Post 3a: Target Progress

From reviewing my targets that I set myself in june, I must now answer these following questions & refer to them in my own opinion.

1. Are You Making Significant Progress Towards Meeting Your Targets?
2. Is There Anything You Should Be Doing More Of To Complete Your Targets? (If Necessary Set Yourself Further Targets Which Are Smaller Steps Towards Reaching Your Higher Target)
3. Have You Met Any Of Your Targets & Therefore Need To Set Yourself Others?

• In my first target, I wanted to successfully complete my blogger to a high standard as I did not feel that I completed my AS coursework to the standard that I wanted to achieve. I have not completed this target so far and I will need more time to complete however,  I have improved considerably & the reason that I have improved my work is because I am adding in more detail  & I am including quotes & points.

• My second target  when we were  filming was to our opening sequence, I got distracted a few times, & this caused us to have a number of outtakes, so I wanted to stay focused at all times with our next filming project, & I cannot say whether I have achieved this target yet because we are not that far ahead at the moment in A2.

• The next target  was to be able to understand more on how to use the editing suite when filming our opening sequence.  One member of my group did most of the editing because they understood how to, whilst myself and the other person in my group took a back-seat role due to the fact that we did not understand how to use the editing suite. Again I cannot say whether I have achieved this target yet as we are not that far ahead in A2.

• My next target was to be more organised throughout media as I felt that in previous lessons I was not organised enough in a sense of forgetting certain pieces of work & forgetting deadlines and  this effects me in a way that it makes me look incompetent and & unprofessional. I feel that I am now prepared and I have not asked to borrow anything and I am handing in work on time.

• My final target was to improve my work that does not include my blogger.  Because my standard of work was basic, I did not explain thoroughly in certain pieces of work and I used minimal detail. In future lessons, I would like to be able to understand my work & and be able to produce detailed pieces of work that is of a high standard. I think that from the work I have done outside of my blog, it  is of a good standard that both I and my teacher can understand and relate to.

Overall, I feel that my targets are achievable & I will be able to complete them during the course of this year. I also will make sure that I remember the targets that I set myself when completing my postproduction tasks. Also now, I feel that If I had to set myself one new target it would be;

• I need to include more images & video clips onto my blog because it helps me prove my point that I am giving in more detail & it is easier to understand my work.
  

Post 8: Decisions & Revisions

For this task I first wrote down ideas on a PowerPoint presentation that came to me. I had a brief idea on what genre still script that I wanted to write. The task was the basis of the next few stages which helped me go on to write my first script draft. 

To allow me to get the best possible outcome, I created a lot of planning of notes prior to my lessons. The first image shown below is an 8way thinking chart. This is a new technique which had eight words that I had to think about.  They were the following:

• Nature
• Sights
• Sounds
• Actions
• Feelings
• Words
• People

From these words I then had to think & write about three different elements I could talk about. I found this to be very useful as it made me think about different ideas that I had originally thought about for my script.

Post 7: Creating Your Own Script

During our lesson, we were asked to individually explain for one minute what we did the night before.   We thought that this would be an easy task as a minute isn't long. We all however found it a lot harder than it first seemed & for most of us.  We rushed though our events without putting them in detail and when telling our stories we chose to leave out what we thought was irrelevant for the audience to hear. This was done by using our passed experiences  such as telling friends stories and knowing what the audience will find interesting to listen to.

When it came to the turn of our teacher,  we then realised how we could have improved by giving it in a lot more detail & still being able to keep it under a minute. During our lesson, we were given the task to come up with script ideas that we could possibly use for our 6 minute short film task that we have to do.

We also looked at the different models of narrative from Propp, Todorov, Levis-Strauss and Barthes, each had very different ideas into narrative and what is the most common form of narrative.

• Propp - Thought that there are 8 different types of characters that is always present in fairy tales, & these where Hero, Villain, Princess, Helper, Donor, Dispatcher, False Hero & Princesses Father. He also thought that there are only 31 different actions that these characters can do.

• Todorov - Thought that there will always be Equilibrium, which is the normal narrative, Dis-Equilibrium, which is something that will change the narrative, and also new Equilibrium, which is the narrative that will carry on but only because of what happened in dis-equilibrium.

• Levis-Strauss - Thought that there is always Binary Opposites such as Good Vs Evil & Hero Vs Villain.

• Barthes - Thought that there is always Enigmas, which is a raising question that the audience will carry on watching to answer this question, however an audience will have a different interoperation.

In class we looked at this Power Point to help conclude or ideas on Narrative and understand better and in more detail: http://klsmediadepartment.blogspot.com/2010/10/narrative-theory-powerpoint.html

We then looked at another short film that focused on getting us to understand social realist films which was to draw our attention to a short film that has a significantly simplier message.


Below Is The Following Short Film 'Signs'




Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uy0HNWto0UY

Post 6: What Makes a Good Short Film?

To start off our short film research, our school organised a guest to attend a lesson with us.  Her name was  Rebecca Knapp and she  is involved with the film making industry.  She  showed us a variety of short films that she had worked with. When Becky came in to talk to our group about short films, she gave out two scripts from her productions. After we were given two scripts, we had to watch the short films and see if our thought from the script was anything like the actual film.  Independent study was also required and reading.

We then read the script for the films she showed us, & the idea of this was to get an image in our heads about what we think of what the short film will look like on screen. We looked at three scripts reading one script at a time then watching the film after. The two films we looked at were, ‘Donna’ & ‘Does God Play Football’.

The first script we read was from the short film ‘Donna’. The lack of dialogue from this film stopped me from picturing the characters. 


I felt that the script was difficult to stay focused with as it dragged on too long  however,  the film was well presented & we watched it to see if our reaction would change. Also it had a good location and a good choice of characters.

The second script that we watched was 'Does God Play Football' & we all found this script to be a lot more interesting as there was more dialogue and the storyline was very encouraging you as you read through the script to continue reading through it, & it also made us picture the storyline very well. When we watched the film, I found it to be much  more interesting than the script itself because the dramatic acting made the film more enjoyable & exciting to watch.

Music plays a big role in recognising the Genre of the film in 'Does God Play Football', It starts off with classical music & the sound of an organ playing which tells us as the audience that the plot is based around a church and possible religion, It also helps build tension when needed.

Films that last between 5 and 12 minutes would have more of a plot & also more unique characters. With films lasting between 12 and 30 minutes they would have a secondary story line with more developed characters.

The films included ones that she had produced and some that she produced the script for. With the length of a short film being under 5 minutes, producers could only focus on a plot with stereotypical characters.

Short films enable producers to present their ability to the media industry in hope their career will proceed from there. With films lasting between 12 and 30 minutes they would have a secondary story line with more developed characters with multiple character traits.

We should consider the 3 parts to our script:

The Beginning:

The Middle:

The End:

By having these parts in our script, they will ensure that our scripts will be creative  with   high quality and detailed work.

It is also important when writing a script that the producer trying  to portray the message to the audience can be very hard.

An example of this could be from when we read books, it is easier to understand what is happening, & they are easier to understand the feelings that are inside the characters head, but through films, we need to see the character doing some action to showing their emotions.

Conclusion

In conclusion with the questions, "why do we make short films?"  & “who is the target audience?” I think that we make short films to promote ourselves to the media as well as promoting ourselves to a wider public, particularly people who are informed by means of audiovisual media and some young people who read very little.

By looking at existing videos & scripts, it will give you a better insight on what quality is needed to express to the viewers. 

From reading these scripts, I have also found out that the title of your short film plays one of the biggest factors to whether it is a success or not.


From viewing these short films that have been shown to me, I feel Donna did not draw my attention however, Does God Play Football I found did have an appealing title.

I was also set some independent study which consisted of  doing some further reading on how to make a good short film script. It was recommended to me to read of which I did, the link on the KLS Media Department blog on 'how to write a good short film script' 

Once you have created and thought about everything you would like to have in your short film, & you have finished writing your script, then you should use this step by step routine to make sure that you can answer all the questions about your short film;

• One Sentences That Summaries What Happened?
• What is Revealed That is Significant to The Audience Understanding The Character?plot?
• What is Revealed That is Significant to The Plot?
• Is There An Identifiable Theme?

To sum all of this up, I think that what I have learnt from this  has made me realise how I need to set out my layout. I will use this information when it comes to drawing up my final script.