CONTACT- Final

From our second draft to our final trailer we changed quite a few aspects. Firstly we decided to make our own production company name and logo and included this at the beginning of our trailer. Additionally we added in a screen to tell the audience what certificate rating the film is. After feedback from different people telling us that the sound wasn't right we realised that it was because it did not flow very well and there were two voices at once. So we made sure that no sound was overlapping. Also over the medical scenes we added in beeping sounds from an ECG to differentiate it from the other shots and clearly show it was medical. Finally we also decided to change the shot of the assembly as the previous shot of people's legs from the side didn't show any progression or change whereas our new shot does.

Importance of visual and sound cues to create spectator response

Our website deconstruction

Website deconstruction

I chose to use the Hunger Games website as a basis of ideas, because it is also a dystopian film so I thought that it would relate more to what our website should look like.

Evaluation Question Four

Evaluation Question Three

Evaluation Question One

Website-Final

Click to view full website:

Evaluation Question Two

Poster

Poster Genre Research
Minimalistic vs Traditional poster
Poster deconstruction
Creating our poster
Final poster
Our poster deconstruction

Website

Website genre research
Website Deconstruction
Final website
Our website deconstruction

Filming and Editing

Storyboard Alterations
Filming and Editing schedule 
Filming Day 1
Filming Day 1: call sheet
Filming Day 2
Filming Day 2: call sheet
Filming Day 3 and 4
Filming Day 3 and 4: call sheet
Music Choice
Soundtrack analysis in our trailer 
Difficulties encountered when editing 
Technologies used
Model Release forms 
CONTACT- Draft 1
CONTACT- Draft 2
Our use of film form

Planning

Production Company
Initial film idea
Final film idea
Futuristic technology
Colour palette
Scripting draft
Scripting final
Title of our film
Message behind the film
Draft storyboard
Final storyboard
Trailer animatic
Location recce
Casting
Risk assessment
Costume and props
Makeup
Technology in our film
Technology test shots
Theorists ideas in our trailer
Importance of visual and sound cues to create spectator response

Research

Progress: AS-A2
Reflective Research from AS
Teaser vs Theatrical trailer 
Film Promotion 
History of trailers 
Genre in trailers 
Black Swan poster 
Black Swan teaser trailer 
Narrative Theory 
Audience Theory
Representation Theory
Research- Black Mirror
Girl with the dragon tattoo promotional package 
Genre Research- Conventions and History 
Voice-over Research
Iconography
Iconic sounds 
Audience expectations of Genre
Iconic Directors
Certificate Rating 

Creating the poster

Poster- Final

Poster Deconstruction

Trailer Animatic

Our poster deconstruction

Website Genre Research

After looking at a number of dystopian film websites, including the Hunger Games and Maze Runner, I found that they all had a lot of similar aspects. One of the major things you first notice when you look at the websites is that they all have a dark colour scheme, the darkness of all the websites could be to create a sense of fear and mystery about the films. Some of the websites I looked at also had eerie music playing in the background while you look through the website, this could be to give the audience a feel of what the atmosphere in the film is like. Another aspect that I noticed was that all the websites have a gallery page and/or on the home page a sequence of moving images that gives a snippet of some of the shots in the film. After researching many different websites we decided that we would try to incorporate many of the aspects we found on other websites onto our own. In that way we would ensure consistency with the genre of the film and the genre's audience, making sure it delivers to expectations, looks professional and arouses interest.

Message behind the film

The cause of the virus in our film is teenagers spending so much time online that they have grown allergic to human contact as they spend too much time in their rooms isolated from the outside world. We feel this makes a relevant comment on society today as this is the 'social media generation'. There are many debates right now about what the effect of large amounts of social media use does. Our film gives a slightly exaggerated effect that will interest viewers.
We also intend for the virus to be a metaphor for terrorism. The way everyone is scared of each other and of trusting each other reflects the fear people have about terrorism. This is relevant to society today because of the recent terrorist attacks. As our original film idea was a social realism film we thought that having this message behind our film added in the aspect of social realism that we originally wanted.

Our use of film form

Soundtrack analysis in our trailer

For our sound track we wanted to reflect an independent and authentic style. We initially planned to create footage that entailed a news broadcast. However, we decided to create just the audio of this, to accompany different shots, acting as a narration. The news broadcast sets the scene and the non-diegetic background sound of a piano, slowly builds tension and suspense but does not distract from the broadcast. We had to include sound bridges as some footage had its own sound that we needed the audience to concentrate on. An uplifting soundtrack helps contrast the previous times of parties and intimacy. This happy mood is abruptly interrupted as we are brought back to the 'present' with the loud diegetic sound of a skateboard. This is designed to catch the attention of the audience and break the happy mood. A new non-diegetic music piece increases the tempo and accompanied by rattling sounds of handcuffs and the beeping of a heart monitor adds increased tension and rapidly builds an association with fear and eventually death as captured by the final flatlining.
We believe we created a very atmospheric and original sound which compliments our trailer. Through the gradual increase of pace in our non-diegetic music we successfully increase the levels of tension and suspension in our trailer.

Model Release forms

Difficulties encountered when editing

One of the main problems we had was when we were editing the sound. This was a challenge because we had lots of layers of sounds and it meant that some of them were conflicting and some of them didn't flow very well. To overcome this we had to fade in and out the different pieces of sound so that they were able to transition better from one to another. We also had to delete some aspects of the music so that they didn't conflict with people talking. Doing this improved the clarity of the sound and made sure that there wasn't too much going on.

Another problem that we encountered while editing was the continuity of the park scene. Whilst editing this scene we noticed that in one shot the teenager was holding the skateboard in her left hand but in the next shot it was in her right hand. We also realised we had a shot missing which was creating a problem with the continuity as well. We fixed this problem by having to reshoot one of the shots and then deleting one of them, by doing this we made sure that the continuity of our trailer was perfect.

Apart from these two challenges we did not encounter anything else major in terms of editing as we had developed our skills on iMovie at AS and honed them throughout the year.

Theorists ideas in our trailer

Allan Cameron
In our trailer we used Allan Cameron's idea of an anachronic narrative which is a discrepancy between the order of events in a story and the order they are presented. We used this concept in our trailer by including flashbacks and flash forwards, our idea of using these was to show the contrast of what love used to be like and what it is like in the time the film is set, but also what it could turn in to. Also showing the different aspects of love shows how large the contrast is.

Levi Strauss
Levi Strauss is another theorist whose ideas we were able to incorporate into our narrative. He says that binary opposites are an important factor in narratives. We used binary opposites in a number of different ways, to start with we used the juxtaposition of a previous happy life and a now sad and depressing life. We did this to show a large contrast in how life had changed since the disease. Another binary opposite we used is old and young as our trailer clearly shows that teenagers are the only ones who can get the disease and this sets them apart from the rest of the population. Finally we also used the opposites of healthy and unwell to show what the disease does to people and to make it easy to differentiate between the two.

Music Choice

Choosing the right music is essential to set the mood of the trailer and is fundamental in creating an emotional connection with the audience. We were limited by copyright laws and therefore reviewed many options on the copyright free music sight 'epidemic sound'. We chose a track for our first montage that is emotional, intimate and uplifting, creating a feeling of happiness and warmth. This aligned to the montage of flashbacks covering earlier times where contact was accepted and taken for granted. Picking the right music for the rest of the trailer, to reflect the eerie and tense atmosphere associated with the disease was much harder. We needed a combination of soundtracks that would create the desired increase in tension and suspense. Eventually we found two songs that we believe successfully build tension.

The first is 'Silent Castle 1' by Niklas Gustavsson

The second is 'The Cold research 2' by Niklas Gustavsson

Poster Genre research

Most dystopian genre posters have a very dark colour palette and don't show very much other than maybe one of the main characters. All the posters I looked at seemed to be very similar in the style of them, they all included a white text of the title and some of them had the main actors name also in white. The fact that they are on a black background makes them stand out and appear obvious to the audience. The two posters below are some of the posters that we got inspiration from for our final poster. They all create a mystery and don't portray much about what the film is going to be about or what will happen.

I asked a few people what they would expect of a dystopian poster and what it could include, and this is what they came up with:

• "Would have a dark colour scheme and cold tones to create mystery"
• "A lack of vitality and colour"
• "Showing conflict"
• "Sad facial expressions"
• "Lack of empathy and feeling"
• "Destruction and things falling apart"

This research will help us to come up with a poster that is suitable to our genre and what the audience would expect from it. We will try to incorporate the different aspects of a typical dystopian poster to create a professional and appropriate poster.  

Technologies used

Certificate rating

Under the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification), we would rate our film a 15. This means that only people over the ages of 15 are allowed to watch the film. We decided this after reading the guidelines set by the BBFC and found that it didn't quite fit into the 12 category so 15 was the best option. This is justified by the BBFC guidelines that state:

• The work as a whole must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour, although there may be racist, homophobic or other discriminatory themes and language. 
• Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of pain or injury.
•  There may be strong threat and horror. 
• Sexual activity may be portrayed, but usually without strong detail.
• There may be strong language. Very strong language may be permitted, depending on the manner in which it is used
•  Dangerous behaviour (for example, hanging, suicide and self-harming) should not dwell on detail which could be copied. 
• Drug taking may be shown but the work as a whole must not promote or encourage drug misuse. 

Under the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), our film would be rated R which means Restricted. This requires that anyone under 17 needs an accompanying parent or adult guardian. Contains some adult material. Parents are urged to learn more about the film before taking their young children with them. This is Justified by the MPAA guidelines that state:

• Violence can be both intense and persistent.
• Multiple occurrences of bad language may be used.
• Drug use content is restricted to PG-13 and above.
• Nudity is restricted to PG and above, and anything that constitutes more than brief nudity will require at least a PG-13 rating. Nudity that is sexually oriented will generally require an R rating.
• Not have any explicit criteria for sexual content other than excluding sex scenes from G rated films.

Filming day 3 and 4

Day 3
For filming on day 3 we filmed the first montage scene which is showing what life used to be like before the disease struck. All the shots are either filmed outside or in a house, which were for the intimate shots of the 2 protagonists. The shots we filmed were all less than 5 seconds long so we had to make sure that they captured everything we wanted them to. Because they were all relatively short shots it meant that they were quick to film, so we were able to get everything shot in a reasonably short timeframe. Some of the shots we first filmed however didn't look right and they were overexposed, this meant that we had to re-film some of them. Luckily we allowed and planned for extra time to re-shoot things incase we didn't like any of them or wanted to change  them.

Day 4

On the 4th day we didn't have much left to film, on this day we were just filming the shots that we were still missing. There were a few shots in a park from the second montage and the shots of people looking scared and frightened. We started off at a house which was the location for the shots of people and as these were relatively quick shots to film it didn't take very long. Once we were happy with these shots we drove to a park that was near the house. We knew where in the park we wanted to film as we had already checked it out on previous occasions. This meant that we didn't waste any time and got on with filming straight away. For the shots in the park we had to make sure that there were no people in the backs of the shots as we wouldn't have permission to film them.

Production Company

As a group we decided to call our production company "RACA PRODUCTIONS'. We decided on this name as we wanted a relatively short name and we were able to incorporate all the first letters of the groups name to come up with a suitable name that sounded plausible.

We created a production video that was our logo with an altered background. We wanted to keep it simple as it created a better effect and and didn't take too much away from the actual trailer.

For our logo we decided that we were going to use a simple design of our house for the basic structure of it, we did this as we thought that a house is an item that most people can relate to. Then to suit it more to our dystopian genre we added emergency tape to try and portray the genre of our trailer more. This tape represents danger and possibly medical problems. The  dull yellow colour can be associated with caution, decay and sickness, also the colour black is associated with fear and the unknown. Finally we decided to use red writing over the top so that it would stand out and to signify death, blood and danger. We created out logo to signify all the feelings and mood of out trailer such as sickness and death.

CONTACT- Draft 2

For our second draft, after receiving and reviewing feedback on our first, we decided to make a few changes. Firstly we decided to use a more suitable production company name that fitted to our film better. Also in our first draft we had a few shots missing and some of them were not filmed from the right angle. We corrected these in our second draft. We also cut down a few of the shots like the one where the boy is putting gloves on as they went on for too long. For our second draft, we also edited the shots more in post production as quite a few of the shots were too light and we wanted them to give off a darker, eerie feel. We also edited the sound so it wasn't the same the whole way through and we did this to create more of a tense atmosphere. Adding in a black screen with headline-like information about the film also makes it clearer to the audience what is happening. We also made it clear that there were two separate, contrasting montage scenes one to show what life was like before (with brighter lighting) and one to show what it is like at the time our film is set (dimmer lighting), the sounds also helps this. Finally at the end of the trailer we added in the title screen and the screen with all the production information on. 

Filming day 2

On our second day of filming we filmed all the shots that included the family. These shots covered the scene where the family are sat at the table in a house and the shot of the children in the park. 

We started off by arranging a meeting point in the park to meet the family so we knew where they were going to be and didn't have to waste time trying to find each other. Once we had met the family we set up the camera by the slide that we had previously checked out and decided was suitable for our trailer. As it started raining on our filming day, which it wasn't supposed to, we had to try and get all the shots filmed as quickly as we could. The bonus was that it kept away others from visiting the park so we did not have to worry about strangers appearing accidentally in the scene. It also provided us with our desired lower lighting. Because on the day it was also colder than forecast we made sure that we kept our actors warm by buying them a coffee. I had the additional challenge of learning how to ride and handle a skateboard.

After finishing filming at the park we moved on to filming the house scene. We drove from the park to the house we were shooting at as it was only a 10 minute drive. Once we got to the house we went to the room where we already knew we were filming the shot, so we didn't waste any time. We made sure only the appropriate props were visible in the camera and there was no additional activity going on outside behind the actors. As we were in someone else's house we had to make sure that we were respectful and grateful that they were letting us use their house. Once we had filmed everything we needed to we made sure that we tidied everything away and left the house as it was when we arrived. 

Minimalistic vs Traditional poster

Posters attribute promotional and aesthetic value to films. The primary goal of the film poster is to 'sell' the film. They are prominently displayed on billboards, in cinemas and often on public transport such a buses. The location of the film poster is always in correlation to the target audience. 

Traditional posters:

• Will appear to be eye catching and clear as to what the film is.
• The protagonist and sometimes the antagonist will be positioned as the focal point
• Consistent colour palette to make the poster more appealing to look at
• Film title 
• Possibly a tagline
• Release date and promotional information.
• Reviews and ratings 
• Leading actors, director and production company. 

Minimalist poster:

• Very limited colour palette used, often being restricted to two or three colours. 
• Relies on iconography to convey film's title.
• Often simple and easily recognisable.
• Focuses more on the aesthetic value of the film.
• Possibly a tagline 
• Sometimes actors' names 
• Most films don't have a minimalistic poster 

Storyboard Alterations

From our first ideas to our final storyboard we made a lot of alterations as we had to ensure our trailer clearly showed the narrative and got our message across. 

From our first ideas we realised the trailer needed shots to really show the division between teenagers and the rest of the world. 
This was the main alteration we made:

Initially, we put in a scene of a mother handing out pieces of cake to young children at a cake sale. A teenager comes to take a piece and the mother refuses to give it to her. We quickly realised this scene had many flaws, in particular we would not be able to round up lots of children and gain permission for their appearance. We would also have needed easy access to a primary school location which we did not have.

We changed it to a scene in a park where a teenager is skating. A mother and her child are playing on a slide and when the mother sees the teenager tension rises. She hurriedly gets her child and rushes out of the park with her. On the way out she tells the teenager they do not belong in the park. This scene will show the audience that teenagers are being completely isolated from the rest of society and there is fear amongst the citizens.

Iconic Directors

Fritz Lang



Fritz Lang created Metropolis in 1927. This was the first film in the science fiction genre and set the foundation for science fiction films to come.  Metropolis is set in a futuristic urban dystopia and follows the attempts of Freder to overcome the vast gulf separating the classes of their city. The film features many of the conventions seen in dystopian films today.






Stanley Kubrick


Kubrick has created many iconic films including The Shining and Eyes Wide Shut. However his adaptation of A Clockwork Orange is iconic within the dystopian genre. He created a dystopian future in Britain with artificial lakes and elevated walkways. The film explores free will within humanity. He is frequently cited as one of the greatest and most influential directors in cinematic history. His films, which are mostly adaptations of novels or short stories, cover a wide range of genres, and are noted for their realism, dark humour and unique cinematography.

Ridley Scott


Ridley Scott has created many iconic science fiction films one of which was Alien. However Blade Runner has set him apart as an iconic dystopian film director. The film examines the impact of technology on human society and existence.  This film was the first to incorporate conventions from film noir, its dark style and futuristic design influenced films, television and video games to come.Scott's work has an atmospheric, highly concentrated visual style. Though his films range widely in setting and period, they frequently showcase memorable imagery of urban environments.

CONTACT- Draft 1

This is the first edit of our trailer which is missing shots and some of the shots need to be re-filmed and edited. 

Iconography

Iconography is an important aspect of genre. We expect to see certain objects on screen when we see a particular genre. For example in a dystopian genre you would expect to see futuristic technology, something that is falling apart with the world or there is something wrong with the world like a disease. It may also make you think of all the different special effects that are used to create the dystopian feel. A lot of the time dystopian films are also sci-fi films so in a lot of dystopian films you could expect to see space elements like aliens and planets.

Iconic sounds

Iconic sounds of the dystopian genre cross over with iconic sounds of the science fiction genre. The first iconic sound comes from the 1951 film 'The Day the Earth Stood Still". The oscillating, high-pitched sound was introduced with this film but has now become familiar to the ear and synonymous with aliens.
The Wilhelm Scream is a recording which has featured in over 300 films. It is iconic to many genres, dystopian being one of them as the films often have war and destruction which results in screaming.

Terminator 2 features some iconic dystopian, cybernetic sounds. However one of the most memorable comes from the scene of a Terminator sliding through prison bars. This sound was created simply by sliding dog food out of a can. 

Audience expectations of genre

Filming day 1

On our first day shooting we filmed the technology shot of the pupils walking into the the hall and the shots of a distressed female in the hospital. To film the hospital shot we asked Rida's dad, who is a doctor at Pembury Hospital, to ask if it would be possible for us to film in one of the hospital rooms. Once we knew we were allowed to film, we arranged a date with Rida's dad and he made sure there was an empty room we could use. As we were filming in the hospital we had to make sure we were quiet and respectful to the people around us. 

The pupils walking into the hall we filmed in our school's hall, we thought this was an ideal place to film as it is easy to access. We found a place that we thought would look good in our film and that wouldn't get any other people in it. At the time we filmed it there was a lesson going on in the hall so we had to make sure that we weren't getting in the way and were being respectful and not making too much noise as a teacher was trying to teach a lesson.

Technology test shots

This is the test shot that I did of the pupils scanning their wrists while walking into assembly. I found a copyright free video of a slow heartbeat that would make it look like when people scanned their wrist a heartbeat came up.

Above is the original video that I found. I edited it so it worked better with what we wanted it to look like. Once it was edited I downloaded it onto the iPad as this is what we wanted to use for the filming. I also bought iPad holders that would be able to hold the iPad up against the wall without it falling. We chose to have them white so that they would match the colour of the iPad and look more futuristic.

Above is the test shot we took. We went into the Sixth Form hub at our school and found 3 people that had Fitbits and were willing to participate. They were wearing clothes that we thought worked. We had to make sure that the people walking were in time with when the heart was beating so that it looked realistic.

Location Recce