Skip to main content

Pre-Production Blog Post 2/28

Once again, I've begun working on the pre-production stage of another film. Currently, I've felt that I have had a lack of ideas that I wanted to really pursue for films. It also felt like if I did have an idea, I wouldn't be able to stretch it out into a full film. However, over the past couple weeks I've managed to come-up with a decent idea that I think will make a decent little short film. The following is a collection of the pre-production work for this next film.

Concept

The concept that I have for this film involves a briefcase that when opened, releases a random event and resets time back to a set time. The briefcase is given to the protagonist with instructions to not open it. As we can expect, curiosity gets the best of the protagonist as he opens the case. The film then progresses as the case is constantly opened, it's contained chaos being let out, and time returning to back to just right after the case was received. After coming up with this concept I felt that it would be a good foundation that would allow me to creatively try new effects and techniques that wouldn't be too complicated or demanding. The film does still have a 3 Act structure, but the concept of the case and the scenarios it creates is the main focus of the story.

Storyboard

Prior to finalizing the film's concept, I had begun to storyboard some basic dialogue scenes such as the one that takes place in the opening of the film. Since then, I've worked to storyboard a few examples of the case being opened. I only have a few of these scenes storyboarded so far but I do anticipate that I will end up coming up with more different scenarios of the case being open and chaos being released. Attached below is the first draft I had of how the concept of opening the case and time being rewound would look like.

Script

The current draft of the script isn't very long or detailed which I don't really see as a bad thing. With the focus of the film mainly acting as a set-up to create visually interesting and comedic moments, the script doesn't necessarily have to be what drives the progression. I've always struggled with writing good dialogue as I've said before, but I feel that my script sounds like it won't really cause any problems. Both the beginning and the end of the script are the areas with the most dialogue since I expect to do most of the Act 2 storytelling visually. Attached below is the first page of the script which tells all the "need to knows" of the film (dead dad, briefcase, protagonist)


What Next?

Currently, I am just planning on acting as all the parts within the film and shooting it at my home and garage. This, like my last film, should make things a lot easier production wise. Despite this, depending on scheduling and how big the scope of the film grows to be, I might end up incorporating the help of maybe another actor or two in order to expand the film. However, this does depend greatly on how busy I am due to Musical season beginning to pick-up pace. With the state of the world getting better and better, I do hope that maybe I can do one more film later this year with other people. Even if that isn't a possibility, I do think that this film and any other ones I work on this year will go well as long as I keep working hard and don't lose focus.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Investigation 3/1: The Tools Of Camera Stability

One of the most important aspects of cinematography that goes commonly unnoticed is having the camera steady. Even a slight amount of movement within a shot can pull the audience away from the film, so it is important to attempt to have shots. There are multiple different ways that you can use to stabilize your camera, some of which are more effective than others. Tripod Using a tripod is the easiest way to stabilize the camera while filming. By having three points of contact with the ground, a tripod keeps the camera extremely stable. The camera would likely only move due to very large movements on the ground or strong winds. The one downside to using a tripod is that it has to remain stationary. If the required shot involves moving around, a tripod can likely not be used. Overall, the tripod is the easiest, simplest, and cheapest way to keep your camera steady. (Image Source) Shoulder Rig A shoulder mount is one way to keep the camera stable while also being able to mov...
Post a Comment
Read more

Elements and Principles of Cinematography

Bird's Eye  Curved Lines  Diagonal Lines  Emphasis  Formal Balance  Framing  Horizontal Lines  Informal Balance  Leading Lines  Movement/Rhythm Proportion/Scale  Repetition  Rule of Thirds  Simplicity  Unity  Variety  Vertical Lines  Worm's Eye
Post a Comment
Read more

Post-Production Blog Post 5/9

Over the past couple weeks, I've been working to put together the Mini-THON Documentary for 2021. The following describes the status of the documentary as well as updates regarding some things that I have previously written about during the Pre-Production and Production stages of documentary. Transition Success In my previous Production blog post, I talked about my idea as to how to transition from the different parts of the documentary. Now that I've been able film the shots for these transitions and incorporate them into my editing timeline, I can say that my idea is largely a success. It was difficult to properly set-up the corkboard in a way that gave me my desired framing, but I'm happy with what I was able to make. Within the edit, the transition clips are given a digital tracking zoom along the string in order to show the transition from each labeled section. I chose to use a digital tracking zoom rather than doing it physically due to limited help to film the transi...
Post a Comment
Read more