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I learned how to direct a movie through planning and organization throughout the making of this film. In addition, there were a lot of things that we changed and can still change in this film. For example, in one scene the mic is in frame and we didn't realize it until we sent the clip to our editor and she noticed the mistake. Also, we have many production errors where one item will be in a clip and then in the next clip, it won't be there. There's also errors where she'll pick up a phone in one scene and then pick up the same phone again in the next clip. Mrs. Marquis watched both cuts we submitted and gave us great feedback. She told us how the scene at the park the tackle looked a little odd, and at first when we saw it and edited it it looked fine, but now that I see it from someone else's perspective, the tackle does look weird and we should fix that. We changed the actors in between both cuts as we weren't able to get people to fix their schedules in order for them to be in our film. So we had to find a whole new cast. We also changed the filter over the "past" in the film from a yellow tint to black and white so that the audience could tell the difference between present and past within the film.

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Independent Distribution and Marketing Plan - Lover from the Past

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Independent Distribution and Marketing Plan - Lover from the Past

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1. If I were to distribute my film independently, I would publish it to YouTube and every social media platform I have access to. For example, Tiktok would be a great way to put my film into the world for people to see, as Tiktok seems like the easiest way to get people to notice you fast as people go famous all the time for no reason. I could also start a funding campaign as I am only 16 and don’t have a lot of money to distribute this film. Maybe I could get a few hundred dollars from generous people, which could help with funding greatly. Especially since distributing a film can get expensive. I would also try to get into any film markets or festivals to try to get people to notice the movie, and hopefully put down money to distribute the movie because they like it so much. Although, it’s a lot harder said than done as I don’t have experience and people don’t know me so they might not put in an effort to notice my movie. But, if I was only interested in streaming my movie, I would try to get in contact with the CW as they stream movies very similar to mine. They have streamed numerous romance mystery movies that have gotten a lot of attention in the past. This would be perfect for my movie as it would be a great way to get people to see my film. And not just any people, but my target audience, as they majority of them watch movies streamed on the CW. But, a smaller, niche streaming service that we could approach directly would be Pluto TV, as they stream action/mystery/romance movies which fits right into our genre. Although they do also stream other movies, they are smaller and cheaper, so we can’t ask for much. The fact that they do stream romance mystery movies is perfect. Part of their target audience’s are people interested in romance mystery movies who can’t afford the bigger streaming services such as Netlix, Hulu, or the CW. Although, the CW is also free, so it would probably be our first choice as it is a bigger streaming service, yet its also free. But, because it’s so big, they might not agree to distribute and stream our movie since we are small. So, Pluto TV, would be our next choice, as they are cheaper, and they stream movies in our genre, which is perfect for us. As we don’t have much money, so the fact that its cheap could save us lots of money. In addition, it’s the perfect fit for our movie.

2. The title of our film is “Lover from the Past”. I think that this is the perfect fit for our film as the movie is literally about a lover from the past that comes back from the dead, back into the main characters life again. Our original title was “Dead Boyfriend” but that seemed way to blunt and boring. It didn’t seem like the type of title that would catch anyone's eye, whether or not they were interested in mystery romance. The title just seemed boring and didn’t really describe the movie too well. Which is why we decided to change it to “Lover form the Past”. It seems more mysterious. Leaving the audience to wonder who this lover is, and what was their significance in the main characters past. I think the title really reflects the genre in that way, leaving the audience to wonder. In addition, I think its short and sweet. It's simple, not too long, but not too short, and it gives a good idea as to what the movie is going to be about. But, it doesn’t make the movie seem too boring either.

3. Our tag line is, “If the loves real, it’ll come back.” I think this is very fitting for our genre and our target audience as girls this age are really into love and finding the perfect guy, so I feel like a lot of them would agree with our tag line and feel connected to the movie in a way.

4. I think our target audience is girls in between the ages of 15-30. These are girls that want to find the love of their life and want someone to spend their time with. They want to find the person who they can spend their rest of their life with. Their best friend and soulmate. These are girls that are very interested in love. They want to find the same love that they are watching in movies. These girls will usually follow famous couples who they aspire to live like. Who they aspire to find love like.

5. The places we would advertise would be on social media: tiktok, instagram, snapchat, facebook, Youtube, TV ads, commercials and Vimeo. In addition to film festivals and film markets. We could use the information about our audience to help reach them by making our ads relate to them. Making our ad interesting enough that they will stop and watch it for a few seconds, and hopefully catching their eye long enough to get them to want to watch our film. By making our ads interesting and similar to what the audience likes, we could grow a large number of people fast and increase our audience.

6. By relating to my audience, I will grab their attention and hopefully engage them because they are interested and relate to the ad. My marketing strategy would be to put out a trailer that enhances the love life and the romance of our film, catching the audiences eye. I will get them to click on the ad by making our trailer interesting and highly attentive to watch. If they are interested in our trailer, they will talk to their friends about it, and their friends will talk to their other friends and the trailer will be shared continuously.

7. Our movie poster will enhance the love life and romance of our film. It will show a picture of the main actress, and the two boyfriends behind her. The three main colors we would use on our poster are red, pink, and white. We would use these colors because they are mainly associated with love and romance, especially on valentines day. Not only this, but we would use cursive, to make the story seem more elegant in a romantic way. This will help us build on our genre. But, to enhance the mystery part of the movie, we will have different expressions on the actors faces as well as dark spots along the poster to show that somethings not right, and that something else is going on. We would use the colors black and grey to do this, as darker colors have always been associated with sadness or mystery.

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Production Requirements - Writer and Producer

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Production Requirements - Writer and Producer

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The script changed because the original script was a little hard to understand. The issue was confusing the audience, especially with a boyfriend and then a past boyfriend coming back. I didn't want the audience to confuse the two characters, especially since we are using younger actors as well. Which is why I didn't want the audience to mistaken the younger actor as the younger version of the wrong boyfriend. Ms. Marquis suggested that I change a few things so the audience wouldn't be confused. What I came up with, was to add a conversation between the character Ava and Wade, where the name Wade is said out loud, so the audience realizes that that is him and not the boyfriend. And in addition to this, I decided to add a scene where the current boyfriend is standing with Wade in the same scene, giving the audience the opportunity to recognize the current boyfriend from the facetime call a few scenes ago. Therefore, clearing up who is who. Also, I decided to do match cuts from younger Wade to current Wade back to back so that the audience will recognize the younger version as Wade, and not mistaken him for the current boyfriend. Also, I decided to change a few of my actors, to make the two actors very distinct from each other, to clear up any confusion so that the audience clearly can tell which boy is who. For example, I want to have the current boyfriend be darker and have darker hair, while Wade has lighter hair and is extremely taller.

Shoot schedule:
- 2/18 and 2/19 for the Park scene
- 2/24 and 2/25 for inside the house scene

Locations:
- Baker Park
- Leana's house
- My backyard

Cast list:
- Ava - main character (girlfriend)
- Noah - current boyfriend
- Wade - old boyfriend that died and comes back
- Shyla - younger Ava
- Christian - younger Wade

Prop list:
- a phone
- chips
- drinks
- couch
- refrigerator
- photos of younger ava and wade
- frames for the photos
- etc.

Costume/makeup/hair list:
- All the characters are distinctly different so there is no need to change their hair or do their makeup, although we are planning to have makeup on Wade to make him look more tired leaving the audience to wonder where he's been and why he looks the way he does.

Music/sound effects list:
- sad/somber music
- intense music (for when Wade shows up at the door)
- heart beating sound effects (for when Ava see's Wade - basically for that entire scene)

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Movie: Deep Water

1. A man is biking around the city, then arrives at his home. His wife is watching him as he opens his front door.

2. This movie is about a husband who allows his wife to have affairs. But suddenly, he becomes a prime suspect when his wife’s lovers start to disappear. So this movie is a romance/mystery film. I would say the target audience for this film is females around 17-30 years old.

3. In the first 30 seconds or so of the movie, there was a grey company logo for regency as well as a blue/grey for eone. In addition to this there was the green Hulu logo, as well as transitions merging into the next logo. After this, there were opening credits in front of the establishing shot of the city. Each logo had distinctively different font and style, using different unique transitions as the logos formed together. I didn't really think it aligned with the opening of the film because it didn’t relate to the film at all, it simply just showed company logos/idents. But, in the establishing shot, it did show opening credits, which did align to the film as the movie was just beginning, showing a view of the city and the main character biking his way home.

3. It started off with an establishing shot of the city, while the camera moved upward. Then it cut to a shot of a boat moving in the water, and a person riding a bicycle passing by. It then followed that person by tracking. Then it went to a still shot of that person biking through a tunnel. The next shot was a close up of that persons face, with movement to show that they were biking. It then cut to a wide shot of them biking from behind them. Then it cut to a shot of them walking to their front door to unlock it. Then it cut to a woman watching the man open his front door. Then it cut back to the man noticing the woman looking at him. Then it cuts back to the woman, zooming in on her face, then cuts to a wide shot of that woman as she stands up and walks up the stairs, out of frame. Then cutting back to the man standing there watching her. It then cuts to the man walking up the same stairs the woman just walked up. Then dissolving to another shot of a lake with running water , then the title appeared in all caps “DEEP WATER” as it started to zoom out from the lake. Then it cut to a high angle shot from the stairs looking down as a kid passes through the hallway below.

4. During the first 30 seconds or so, when they showed the company logos and idents, there were sound affects connected to each transition of the logo, from where the logo was starting to form to when the logo was formed. It was a cool, loud type of sound, but it wasn’t music. It then transitioned to music as it showed the establishing shot and the man biking around town. The music then cut out when the man got to his front porch, as he opened his door.

5. The first two minutes were boring in my opinion. It was just an establishing shot and a man biking around town and then a woman looking at him. I was a little confused as to why the woman was looking at him, but I wasn’t so intrigued to know why. There wasn’t really anything that caught my eye or really made me want to watch more.

6. The editing style is simple, and cuts to the chase. Nothing special. Although, I did notice that the shots were short and simple. The only shot that was longer than the rest was the establishing shot.

7. The first two minutes simply introduced the characters. One being the man (husband) and the other being the woman (wife).

8. The first two minutes broke conventions by showing the establishing shot and shots of the man biking which didn’t really adhere to conventions.

9. The first two minutes brought up a question, rather than an issue. It raised me to question why the woman was staring at her husband from the stairs, and then proceeded to act like it was nothing and walked away after she was questioned about it.

10. I think this film was distributed on Hulu because Hulu has a lot of adult films. Deep water was originally on Disney, but Disney dropped it to Hulu as it was too much of a mature film for Disney. Hulu is more of a teen/adult site, which was perfect for this movie.

11. I felt that the woman, who I believe is the wife, seemed a little suspicious. She was simply sitting on the stairs as if she'd been waiting for her husband to get home, and just stared at him. When he noticed he questioned her and she smiled and looked at him and brushed it off, then got up and walked away. The smile seemed a little off to me, it didn’t seem a genuine smile, which leads me to believe that something is up with the wife. I think she's up to something or something is going to happen regarding this woman.

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In November and December of 2022, I learned about editing, sound, and screenwriting/screenplay format.  I also studied film editing concepts and created documents featuring 20 plus kinds of editing techniques and studied sound basics and watched a documentary on cinema sound ("Making Waves"). In addition, I watched a documentary on film editing ("The Cutting Edge") and a video on the use of color. I also read the screenplay for "The Incredibles," which helped me learn how to format screenplays using special software. This helped me write a two-minute horror film opening about someone having a nightmare as the basis for my midterm film project.

The requirements for my midterm film is to have a one to two minutes; horror or horror hybrid; an "opening" rather than a finished film product; minimal dialogue (mostly music, sound effects/ambience); no wall-to-wall music; no long takes; start in black with company ident and/or logo and title and (optional) credits before straight cut or dissolve to first image; minimum of three crosscuts between actor and nightmare; edited/shot/uploaded by student; accompanying blog post. The film must also include one  close up; one dutch angle; one high or low angle; one low key light set up or one silhouette; one pan or tilt or track/push or spinaround; one zoom or dolly zoom;  one subliminal cut or multitake or smash cut; one match cut; one  J cut or L cut; one use of slow or fast motion; one intentional use of color for story/emotion; one instance of intentional use of costume/hair/makeup; one instance of visual complexity in setting choice (color, texture, depth, lines, shapes, etc.); three sound effects; one piece of incidental music or one sound motif repeated three times.  For extra credit, I would include any of the following: quick cuts; montage; wide establishing shot; split screen; POV shot; reflection shot; intentional break of the fourth wall; intentional break of the rule of thirds; rack focus or pull focus shot; intentional use of handheld camera work; use of color filters to create a dream like quality; fisheye lens or fisheye effect; company logo with high quality graphic.

In many ways, I followed the rules, norms, and expectations of the horror audience. To start, I added sound effects to some of the scenes to enhance them and used music to heighten the suspense. In an effort to make it seem "scareier," to fit the horror genre, I made the lighting subdued. Additionally, I've positioned the camera in certain shots so that it appears as though someone is staring at the actor. This gives the audience the disturbing impression that someone is staring at them in the same room as the actor. I also ensured that each scene flowed into the next. For instance, you might hear a noise in one scene then a different noise in the next. I did a lot of things that broke audience expectations, horror conventions, and codes. First off, I thought the lighting was too strong in a few of the shots. For instance, the lighting in one of the "horror" sequences should have been darker, but it was actually very bright. Additionally, I made an effort to make it humorous by briefly pausing several of the sequences to depict the actor's initial shock upon discovering the visitor inside her home. Though I'm not sure if some folks thought it funny. Additionally, the location—a house—and the establishing shot—which was light rather than dark—didn't make the scene particularly spooky. The lead actor in this movie was the main character. By having her call her mother and express her anxiety and worry about hearing noises within the house, I was able to demonstrate how terrified she was. Additionally, she conveyed her fear in some situations with her facial expressions and shouts.

Near the end of my movie, I believe the transition from the dream to the actor sleeping was my most successful scene. In spite of the acting, I believe my transitions were smooth. Additionally, I believe that some of my editing was the weakest aspect of the film. I doubt that it went without incident. I edited this movie with the help of a software called capcut. Because I had never edited anything before, I also acquired editing skills while doing my midterm. Additionally, I had never independently recorded or filmed a movie before, so that was another first for me.

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In class, the genres we covered were thriller, war, animation, comedy, musical, mystery, horror, romance, sci-fi, sports, drama, crime, and adventure. We studied conventions, codes, and audience expectations. I learned that conventions are stories, characters, and their representation, setting, iconography, and values. I also learned that codes are cinematic elements that include camera work, lighting, editing, and special effects. And we learned that the audience expectations are their emotions and reactions. For each genre, we watched three movie clips from three different time periods that highlighted the genre. Some of the films we watched were hybrids. Hybrid movies are movies that have multiple genres embedded within the movie. For example, horror comedy or superhero action movies.

For my first film, we put together a drama. In this film, we conformed conventions by creating a drama filled story with a great plot. We made sure that the audience would be surprised and entertained while watching this film. We introduced all the characters in this film, and who they were, as well as their importance to the storyline. For the setting, we made sure to change it whenever we filmed a new scene. For the iconography, we added a coke bottle because it played a significant role in the film, as it was the item that was spiked. The values in the film were obvious because it was basically what the whole film was about. The goal was to get revenge on the boyfriend by spiking his drink. For codes, we used the sun for lighting as well as a camera stand for our camera (phone). As for editing, we used an app to edit. For the second movie however, we conformed conventions by creating a comedy/horror filled story with another great plot as well. We made sure that the audience would like our film and plot better than the original film, as we were tasked with recreating another group's film for this assignment. For this film, we basically copied the storyline, characters, setting, iconography, and values as the original, except we changed it to make it “better” in our eyes. For codes, we used sunlight as well. We also used a phone stand to prop the camera so that the scenes weren't shaky or crooked. As for editing and special effects, my team edited using an app to make each transition and scene flow together nicely.

Personally, my favorite genre is horror. A potential idea/story synopsis for a final film project that I have, is about a girl who finds out her parents aren’t really who she thinks they are. Basically, my idea is that a girl grows up in the perfect family. Her dad is a doctor, and her mom is a lawyer, or something like that. She grew up in a massive house with everything she could possibly ever ask for. She is the only child, so sometimes the house seems a bit quiet, too quiet almost. The first two minutes of the film would introduce her and her family, as well as the lifestyle they live in, their friends, her school, and the people around her. The audience should expect to be shocked in this film, with a lot of plot twists and unexpected things to occur. The camera work will be slow and steady, with no fast movement in the beginning. Lots of panning and tracking. In addition, the lighting should be dark and mysterious, putting the audience on edge as to what's going to happen next etc.

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For this assignment, I was assigned another group's original film and was tasked with rewriting and improving the script. I also had to include 10 different kinds of shots and camera movement. In the other groups original film, in short, there was a student who came face to face with his clone in the hallway. He follows his clone into the bathroom and meets his clone. He wakes up on a bench in the courtyard with his friend. In our film, the student was in class and saw her clone looking through the window of the classroom. Out of curiosity, the student left class to find her clone. She followed her clone into the bathroom and ends up finding her, and faints from shock. She wakes up back in class thinking it was a dream, but to her surprised, the teacher, standing in front of her, was her clone. Compared to the original film, we changed the story by making the clone appear in real life instead of it being just a dream. We also  changed the setting of the story. What we kept the same was the bathroom scene and the chasing scene. We also made sure to have the clone and the girl face each other, just like in the original film. We improved the original story by leaving the audience on a cliff hanger after seeing the teacher as a clone. We felt that that was a better ending compared to the whole thing being a dream, although we did slightly incorporate that into the story as well. In this film, the shots/movement types we used were an establishing shot, pov shot, pan left and right, zoom in, three shot, tilt up, over the shoulder, wide shot, tilt down, and a high angle shot. While creating this film, I was one of the writers as well as one of the directors. This was different for me, as I have no been the director nor the writer before. In our last film, I was the actor, so I didn't take part behind the scenes in any filming or creation of the storyline. Directing was interesting because I didn't realize how difficult it was to get the right shots. I liked rewriting the original film because I was able to throw out my ideas and see it come to life in the finished product.

I thought the editing in this film was good and well received, although there were a few scenes that were slightly off. Some scenes were cut too short which didn't make it flow. I also found that the storyline was slightly hard to follow due to the fact that the clone and the girl were wearing the same outfit, so it was hard to distinguish who was who during the film. Obviously when we watched it, we could tell the difference, but when we reviewed it with the class, I realized that others may not understand. We received criticism for how short our shots were. For example, the bathroom scene. We should have kept some of the scenes running a little longer. For instance, when the girl fainted, we cut it a little too short, which resulted in the film feeling more rushed and not running as smoothly.

Throughout the film, we used a lot of panning. For example, when the student looked over to the door to see her clone. In addition, for the scenes where the clone and student were walking, I felt that tracking wasn't the best option because we didn't have the equipment to make the tracking run smoothly. The shots came out really rough and not smooth when we tried to track. So instead, we just set the camera up and let the actor walk/run past the camera. We also tried to do a POV shot from the students perspective looking up at the board when she woke up, but it seemed like some people didn't get the idea that it was a POV of the student and not just the camera moving. We could have added some transitions to the scene to make it appear more like a POV. We also did a pan to the door where the student saw the clone, and that scene was a bit choppy. We added a zoom in to make it appear less choppy, but now that I think about it, I think that if we just panned over to the door and then zoomed in, it would have been a better shot compared to making it two different shots, and then combining them.

In a few of the scenes we added music or background noise to make the film appear either funnier, or more drastic. We added the duck noises while the actor was walking to make it more funny, and then we added the "dun dun dun" music to end off the film because we felt that that suited the film more and made a good final shot. The zoom into the actors face in the last scene also made the film more entertaining I would say. From the audiences perspective, we wanted it to be more like "Oh my gosh, the clone ends of being the teacher", dun dun dun. Instead of it being just a clip of the clone. I felt like the music and editing made it better.

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This was my first film in AICE Media. I worked with four of my classmates, Leana, Emerson, and both Sophia's. I was the actor Jamie. In this film, Jamie finds out that her boyfriend cheated on her. She then comes up with a plan to spike his drink, hoping to upset his stomach as revenge. What she didn't see coming, was that the secret love of her life, Brady, would end up drinking the drink instead. Brady ends up have an allergic reaction to the drink, and dies.

After re-watching this film, I noticed how many errors we had. For instance, the camera angles often cropped out the actors heads, or it was a bit shaky. We need to work on our camera work. In addition, I think the story was slightly hard to follow. After watching the finished product, I realized how it might be confusing for some viewers. Also, in a few clips, some of our actors would just be waiting in some scenes, and aren't doing anything but standing there. Watching that again, I noticed how weird it looks, so definitely giving our actors something to do in each scene would be good. In addition, the transitions between each scene was a little rough. Some of the clips were slightly cut to short or the transition to the next scene was not smooth. So, working on our transitions would definitely help. Besides this, I do think my classmates and I did a good job acting for the most part. Considering none of us had ever acted before, I think we did a good job acting out our parts. I also think the storyline was unique and interesting to watch. Overall, I think we did a good job on our very first film, although we definitely keep in mind all the errors that were made, so hopefully our next film will be much better.