Secession.com examples

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeEDQMLtyGY

Here is a link to an example of the music (from secession.com) that I hope to include in our final project, this may change depending on our final concept but either way I do still really enjoy this music and hope to include it in some way. It's very soft and dramatic and I think it would be nicely suited during a conversation as I can see it adding drama to a scene very easily.

Music For Our Final Project

Today I have been searching through music which might be possible to use for our final project. When I was searching through YouTube and I found a YouTube page from a 'sucessionstudios'. The music on his profile was by far some of the best that we've heard. I emailed him asking for permission to use his music for our project. Below is his reply. I am incredibly happy to say that he has allowed us to use his music as long as we can attribute it to his website during our video. If anyone is interested in using his music for personal use you can see the details in his reply below. His email address is "info@thesecessionstudios.com".

"Hi Reece, Feel free to use my music in your academic projects. I don't charge students a fee to use my music I just ask that it be attributed to http://thesecessionstudios.com if possible. If you decide to use my music for personal, non academic projects, I usually negotiate a very small license fee depending on your budget. About 5% of what I charge for mainstream production use.

Take care,

Greg"

Continuity Project Video

Here is our continuity project video. It took a long time to complete and a great deal of stress came (in particular when we discovered there were some missing shots) however we decided to simply focus on ensuring the action match is shown clearly (when Barry, credited as "P. employee is walking through a door at the begining), the shot/reverse shots are shown throughout the clip and the 180 degree rule is hopefully established. There are some continuity errors which I stated before in earlier blogs. The most notable could be me changing my position on the chair. This was caused because the original shot is missing so we decided to use a 'take' from another shot. Another continuiy error can be seen when Barry's hand reaches out to shake mine but then disappears in the next shot of me. Overall I think we have learned from this that comedy is incredibley hard to do. Steve Martin said "comedy may be big business but it isnt pretty" and I never understood that properly until now. The timing is very hard to do but like stated before we do have the 3 requirements established which should mean that we do not lose any marks. I have learned about continuity and I feel I also understand more about ensuring multiple shots are taken and there are many 'takes' for each shot. I also feel as though we have learnt that as a group we are better suited to shooting a more serious video than a comedic one which should effect our final video.

Indy Mogul

http://www.indymogul.com/

Here is a link to a website which Amir introduced me to. Within the website it shows an array of different ways to design specific objects such as a broken glass bottle and also different camera uses, shots and effects. It is very useful and offers a vast amount of advice which can be applied to our project. It's a good educational website for people who are doing media as an A or AS level. Check it out and see what you can apply to your project. Also the majority of the advice they give is how to make objects at the cheapest price which makes it perfect for students who are working on a limited, small budget.

Editing Finished (Apart from one sound effect)

The editing for our continuity project has now finished, apart from the end sound effect. So far we have not got the file with the sound effect in it yet, however according to Katie it is very easy to get the sound effect so we should be able to upload the final project very soon. 

Almost Finished

After today it seems as though we may finish the project completely by Monday! The only thing that appears to be missing (besides the missing shots) is the Darth Vader voice which should appear at the end shouting "No!", once this sound effect is found and included in the video then we should be finished. Some continuity erros will appear and we are aware of this, however like stated in my earlier blogs we do still have the necessary requirements to not lose any marks from this project.

Continuing Editing

Today we are continuing the editing of our continuity project. Since some clips remain missing it is likely that there are continuity project regarding my posture as sometimes I am leaning forward whereas other times I am leaning back on my seat. It is unforuntate that these errors are there and very noticeable but we do still have the Action Match, 180 degree rule established and have many shot/reverse shots so hopefully we will not lose any marks by the end of the project.

All is well

Amazing, today while we were editing we just so happen to stumble across some of the missing clips! unbelievable and totally unexpected but fantastic nonetheless. This means our project will not be drastically edited. However some clips have remained lost but as a group we feel that we can use other clips from different parts of the script and use these as opposed to re-shooting the whole task again. This is such a relief and hopefully we can upload the project a lot sooner than expected. We understand that the project wont look as good as originally planned however since all we need is the Action Match, Shot/Reverse Shot and 180 Degree rule established of which are all already completed it means none of us in the group will lose marks for not completing the task.

Disaster - My Fault and Apology

I have made a huge error and I take full responsibility for it. Basically  it seems that we have not got the shots of some of the lines in the script. This is frustrating because the lines missed are the most important lines in the whole dialogue. Thankfully we still have our Action Match shot which is good. However for some reason the shots that are missing I was certain that we shot however I have to digress. Katie is very annoyed (and rightly so) with this and I specifically got the blame within our group for the missing shots (again, rightly so) as I made the script and should have been certain that each shot was made whilst working through the script. I do think that it is possible for our continuity task to still be completed, the narration of the story unfortunately will not be good,  however it is a necessary sacrifice for us not to lose marks in this project. I am frustrated with myself as should have been certain that each shot was made and since I didn't it caused a conflict in the group which I have to take responsibility for. Overall our continuity task will not look great, I am very SORRY to Barry and Katie in my group and I do take full responsibility as stated before. Like I said, we might be able to grasp some sort of narration and AT LEAST we do have the shots which are essential to the task (pending the 180 degree shot which I have not seen yet); the action match is good and the shot/reverse shots do come together well. It is only the narration and the story that will suffer from this but hopefully we can manage to gather a narration in the upcoming lessons.

Editing Today

We should be editing today, I am looking forward to it and hopefully we can complete the task to a good standard and not lose any marks.

I forgot to mention that last week I helped Ahmir with his continuity task, he struggled at certain points with his vocabulary but I helped him with this and we eventually got through it. He was good to work with and came up with a great concept of a kind of mafia-crime thriller which admittedly looks really good. I am actually looking forward to seeing his completed version slightly more than my own continuity task because the concept looked really interesting. It is also a slight relief as this time I was not under any stress that the project wasn't going to be completed. I helped with the project by acting as the primary villain, I only had to say a few lines and some of the shots involving me and Ahmir were very hard to make but Katie (as the camerawoman) helped make the shot look very good.

Cinemassacre Review of Alien Invader Films and Their Remakes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwl19Vv1AX8&feature=relmfu

Mr. Earl once told me that he was a very big fan of the H.G. Wells novel War of The Worlds; I remember I talked about the film adaptation's of the novel with him (after I asked what the worst film he ever saw was) and I think he was surprised to know that I knew about the film he mentioned. I knew the film he mentioned because of a video review 'Cinemassacre'/James Rolfe did when he compared alien invader films and their subsequent remakes. Here is a link to the second part of said 'Cinemassacre' review in which he talks about the War of The Worlds original 1950's film and the 3 remakes that were all released within June 2005. If you watch the video beyond were he talks about War of The Worlds you can also see that he mentions the film 'Invaders of Mars' and the remakes which followed that film.If you enjoyed this part and would like to see the 1st and final 3rd part of the reviews then I have included these links below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csHfT5lYVfU&feature=relmfu - 1st Part ('The Day The Earth Stood Still', 'The Thing' and 'Earth vs The Flying Saucers')
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9mGfVhtnhI&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL - Final and 3rd Part ('Invasion of the Body Snatchers' and 'The Blob')

I decided to post this simply because I find them really interesting and it helps you learn about old and classic films and how they change over time, these reviews are very informative and you can learn a lot about films through watching these and still get some enjoyment out of them. You can also see what makes these particular films stand out over the others and how they have achieved this instead of blending in with the other films that are similar. A minor complaint about this is because I would have really liked to see a review for the remake of 'The Fly' from the 1980's which is one of my favourite horror films but I digress because these reviews are still exceptional in their own right.

Cinemassacre/Angry Video Game Nerd

http://cinemassacre.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/JamesNintendoNerd

Here is a link to James Rolfe's website 'Cinemassacre' and also his YouTube page, if you have already looked at my link for the Nostalgia Critic you can probably see the similarities between these two, basically as the Nostalgia Critic focuses on reviewing horrifically bad films, James Rolfe takes the persona of the "Angry Video Game Nerd" who obviously reviews very bad games, the games are always old-fashioned games coming from old old Nintendo consoles and Atari consoles, you can really learn a great deal about video games in the AVGN videos however it is the humour that makes the videos so memorable, it is genuinely one of my favourite things to watch on the internet because the videos are so informative but so funny at the same time. On the 'Cinemassacre' website you will also see links to his "movie reviews" which admittedly don't have any humour in them but they are very informative and you can tell he knows a lot about films so you can definitely trust his opinion on whether a film is good or bad. You can also see links to the films he has made which aren't related to AVGN, this is the only part of the website I do not know much about as I haven't seen many of these videos. There is also a section called 'Board James' which is another persona he takes in which he plays old board games and teaches people about them, the 'Mr. Bucket' episode I particularly recommend as this episode is the only one which is more like it's own personal film and includes a proper narrative and still remains hilarious. There is also another section which I don't think I can say the name of but if you look at the website you will see what I'm talking about, this section does not have a lot of videos but these videos each highlight a problem James finds around life, these include problems with DVD and Blu-Ray cases which don't make any sense and hotel TV's which don't have RCA cables.

If you choose to check out the 'movie reviews' section you will immediately notice that almost all the films mentioned are horror films, this is because he is obviously a very large fan of horror films and knows practically everything about them and the history around them. The website can be confusing with this section because very often James makes videos which aren't really film reviews and are instead videos which are related to different things; the most recent of these is  the 'titans of terror' tournament in which he made videos which involved the 'great classic horror' actors battling it out to see who defeated the other the most times within films.

If you look around the website in certain areas you can also find links to videos that you probably wouldn't find on many other websites. Now since James has literally a humongous collection of not only old video games but also films (which I can guarantee you would not have heard) and even very old systems that play films like Beta Tapes and Laser disc's.

 It's very bizarre but if you give it a chance you will find it very entertaining, I have shown a few friends recently AVGN videos and they all loved them even though they knew nothing about video games they still said it was hilarious. Be aware that the YouTube page does not upload AVGN videos until much later due to rights issues with I believe "GameTrailers.com". However the videos are uploaded eventually within a certain amount of time depending on successful the video is with the audience.

Recently he has been making a AVGN film which he says he hopes to release within next year or so. He's using a website called 'IndieGoGo.com' in which anyone can help by donating any amount of money they want and in RETURN anyone who donates will gain something such as a copy of the script or a simply a signed photo of James as 'The Nerd'. The rewards people get are based on how much money you choose to donate. If you watch these videos and decide you like them and want to donate simply go on to the 'IndieGoGo' website and simply type in "Angry Video Game Nerd Movie" in the search engine and click on the first link.

Looking Through Clips

Unfortunately Katie was off 'sick' today which left me and Barry to search through the clip, from what we've seen the clips seem good, not quite as good as i would have hoped for as there is clearly a lot of fuzz around certain shots which makes these un-usable. Hopefully we can work with the clips we have and complete the task to as good as standard as possible.

Shooting Finished

Yesterday me, Barry and Katie completed the shoot of our continuity task, it was quite hard and very time-consuming. The fact that our script is much longer than everyone else's groups was also a downfall as it took us longer to shoot the dialogue scenes which may have ended up corrupting the actual point of the continuity task. Hopefully however we have made the continuity task as good as it can possibly be. Just the editing process to do now, if this goes well then we should then be able to complete the task and therefore not lose any marks (ironically I have learnt we dont actually gain any marks from doing this which does confuse me although I digress). I hope to post the video as soon as possible.

Possibly Shooting Today

Thankfully, today should be the day we start to shoot our continuity project, I have asked the Connections Officer in our school and she has kindly offered her office for our project, it should be good, I feel as though it looks very much like a simple office, there are aspects in the background which obviously relate the office to a school, however hopefuly this will not be recognised by the audience. It is notable that the two characters are not wearing suits which could be distracting however again hopefully again we can address this issue by making the boss look as though he's trying to be "hip" and Barry's character looking like an everyday guy

Scripts for our Continuity Task

Here is our two scripts that we have made for our continuity project, they both follow the same format of a job interview with the questions being very similar, the only difference between the two is basically the reaction the employer has to "guy1"'s answers; in the first script you can see that the employer is very aggressive and shouts continously, in the second script you can see that the employer is still very aggressive however he does not shout often and instead focuses on speaking quietly which should make the dialogue from the employers point of view much more vicious and therefore hopefully more enertaining. I think the second script is the one that we will most likely shoot because there is less shouting and it is more serious which should make it funnier to the audience as the more serious as i am to the situation the more ludercrous the situation is to the audience. With there being less shouting it will mean it is more realistic to the audience, it is also much easier to shoot as it will mean that i will not interupt anyone among the surroundings

The Beginning of the Continuity Task

This week we have discovered that our next project will be a task which revolves around continuity, in the task we simply have to show a person walking through a door, the camera should then do a 180 degree pan which highlights the room, then there must be a shot/reverse shot on two people in the room with dialogue. The use of  one of the characters walking through a door should be an Action Match which means there is no continuity issues at all between  shot of the person opening the door to the next shot of them entering the room, the 180 degree pan across the room is supposed to reflect how to establish a scene and not break the 180 degree rule. The shot/reverse shot will show the two characters different points of view as they're both talking between each other. There were many ideas that we came up for what we would do for our continuity project with situations including a horror scenario with a murderer through the door wearing a Halloween costume, there would have then been a fight between a person who was already in the room in which the character who wasn't wearing a Halloween costume would tie the man who was wearing the costume onto a chair and insinuate aggressive dialogue towards him. However this idea was cancelled for two reasons, one is because we decided that it would be better for us to shoot this task in school and none of us was willing to wear a Halloween costume to school, the other reason was because we actually came up with another idea (thanks to Mr. Earl's contribution)  we decided that we would instead shoot a job interview scenario in which a boss asks very awkward and very irrelevant questions and becomes very aggressive towards his possible employee. We came up with idea as Katie decided she would have preferred to make a more comedic project as opposed to the very serious projects that were completed before. Me and Katie contributed equally to the script with Katie setting up the scenario and me contributing by telling Katie what questions should be asked in the interview and how the employee should react.