Marking hide and seek

"Hide and Seek"

Good bits:

• Good idea
• Children acted well for their age
• A good variety of shots
• Excellent focus on mise en scene, clothing, cake etc
• Good continuety throughout
• Good use of dark and light to show different times

Bad Bits:

• Predictable story
• Seemed to change from the past to the present too quickly

How it helped me:

• A large amount of focus on mise en scene will help with the feel of the whole Short overall
• Be careful that the story doesn't seem to be rushed to an ending
• Child actors can work well but would need make sure they are good

Marking love hurts

"Love hurts"



Good bits:

• The sound worked well to add to the ambiance of the film along with the black and white balloon 
• The control of the camera was good most of the time
• The symbolism with the selective desaturation effect on the balloon.

Bad bits:

• It was  a very predictable film
• Occasionally the camera would be too shaky, during the POV shot from the girl
• A small variety of shots
• Some shots went on too long, especially when they are sitting on the bench, a close up of their hands would have helped break up the shot.
• More close ups to show emotion as it is a silent film

How it's helped me:

• Not to have shots that go on for a long time
• Choose music that fits well with my theme
• Close ups to show emotion are needed
• Use a variety of shots

Narnia lamp post scene (focus on shots)

For this scene we were given the script from the lampost scene in Narnia and told to recreate it with a focus on the shots used. Because of this we didn't record the dialogue sepereatly to remove wind and traffic noise.

How do people watch Shorts?

People and their Short watching...

People consume Shorts in a large variety of ways, youtube, cinema's, websites, film festivals ect.

Youtube:

It's probably the most popular way as their is a huge variety of Shorts on their and anyone can upload their Short. It is also free and easy to watch them so everyone with Internet access can watch them. As technology advances people can now watch youtube on their phones or tablets so it is also becoming a more accessible. People often watch them together with friends or watch alone and then share the link to their friends via social networking. Youtube also allows people to comment and offer feedback so a lot of amateur film makers use this as a way of getting feedback and advice from the public. 

Cinemas:

Many "art house" cinemas show a series of Shorts in one go for a small fee. The type of people that watch these are often more of the aficionado/buff section of the audience. They are more likely to go alone and want the Shorts to have more thought provoking or dark topics. The films shown here are usually student films that are nominated or upcoming film makers.

Websites:

Websites such as shortoftheweek showcase Short films that have won competitions or have been nominated ect. Again like youtube anyone with Internet access can watch these for free however they are not as popular as youtube but hold higher status if you film has been shown on them. A lot of people still watch films on these websites though, usually people with more of an interest in Shorts.

Film festivals:

People that go to these festivals will often be the same kind of people that go to watch Shorts at art house cinemas. They will watch Shorts that have been nominated to be shown and then wait to see which one is the winner. 

Best for me:

I think that youtube would be the best platform for me as it is easy, free, has a large audience and people can offer feedback easily to my film. It is also a good way to get yourself known and from their I could then attempt to enter my films into competitions to get them onto websites or in film festivals. 

Goods and Bads of a Short

The time limit:

This can have benefits and drawbacks. Making a feature film into a Short would be very difficult and probably not work well but a simple story could fit very well into the time limit. The short length means that less work is required and usually a much smaller budget which means that it is well suited to beginner or student film makers as well as Hollywood stars. However because they are short most of the public won't pay to see them as they are used to paying to watch 2 hour films so feel like they are getting a bad deal. So they usually aren't made with the idea of making money in mind.

The audience:

Shorts actually have a huge range of audiences. For example a Short could be aimed at the arthouse audience and shown during a Short film night or at a festival whereas they could also be uploaded to youtube and aimed at a mainstream audience. As you can upload it to youtube easily this means that most your audience will be able to view it easily for free which is a big benefit as they are more likely to watch it.

The ideas:

You can usually be more risky or bring up taboo topics in a short film as the low budget means that there is less risk. It is also much easier to keep the audiences interest for the short time so in a way it is easier to make a good Short compared to a feature film. However the shorter time does mean that complicated ideas usually won't work as well when made for a Short. It is also a good way of testing new ideas to see if the public like them before using them in a feature film.

Starting Ideas for my Short

Idea 1 (4 in a house)

Plot:

4 people live in a house but are banned from talking to each other so they all go about the day acting as if the others don't exist. They have no contact to the outside world and can't get out of the house. Each night one of them has a dream where a person they don't know dies. One day one of the people in the house doesn't wake up, the others go about their day and ignore this. The next day another person doesn't wake up but the 2 awake ignore this and start their day. One of the remaining 2 accidentally opens the door to one of the peoples rooms. They see a dead body the same as how the person in their dream died. They check the other room and the same as happened. As they can't get out or contact anyone they decide to carry on living as if nothing happened. That night they both stay awake and thinking the other will try to kill them arms themselves. They both bump into each other and assume the others attacking them so kill each other. 

Then the screen goes dark and after a slight pause a huge round of applause sounds and someone switches a light on and lots of men in suits appear to have been betting on which one would survive the longest.

Characters:

I would need 4 people, probably 2 boys 2 girls who act in a similar way and then the group of people in the end scene. 

Inspiration:

The Truman Show gave me the idea for the people to have been watching and betting in the end. 

Big Brother gave me the idea for them not being able to leave the house.

Nightmare on Elm street gave me the idea about the dreams.

Brief review of the idea:

I like the idea but feel that it needs to be developed as at the moment it would be very short. I think that with camera angles I could make it have a big brother style but more subtle so you only realise at the end when you realise they were on a game show which could work well but would be difficult so I need to put more planning into this idea.

Idea 2 (Peter Pointer)

Plot:

A man who can stop a weapon hurting someone by pointing at it is dragged into a gang war and he tries to escape. He starts to plan his escape early on with the help of one of the gang members he trusts. Just before the escape his friend gets shot by the other gang and he is forced to try to adapt the plan to escape by himself. He tries to dig through a wall. During the escape he discovers he also has the power to kill people by pointing at them. After he escapes he wakes up in the night o the police arresting him for the murder of several of the gang members.

Characters:

The main character who should be nerdy and small, the gang member who should be your stereotypical gang member. The gang leader who should be a big intimidating person. And all the other gang members and police who would have a small speaking role if any. 

Inspiration:

Weirdly Sir Alan Sugar inspired me for this, when he says "you're fired" and points his finger I felt like this could be adapted into super power for a person. 

Shawshank Redemption gave me the idea about the escape involving digging through a wall.

Brief review of the idea:

I like this idea but feel like it would need a big budget for it to be done well, for example I would need to find a place where we could hit down a wall ect and this isn't practical. It would also take a large cast which would be difficult to find and a lot of different locations. But I think the idea could be changed so that it is more practical easily.

Good looking poster campaigns

A successful poster campaign

Example of the viral posters,
would be placed on a bus stop in real life

I have been looking at film poster campaigns that I think have been interesting so that I can develop the ideas for my own film poster campaign.  I think that the campaign for the film DISTRICT 9 (2009) has lots of great elements that I would like to build into my poster campaign.  I have also chosen to review this poster campaign as the film was in the action/thriller film genre which is an area I am interested in for my own short film.  District 9 was a successful film despite having a limited budget in terms of feature film ($30 million) and no A list celebrity actors.  

Sony Pictures used a viral marketing campaign which started a year before the film trailer in July 2009 with a clear tag line of ‘Humans Only’.  Not only using posters, they also developed stickers and put their images in lots of different places to create interest in the film.  These are all really good examples of Teaser posters and images to create interest in the film.  I think we can easily develop these ideas for the poster campaign.  Because the film is shot like a documentary the poster campaign really works by putting images into the day to day life of its possible target audiences – as if the film is real life.

Their traditional poster

The final ‘traditional’ posters for launching the film built on the campaign and are very effective.  It’s also interesting that because the film did not have very famous actors in it they chose to highlight the Directors who would be known by the cinema going public for other successful films (Lord of the Rings).  In my poster campaign I won’t have any famous actors or directors so I need to think about the best way to present the film poster for impact.

Influences on me:

As I won't have any famous actors and I'm not exactly a world famous director I need to think of other ways to make my film posters interesting and sell my film. I think that the viral stickers and posters used to advertise District 9 would be a good option to go with as it would quickly gain the public's interest if placed in the right places.