Technology standard

NOTE: Just click on an image to make them bigger :D Why is my blog so narrow >.<

Recording:

Filming Day

I used my Canon 500D mainly with a 35mm-55mm lens and I had a Sony handicam on standby if needed. I used a tripod as a stabilizer in some scenes.

Even with the tripod I found some shots much too shaky

I also found some shots not framed perfectly the way I wanted, but with the multi tasking of co-ordinating the action I lost track.

Swagga

Composing shots:

I tried to experiment with my shots so the film would not be so boring.

I always hoped to pull off a down the scope POV shot but that was not possible with my equipment.

I think some of my over the shoulder shots were the most successful
If a lot more of my shots were closer up the film would have felt much more dynamic.

Use of sound effects and music:

My Vegas project... those layers of sound...

A lot of my sound effects were ripped from video games and used.

Importing Images, Videos and Sound:

Thats a lot of gigabytes...

As I soon found out, working in after effects burned through memory, which was something I was not expecting.

I am quite proud of my workflow and management of folders, I never got lost and it was easy working in post.

So many After Effects Projects....

My work in After Effects:

Even though it was too many hours of work, it was totally work working on it, very proud of the end result

MOAR IMAGES:

See me in the BG working with the others

COLD

Plus rain >.<

Yup, we were working right beside railways :D

EVALUATION!

The Positives!

• Good time management
• A decent film was created :)
• Learnt a lot of things while working in post
• Had an excuse to buy a BB gun :3
• Cool costumes, unique

What would I have done better next time?

• Spread my filming over two days, no filming the first day but rehearse and plan the action scenes, and then film on the second day, less stress and more efficiency
• Redo almost all the post, atleast the first half of the film, I learned more tips and secrets as I edited, so the last half of the film in terms of the special effects look better than the first half.

Strategies used

• While planning my film, I watched a lot of action films, which kind of gave me ideas on composition and story.
• The internet helped a lot with the special effects.
• Previous experience in film gave me an edge on being time efficient.
• Planned out my time well to get everything done

Changes and why?

• An unfortunate change was just the manila folder at the end of the film, there was meant to be some sort of safe, but there was nothing to use, so a folder took its place instead.
• There was meant to be dialogue, from both the enemies and the main character, but the environment was too loud and audio recorded would have been useless, so I would have had to have dubbed audio, which is difficult. So I thought to add at least some dialogue to the enemies but without sound coming from the main character, the sounds seemed awkward, so was also removed
• EXPLOSIONS but of course thats too hard...
• ahh, I always had this image of the enemies pixilating and fading away when they died... but I didnt have a green screen with me...

Exam Evaluation

I think it went pretty good...
I studied most for horror, almost nothing for representation
I felt pretty prepared
2 hours on horror and 45 minutes on REP, 15 minutes of massaging my sore hand >.<
i did finish early... did not read back
I tried to remember key quotes :)
of course ill try to be more prepared :)

Sound Settings Notes

-16% Pitch
delay: 0.006
decay: 0.7

Script

Apprentice: You've got two guards patrolling up front, they don't look too focused, you could probably sneak and take them out.

Apprentice: Careful, there's a patrol group, looks like they have been alerted and looking for you.

Apprentice: 2 Guards just found the bodies from before, careful of behind you they are tracking you down fast.

Apprentice: Nice job, no wonder you were the guy to be picked for the job

Apprentice: ok its the silver van, should be in the front glovebox.

Guard: Put down the files and step out of the car.

Main: That was weird...

Apprentice: Hmm lets have a look at these files.

Main: How did that guard know my name...

Apprentice: I wouldnt worry about it, wait whats this...

Main: what?

Apprentice: Half the files arent there... they've purposely hidden some of the files.

Main: Do you think?...

Apprentive: They must have been expecting you.

Main: ...

Apprentice: We still need those files...

Main: *nods* yeah your right, set it up again, let me back in

Apprentice: You should be more careful this time, if they are expecting you again, they must be tracking you somehow

Main: Dont worry, I've never failed a job before.

Locations

Area behind Science Alive, Railways.

Film Introduciton Treatment

Few decades into the future.
Ally ways (cyberspace).
Midday.

We see a man dressed in a casual military outfit walking against a wall towards the camera. He reaches the corner and receives a message in his ear which warns him of a pair of guards up front, in which he peers around the corner and finds them standing together. He tells the man on the other side of his radio that he can handle it and pulls out a gun and fires it. One guy is shot and falls the ground where the other man alerted now pulls out a pistol and aims it in the wrong direction but he is soon also shot.

Our main character walks up the bodies on the grounds and checks the bodies, where we can have close ups on the outfits and the masks. He may pick up a pistol here and walks off. We track him through alley ways where another message tells him of a patrol group of three is tracking him down and to be careful. He sits behind cover looking down an ally where 3 guards run out, not suspecting anything. The main character looks over his cover and fires his weapon, managing to kill one but the other two find cover and fire back as where our man must hide again. We now get a shot off a couple of guards finding the bodies before, and runs towards the location of the fire fight, so the guy on the radio warns our character of this. Now now more pressured for time he looks over and manages to get a lucky shot on one of the two, but the other is still alive. Now the other 2 guards have caught up and have flanked our main character, so he pulls out a smoke grenade and throws it over his head and blocks the vision of the guards. As the smoke comes off he runs down the ally suppressing the one guard with constant fire, jumps over the cover and fires a bullet into his head. Now using his cover our main guy turns round and fires into the thinning smoke as the two guards run out, killing both of them quickly. He sighs relief and sits back and reloads his gun, and gets back up to get to his target.

He ends up at a car park and finds the right car directed by his radio, opening it and picks out a briefcase or manila folder of some sort. But a pistol appears behind his head, where he is asked to slowly back off and drop the package. But ducking swiftly he tackles the guard, managing to fire a few shots before losing his pistol, a fight sequence ensues but the pistol is picked up by our main character and shoots the guard. He then wakes up of sorts in a dark room, where the man on the radio sits beside him, our main character asks him if the found what they were looking for, but the man just shakes his head and says half the information was hidden, saying that they knew he was coming, and both are confused at this. He asks our main guy if he’s ready to go back in to get the bottom of this and he nods, but quickly mentions he needs someone else in there to help out, if the company/thing is tracking his positions and activity.

Props and Costumes

4 Pistols - Walter
Desert Eagle - Shion Saha
G36c - Mine
Uzis - Mine
Masks - Purchased at a 2 doller shop
Sunglasses - Everyone owns one or from 2 doller shop
Hoodies and jeans - Everyones owns respectively
Camo Outfit - Macjei

pistol
rifle x2
camera dslr - memory wipe - battery
red camera - memory wipe
walters 4 pistols
yoons pistol
cargo bag gear etc
2 jackets
1 denim jackets
the manilla folderm FILLED WITH INFO
Bubble wrap
6 masks PAINTED
2 sunglasses
2 smoke grenades

Cast and Crew

Cast
Main Character - Mason
Hacker sidekick - Me
Guard 1 - Oliver
Guard 2 - Philip
Guard 3 - Love Leehan
Guard 4 - Connie
Guard 5 - Michael
Guard 5 - Nick
Spare actors - Walter etc

Crew
Assistant Editor - Seth Corker

Anything else done by me

All proposes subject to change

NEW FILM IDEA

Inspiration derived from:

1. Brainjack
2. Inception
3. Four Brothers
4. Matrix
5. Sniper Reloaded
6. Add more later

The idea itself basically is, the film is set in the future where the new war is in the cyber-world, and now technology has brought ourselves to a new level of hacking, where we begin to control the internet with our minds. The main character, a prestige but lone-wolf hacker brings onto himself challenges and missions to balance the playing field, but may this challenge be too much for him?

refer back to Possible Genre Concept Ideas

Music I can use on my computer for now

Songs and sound clips I can use

• MFO - Medal of Honor
• Watch Your Corners - Medal of Honor
• Thirty Seconds Out - Medal of Honor
• Taking the Field - Medal of Honor
• Send in the Rangers - Medal of Honor
• Enemy Down - Medal of Honor
• Roof Tops - Black Ops
• Revenge - Black Ops
• Pegasus - Black Ops
• Dwarka - Black Ops
• Cude One - Black Ops
• Blackbird - Black Ops
• Beheaded - Black Ops
• Refer back to Pro Scores
• Control Room - Modern Warfare 2
• Desert Drone - Modern Warfare 2
• Stealth Busted - Modern Warfare 2
• Anticipation - Modern Warfare 2
• Stalk - Modern Warfare 2
• Snowmobile - Modern Warfare 2
• Contingency Stealth - Modern Warfare 2
• Desert Drone Scout Sniper - Modern Warfare 2
• Turn Me Loose - Gamer
• Dress Up Doll - Gamer
• Blood Ball - Gamer
• Magnetic - The Social Network
• Flashback - Short Music...
• Broken Robot - Short Music...
• Busted Recorder - Short Music...
• Radiohead - Short Music...
• More to come if found

Possible Genre Concept Ideas

The genre i would like to cover in my film would be action, lots of guns, explosions and action.
I imagine the film introduction would introduce the main character, perhaps a sidekick if we can afford one, and the enemy group, or perhaps a single enemy boss and his minions. The movie would be covered across a search and rescue scene, with no happy result, feeling like it should go on for another hour to explore the rescue more.
The main emotion i want to convey is a "wow" reaction. The movie will be based on a good setting, acting, and special effects, heavy work on post.
The main character should be fearless, "manly" and competent with a weapon and action scenes. The style should be epic, fast paced cuts and such, slow-mo scenes.

We have a lot of actors we can use to help us with the scene, our limitations would be a good indoor scene and decent weapons to convey the epic emotion. I have a good outdoor location in mind.
I have collected a good amount of special effect stock footage and sounds to there should be no issue in post.
The interest to the audience should be the fact their friends will be in the movie, and will appeal to males for the guns and explosions.

3. Analyse

Over the years the isolated setting conventions has not evolved into anything new, it has always appeared to be where a climatic scene occurs in the film. The birth of Frankenstein and the mass murder both occurs in detached locations, where the rules of society, you could say, don't apply or have no control over. 

The use of this convention shouldn't have changed as the impact remains the same, making the audience fear the dark, the alone. Its horror movies that makes people dash down a dark hallway or be afraid to turn off the lights as horror movies have shown, insanity lies in isolation.

 At the time of release of Frankenstein horrors were just starting to evolve the conventions were not set in stone just yet, but Frankenstein utilities many of the modern ones we see today. One of them being the isolated location which accidentally formed its effect to be followed by many of the horror films to follow. When there was the death of the Doctor no one was around to help or hear, he was all alone to defend himself in which he failed to do so and died.

2. Explain

The isolated lab for Frankenstein allows the mad scientist to conduct all these experiments and eventually create the monster that haunts the town later on, where as in Scream the isolated setting creates a last stand situation for the victims where there is no escape and you can only rely on yourself for survival.

This isolated situation makes the characters morph to flesh out true human nature, where men will play the god they desire and the greed and insanity of people jailed in the mind break its way out. The detached location increases the tension of fear, where we know no one is around to stop Frankenstein's experiment, and no one is ever going to arrive to help out the teenagers escape the blade of the killer. That these victims are truly alone and their death will be a remorseful one.

The use of a severed location from society is a common convention in the horror genre and is much expected by an audience for action to take part in. When someone leaves to go get a beer, they detach themselves from others and then as expected and dreaded the killer comes out of the darkness to finish her off.

1. Describe

An isolated setting is a very common choice of location for action to occur as it makes the characters completely helpless and alone. From as early as Frankenstein and the isolated lab where the monster is reborn. 








Or in Scream with it's house party located in the middle of no where, long shots expressing the barren environment free for the murder to churn up chaos. With the victims screaming and begging for help, the main character eve limping away, no help ever arrives, there is no one around to hear and help. Other ways isolation is shown is with the phone being picked up to call the police but no one answers as its been disconnected and all we can hear is the faint beeps from the phone.

Colour

To be honest these dolls are fairly creepy and could be easily be interpreted by the audience as being evil more than good, but to give the correct emotion the directer selects brighter tones and shades to open up with, gold and light browns, which relate to safety or holy, and as 9 is created we just take in that these dolls were made for a purpose, to help "life go on" in the "dieing world". This is important as we don't want to be confused at all who the real good guys are in this movie, and it gives our support and sympathy for their loss through their brawls with The Machine.

Comparing colour of the creation and waking of 9

However after the short title coming up onto the screen everything changes, the colour palette only consists of blacks, a range of grays and rusty reds. These colours so nothing but emphasize the dead lifeless world that 9 is born in. These tones set the mood and setting immediately, giving us the post apocalyptic feel this movie is based around.
As the Catbeast comes into the scene however, the first thing we notice is his bright red eye which does two things. It gives the beast life, even though it is fully mechanical, and immediately gives the beast an evil tone. This "red eye" motif runs through all the mechanical villains throughout the movie, with the Catbeast, Winged Beast, Seamstress and of course the The Fabrication Machine/B.R.A.I.N, also running through as a motif for evil in the movie.

First real shot of the Catbeast

Other CG movies seem to generally use very bright and cheery colours, but "9" uses very earthy tones, something you don't usually see, and it gives it some grit and texture, some depth just through the colour palette. Even though the palette is very tight, there is a lot of colour, and it reflects on the extreme care and control used by the art department from the film.

Character/Performance

The motions of these ragdolls as some people describe it are a bit 'wonky' or exaggerated, but this is only because the ragdolls physical looks limit the CG teams flexibility. Lacking eyebrows, having camera shutters as eyes and lacking other facial features, they could only rely on describing emotions using pantomime, for example 9 indicating his lack of speech to 2 or when 9 trips over when he first awakes in the room. With every subtle movement and its speed and approach it all comes together to describe the emotion flawlessly, and I think through that its absorbed by the audience better than simple eyebrow movements. This also forces the audience to watch much more closely then you would in other movies and animations, it truly has an effect on how we as the viewers appreciate the beauty in this broken world.

9 Indicates his lack of voicebox

Although this is early on in the film we already begin to learn about the character of 2. Even though 9 is a stranger to him he sacrifices himself heroically so 9 can survive. This isn't interpreted as being arrogant but gives the meaning that there aren't many of these dolls left, and the only way they can face this world and fight the Catbeast is together as a team, but as 1 says later on in the movie "Sometimes for the better good, one must make a sacrifice" which is an important quote that runs through the whole movie. A lot of "survivor" themed movies commonly discuss human nature, how we all truly reveal our true selves in times of danger or extreme fear, and with these 9 ragdolls in this environment each character is given his own personality which is unique from the others. 9 is courage, 2 is smarts and so on, which creates dramatic solutions and reactions to problems that arise through the film.

2 catches the catbeast's attention to save 9

Script/Dialougue

The directors leave 9 speechless for a good half of the introduction, using the excuse of him not having a voicebox and as a tribute to the short film, however instead of making everything dull and boring it does the opposite, creating this extra focus on the environment around 9. As so much of the introduction is silent, any noise becomes emphasized and echoed. The subtle diegetic sounds, such as his footsteps, or the creaking of the old house or the wind outside batting against the window resonating creates the feeling of this expansive but dark place, just like a lifeless cave of sorts even though we are only in a room, we feel it from 9's perspective and think the room as being large and spacious. All these techniques used to help us feel what 9 feels is important as this whole movie really is about the journey 9 takes and immersing us right from the beginning is vital.
Also I think the director likes to keep the usual environment of the ragdolls to be quiet as it gives the action scenes much more impact, the screech of the Winged Beast or the screams of the B.R.A.I.N slice through the "peaceful" safety 9 and the others try to find.

Long shot of the room 9 awakes in

When 2 installs the voicebox the first word 9 speaks is "friend" reflecting on thier brief relationship, as if they were close friends a long time ago meeting up again. This rapid development is significant as it runs through the whole film, even though everyone are strangers to one another they all ignore differences to survive, reflects on a true selflessness in most of the characters in the film. This positive relationship, however soon is shattered when the Catbeast enters the shot and 2 is stolen by it, trying to protect 9.  This brief interaction allows us to understand the motivation 9 has to goto the factory later on in the film, we along with 9 feel the guilt of 2's sacrifice and collective agree that saving him is the best choice.
At these conflict with the Catbeast we feel that the ragdolls have no chance against this, and again we feel worried for 9 and these ragdolls, being able to do nothing but hide from it, which increases the valiance as the team of dolls work together and take the cat down, which only reveals the true evil that exists dormant in this world.

2 reaches out to 9 just before being kidnapped

Types of Shots

The film harnesses 2 shots mainly in the introduction, POV shots and Long shots.
The POV shots, used to show us what our subject is looking at, are important as it immerses us with the characters of the film, for example when 9 leans over the table to find the dead scientist on the ground, instead of just showing us from a different angle, the director shows it from 9's perspective to give us emotion with the shot, as our first reaction would be similar to 9 and we feel remorse for him. This shot is important as it reminds of the character of the scientist himself as he plays a role later on in the film with the plot explaining the existence of the fabricator (the main "villain" of the film) and the explanation of the purpose of these ragdolls.

POV shot as 9 leans over the table

The other shots 9 uses is extreme long shots, a shot used from a long distance away, usually at a low angle, again from the perspective of the height of a ragdoll. It emphasize how collasal the city really is compared to these small ragdolls as the buildings and rubble tower over in the shots, it also increases the feeling of how lonely we are with 9 in this world. Moreover as when the camera zooms out it just shows how much of the environment is still and dead. Through this the director makes the audience feel hopeless and worried for 9 which contrasts heavily with the emotions the first few shots into the film give us from the creation of 9, which is more hopeful.
Also all these shots the environment give us a further understanding of the environment from the director. Mainly we see a world that is completely destroyed, but you see elements of a western society, so we know it's earth that this is on. We see tanks, power lines, something to grasp on. But it also focuses on the world of death, there is nothing alive. However all of these things still shown from the doll's angle view, giving familiar things a dynamic new perspective. Everything in a shot has a history, "a beautiful junkyard" the lead artist would call it, but even though it doesn't hit the audience in the foreground, but all the elements of the background wrap together to bring out an amazing environment as a whole.

Extreme long shot of environment

Genre/Atmosphere

What is the tone?
The movie opens with a series of shots transitioned with fades, to show the lapse in time, accompanied with a voiceover. The words said by the old man set a grim tone, "We had so much potential, which led us to our downfall", something terrible has happened to the world. As 9 awakes after the title there has been a change in colour, the whole room dark except the lift filtering through the broken window, we feel curiosity on where are we, what is 9 really, bit by bit though it unravels through the opening. We get a POV shot of 9 leaning over the desk to find the dead scientest, doing nothing but helpt he grim mood. Then as 9 walks to the window the camera zooms out to give us a extreme long shot of the city, being only composed of shattered buildings and rubble, folloed by a POV shot of 9 scanning the streets to show the first sign of life, someone towing a wagon, seeing this, 9 rushes out to find him but we get a close up of a box with a tag saying "9", giving up the impression of there is something more in this room for 9, which does indeed foreshadow a future event.

Close up on the box for 9

As 9 walks out into the broken city we get slow long and close shots of parts of the city, both setting the
 scene and explaining past events. We get a close up of dead humans in a car, suggesting sudden death, a medium shot of the car coated with rusty paint showing a long time has passed since the apocalyptic event. Close ups on posters of logos and "revolt" which give us the impression of a war that had gone out of control.

Close up on revolt poster

Now we finally have our first interaction with characters and 9 instinctively attacks him, giving us fear as we already have the feeling that this world is not safe, but this is soon changed for us as 2 reaches out and says "I'm a friend." We start to ge the tone maybe things will be getting better for 9, meeting up with 2 who knows his way around the city, finding the voicebox for 9 from the doll and being wise "Some things in this world are better left where they lie, but know where to look and this world can be full of treasures" but again like before this safe mood is broken as we meet the catbeast for the first time.
2 valiantly fights to protect 9, who is pretty much a total stranger but ends up being picked up by the beaat and carried off, leaving us with a sombre tone we can only imagine 9 is feeling too, having his only "friend" in this world kidnapped.

Mood of the opening?
Close to creepy, remorseful, having already 2-4 deaths in the introduction of the film, horror coming in early on too as the cat beast creeps up and attacks 9 and 2, yet mystery plays a part as we have no idea where we are, if 9 is alone and is seen from afar from the telescope of another ragdoll we haven't met yet

How is it created?
The mood is set mostly using colour, audio and some specific camera shots
Colour - the colour palette used by the animators is very grey, using a lot of the darker tones to show this isn’t the most cheerful movie, dark clouds, burnt buildings, shattered rubble, it shows this is a world that’s been through a lot of hurt.

Rusty red, dark grey, depressing colours

Audio - For most of the intro 9 doesn’t speak, so a lot of the sounds are heavily emphasized, e.g. steps, windows, metal clanging, which just makes the silence in between those rare sounds more noticible, showing how the world lacks life, how 9 and us as the audience is alone. Also backing all this up a grim soundtrack plays in the background.
Camera Techniques - A lot of the shots are POV shots, we really immerses us into how 9 would be feeling as he sees everything e.g. the revolt posters increasing curiosity, the dead scientists increaing fear, also using alot of extreme long shots and long shots, just to set the scene but to show the only moving thing in this world is 9 at the start of the movie, everything is just still and dead.