Planning my short film narrative and plot

Original plan

My original plan was to show how cocaine can quickly become introduced to someone's life as a way to escape the aspects of deprivation and trauma. I chose the perfect actress in Nimah Grace who was not involved in the underground scene and dressed completely different and not street/hip, in order to capture the change in her life as a result of cocaine and raving. I planned on showing the deterioration of the character through physical appearance (by bags under the eyes gradually and having an ever increased dishevelled appearance), and the knock on effect at school and work by being shown sniffing at school and becoming increasingly un organised. 

I started filming Niamh in the lyndhurst estate, capturing her excellent acting skills via facial expressions and body language. I gained some footage which was perfect for my film including a slow motion shot establishing the tower blocks panning to niamh smoking a fag and at that precise moment a police car went past in the background and the sirens in slow motion really enhance the deprivation aspect of my film and really created a tense atmosphere. The film ended with niamh completely encapsulated by the coke, she finally became negligant and left the cocaine lying around, her little brother would mistaken it for lemon sherbet and die, hitting the audience hard.

But, due to Niamhs commitments to college and personal problems, she kept letting me down until I took the decision to cut her from the role and alter my plot to accommodate my new actress... Harriett Carolan-Ortan. I had to consider that Harriett's style was already street and so the drugs shouldn't be introduced yet already apart of her lifestyle.

The scenes I had filmed with niamh in my original plan;

I filmed Niamh in 'The Fox' (a pub) toilets doing drugs to get her through her shift, i filmed it in slow motion just as her head goes back, this dramatises the whole episode. The costume was a white shirt and black trousers to get across that she was in work uniform.

I realised after i filmed scenes with Niamh that filming vertically with the iPhone was a mistake as the borders on the screen wasnt consistent with the horizontal view, which covered the whole screen and looked like a film. This shot is a prime example as i positioned myself to be the mirror but holding the phone vertically, making the shot un-usable.

My favourite shot when I filmed with Niamh was the shot when I filmed the establishing shot of her estate in slow motion and at that precise time a police car went past, giving the scene added reality and authenticity, the slow motion dragged out the sirens that were gradually getting louder. When the slow motion stopped, the sirens came back into real time, shocking the audience with its volume.

As these scenes where filmed around Christmas time I really wanted to get the festive season across to my audience as Christmas is a time for family and happiness so the depressing nature of my film would be enhanced by this notion. Another scene which was unusable thanks to my vertical positioning of my camera was this rave scene which was perfect to get across the Christmas vibe.

I made use of opportunities that threw themselves at my at the time of filming, for example there was some sick on the floor so I filmed Niamh over it like it was her sick, as a repercussion from drugs and ill health.

When filming Niamh working in the pub I put a time-lapsing effect of a pint being drunk as to show the passing of time/her shift.
I used a camera angle of a drinker in the pub to project how Niamh feels paranoid due to the drugs.

Due to Niamh's great acting skills, I used my knowledge from my research on the importance of facial expressions to transfer her feelings of her traumatic home life to the audience, telling the story through acting.

Original production

I used adobe elements as my platform for the production of my film on a Samsung desktop, as I was using it, I noticed the quality of the film was extremely poor and nothing like what it looked like on my retina display iPhone. I realised this was the result of emailing my shots instead of downloading them onto a memory stick, also the lack of technological convergence was to blame in the lack of consistency in my work and the quality of film. 

Outline of the adapted plot;

The youth culture theme is what my narrative will be based around, the typical student will do a film generically on drugs and crime, however my film will be about the real life of a girl who uses drugs as a way of escaping aspects of her life that are traumatic. The negligence of Harriett causes drastic consequences as her negligent father finds the cocaine and mistakes it for lemon sherbet which is constantly referenced throughout the film innocently as the fathers favourite sweet. The audience never finds out what happens to the father, which will surely hit home to the audience as Harriett is a representation of the average girl who goes out on the weekends experiments with drugs as other aspects of her life need escaping, this basic story applys to many young people and what my film does is warn the audience as to the damage drugs can do to the normal person if addiction gets a grip.

The storyline will follow a non linear narrative as it flows from beginning to end with one scene of rewinding/ going back in time, disrupting the narrative, Todorov's narrative is being followed apart from the fifth point - the restoration of equilibrium, as the audience don't know what happens to the father so no new equilibrium is established.So for my short film or trailer to induce messages of information or moral elements, I don’t have to rely on the audience being dominant because my message ‘drugs are bad’ essentially is pretty clear. The hypodermic needle theory would say that I am subconsciously persuading the audience not to drugs as there could be dramatic consequences. However, an element of dominance needs to be had as my actress takes drugs and is seen having the time of her life, therefore to prevent copycat theory the audience need to be dominant.
Adding theorys to my work, Blumler and Katz's uses and gratification theory would be manipulated in my film as my audience would be watching for the information gain;
INFORMATION

Finding out about relevant events and conditions in immediate surroundings, society and the world

Seeking advice on practical matters or opinion and decision choices

Satisfying curiosity and general interest          

The information on youth and drugs and the up to date state of the youth today would entice my audience to watch this film.

Storyboard

• The title of the film written in lemon sherbet on the pavement, scene see Harriett walk through the writing, camera follows Harriett's direction. Close up of the writing on the pavement, rotation tracking long shot of Harriett. The introduction of Harriett as the main character,walking to work in the dark. Establishing shot of her work place.

• Point of view shot of a drinker in the pub showing Harriett work encapsulating the audience as they feel they are spying on Harriett from inside her work. Time-lapse edit of a pint which signifies time passing by. 

• Going home on the bus, tired and sad, shot of the bus cctv of Harriett at the back of the bus staring out of the black window. 

• Get a shot of a bus moving with Harriett sitting by the window

• Establishing shots of the council estate
• Harriett smokes a cigarette behind the council flats, long shot with camera movement from top to bottom.

• Harriett walking along the path on the outside of the flats, entering the flat 

• Cupboard shot-camera placed in cupboard to the opening of the cupboards by Harriett to show the lack of food. Facial expressions are key. Walks past living room to see her dad passed out on the sofa surrounded by beer cans, the poverty and bad parenting should come across through these shots via props. E.g portable TV, no pillows.

• Scene of Harriett in her room getting ready to go out 

Reference to lemon sherbet throughout.

• Close up of calender being crossed off till Friday, showing repetitiveness of the week. Time lapse.

• Friday sees Harriett walk into her room still camera movement, cross off Friday on the calender, sit at her desk writing an essay, piled up work around her, phone on charge by the desk

• Texts are received asking her to come out, close up of screen, she tries to resist temptation but finally gives in, slamming her pen down, getting up to get ready.

• Clothing focused on in getting ready, close up of top to bottom.
• Use the camera as a mirror
• Drug use
• Scenes of the rave/slow motion/blurred 

• Shots of the dad placing down and empty container of lemon sherbet, constantly switching to the rave and sniffing to show the contrast in environments and aspects of her life, it also shows that the inclusion of lemon sherbet is important.
• Dad walks (filmed walk capturing the fact he is drunk) into the kitchen to find a bag of cocaine, thinking it is lemon sherbet because he is drunk.
• Harriett comes home from the rave taking her jacket off being extremely negligent, the drugs fall out her pocket and she goes to bed
• To find that in the morning the drugs have gone 
• The dads hand slowly fades in, relaxed, possibly dead, with 'lemon sherbet' everywhere.

Practice short film - Daydream

Daydreamer from Bishop Walsh on Vimeo.

The narrative of my short film is a girl at her desk slips into a daydream where she mysteriously finds a man she knows hiding in a cupboard.
The camera shots I used were tracking shots and two shots. These were not very adventurous shots as I could of taken many shots on the journey to the cupboard from different angles, however i wanted to capture the setting of a school by tracking the back of the actor I manage to show the attitude of the actor in the way she walked giving off a school girl vibe.
The location matched the clothing of the actor as she was wearing smart clothes which would pass for a school uniform, in a school environment. The make up was very minimum as to keep up with the careless attitude of the actor, this creates a character identity.
The editing was simple as I used a filter on the last scene to make it apparent she was in a dream, The one transition I inserted was a wobble effect to establish he fact the scene was changing into a dream.
There was no non diagetic sound in this film, only the sound in the scene and dialogue from the actors. My actor was an 18 year old girl in my class who is very capable in getting her emotions across in her facial expressions which I found through my research is an integral part of a short film.

Using the camera

Using a canon handheld camera I found it hard to make the scenes look professional as the movement of the camera was amateur as it was unstable, so gave off the sense that someone was following the actor, not corresponding with the storyline. The twisting LCD screen improved my ability to select certain frames instead of having to download them all onto the computer, so my efficiency improved with this camera. 

I found the small screen hard to view to make sure the lighting and props where in the frame, so in my actual project I will use a camera or device with a bigger screen to see what I am actually filming in detail.  

Analysis 

The opening establishing shot employs the setting of an office or school environment with the inclusion of a computer and plain walls to signify the boring theme which compliments the actors facial and body language. The medium shot allows facial expressions to be focused upon whilst still being able to establish the setting. The lack of sound in this scene adds to the boring element of the story as the reason the actor is bored is apparent.

The flip transition to the next frame connects the feeling of continuous boredom with the audience and creating sympathy for the actor as time has passed and she is still bored with nothing to do. I used adobe elements effects to add the transition, this was simple however the choices are limited and generic.

The next frame the camera is still a medium shot however the angle covers the front of the actors face in order to capture more facial expressions to tell the story.

The next scene enters via a wobbling transition to signify that the actor has entered a dream and is dreaming this scene, this transition plays a significant role in directing the audience to follow the storyline of the film.

The movement of the camera is following/tracking the actress in the dream which on second thought could be better by using different angles positioned in different places infront and to the side of the actress. A pink filter is put onto the scene to further show the dream-like state and get it away from reality, i did this again by using adobe effects.

An over the shoulder shot is used to portray the conversation between the actress and actor, it shows the story from the actress's point of view which the audience has had time to connect with so will sympathise with more.

A two shot is the final shot used to end this short film to capture the conversation of the two actors, the film also ends on a cliff hanger to keep the audience hanging on till the next instalment of the film.

Improvements/looking back;

Looking back, I could of used a variety of camera shots like a low angle to capture the feet walking along the corridor to extent the tension. I could of  told the actress not to look into the camera and laugh to make my film more professional. It could of been longer by adding a further dis equilibrium and i could of solved it. I could of used music in the background to emphasis the sleepiness of the character for example a soft lullaby. 

Adobe Elements was the platform on which I constructed my practice film, I noticed the slow fluidity of the scenes and the lack of pixel quality, in my real production i will look for a new platform in which to construct my production on. 

Short film research

I am analysing a short film that has the drama genre characteristics in order to gather ideas on how to construct my short film via camera angles and learning how to build up tension. The short film I am analysing is 'omnibus' by Sam Karmann. Omnibus is a black comedy about a man on a non-stop train desparately trying to convince first the conductor and then the driver to let him off at an intermediate station so as his life does not unravel. It is a 1992 short film so I am referring to historical context aswell as contemporary in my research. 

The opening scene is very clever as just by showing writing on the floor it is all mise en scene therefore REAL, not just digital title, this in my opinion makes the film look like it has high production value and looks very well made and crafted. The fact it is on the street via the iconic cobbles and the luxurious French style writing sets the theme of the film as real life.

The canted camera angle allows more cobbles to appear in the scene this further shows the setting as the uneven sides of the cobbles are captured enhancing the reality. 

The camera then pans to a man walking on the cobbles to show a train station accompanied by train noises in a low angle position, this one scene sets the setting just by a moving angle and diagetic sound. 

The camera executes the zoom technique excellently as a way of building tension. The train stations clock is zoomed in on, making time of importance to the audience and the character. 

The varied amount of shot sizes continues as a extreme long shot is used which captures the weather which in turn reflects the mood and tone of this film.

The dis-equilibrium comes when the train stops are changed on the same day and no one informed the main character, this portrayed through close up of facial expressions and dialogue.

The transitions are very quick and smooth this in my opinion could be changed to further increase tension as soap operas create tension by having multiple storyline that they can switch to, to keep the audience hooked and the storyline lasting longer for further tension. 

All of the dis-equilibrium happens on the train and is portrayed through close ups of the faces of the characters involved getting reactions and expression filed faces to pull at the heart strings of the audience. 

Tension is built by the fact that the audience know that the main character needs to get off the train but they don't know how, the driver and the main character seem to know whats going on but the audience do not. 

The threat of death is a threat that could happen as the main character will do anything to get off the moving train. 

A countdown is an obvious way to create tension as the audience know when something big is going to happen but they don't know what, this keeps them gripped and addicted to watching. The music at this point is very quick and high pitched, building up the tension.

There is a twist in this short film as the main character gets off the train safely to the audiences relief and shares an emotion thank you to the driver who helped him, the audience connect with this lovely moment as they feel sympathy for the main character after pouring out his heart on the train so the audience know his problems, however, the twist is that someone pulls him back on the train, shocking the audience. 

Sound

The sound in this film is one of the main tension builders alongside of the eerie camera shots. The fast rhythm and dark undertones create huge tension whilst the scene is quite still, putting the audience on edge. 

The music reflects the time frame in which a major event will happen as the beats increase in frequency until the event.