Limbo Evaluation

Limbo Evaluation

"Limbo"

Film Poster

Behold!

This was taken on a road towards Upper Heyford. I decided that if I was to use a road I could give the feel of there is a long almost never ending journey in trying to escape out of Limbo. The feet belong to Corban who joined me in location scouting. He was wearing shorts so everythings ok! I decided he should go bare foot to make him look out of place. If he was in shoes then the audience would just think it was a lone traveller but I needed that feel of being out of place. It also gives a feel of isolation and more importantly it makes him look lost...

"Limbo"

A brief overview of the finished product before I upload the video to show you.

The trailer is around 1:40 mins long and shows the scene with Corban waking up in the car. There are cuts at certain points to add text and give the audience a vague idea of what this trailer is about. This is a general convention of trailers which I decided to add. I'm challenging the conventions a little bit by having a lot of the first scene of the potential film showing with other cuts and parts of the film around it. The extra clips are to give an idea of what will follow but we're following a short opening to almost pull the audience in and push them back out at the end, making them want to watch the final product.

Locations are the Upper Heyford abandoned supermarket car park and the centre of Woodstock

Corban Wishart acts as the lonely character stuck in Limbo

The track used is "Thistle and Weeds" by Mumford and Sons

The editing software used was Final Cut Express used on the Mac books

Music/Soundtrack

There has been one track I've thought would fit the mood so well was the track Thistle and Weeds by Mumford and Sons.

(All rights go to them, I use the song for a non-profit making A2 trailer, I do not own the song)

The track is about 6 minutes long and has a lot of variety I think. It has a mysterious feel to it due to its lone guitar and eerie melody and lyrics. The piece gradually builds a crescendo with slow drums and a low almost honky tonk piano which really adds to the feel.

The reason I love this song is for the section around 4 minutes in when the piece dramatically changes. The tempo rises, the drums quicken and the piano starts to stand out a lot more. It really gives you a sense of panic, almost a claustrophobic panic. Its brilliant and sounds like it would make the perfect track for a film and, if edited well, a trailer. I use the slower paced sections for the first minute to give a mysterious feel. Later the music cuts out and I have silence with sudden thunder claps to open new shots, a convention of trailers, and finally when it looks like Corban is looking at someone I use the sound of a plane flying over to give that rising panic feeling. The screen blacks out and then cuts straight to Corban running away in panic with the music at the most epic part, in my oppinion, playing. Again another convention of being able to just catch someone off guard. I have edited it also to have the track finish at the right time then then fade out to the title showing "Limbo". Spoiler for the title right there... More to come

Sound (Part 1)

I'm doing a fair few of these posts in parts but who knows I may end up merging them together at the end of this project.

There was an issue I had on my AS Production which was that all the audio had to be taken out, even the dialogue, because of continuity with the background noises as we were filming. The same thing has happened for this project but all that means is that the sound has to be all artificial. Its not so much of a problem in this one because there isn't any dialogue to worry about but because of that, the sounds and how much of an effect they make is really important.

To start with the openings I decided to go for a fairly cliched but effective sound of howling wind to suggest a feeling of isolation and I think that really fitted with where the shot was taken. For the first few cuts I try to make it seem a little bit like different security cameras from different angles were watching the character in the car, zooming in on every cut. I threw in a short electrical buzz on each cut to really give that effect and I think it worked. After the first few shots we come to a shot which slowly zooms in on Corban in the car and as its zooming Corban suddenly jolts up from his ("sleep/blackout/unconsciousness", the audience will decide this) the camera stops as soon as Corban awakes so I needed a sound that would gradually build up and stop, almost like that sound effect used in war films when the character of importance is in the war scene and all the sounds are muffled out until eventually the character comes back down to earth and the sound has made its crescendo and just stopped and his hearing is back to normal. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find the exact sound that I wanted but instead I've used the sound of a plane flying over head which, luckily, cut at the right time doesn't sound like a plane at all and its been able to give the effect I've wanted.

Actors

This will be a short post, but that's mostly because my cast list is tiny. There are only 2 Actors but I thought I should give a run down of the two:

Corban Wishart as an Unnamed character stuck in this alternate reality. I decided to use Corban for the film because he was able to show the emotion I needed, seeing as I wasn't using any dialogue. And also I used him because its fairly convenient to pick him up and get some shots done in the day.

Henry Frater as the busker found in the town. Henry can play the guitar and sing which was what i needed for this shot (wouldn't be the most helpful thing if my actor for this role couldn't play or sing) I plan to give him a rather scruffy and homeless look to help with the role. He does however act very well too and will be able to give off that sinister look needed for the role.

If this was a real project, at least less money would be going to the actors seeing as there's less of them...

Locations (Part 1)

OK so I have my idea and ive been working with a handful of locations and ideas which Im about to run through:

To start I needed a deserted, run-down area to open up the shot of the car and to start this was an issue as there arent really any areas of that description around me. However I first heard of a lone road in Bicester called Gavray Drive which had a bit of a story behind it, that when building the road they ran out of budget for it and just simply stopped bulilding it. If you go there and have a look its a long road, with a few turns off to housing estates but make it all the way down it just stops at a few trees. There are even a few un-operational street lights. It looked really good but I eventually ended up using another location which I will talk about but I think I may use this location still as it really does have that eerie, abandoned feel.

The main location I used for the intro is a place in Upper Heyford very close to the Upper Heyford RAF Air Base and even closer to where my main actor in my film lives. There is the most perfect location there: a fenced off, derelict and abandoned supermarket, including a decent sized carpark. Even the sign just reads "We come To Y ur Superm rket". Its something you can picture out of a zombie/postapocolyptic movie. We needed permission to use the area because it was still private property but they let us use it, I set the car up in there and have Corban sit in the car and I readied the camera. I could'nt ask for a better starting location.

A2 Production Update

It's been a while but I'm back! And with news. I will post the updates in their own sections but for now I will say that progress has been made. Before, the story was fairly complicated and I had always wanted to simplify it so now the story is as follows:

Our character wakes up in a car. In an abandoned car park. Just this will give you an idea of how the film will look. We have no names and no dialogue for the first part. He makes his way out and stumbles around shouting for any life. Through the shot we can tell someone is watching him and our main character sees a glimpse and begins to run. He makes his way to an abandoned street, sounds of ambulances and sirens and crashes can be heard in the background, he makes his way up the street to see a lone busker on the other side of the street playing (track undecided) and just looking at him as he walks past. They exchange glances with an almost desperation to communicate but they don't, as our character walks off the music dies off in the distance. The pace picks up slightly as our character grows more nervous of who or what is following. He eventually ends up along an alley with the one door in the side of the building. With no where else to go he enters and stops dead as he comes out. He ends up in the same car park he was before looking at himself in the car, as he was earlier. The story goes around in a circle.

Deep stuff, kind of. More updates on the way!

A2 Production Experiment Shots

In the next 2 weeks I plan to spend an hour or more at a particular location just experimenting with a few shots so I can have an idea of how i might want a scene in the film to look. My production doesnt go to crazy with locations, infact they're quite basic. So far I only need a living room (it will technically be a flat but I only really need a living room with a TV) and a fairly busy urban area, just a town will do. There will be other locations but I will be more clear with those as I have more ideas for the film. I might possibly need a few houses, a work-place and more urban areas. For now I think I will only be trying a few shots of my main character walking from one house to the other through the town. I want to be able to perfect filming a character through a town but being able to show which person is the main character. I also want to be able to see how I can that the character is troubled, almost out of place.

I will try this this weekend, come back with a simple range of shots and upload them. I shall report back then with those shots and hopefully i'll have more of an idea how I want the scene to act out.

A2 Production Concepts and Ideas

For our AS brief we were asked to make a 2 minute thriller film opening and I really enjoyed this brief as I love thriller films (esp. psychological thrillers) and I decided for the A2 brief to choose the 5 minute short film in its entirety so I could make a full psychological thriller short. I'm a big fan of psychological thrillers and I had recently seen the film Shutter Island, which is now one of my favourite films, and that film inspired me a lot for my ideas. I love the concept of there being 2 separate realities, in Shutter Island there is reality and there is the protagonists fantasy world which we are fooled to believe is the real world. I love this idea and I decided to add that to my film.

I needed a reason for there being a separate reality and the idea was thrown about that the film would follow a simple character, just a late teenager enjoying his life when it is sent down hill after he experiences a crash and enters a coma. There it looks like its going back to reality but this is just a fantasy world in this coma and it was just a question of how he would come back.

Primary ideas are in the last post "A2 Production plan" but I have ultimately come up with a rough storyline that goes as follows:

We follow a simple late teenager leaving his flat on his way to work. The starts as simple as that, but there is something about this particular morning that feels out of place. The news in the papers and on TV talks of a crash, there are faint sounds of sirens in the background and the character generally looks troubled. This is the introduction and the rest of the film acts as a crescendo almost. Things get more tense, the character becomes more troubled, more hints to crashes/hospitals as the film goes on and there's an ever sense of growing panic. The audience is not sure what for and nor is he, yet there will be something or a kind of goal he has to reach at the end. This builds and builds up to a climax which I will keep secret for now ;) whether he reaches his goal or not and whats really going on, what is the meaning of all the sirens and links to crashes? Who is he looking for?

I'm still fairly unclear as how I want the ending to happen, but I do want a sense of panic and I hope the audience will worry for the character and whether he reaches his goal, whatever it is.

A2 Production Plan

A2 Production Plan

Evaluation: PowerPoint

Doppler

Main Task: Locations

Our film consists of 2 half's essentially: The pub and the flashbacks. The flashbacks took place in a few locations but as far as locations went finding a decent pub was our priority. We needed a simple pub, not too glamorous like a night bar, with a few tables and a quiet atmosphere. We started looking around in Bicester for a suitable pub because Bicester was where we all lived or lived near so it would be easy to film the shoot out of school time.

The difficulty we had was that every pub we rang were busy with events and/or parties on the dates that we needed. We rang the the Black Bull-Launton, The Bure Farm-Bure Park and the White Hart-Glory Farm but all were busy. We then decided to move onto pubs around Woodstock and instead of filming out of school we would film in school, when we all had free periods. This was probably the best option because on the day of doing the pub shoot it was around 10 o'clock which was good because it meant the pub would only have a handful of people stopping for breakfast, providing us with the quiet atmosphere we needed.

We were a lot more successful when it came to asking pubs in Woodstock because every pub we asked said we were allowed to film there which was great. We had a choice between The Kings Arms, The Star Inn and amazingly even The Bear Hotel said they would let us. Ultimately we chose the Kings Arms because it had the more simple image we were looking for out of the 3, the Star Inn did have a good image but it was a little too dark for our liking. Sure it would have helped create a better atmosphere for the film but we needed a light atmosphere to contrast with the theme so the dark tone was more unexpected.

Our main location was set we then needed to think about the locations of our flashback scenes. In our flashbacks we have a police interrogation scene, a swing and a bathroom. We needed a park for the swing which ended up being the park outside our school back field, this was an easy 5 mins of filming. The interrogation scene was the only location you could really call a set because we had to make our own scene seeing as we didn't have a police station to film in. For this shoot we used our drama studio at school, turned off all the lights so the only light was the lamp on the table, found an old tape player which worked as the recording equipment on an interrogators table, 2 chairs and we were set. It was simple but it worked really well, the whole rooms lighting only being that lamp really helped with the atmosphere. We then needed a bathroom for the last 30 seconds of the film. We simply used the toilets at school, they had a handful of sinks and mirrors which was all we needed. We decided after a small incident that it was best to film this after school, because one lunch time when we were trying to film a shot someone in our 6th form walked in, turned straight back out and just as a joke told everyone we were filming dirty scenes together in the toilets... Funny times.

Main Task: Sound

Sound was a big aspect in our main task because not only did we need to find the right soundtrack that wasnt copyrighted and that fitted the mood we also needed to put all the sound that was taken out back in with sound effects and dub overs.

When filming the pub shoot we noticed a problem while we were filming; there was music playing in the background. The problem this meant for us was that if we were to keep the sound in the shoot there would be continuity errors. There would be one shot showing Hunt walking through a room and the music in both those shots would have been different, even though as far as the plot was concerned Hunt would have only been 2 seconds walking into the room. When editing the pub shoot we decided to take all the audio out and put in our own. All the sounds you can hear in the pub scene were edited in: the traffic in the opening shot, the background pub noises e.g background chatter, clinking of cutlery, footsteps, the door opening and closing we had to do all the sound. Henry even spent 5 to 10 minutes putting footsteps in and syncing them to the footage which was impressive. It turned out really well we thought in the end, and when people watched the edit after they didnt take notice of the sound, which is good because it meant we did it right. If it was wrong they would have noticed, so we were happy.

There was a great website called SoundJay.com which i used for finding free, good sounding and not copyrighted sound effects. I used this to find the door sounds, traffic sound, background chat sounds and footstep sounds.

There were also small scenes of dialogue which we had to dub over. To do this we simply recorded ourselves talking into the mic on the mac laptops, took the finished clip over to Final Cut and deleted the video but kept the audio. Then it was just a question of syncing it right with the footage. We borrowed Corban again when eiditing the film and made him say his line again and we did the same with Rob and myself. Henry took it apon himself to place the dubs in and sync them right and he did a good job we thought.

Main Task: Camera Shots

One thing about our main task is that as far as the camera goes we jump around quite a lot. As in there isnt a shot that lasts over around 10 seconds. Our story line revolves a lot around flashbacks which are used to give the viewer an insight to the whole backstory and a hint to who is the "bad guy".

Our first scene shows our main protagonist known only as "Hunt" being shown walking to a bar. Once inside he makes his way to a table. Just someone walking then sitting down is fairly boring so we decided to make the most out of what we had there and make the shots as interesting and invloved as we could, really showing how Hunts feeling. For example in the bar there was a pillar in the middle of the room with two pains of glass. If looked through at the right angle you could see 2 of whoever walked past. This was good because it could show that there may be 2 sides to this character... There was also a shot just after Hunt has walked through the entrance and is making his way to the next room. The camera pans and follows Hunt from a table. We used this to make it seem like we the audience were sitting in the pub and watching him.

There are a few Dutch Shots used aswell to give a feeling of uncertainty and mystery in the film. One is used in the pub through a reflection in the mirror, again making the most of what we had there, this is the last shot in the pub before we cut to our first flashback. We use another Dutch Shot in out first flashback of the police interrogation with the cop telling Hunt that they've had to drop the case looking for his sister.

In the last flashback scene we see Hunt in a bathroom hanging over a sink, panicking and breathing heavily. We open this flashback by showing a first person of the camera looking over the sink. The camera is unsteady and shaking, a lot like Hunt was in this scene. The camera cuts to 2 medium shots in the space of around 5 to 7 seconds. We wanted this scene to feel slightly paced to help with the tense feel.

Background Info on Main Task

Our film mostly takes place in a pub. Our film starts out with our character going out to a country pub to drown his sorrows. The real time of this shoot takes place in the pub for the whole time but our film includes a lot of flashbacks.
We use flashbacks to create the main feel of our piece. The flashbacks are mostly eerie and sometimes blurred which will leave the audience questioning what the characters actually visualising. The flashbacks will give the backstory about his job and the case with his sister. After all the flashbacks giving all the backstory we now see the blurred visions which will show theres a second person involved, or second personality...
The film will mostly take place in a pub but others scenes show a police interrogation room, a park and a bathroom used at the end of the piece.

As far as locations go our main worry is the Pub. The majority of our film takes place here and we've been struggling to grasp a date due to there being a lot of events occuring when we needed to film. This weekend we plan to use the Black Bull in Launton who have confirmed us being able to use the pub for a shoot which is great

We have a sheet showing a shot list and other technical ideas behind the piece which is yet to be scanned and posted so ill have that up as soon as it is.

Main Task: Introduction

Our main task was to create a short 2 minute opening of a thriller film. In the group theres me, Henry, Chris and Trey and we came up with an idea about an ex-cop who got fired from his job because of the character (unnamed) being obsessed with searching for his kidnapped sister. The case to find her was dropped due to there being no success in finding her but the lead character is obsessed with finding her. Our character also suffers from a multiple personality disorder and clues are hinted throughout the two mins to show how this has affected the character and the case itself...

Media Studies Blog

Hey ^_^ First post... Ill be keeping information for media studies on here so its all good.