I said that my most underrated film trilogy was Terrifier, due to the gore turning so many people away & the trilogy improving with each film.

Learnt the basics of the course and how to use Padlet, as well as the structure of the coming weeks.

We learnt about what makes a short film both good, and actually a short film, & our reflections going forward - such as things we may struggle with.

We also found out our groups going forward and assigned each other our roles. In my group I have:

Charlie(me) - writer & producer

Gemma - sound

Kaitlyn - director

Alex - camera & lighting

Overall I am extremely happy with this group, I already know them very well and look forward to seeing what we can create together.

As a group we each have our own strengths and weaknesses, and our roles help to reflect this.

For a first session, I would call this extremely beneficial, it was straight forward & to the point, nothing was dwelled on for a long time and there was an overall good pace, I'm looking forward to the future workshops.

We also watched a second short film called "The Black Hole", even shorter than Doodlebug, but with just as impressive of a message, the dangers of greed and abusing your power. However, there are also links to the saying; Curiosity Killed the Cat - a proverbial phrase.

We then looked at how to correctly create a character description - whats necessary and what isn't.

I drafted a basic premiss of 4 stories, but after collaborating with Kaitlyn, we decided to go for a home invasion romantic comedy style film, so a thriller rom com.

Only a basic draft exists so far but our key ideas are present and should hopefully be achievable with what is at our disposal at uni.

Story development:

Story type

Underlying themes

Where the story falls commercially (genres)

Seven basic story types:

Overcoming a Monster

Rags to Riches

The Quest

Voyage and Return

Comedy

Tragedy

Rebirth

Blake Snyder's basic plots:

Monster in the House

Out of the Bottle (wishes and curses)

Whydunnit

Golden fleece (quest)

Rites of Passage

institutionalised

Buddy Love

Superhero

Dude with a problem

The fool triumphant

Over the coming week I will create a rough story board and script for our short film - The Thrill of Love

We learnt about what actually goes into a good log-line and created several before finally settling on one which worked.

"A hopelessly lovestruck student pursues an uninterested man. When she takes the obsession to new heights, it hits a bit close to home."

Until today I never realised how vitally important a log-line was to the actual creation of a film, I never would have thought that simple sentence would influence whether a film is created or abandoned.

The opening of our lesson today began with learning about the similarities of a producer and director and how integral it is that the two of them work together.

We also learnt about the creation of a storyboard, and how integral they are to the creation process.

These storyboards then go hand in hand, with a shot-list, which is simply a list of all shots and the angles they use. This will then get turned into a shooting list, which is simply an in order shot-list.

For a good audition:

-Ask them to prepare a piece

-Have them perform an excerpt of the script

- Give them some lines from the script to do on the day.

• Allow them to do it as they have prepared

• Give them direction to alter their performanc - seeing how good they arer at following directions

• Try another direction.

  • MAKE SURE THEY ARE AVAILABLE on the day and at the right times.

  • DO NOT give them a role there and then - someone better could always come along.

Starting with Actors in rehearsals

• Starting with ice breaker questions

• Talk through character(s) with actor(s) and see how they feel about them

• Have a table read

• Have an active read - directing as they wander around the space - also block some lines

• Listen to suggestions - don't let your vision get destroyed by an actors concept of their character

• Test out multiple versions of pacing to discover what works best.

• PLAN IN ADVANCE

• Working with actor:

Make sure you have:

• Rehearsed ahead - so you can remind the actors of what was decided on already.

• Keep actors fed and watered

• Keep actors waiting as little as possible - need a place for them to relax.

  Shooting schedule:

• Simply a template involving Who, What, Where, When & Why

• Includes time stamps, location, ideas and what is being scened.

- A treatment package includes

• A film title

• Logline

• Synopsis

• Character description

• Statement of intent

I am intrigued to see our work culminate together as we build our film from the ground up and finalise our creative vision.

A logline is a catchy sentence which highlights why your film should be produced. It has to easily describe the basic plot of your movie and bring an interest to the story created.

Frame composition -

Static composition - lines are vertical or horizontal (soothing)

Dynamic composition - lines are diagonal (unsettling)

Lead room - space infront/in the direction of moving or stationary subjects.

Rule of thirds - The intersections of the lines are "points of interest"

In addition to this we can now ensure that our film encompasses several camera and lighting techniques to show the progression of our skills learned on our course.

We also each had our own personal objectives, as the director mine were; marking up the script, the statement of intent, mood board and to plan a meeting with the team later in the week.

On the benches outside her University Students' Union, Cindy eagerly texts Michael, pouring her heart our, while he responds with indifference, polite - but distant.

When texts aren't enough, she takes matters into her own hands, standing outside his flat, peering through the window, imagining a love story he never agreed to. Inside Michael goes about his life, unaware Cindy is closer than he thinks.

A split-screen reveals their vastly different realities - Cindy, filled with romantic hope, and Michael increasingly unsettled. Then, an opportunity presents itself: Cindy sneaks into his building, slipping through the door behind another tenant.

Michael remains oblivious as Cindy watches him from the shadows.

We chose to start on Tuesday with the evening shots, both internal and external, we thought these would be simpler to shoot, hence the shorter filming schedule, but we didn't account for the usual filming blunders of the first day being MANDATORY for something to go wrong. Despite this however, we successfully shot all evening scenes bar the finale and a handful of shots involving both characters' differing perspectives from the window of Michael's apartment.

As we only had a small handful of evening scenes left to shoot on Friday, it meant that we had plenty of time for reshoots, as we thought these would be where most of the problems would arise because of the heavy use of lighting effects. This was a smart choice as we ended up having a number of reshoots, primarily because of lighting changing slightly between scenes, or realising a new idea we incorporated contradicts a scene from before.

The scenes set through the day were much simpler. We used the golden rule for permission to film in Peel Park, by. using no equipment aside from the camera. Some shots were harder than others, thanks mostly to having to deal with the public, but it was a highly successful final day.

Overall I'm really proud of what we achieved during our filming week, we have one reshoot we want to do, as we've realised that 2 shots which should transition into one another swaps perspectives, so we will do that before we start putting it all together.

I then had another idea, from the beginning I had wanted this project to be more of a horror/thriller than a romance/thriller, but I was happy to change the script to accommodate the wishes of my group. As this was my edit however, I knew there were ways where I could have my original vision shine through. So I stayed after the lesson, changed the backing track, added more realistic sound effects, slightly altered some scenes to make them more horror themed, added special effects to the 'dream sequence' to pull it away from being a solely romantic sequence, to it starting romantic and lulling the audience into a false sense of security, only to change course at the end and become a much more disturbing sequence.

After completing this, I was happy with my final edit and ready to submit.