Script

Me and Matthew worked on the script for our final piece. Matthew helped the script stick to our narrative and head in the right direction, whilst I developed the ideas and wrote the script itself.

Josh Coe: Tony (Everyman)

Heather McDonald: Victoria (Femme Fatale)

EXT. Road. Night

(Tony leaning against wall looking at empty wallet)

Tony: 

(voiceover)
(hopeless)

I lost it all, she took everything I had. I'm left with nothing but dreams, of what could have been.

(Tony tosses wallet away and walks off)

OPENING TITLE SEQUENCE 

Tony:

(voiceover)
(desperation)

Theres only one thing left to do, she deserves it.

(Tony stands behind wall to hide)

Tony:

(voiceover)
(with love)

This is the route she walks everyday, I'd never forget.

(Victoria becomes visible walking through the alley, a cigarette in hand)

Tony:

(voiceover)
(with hope)

She still looks as beautiful as she did the first time I saw her.

(Victoria walks past Tony but can't see him)

Tony:

(voiceover)

(more hate)

 She's blinded from the world, she deserves this.

(Victoria continues walking as Tony appears from the darkness)

Tony:

(aggression)

Hey Victoria!

(Victoria turns quickly and shock fills her face)

Victoria:

(Gasps)

(Tony pulls the trigger and the camera looms on the cigarette burning out)


Reflection:
Overall, we are happy with our script as a whole. I decided that it would be best for me to write it because of the other A-Levels I am studying (Creative Writing). This meant that writing a script was best suited to me. Matthew was next to me the whole time and helped ensure that my ideas kept to the genre at the narrative structure we had. The script writing went well and we are getting closer to filming now. To of made this better, we could've just tried to do it quicker than we did, but we are happy with the content of the script and have no intention of changing it. It did take us quite a while to write because we kept changing and editing the ideas that we put into it, however I think that this is good because it allowed us to make sure that the content of the script was suited to our narrative.

Research of Camera and Composition - Credit to Matthew

Whilst I was researching sound and editing, Matthew did some research on camera and composition. The screenshot below shows the research he did, and the post on his blog:

Reflection:
With Matthew researching this, Heather doing mise-en-scene and me doing sound and editing, the 4 aspects that we wanted to complete have been done. We may come back to them at a later date and improve the amount of detail, but we are happy that we've split up the tasks to get them all done. We all learnt about the different aspects of a Film Noir, and put this knowledge into practise because of the way we discussed what we researched and how we should adapt our final piece to suit each convention. To improve I think we all would have liked to do more in depth research, but we just aimed to cover the basics so we can use the research to move onto the filming process.

Researching Editing Techniques

Like the research on sound, I also decided to do some brief research on the way that a Film Noir is edited.

Editing:
When researching online about the editing used in film noir's, I wasn't able to pinpoint a website that clearly described in detail the way that they were edited after being filmed. This is because that back in the time when they were made, technology was limited and very little amounts of editing could actually be done. It was most likely done during the actual filming progress.
After using Vimeo to watch some more Film Noir's, it is clear to see that techniques which fall into the editing section are simple things such as eye line match, and shot reverse shot, along with the soundtrack and voice, not to mention that most classic Film Noir's were shown in black and white. The website for Vimeo is below:
Film Noir's on Vimeo
For our final piece, we plan to film it and then obviously edit it, but to stick to the conventions of the way that Film Noir's are edited, we will keep things simple. We will add the voiceovers, along with the soundtrack, and possibly some transitions in between scenes, but generally we want to keep things simple to match the convention and make our film seem like a classic Film Noir. We hope that from the way we edit and produce our piece, members will think it is an old film, and even possibly relate it directly to the genre of a Film Noir.

Reflection:
As I've mentioned before, splitting up the tasks between our group has been very effective for us and worked well, because its meant that the research we've done has moved forward quickly, and meant we can film our piece quicker, which in the long term will give us more time to edit. To improve this piece of research, like the one on sound I would have liked to cover more detail, however with the editing aspects of a Film Noir, there is very limited amount of things to talk about so I think the main areas have been covered. From this task, I learnt about the simple form of editing in a Noir, and it gave me a full understanding of how simple we must keep our editing for our production.

Researching Sound

Another aspect of research I carried out was sound. I focused more on soundtracks, and in film sounds to see what conventions we will have to stick with for our Noir.

SoundTrack:
To understand the sound throughout a Film Noir, I first looked at the actual soundtracks that feature throughout the films. I used a website called All Music, which contained dozens of Film Noir soundtracks, and gave me and idea of the typical sounds throughout. The website for All Music and be accessed by the link below:
Film Noir sounds on All Music
















From this, I was able to listen to the way the soundtracks are composed, and their general sound to give me some sort of idea of what we need to create for our final piece.
After looking on the website, it is clear to see that the genre's of Film Noir soundtracks are 'jazz' and 'electronic'. They seem to be played on old pianos, and violins. This means that for our final piece we will need to either recreate a piece of music like this ourselves, or find some music that is copyright free to embed into our production.

In Film Sounds:
In terms of in film sounds, I focused on one thing; voiceovers. I used a website called Vimeo to watch some openings to Film Noir's and see exactly how voiceovers are used. The link to Vimeo is below:
Film Noir's on Vimeo











From researching this, it became clear to see that each Noir had a voiceover at the start which explained the narrative. Because Film Noir's always traditionally start with the end of the film, the voiceover gives the audience an insight of exactly whats happened before to create this situation in the first place. This means that obviously we will try to match this convention to start our Noir at the end, and have a voiceover explaining exactly what has happened to create this situation.


Reflection:
Although this was only a brief piece of research, it was still vital for our group because it allowed us to understand the typical soundtracks used, and the way a voiceover is embed into a Noir to create the story line. Obviously to improve this task I could've done more in depth research, but I just wanted to gain some brief knowledge so that we have an idea on the sounds used. We may come back to this and do some more in depth research later on to gain us even more of an understanding. I learnt about the soundtracks used in Noir's from this research, and I now feel more confident with the knowledge of the conventions we must match.

Research into Mise-En-Scene - Credit to Heather

Whilst I was carrying out research on location and Matthew was adapting the narrative, Heather did some research on mise-en-scene, and talked about the costume and props typical for a Film Noir. Her post can be seen in the screenshot below.

Reflection:
Splitting our group up to work on different aspects of research was very useful and proved effective for us because we were all able to come into lesson and work independently on different aspects of research. This also meant that if any of us had any free time, we knew exactly what we needed to be doing. We all learnt how much easier it is if we trust each other to do different parts of our planning and research, and how much quicker it can prove to be. To improve this post, Heather could add some links about the websites she visited, but the research she carried out is good.

Photo Shoot

With research carried out about our location, and the synopsis of our narrative having been written, be decided it was time to do a photo shoot using one of our possible locations. The post I previously did about possible locations can be accessed by clicking the link below:
Location Research
This location features in the post above, but we are unsure about wether or not this will be the final place we pick for our actual filming. The purpose of this photo shoot was just to say what scenes will go where. We haven't sorted out costumes or props yet, so we are just wearing our normal clothes for this. Also, this shoot is during the day, but we will film our actual final piece at night to create the 'Noir' effect and match another convention. Matthew took the pictures of me and Heather on his iPhone 6 using a range of camera angels. He then sent them to me via Gmail, and I put them into a power point before uploading them to slide share:

Media photoshoot from Coey1611

Reflection:
In terms of planning, this was a big step up for us and helped us move forward in the right direction. From creating this photo shoot, as a group we now have a firm understanding of what scenes will go where when it comes to filming. We also now all have a feel for the location, because we all went there together to perform this photo shoot. We will now discuss further wether or not we think that this photo shoot could work for our production. From this task, I learnt about the importance of doing a photo shoot, and experimenting with different places throughout our chosen location. We could've done this task better by doing it in the dark or in costume, however we just wanted to draft each scene briefly to give us all an idea and I think we did that very well.

Production Log - Actors

After discussions within our group about what are next steps are to be, we've decided that it could benefit our grade if we looked at the possibility of hiring professional actors. This would also help stick to our conventions of a Film Noir because the actors need to look somewhat older than teenagers because in classic Film Noir's they are always older. The website we found to hire actors is called Star Now, and can be accessed by clicking the words 'Star Now' below:
Star Now
However, after looking on Star Now we discovered that in order to fill out the forms necessary to hire professional actors you have to be over the age of 18.
This is a set back for us because we really wanted actors to play the roles of our characters for us, but after further discussions together, we've decided that we will play the roles ourselves. Heather will play the femme fatal, whilst I will play the everyman. Although this isn't exactly what we wanted, we are glad we have been able to fix the problem.
Our Film Noir has failed to meet one of the conventions because of the age of our characters, so it has now became a Neo Noir because of this. We will still do our best to match all of the other conventions of a Film Noir, but overall the genre has shifted slightly.

Reflection:
This was a major setback for us, but we managed to find a solution quickly to help fix this problem. From this, we all learnt that we have to expect the worst, and plan ahead in case anything wrong does happen. In this case, we weren't expecting something like this to happen but we managed to work our way round out. To fix this problem further, we could have looked at other possible websites for hiring actors, but we anticipated that the same issue would appear on each one because of our age, so we decided that taking the responsibility of acting on ourselves would be the better thing to do.

Narrative Synopsis - Credit to Matthew

Whilst one of my roles was to research locations, one of Matthew's was to take all of the ideas we had discussed and put them into practise by creating a synopsis for our production. His post in relation to this is below:

Reflection:
This is an example of how dividing up the tasks was good for us because it meant that whilst I was carrying out research on possible locations, Matthew was working on our narrative which meant our planning time was moving forward quicker. Matthew did a good job here, and the synopsis he has created outlines exactly what happens in our film so that we are all aware of the plot. To improve, there could have been more detail used and perhaps a name for our character other than the 'femme fatal'. Having said this, I think that the synopsis created is very good and will help us move forward as a group and into the next stages of planning.

Location Research

It was now time for us to allocate roles for each other in terms of research. One of my roles was to look at the typical locations that Film Noir's were produced in, and try to match these locations with actual ones local to us for our filming.
First, I looked online to find some pictures of where a Film Noir would usually be filmed, and the typical image I found is the one you can see below. As you can see from this picture, it is dark which matches a convention that Film Noir's are almost always filmed during the night. The location itself is very urban, as Noir's always are. You can see the tall buildings that could possibly be flats, along with the long dark alley ways which are only lit up by street lamps, which makes the alley look misty. The street lamps also create shadows, which is another convention used frequently in Noir's. From a quick research into location, I got a full understanding of the type of place to search for locally to film our Noir. I will attempt to keep the locations urban, and incorporate other conventions by finding street lamps that give off shadows in the night with long dark alley ways.

After having a clear understanding on the locations that Film Noir's are typically filmed at, I decided to look around my local are to attempt to find certain places that could be an option for us when it comes to deciding on a location to film. The pictures you can see below are taken from each end of the same road. Out of all the places that I looked locally to me, this road stood out to me, and matches the conventions I've identified in the picture above. The road features street lamps which create a type of mist, along with some tall houses that gives the area an urban feel. There is also an alley way along this road that I was unable to get a picture of because it was too dark to physically see down it, however this could be used for a possible photo shoot during the day. When thinking about filming, this road would work with it because the main elements of filming could be done under the street lamps so the characters are visible, and the mystery can be created when they walk away and fade into the darkness. This is why the street lamps are vital, to help give our piece a sense of mystery. These locations that I found are only possible locations, and may or may not turn out to be what we actually decide to go for. I simply wanted to do some research into locations, and try and find a few myself so as a group we had some options as well as an understanding on the conventions.

Reflection:
As a whole, I think I performed this task well, and gave our group an understanding of Film Noir locations. Allocating roles to each other for research was a very good move because it meant we all had things to be getting on with, and could feedback to each other what we'd found. From this task we learnt the Film Noir locations, and now have some ideas about where we'd like to film. We also learnt the importance of communication between as a group, to ensure we were all aware of exactly what our task was when it came to research. To do this particular task better, I would of liked to have found even more possible locations to give us an even wider option when it came to picking a place to film. Having said this, I think that the research I did do will be very useful in the upcoming plan to film.

Our Foley Sounds

After my previous post, we did in fact try to recreate as many as the sounds that we found from the extract of the film 'Priest' that we possibly could. The technological device that we used for this was Matthew's iPhone 6. We recorded as many of the sounds as we could, obviously using the foley technique to naturally recreate them ourselves. After this, we then uploaded all of them to google drive, and from here transferred them into iMovie, where we spent time editing them and adding titles to explain exactly what the sound was meant to represent. The list of sounds we attempted as before is shown below, and the iMovie that we eventually uploaded to vimeo which contains all of the sounds that we foleyed can also be seen below,

   Foley Sounds from Josh Coe on Vimeo.

Reflection:
Overall, this task was extremely useful for us as a group. The analysis of sound throughout an extract allowed us to understand the importance of it, and the recreation gave us some experience of making foley sounds ourselves. We were all able to talk about our ideas on how to recreate sounds ourselves, and we all gained a full understanding on how precise the records must be, and the importance eliminating and background sound. The fact that we then uploaded them to iMovie and edited it to add titles gave especially me and Heather further experience on using iMovie as we have not studied Media before. Our next steps now are to think about what sounds we will need to include in our production, and split up our tasks for further research into Film Noir's.

Foley Sound

To make us more aware of the use of sounds in films, and to help us realise the large variety of sounds that are needed in our final piece, as a class we watched an extract from a film called 'Priest', which is a fantasy horror film from 2011. At first we watched it with no sound, and listed ideas of the sounds that we expected to hear throughout it. We then watched it with sound, and compared it to the list that we had already made, adding the ones we hadn't noticed or expected. This list can be seen below:

Now, we will attempt to recreate the sounds that we have listed, using the 'foley' technique, which means to naturally create the sounds ourselves, and edit them in a way to make them actually sound like what they are. 

Reflection: 

For our group, this was a useful task and will continue to be as we recreate the sounds. From this, we are learnt about the importance of sound effects in films, and how they are emphasised in different ways to have a different effect on the audience and enhance the production itself. In terms of our final piece, this made it clear to us how important the use of sound is, and made us think about how we are going to incorporate foley sounds into our Film Noir.

Research of Opening Title Sequence

Now that we have looked at different variations of narrative structures as well as knowing our genre, it was time to do some research about Film Noir's. To do this, we each picked a classic Film Noir and analysed the opening title sequence, noting down the conventions. The website I used to do this, is called Art of the Title. Here, I found a large variety of different opening title sequences, and by looking up Film Noir's, I was able to find 'Fallen Angel' from 1945, which is a classic Noir.
The website to Art of the Title with the Fallen Angel opening title sequence can be accessed by clicking the link below:
Fallen Angel Opening Title Sequence

After watching the opening title sequence of the Film Noir 'Fallen Angel', there are some clear conventions that are unique to a Noir.
In terms of camera, and the way each shot is composed, its very basic. Noir's are different in the way that the opening titles last for one or two minutes, and whilst they are being shown very little is happening in and around the scene. For Fallen Angel, it follows exactly this because for the whole duration of the opening sequence the camera doesn't actually move, and instead editing is used to display each title. The camera is placed at the front of what appears to be a bus, which is travelling along a main road. The road signs that it goes past are enhanced and edited in a way that titles are visible on them. An example of this can be seen in the screenshot below:
As you can see here, the shot is composed very simply because the camera doesn't move. The titles are edited onto the road signs, and made easy to read for an audience. This carries out throughout the whole opening title sequence, so in terms of camera, the shot used is very simple, and the editing around it allows us to read the titles on the upcoming road signs.


The sound used throughout the titles of Fallen Angel is very typical Noir style. Just by listening to the soundtrack, it gives us an old classic feel, which we will have to try and recreate to match the soundtrack convention for our production. The music in Noir's is generally composed using saxophones, pianos, and trumpets. This soundtrack is played throughout all of the opening title sequence, and fits well with the titles. The soundtrack also helps to create an atmosphere so early in the film.
Very little can be analysed in terms of mise-en-scene, because there is so little happening in the titles. As mentioned before, the camera is placed still at the front of a bus, so all we can see is the road in front. The whole clip and film is in black and white, which is obviously edited in. Film Noir's are always traditionally in black and white, so we will ensure that our production follows this convention.

Reflection:
We each analysed an opening title sequence of a Film Noir, and all did a blog post on it. This was a big step for us in terms of our research, because we were able to analyse each others posts and talk as a group about the conventions we found, and how we plan to match them. The conventions that I've talked about above, were similar to what Matthew and Heather found. This was good because it showed that we all had a good understanding on how identify the conventions of a Film Noir, as well as knowing exactly what they are. We all learnt from this that splitting the tasks between us is good and can be very useful in terms of research, especially in this case because we got triple the amount of research and three different classic Film Noir's analysed. Our next steps are to look out the ways to recreate sounds, and possibly start further planning with out production and look at locations we could possibly film at.

Analysis of Narrative Structures

Now that we have decided on our genre (Film Noir) and planned a general synopsis of our production, we looked at some narrative structures that current films follow to give us an idea on how we need to adapt our ideas to fit a structure. We discarded most ideas because they simply didn't fit the style of a Film Noir, but managed to narrow it down to two ideas which can be seen below:

The first narrative structure is 'Vladimir Propp', and the whole idea of the structure revolves around the characters. If we were to adapt our narrative to suit this, we would have to create seven different characters to build up the plot. The whole idea of this structure is that every character has an effect on the way the plot pans out, and each of these characters has a role with exactly what they do in the relation to other characters. This structure would work, however we decided that as whole it wouldn't suit our production because we are only filming the opening title sequence, so even if we designed all of these characters we wouldn't actually be able to involve them in the filming process. Another reason why we decided against this type of structure is the fact that it doesn't follow the conventions of a Film Noir. Traditional Noir's start with the end of the film, and usually feature two main characters (the everyman, and the femme fatal), but the 'Vladimir Propp' structure features far too many characters, which simply wouldn't fit the conventions of a Film Noir.

The second narrative structure we looked at fully was the 'Enigma Code'. This structure is usually related to a mystery, and used in relation to genres of thrillers and crime. It is also designed so that the audience become instantly engaged with the film, and attempt to guess the solution of the mystery. Generally, this narrative structure fits a lot of the conventions of a Film Noir, which makes it more suitable for our production. For example, the fact that the structure relates to a mystery fits the conventions of a Film Noir because they are usually about a dramatic event that has happened which we spend the majority of the film trying to figure out. Another part of the structure that relates to the conventions is the fact it is common with genres related to thrillers and crime. These genres are related and feature throughout a Film Noir so this structure relates to it well. As a whole, the 'Enigma Code' is more suited to a Film Noir, so we can relate our ideas to this structure to help us construct the plot.


Reflection:
Analysing these narrative structures was very useful for us, because we were able to get an idea on what structures actual films follow. With these structures in mind, we have been able to relate the 'Enigma Code' to a Film Noir, so we can analyse the structure and possibly compare it to our synopsis to help us have a full understanding on the layout of the plot. From this task, we all learnt how important it is to know the structure of a film, and not just attempt to create a plot for a film without an idea on the direction it has to go. To improve this task we could've analysed more structures to give us an even better understanding, but we decided to discard the rest because they didn't relate to our idea of a Film Noir enough.

Narrative Starting Ideas

Our task for Media is to recreate an opening title sequence of a particular chosen genre. For my final piece, I am working with Matthew and Heather, and we have started to plan a narrative for our production and discussed different ideas for a story. We started by talking about a genre, and landed on the idea of recreating a Film Noir as much as we can. To do this, we will need to have a full understanding of the conventions that a Film Noir has, and attempt to recreate these into our production. Soon, we will allocate roles to each of us to ensure that we have that full understanding of this particular genre of film. Research will have to be done on things such as sound, so that we know what the soundtracks generally are, not to mention the way the dialogue is embedded. We will also need to research typical camera angles used, and the way that these films were edited, and how, not to mention the mise-en-scene, such as costumes and location. Another aspect of research will be the audience of a Film Noir; with an understanding of who these films were generally aimed at, we will have a good idea on the way we need to adapt our production to suit this particular type of audience. As a starting point, we talked as a group about possible ideas for our film and also about how many characters we would plan to have and what the general idea would be. From this, we were then able to write out a general synopsis of the narrative that we want our story to follow. Obviously this is just a starting idea so we will undoubtedly build on this idea and develop it in different ways.

'Micky is staring in the mirror with a gun... Flashback:

He was a successful person, but he had a big secret.

He employs an assistant (femme-fatal) who finds out his secret but agrees to keep quiet by blackmailing Micky.

Leaves him broke.

In his anger he kills her.'

Reflection:

In terms of planning, this was a good starting point for us. We were able to pitch all of our possible ideas across to each other, and adapt each one as a group. This was also good because now that we have picked our genre (Film Noir), and created a general synopsis, we can move on to research and future planning for filming our production.

This task also had some negative aspects, which allowed each of us to learn what we need to do to improve as a group. The discussion we had about out genre and narrative took a long time, and we were quite indecisive at times about deciding exactly what direction we wanted our production to go in. With future discussions, we plan to try and be more decisive about the decisions we make, which will allow us to work faster and develop ideas quicker. If we had landed on a genre and narrative quicker, we could have adapted our piece further and perhaps starting thinking about other things such as a location for our filming, or what equipment we would use. Having said this, the synopsis above is a good starting point, and we are all happy with the ideas we have.