction Adaptation: Essay

Ficton Essay

This is the draft essay that I handed in today, its total of 1165 words is about half of what I will be handing in on December 12th.
I am quite proud of this essay as i have lots of notes and quotes I just needed to sit and write the essay, now as the draft needed to be between 500-1000 words I was going to hand in about 500 words but I was on a roll when writing this and I decided to hand in as much as I possibly could today so I know whether what I have written was the right stuff.
I feel that at the start of the essay I did waffle a little bit so the beginning might not be right but I felt that the person marking the essay might not know much about the subject so I wrote a bit about it.

Fiction Adaptation: My Idea

My idea hasn't changed much since the start of term when we was given the handbook and the information for we had to do. Using world war 1 poems chosen by Helen we have to chose one and make a short film on it, for the first couple weeks back I have been focusing on my Digital News project so I haven't given this much thought of organisation so I now have to pull it together quicker but I feel confident I can do it as I know what I want I just need to put it in an order which I can follow and script.
I originally had 2 ideas which was the memorial one with candles, flashbacks and emotion through music. I also had the modern day approach idea which was interpret the poem differently and use the words to translate to a nightout/house party so have the blinds come down as the sun rises after a night out and watch the girls go home doing the 'walk of shame' but unfortunately Helen didn't think this would be very easy idea so I decided to use my other idea instead and add stuff to it making it a secure and finished idea here is the ideas:

• boy crying over a loved one/soldier 
• Candles flickering (lots of candles filling a room) 
• POV of the person so the audience can feel and see everything through them 
• See the main characters hands when open doors and maybe a look down at the ground and see there feet
• Emotion piece so no talking or anything except natural buzz track and music.
• Sunset over the fields as the blinds come down over the day.
• A look at he sky to see the stars, one for every man sacrificed 
• A group of girls chatting outside the cinema causes da ja vou and we see a quick flashback a few years ago when he was younger and the girls were doing the same thing

The only critical stuff with all this is I need to find where I am going to film and if it fits plus I see that I can't just hid my character and that the audience needs something to relate to so I need to show more of him which I can plan to put into the script but I don't want to show there whole identity I wan tot keep some as a mystery, also I can see that the POV is going to make some trouble for me as its not going to be steady and could loo really bad so I need to work on the hand shake and use everything I can to stop the bouncing around and as smooth as possible, this might mean making more cuts and doing the filming over and over till I get it right and as smooth as possible I just need to be careful if its over a day as the weather can change.

Digital News Production: Channel

This is our design for the news channel, we had to make this to upload our news videos on. We wanted to call it Kentertainment as that is our production name plus we used a shot of our intro as the name as we didn't have any other form of Kentertainment written anywhere.

The only things that have been uploaded so far is the rough cut so we could hand it in and everyone watch it and the finished intro which is not yet been put in with the rough cut. 

Digital News Production: Draft Hand in

This is the rough cut so far for our news pieces. The studio green screening and the intro are not yet put up onto this as it is only a rough cut and so not a proper edit. The food festival is first which needs more editing and to fit the repeater talking as Cecily talks way too quickly and the class agreed plus it needs stretching out a bit more as its only 1.30 minutes and needs to be 2 minutes. The Banksy piece (package) is second and is nearly finished, everyone said they lied this piece and the reporter was profession and looked good and we are proud of this piece. Helen liked this and Sheryll and said its coming along nicely. We know the things we need to do to finish everything and it shouldn't take long once we re-record the V/O with Cecily.