Preliminary Task

For our coursework, we have to create a short film opening of our own. This task was the foundation for our editing, filming, directing and even acting skills. In this task we had to film a conversation between two people as well as showing camera and editing skills like, walking through a door, and using shot, reverse shot in the filming of the conversation which i did with my task partner Max. We named it 'Rendezvous By Text'

The Black Hole

Short Film Research

We looked at three short films in a lesson to gain some knowledge on music and sound effects in a film clip. Firstly 'The Black Hole', 'The Otherside of the Lens' and 'Occupied'. I chose to look at 'The Black Hole' in more detail even though it wouldn't have a very interesting music time graph. However, it can help us to understand how it works. It tells the story of "a sleep-deprived office worker who accidentally discovers a black hole - and then greed gets the better of him..."
The main sound effect through out it is of a photocopier, when the noise is being used the graph would have a small raise in the it. This is continuous throughout the film so the graph would have little bumps for the beep all the way through. Another noise we hear often through this short film is the noise when the 'black hole' is being used, the zorbing. This is then set in our minds when the hole is used, so we may not even have to see the hole being used but hear the sound and we will know what is happening. Toward the end move and more is happening so the noise level is raised, so our graph will start to look as if it is climaxing. And this is where it finishes, at the peek of the climax, the loudest point of this film is the point of which it ends.

Garage band Lesson

In one of our previous lessons, we were taught how to use garage band. The programme helps you create music or various sounds to add into a film or short clip. Using music to create an atmosphere or just add to an action. For example music can create dramatic tension by the use of one instrument, a single drum beating as an example. In this lesson we drew some graphs to represent what is going on in the music in correlation with the film. Along the x axis would be the time of the film, and the y axis would be the volume of the music, in my idea of the graph, you could change the y axis to pitch but I will stick me volume. So the total graph length is the total time of the film including the highest peeks to be the loudest points in the music and the lower one the quieter parts.

iMovie Lesson

What I learnt on iMovie.
Firstly I have learnt how to upload a film clip. This may seem really straight forward but I can be quite complicated for a first time user, as I have never used it before. After getting all my clips on screen, I then learnt how to view my videos and able to select which clips to use and which clips not to in a new project. After this I was shown how to crop and cut my shots, which was extremely straight forward compared with the uploading. After editing my clips to the standard I wanted, and then added the finishing touches like credits and an title opening title.

Opening Sequences

Opening sequences of a film generally introduce the audience to the tone and theme of a film as well as the cast, crew and company. it is more than just a list of credits, and can become a min movie of its own, establishing mood, period and styles and can be seen as an art form. in this essay I will be comparing the films 'Catch Me If You Can' and 'Amelie' and i will discuss the use of genre, characters, camera shots, lighting, colour and storyline to see how these are aimed at a certain type of target audience.

‘Catch Me If You Can' is a Stephen Spielburg American crime film based on the life of Frank Abignale Junior who successfully conned millions of dollars by posing as a Panam airways pilot, a doctor, an attorney and as a parish prosecutor through cheque forgery, all before his 19th birthday. It stars Leonardo Di Caprio, Tom Hanks and Christopher Walken. The film was created to exploit the sympathy we feel towards the crook and deals with themes of troubled childhoods, broken homes and people on the run from their pasts throughout.

The elegant retro intro to Catch me perfectly sets the scene and time period. The sequence moves through various brightly coloured animated locations (an airport, the road, the poolside, a hospital) the colour scheme changing with each new setting. It describes the events of the movie almost literally but without ruining its events and still highlights the films topic. This prepares the audience for the main narrative and can be most fully appreciated after watching the whole film. The constant perpetual motion and endless metamorphosis follows a chase motif but in an excited and playful manner. Helped by the use of music, up tempo and stirring. But it can also be used as a metaphor for the new and jet setting prosperities of the mid 1960’s. Spielburg also uses vivid arrows above Abagnale and Hanratty’s heads to emphasise the tracking of their progress but additionally to keep the audience’s attention on their movements.

Eventually the two characters meet in the same frame and this turns to a fade out, leaving suspense and anticipation as to what will come next.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s romantic comedy Amelie is a film set in Montmarte, Paris about a young woman, grown up isolated from other children, who decides to change the lives of those around her for the better. Living with her iceberg of a father and her neurotic mother, until her untimely death, when Amelie is only six years old. Left even more alone, Amelie develops an unusually active imagination. At 23 she finds an old metal box of childhood memorabilia hidden by a boy who lived in her apartment decades earlier, inspired by this she decides to devote her life to bringing happiness to others.

The opening sequence of Ameile establishes the movie’s themes of happiness and simple pleasures throughout its surreal but unique visual style and creates the films quirky sense of humour. Most characters in stories are introduced by their characteristics, but Jeaunet introduces his characters by their likes and dislikes. These are not important to the overall plot, but they are humourous in their abnormality. For example, Amelie likes skipping stones and dislikes drivers who do not watch the road in old movies. The openings use vivid colours, lighting and an amusing voiceover which all combined create a feel-good experience.

The things young Amelie is doing whilst the credits occur are related to the credits themselves – playing with wine glasses and making noises when the composer’s credit is shown. She cuts out paper dolls for the editor, and plays with her mouth for the script and dialogue writers. And I think this shows the simple beauty and uniqueness of ordinary people.

The specific colours used enhance the films surreal atmosphere, emphasizing that while the film is set in modern Paris, it is not however the Paris of the real world but Jeunet’s fantasy version of it. Green tends to be the background colour and the main objects are red. The openings camera movement is unique as well. Where the camera moves subtly, even though it could easily not move at all and this gives the sense that the camera is almost floating around its subjects at all times, like it is the character itself. This camera dance allows the viewer to follow and become not only an observer but an important part of the action as well.

Catch Me If You Can - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaLDyrun_Cc

Amelie - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9FdDw1esFM

Breakfast Club Script Exercise

In lesson we looked at the opening scene from the film “The Breakfast Club”. The sequence we looked at involved meeting 5 high school students and them arriving at school to complete their detention on a Saturday morning. Here we can see the different characters behavior and we analysed each camera shot and parts of the dialogue. Our task was to try to create our own version as a class to help build up some filming and editing skills. However, we didn’t have the same location but we still tried to create a similar look to the layout of the classroom. All of us were given a certain purpose and I took the role, with a few others, as an editor. We had to cut our film and make sure the final look was going to be good enough for the directors which I think we managed. 


From this task I learned how long a time it takes to create a small section of film. By shooting many different angles and sections to get the exact shots you want. I also learnt that although you have to work as a team, it would be extremely hard to produce on your own and you have to remind yourself to keep the whole production working exactly the way you want it to and remember what you went there to do.