October 2011:
After having watched many classic noir and neo-noir films I brainstormed possible plots for my short film.
I had decided to use the plot - which is highlighted above - with the setting of a public house. Fortunately, my father is a manager of a public house in Ladbroke Grove (W10) and I was granted permission to film there.
Then, I brainstormed possible names for the title of my short film:
When considering who I shall cast the most apt decision was to cast my younger brother Conor and friend Rebecca. This is because Conor visits my father with me so getting to the location would not be an issue and he is studying Drama GCSE at school and Rebecca has an interest in acting.
With my plot, location and cast established I completed a storyboard of the film's plot and created an anamatic, which I published onto Youtube:
My anamatic from Youtube
Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKBgxA1vKTk
In order to discover a route for the characters which would would be longer than the 5 minute minimum and one which would allow for discretion as I intended to give an atmosphere of isolation, I investigated the Ladbroke Grove area by walking different routes. Afterwards, I had finalised the route the characters would take during the film:
Key: Purple circle = location of pub
Red star = starting location of film
Blue path = female protagonist's path
Black path = male protagonist's path
Red cross = location of the film's ending - where the two characters meet
November 2011:
In preparation for filming, I considered any props, constume and equipment I shall wish to use to complete the film so I researched make-up and clothing typical of 1950's female icons:
Elizabeth Taylor:
Grace Kelly:
Common qualities of the Film Noir woman:
- Red lipstick
- Heavy, black eye makeup
- Sexualised attire - e.g. plunging necklines
- Black and red are the most common featured colours in clothing and makeup
Cast and Location Shots:
The cast and myself agreed that only weekends (Friday night to Sunday early evening) were appropriate for filming as it would not interfere with our schooling so I created a calendar to calculate when we shall be able to film:
Purple squares = times I am unavailable
Green squares = times Rebecca is unavailable
So it was decided that we would begin filming on Friday 25th November. However, as I wanted dry weather conditions for filming, the filming was cancelled due to a large amount of rainfall. So filming was postponed to the following Friday.
Friday 2nd December 2011
I captured still images of the cast and of the location (Ladbroke Grove).
In order to reach my chosen audience, I cast a 15-year-old Irish male and a 17-year-old dual-heritage British female. I chose to cast my brother Conor to play the male protagonist as he is currently completing a GCSE in Drama.
Production:
Friday 2nd December 2011
Call Sheet for Friday 2nd December 2011
I started filming in Ladbroke Grove. I captured the entire storyline of the film on that one occasion. Whilst filming I decided to slightly alter my original story as whilst filming I captured police cars - with their sirens on - passing when the cast and I were filming the ending scenes, so I felt I should take advantage of this footage by giving the film a more sinister ending. Shortly afterwards, after we had just finished filming the final scenes, it began to rain and the rain caused a 'floating light' effect on the camera; this is the first image seen on my final film product.
Tuesday 6th December 2011:
I uploaded the camera footage onto iMovie on the Apple Mac and began to select the parts which I wanted to include in the film.
Friday 9th December 2011:
After identifying the film footage I wanted to include in my film's title sequence, I began to create my title sequence. I experimented with the speed of the footage and found the slow-motion footage shown at the beginning gave a haunting ambience. The footage I placed in the title sequence features people mindlessly walking past and Conor is in one of the shots and not in the next. This was filmed unintentionally as I had originally wanted to show him arriving from the station to the pub but, as there was a large crowd passing, I filmed the crowd instead and Conor got caught in the shot. When adding the titles, I experimented with different fonts and colours.
Tuesday 13th December 2011:
After editing all of my current footage I noticed: there were times when the actors' voices were drowned out by the music coming from the jukebox, the quality of acting was poor, the focus of the camera faultered. The most important error was I could only accumulate a maximum of 4 minutes of film footage - less than the required 5 minutes. Also, I felt I neglected the build-up of the stalker sequence towards the end of the film. Thus I arranged another date to re-shoot:
Key: Blue square = Conor unavailable
Purple square = I am unavailable
Green square = Rebecca unavailable
Red square = we are all unavailable
We thus decided to re-shoot on Friday 16th December 2011.
Friday 16th December 2011:
I re-filmed the bar scene, the concluding scene and experimented with camera shots and angles for the outside scenes. There were continuity errors as Conor's shirt was in the same style but in a different colour than the first and Rebecca's hair did not have a clip in it to give the half up-do style she was seen with before.
However, I was unable to finish the concluding outdoor scene as it began to rain, which meant I had to reschedual with the cast:
Purple squares = I am unavailable
Green squares = Rebecca unavailable
Due to time constraints I was forced to film both Conor and Rebecca separately, which is why Conor is not seen during the stalking sequence. As I wanted to film as soon as possible, I stayed over Rebecca's house on Thursday 12th January and filmed her part and I filmed Conor's part in our back garden on Sunday 8th January.
Friday 6th January 2012:
I uploaded the new footage and began editing. As I had only new footage of the pub scene I could only focus on editing that scene - both the previous and new footage. I had several versions of which shots to use in the indoor pub scene.
Sunday 8th January 2012:
I wrote the script beforehand and as Conor was saying his lines to the camera, I read Rebecca's lines. On this day of filming it was snowing so I filmed Conor under the roof of our shed in the garden - this meant that the snow was not visible and thus wouldn't cause any continuity errors. As we were filming in the evening, I found that Conor was barely visible on the camera so I had to keep the motioned sensor light - which is at the end of the garden - on constantly for the 20 minutes it took to film, so the camera was left standing on a tripod. I had decided beforehand that I wanted Conor's dialogue to be filmed while the camera was on a tripod because the camera - in this instance - is acting as a point of view shot from Rebecca's character. The steady shot would connote Barmaid's mental stability and the shaky handheld I would go on to later use to film Rebecca's dialogue would connote Boy's mental instability and fragility. I also wanted to reinforce Boy's insanity to the viewer by presenting his dialogue scene as fragmented.
Having already done my film poster research, I knew that I wanted Conor to be on the film poster and so took this opportunity to capture still images for my film poster. I had the concept of immitating the film posters of "Brighton Rock" and "The Third Man" because the respective male protagonists have serious facial expressions, which could be perceived to be intimidating (to influence by evoking fear) - I consider fear and intimidation to be a central emotion and theme to my short film. In order to have a gradient of light to darkness, I used Conor's Apple iPhone - which has an App that projects a white light - to light different sides of his face.
Tuesday 10th January 2012:
I uploaded the footage of Conor's scene and found that the brightness was low so I experimented with the colour filter and the brightness and contrast levels.
Thursday 12th January 2012:
This time I filmed the stalker sequence in Enfield and had to be cautious not to frame anything which would reveal the location as - for continuity purposes - I wanted the viewer to believe the location to be near Ladbroke Grove. I found the location more apt for a stalker sequence as there were many narrow alleyways, which meant that it was unlikely a member of the public would appear in the film and continuous silence could be established; these elements highlight Barmaid's vulnerability as she has helpless and cannot receive any help. As I was filming Boy's point of view shot whilst stalking Barmaid, I used the handheld camera for the entire sequence.
I recalled my research into suspence sequencing at the beginning of the academic year and placed different false climaxes within the film. This constant anticipation builds up the tension to provide a shocking climax.
When filming I found the sequence to be somewhat monotonous so I asked Rebecca to have a telephone conversation with her 'flatmate' - the conversation which is on the final version of the film was entirely improvised. I also wanted a reason to be provided as to why the police cars would be shown in the film; the police cars connote that they have been contacted regarding Barmaid's assumed disappearance and I thought if Barmaid was living with a flatmate then this provides an explanation.
Despite not having originally planned this, during filming I told Rebecca to film her character's point of view. For all parts of the stalker sequence I filmed the same parts three different times to provide: a stalker point of view, victim point of view, general camera overview.
Friday 13th January 2012:
I uploaded the footage of Rebecca, the stalker sequence and the ending and began sifting through which footage I would be using.
Friday 20th January 2012:
I arranged all the footage into chronological order and began integrating footage from all four filming occasions. I spent most of the following week working on the conversation between Conor and Rebecca as I feel this to be the climax of the film.
Friday 27th January 2012:
I found the lighting to be an area that needed many alterations. The first alteration which needed to be made to the lighting was the scene which included Barmaid's telephone conversation with her flatmate. To resolve this problem, I experimented with the colour filter and brightness and contrast levels. I found that the colour filter made no improvement upon the visual clarity and so I decreased the contrast and increased the brightness, which I found resolved the lighting difficulty.
The second alteration was completed when I noticed that the lighting was different in Rebecca and Conor's scenes individual alleyway scenes. Conor's scenes, despite altering the brightness and contrast previously, to be a different colour filter from the yellow colour filter in Rebecca's scene. I made Conor's scenes more yellow but, as I had already finely cropped the timings for the dialogue, I had to change each individual clip to the same colour filter which was a challenge and time consuming. Another issue I encountered was the difference in volume - Rebecca's dialogue was quieter than Conor's dialogue so I adjusted Rebecca's dialogue to 200% for each of her clips.
Tuesday 31st January 2012:
I had completed editing the film footage and re-watched the film in order to check for any visual or aural errors.
Sound:
Friday 9th December 2011:
When creating my film's title sequence, I searched the iMovie music database as I wanted to create a mysterious ambience. Having found a piece of music I liked and found apt for the short film, I placed 'Drone Dark Suspense' in the title sequence.
Friday 16th December 2011:
In preparation for the production of an original piece of music, I brainstormed melancholic songs - which I found to be best suited given the film's denouement - which I could manipulate to create a loop on GarageBand:
I had already imagined some piano chords being played in the stalker sequence and when I listened to 'Bring Me To Life' by Evanescence I knew the into was the piece to put in the stalker sequence. The song's intro is mysterious and eerie, which is what I intended the stalker sequence to be. I found it difficult to perfect a loop of this intro and make one note from the end of a loop flow into the beginning of the next.
I also chose to include 'Hello' by Evanescenece as the beginning note is very haunting and an apt accompaniment to the ending credits as the music - along with the police sirens - connote a violent attack of some sort has been made on Barmaid and the music of 'Hello' establishes a melancholic ending.
Friday 20th January 2012:
As I was nearing the completion of my short film, I uploaded 'Hello' and 'Bring Me To Life' by Evanescence onto GarageBand and began to manipulate both respective intros into a loop.
Wednesday 1st February 2012:
The creation of the loops for 'Hello' and 'Bring Me To Life' were completed. I re-watched my film footage of the stalker sequence in order to pin-point the location where the accompaniment of the loop of 'Bring Me To Life' would be most apt. After doing so, I placed 'Bring Me To Life' in the decided upon positions.
I placed 'Hello' at the end of the film footage so it acted as a sound bridge from the film to the ending credits. I altered the ending credits after researching the ending credits of short films such as 'Virus'.
Friday 3rd February 2012:
I created the loop for 'Bring Me To Life' and placed it in the stalker sequence. When replaying the sequence I found some clips that were slightly out of sync with each other - i.e. one clip did not flow perfectly into the next - so I corrected these errors. After watching the film three times to ensure it was faultless, I concluded the editing of my film and published it to Youtube.
However, I encountered a problem when publishing my film to Youtube. As "i.D." is a popular video title on Youtube, I found it impossible to find my film when using the search engine so I published the video entitled "i.D. Lights and Frights", which references to a possible title for my film I came up with when brainstorming.
My final film product
Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QetXfyHxzM
I then went on to show fellow Media Studies students and friends my short film and asked them to answer my questionnaire. I recorded their responses on the built-in camera on the Apple Mac and edited the footage using iMovie:
Questionnaire Feedback
My paper-based questionnaire
I used Microsoft Excel to generate bar graphs and pie charts to illustrate the results of my questionnaire:
1. a) State age and ethnicity
Bar graph representation of the ages of those who completed my questionnaire
Bar graph representation of the ethnicity of those who completed my questionnaire
1. b) Male or Female?
Bar graph representation of the gender of those who completed my questionnaire
2. Did you enjoy this film?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "Did you enjoy this film?"
Those who answered 'Yes' stated:
"The girl's footsteps built up the tension as it emphasised her isolation and vulnerability"
"There was a good build up of suspense"
"The setting of Ladbroke Grove made the film realistic"
"The piano soundtrack made the chase sequence, and the build up to it, really sinister"
"I liked the handheld camera work as it made the viewer on edge because you knew the girl was being followed and the guy was more threatening because you couldn't see him"
"There was a good build up of suspense"
"The setting of Ladbroke Grove made the film realistic"
"The piano soundtrack made the chase sequence, and the build up to it, really sinister"
"I liked the handheld camera work as it made the viewer on edge because you knew the girl was being followed and the guy was more threatening because you couldn't see him"
Those who answered 'No' stated:
"I don't like short films"
"It was obvious it was low budget so I didn't enjoy the viewing experience but I thought the build up of the climax was good"
"It was obvious it was low budget so I didn't enjoy the viewing experience but I thought the build up of the climax was good"
3. What genre would you associate with this film?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "What genre would you associate with this film?"
4. Did you find the gender representations stereotypical?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "Did you find the gender representations stereotypical?"
Those who answered 'Yes' stated:
"The boy was dominant for most of film - this began as he waited outside for the girl as from that point onwards he is controlling her fate"
"Even though the barmaid is overpowering in the pub scene this is only because she works there and there's lots of people around - most of whom are men - so she took advantage of her status there. Because of this I didn't find this to subvert the gender stereotype."
"The fact there is a barmaid, who serves the patriarchy through her role as a sexual object and servant, is stereotypical"
"Even though the barmaid is overpowering in the pub scene this is only because she works there and there's lots of people around - most of whom are men - so she took advantage of her status there. Because of this I didn't find this to subvert the gender stereotype."
"The fact there is a barmaid, who serves the patriarchy through her role as a sexual object and servant, is stereotypical"
Those who answered 'No' stated:
"The boy began as inferior to the girl as in the pub she was in control"
"When the barmaid humiliates the boy she's not sweet or particularly feminine so she assumes a masculine role in a masculine environment (the pub)... subverts gender stereotypes because you would assume if a woman was in a male environment she'd have a greater desire to establish her femininity, which the barmaid in the film obviously doesn't do"
"When the barmaid humiliates the boy she's not sweet or particularly feminine so she assumes a masculine role in a masculine environment (the pub)... subverts gender stereotypes because you would assume if a woman was in a male environment she'd have a greater desire to establish her femininity, which the barmaid in the film obviously doesn't do"
Those who answered 'Yes and No' stated:
"There was a balance as the girl was in charge at the beginning and then in the final scene the boy exerts his dominance by stopping the girl from leaving and intimidating her"
"It was not stereotypical in the beginning because the girl humiliates the boy but then it is stereotypical as the boy takes charge by frightening the girl and, we can only assume, through violent or sexual means"
"It was not stereotypical in the beginning because the girl humiliates the boy but then it is stereotypical as the boy takes charge by frightening the girl and, we can only assume, through violent or sexual means"
5. What did you think about the role of the setting?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "What did you think about the role of the setting?"
6. Did you find the film realistic?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "Did you find the film realistic?"
Those who answered 'Yes' stated:
"The i.d. situation was realistic as that happens to people all the time who are around 18 years old. And it was realistic that the boy was annoyed and stormed out"
"The realistic setting makes the film more credible"
"The realistic setting makes the film more credible"
Those who answered 'No' stated:
"I've never been stalked so the boy stalking the barmaid after their altercation seems unrealistic, but although it does happen in real life, it is not realistic to me"
"I can sort of believe that the boy follows the barmaid to settle the score because he's shown to be a bit insane and unhinged in his conversation with her but I don't find it realistic that he would stalk her for such a long time"
"I'm not used to it [stalking] in real life so I can't really relate to it"
"I can sort of believe that the boy follows the barmaid to settle the score because he's shown to be a bit insane and unhinged in his conversation with her but I don't find it realistic that he would stalk her for such a long time"
"I'm not used to it [stalking] in real life so I can't really relate to it"
7. Did the film come across as professional? What made you conclude this?
All those who completed my questionnaire provided balanced answers - below are quotes from some responses:
"The different locations made it seem professional as you'd assume the budget was larger than if it was in the same location"
"The range of camera shots and angles make it clear that you've been educated in cinematography and you have a good range of knowledge and you didn't just randomly film"
"The quality of the camera was obviously from a cheap digital camera so that gave the impression of an amateur film-maker but the different camera techniques and shots conflicted with this amateur impression"
"I thought the in and out of focusing was really good so you seem to have good technical knowledge about editing films"
"I thought the acting was ok, nothing special, and the camera that was used was clearly not that of a Hollywood film standard because it was a bit pixilated at times so I thought it came across as more amateurish"
All those who completed my questionnaire provided balanced answers - below are quotes from some responses:
"The different locations made it seem professional as you'd assume the budget was larger than if it was in the same location"
"The range of camera shots and angles make it clear that you've been educated in cinematography and you have a good range of knowledge and you didn't just randomly film"
"The quality of the camera was obviously from a cheap digital camera so that gave the impression of an amateur film-maker but the different camera techniques and shots conflicted with this amateur impression"
"I thought the in and out of focusing was really good so you seem to have good technical knowledge about editing films"
"I thought the acting was ok, nothing special, and the camera that was used was clearly not that of a Hollywood film standard because it was a bit pixilated at times so I thought it came across as more amateurish"
8. Was the narrative clear?
Bar graph representation of the response to the question: "Was the narrative clear?"
9. What did you think about the use of non-diegetic sound?
"The piano made it seem spooky and added to the ambience"
"The repetition of the piano foreshadowed the confrontation between the boy and the barmaid... it reminded me of 'Jaws' in the way that the more the music played the closer the climax was"
"The music fitted well with the sequence and so I thought it was a very good choice to place in the chase sequence"
"I really liked the music at the end because it starts off really creepy and leaves the viewer unsettled because the ending's left open and the police cars and ending music suggests that the boy killed or raped the girl"
10. Did you have an emotional response?
Bar graph representation of those who had an emotional response to the film
11. Did you find any camera angles or movements to be sophisticated?
12. What could be done to improve the film?
Pie chart representation of the response to the question: "What could be done to improve the film?"
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