CREATIVE CRITICAL REFLECTION

FINAL PROJECT

Final project film opening, a collaboration with Wanda Mora and Sofia Jimenez. Featuring local south Florida band, Vincent Mango.

ALMOST

As I resumed editing today I was really unhappy with the footage of Andy because of how dark it was. I think I am going to try re-filming his scene tomorrow at Shaggy's house before they practice. After that, I will have all the footage I need to finally edit the entire thing.

"IZZE" drink prop

Today I filmed Isaiah's part and re-filmed the band scene. I also got a recording of Sao Paolo and I am praying that the quality won't be horrible.

headboard

The room we filmed in was perfect because everything was black and white, the only color being the post-it notes we put on the headboard.

PROGRESS, I HOPE

Another problem arose! Yesterday I was supposed to film Shaggy and Andy in Weston. Andy was supposed to be in a recording studio at a friend's house in Weston so my plan was to film Shaggy at Regional park then go over to the recording studio with my mom so she could act as the mother. At 3:00 when school ended, Shaggy had told me he was running late and Andy wasn't answering his phone. Then finally, at 3:30, Andy calls me, "Hey, I just got home" to which I responded with, "HOME? WHY ARE YOU HOME? YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE IN WESTON!".

Andy

Shaggy

Recording in the studio had been canceled and he forgot about filming. Mind you, Andy lives in downtown Ft. Lauderdale, 35 minutes away and even worse with traffic at that time. My mom refused to drive all the way there so I changed the scene a little bit. Instead of having a woman acting as his mom, then come into the room, I am just going to insert a recording of my mom's voice as Andy acts as if he is talking to her. By the time I got to Andy's house after filming Shaggy, and sitting in rush hour traffic, it had gotten dark outside. The only light sources in his room were a string of christmas lights surrounding his ceiling with a peak of sunset light coming through the window. The shots were dark, but adequate. Hopefully I can do some editing to brighten it a little bit. This might be a good thing because in our initial plan we wanted to incorporate lighting in his scene as the dark lighting symbolizes his rough life at home, although this lighting may be too dark.
I attached some stills from filming to show the lighting and the settings.

Today I will be filming Izze at my house then I will be going back to band practice to re-film the band scene, as well as get a recording of the instrumentals of Sao Paolo.

Side note: all of the actors will have headphones in, listening to music, showing their literal connection to music.

BAND SCENE

I forgot to mention that I had finished editing the band scene, which is unimportant now because I have to re-film it. It was difficult to time all of the snare hits accordingly to the EP recording of No Left Ear. At the part where I put the title I had made the video go black and white, I was pretty happy with it. In total the scene was 13 seconds and I don't know if I need more or less footage to meet the two minute mark. Now I just need to do exactly what I did but with footage from my phone.

COMPLICATIONS ?

Yesterday we filmed Alejandro's part and decided to use my iPhone. As I added the shots to iMovie to edit, the orientation of one of the shots was portrait and couldn't fix it. This led to me having to download an app on my phone, edit it there, then resend it to iMovie. I had been looking through past projects I've made with my phone and realized that the iPhone quality is extremely clear compared with the digital camera I had borrowed from my sister. I think that the quality difference will be so great that it will look weird and (more) unprofessional (than it already is).
The band had informed me they have practice on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday so my only time to film will be today (Tuesday) and quickly before practices. Isaiah's scene would've taken the longest to shoot because we had to go to the Korean market, then back to my house, this would take an hour of just driving there and back. And on top of that, Isaiah will be in and out of the hospital due to his mom's pregnancy so we had to make changes. As a result of all of this we decided to cut out the Korean market scene. This scene was just to include the color contrasts and open up the film, which we can still do but it would have been better to include it.
Today I will be filming Andy and Shaggy's part immediately after school and then Isaiah's part before band practice (most likely) on Wednesday. Then I will hopefully have a chance to re-film the band scene and also get a recording of an instrumental of Sao Paolo.
So basically I'm starting from square one again. Great.

OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD

As the deadline rapidly approaches, we have a little over a week to complete our project. Trying to stay calm I have tried to make a coherent schedule for filming. Unfortunately, the band will be at the recording studio, recording their new EP, Andromeda. The recording process will take the ENTIRE weekend with all four of them confined in a small smelly room with loud music (how wonderful). Next week will be a challenge to film because the boys who go to St. Thomas will be back in school and throughout the week they have practice, so AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!
The only tangible footage we have is the group scene, which I have yet to edit. We need to figure out all of our settings and props ASAP so there is no time wasted.
Needed:
Isaiah- dull colored room, black framed bed, Korean market; dark clothing, post it notes (a lot of them), "IZZY" drink.
Alejandro- library; bright clothes; extremely decorated notebook "MCLOVIN"
Andy- bedroom; camera, photo album with photos "ANDY"; woman dressed in dark clothing
Shaggy- skate park (regional); grey/white clothing; skateboard "SHAGGY"

So much to edit, so little time; oooOoOOooOooohh boy.

FIRST AND LAST SHOTS

Today I filmed a few shots of the band. Seeing as the group scene is actually the last scene we are including, I am going to begin to work backwards with the footage we got.

    

The current plan for music is to use a new song written by Vincent Mango called Sao Paolo (unreleased), and have it transition into another one of their songs, No Left Ear, included on their EP. Hopefully we can play around with the sound editing to have the sounds flow from one to the next unnoticed. The two songs differ greatly in melody and chord progression so this will be a challenge, as well as timing the shots perfectly with the song. I aim to edit the footage today and see what we're working with so we know if we have to film again or not.

NEW THINGS

Discussing with my group we've made various changes to the storyboard. The most significant being the incorporation of freeze-frames. In the introduction of characters we wanted to have their names appear somewhere in the shot nonchalantly paired with a freeze-frame. Another technique we wanted to use is graphic matching to better continue the flow of scenes.
Just to have it written down, I will explain how we are going to use these techniques with each character.
Deciding to use Isaiah in the Korean market, we would have him buy a soda and as he places it on the check-out counter it cuts to it being placed on his bedside table, paired with a freeze-frame when it lands where the soda says "IZZE". Later in the scene there is a close up of his face as he closes his eyes, the next scene will cut to Andy opening his eyes and begin to look through his camera. Later in the scene he opens his photo album where the photos spell out "ANDY"(freeze-frame). The next shot will be Alejandro's notebook image matching the photo album. In neat handwriting shows his name "Alejandro Lopez", he then closes the notebook to show a decorated cover with his nickname painted on the front "MCLOVIN" (freeze-frame). Later in the scene is a side shot of his hands stressfully running through his hair as this matches the next shot of Alex running his hands through his hair at the skate park. To introduce his name we would have a low angle of him and his skateboard off of a half-pipe with his name on the skateboard "SHAGGY" (freeze-frame).
After these introductions we would transition this by Alex skating out of frame as the shot is stays in place. This would then cut to band practice and the title.
The use of these types of transitions would better convey the idea that all of the characters are connected in a deeper way than just the band.

"Cinematic Terms - A FilmMaking Glossary." Cinematic Terms. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2016.
"Match Cut - TV Tropes." TV Tropes. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Mar. 2016.
Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 29 Mar. 2016.

KUMIKO INSPO

Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter (2014)

Although I haven't watched Kumiko, from the synopsis and character developments I've read I can infer that Kumiko, the woman pictured above, had a bright personality. The plot included information of Kumiko leaving her office job in Tokyo to find hidden treasure in North Dakota as her "imagination transcends the confines her mundane life". The color choice in this shot exemplifies Kumiko's colorful and different personality against the (literally) dull and grey world. I'd like to have this, as I've said previously, prevalent in our own shots. The one shot I had in mind would be Alejandro's shot where he is in the library surrounded by dull and grey books where his clothing would be bright and colorful, representing his creative mind in his mundane studies.

"Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter." Rotten Tomatoes. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Mar. 2016. 

GREAT NEWS

So! Seeing as I had limited wifi this spring break, I am left to post my drafts now as I finally returned home. The camera had finally arrived in the mail!!
My group and I have decided to meet tomorrow morning to approve the rough sketches of the storyboard so I can begin finalizing the final drawings. Next week we will have all of our required equipment (storyboards, actors, camera) so we can start filming then. Our planned film date where we have all of the members together will be on Wednesday, the 30th.

SEARCHING...

For the past three days my group and I have been in the search of a camera. After all the tweets and pleas for a camera to use I remembered that my sister had a good quality camera she shoots all of her videos on. One problem: she lives in Orlando. I actually planned to make the eight hour round trip and told my sister to leave the camera with her suite mate only to find that she had locked the camera inside her room while she was out of town. Concluding that we are forced to use our phones I received a text that the camera is being shipped down to us! With all of the shots in mind and filming left to do now we just wait. Hopefully the camera will reach us before this spring break ends so we can make good use of our time away from school.

I have started some VERY rough sketches of the storyboard, but we have the shots we want in mind.
The scene will be composed of parallel shots of each character going about their day. They will be doing things that will represent their personality and their character. After each character is shown we will have them join together at band practice as a sound bridge connects the scenes. The music will turn into a diegetic sound as it will be the song they are practicing. A pause in the music will cue the movie title in full screen "VINCENT MANGO".

BAND MEMBERS//ACTORS

We've decided on our character development for the most part. Seeing as this plays a large factor in the opening we need to have each of the actors with a defined sense of style and personality. Although this is only a film opening and we have the short time of two minutes, we'd like to construct a thorough backstory for each character. This would be shown through little messages here and there, hinting at their back stories that would develop further (after the two minutes). In this article it stated that creating a character's backstory would make it entirely easier to plan what/how this character would do or act in a situation. By creating a life for this character and not just including essential and obvious actions, it would be as if you were the character because you'd know them so well.
I liked this example here because it really shows that whatever your plot needs to show, it can all be told by actions of your character (exemplified by the one armed accordion player). How well your character is developed determines how far the plot can really go. Though the plot is the story of "Vincent Mango" and how they make into the music industry,

Andrew "Andy" Acosta

Isaiah "Izze" Ampuero

Alex "Shaggy" Alston

Alejandro "McLovin" Lopez

Andy is the most extroverted of the group, he loves meeting new people and making new connections. He is an avid photographer and painter and puts together photo albums. Although he is the mediator of the group, he has a tough life at home. His single mother is constantly on his back about everything and verbally abuses him. Not many people know about his home life, even his band mates have only a vague understanding of his situation.

Isaiah is the "sadboy", yet a dynamic character of the group. He spends his time writing music (that's usually very slow and sad) and is usually alone when away from the band. His biggest joy comes out of music, thus always has guitar or is singing.

Shaggy is the most serious out of the group, he handles all of the business related issues such as money and booking shows. Although stern, he spends the time away from the band at the skate park practicing tricks. Shaggy is still trying to find out what his true personality is and occasionally puts on a social mask to maintain connections.

Alejandro is the studious of the bunch. When away from the band he is studying, often times tries to cram for exams at practices. As his parents push him to sustain good grades he would have to leave practices early, causing conflicts within the band and their practice time.

BACKDROPS

We've decided on having the backgrounds reflect each of the characters' personalities using color schemes and lighting techniques. For the more serious characters we would have darker colors and lower lighting to convey a more sullen tone.



This is the Korean market Sofia was talking about, very colorful (and aesthetically pleasing). The use of backgrounds would be able to develop the characters more in depth in such a short time without too much dialogue. I would like to have the backgrounds reflect their emotional state of mind, this would be reflected through different mise-en-scene elements like the Korean market.

Another scene similar to the Korean market one would be Isaiah's scene where he is laying bed staring at the ceiling. The room would have dull colors such as blues, grays, and blacks and the headboard of the bed he is laying in will be full of various vibrant colors. Trying to convey this idea to my group I found this photo. Not including the peacock, but the style of the sprouting of colors is what I had in mind. This contrast would reflect his restless mind against the colorless world and his "sadboy" appearance.

"Light Source: Lighting For Mood." N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2016.
"Peacock Bird Art Print." Etsy. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Mar. 2016.

START

Yesterday my group and I had in mind a couple of ideas as to what could be our film plot. After throwing around some ideas, one of my partners, Wanda, brought up a new idea. She suggested the film should revolve around Vincent Mango, a local band here in South Florida. The band is comprised of close friends of mind so I thought it would be a fun project to take on.
We began brainstorming and visualizing how the shots would be set up and put together and how we could represent each band member completely and accurately in only two minutes. Sofia, another group member, entertained the idea of using lighting and color schemes to play a large role in this production. She brought up her idea of shooting in a local Korean market for its vibrant and ranging colors. "This could contrast with the 'grungey-ness' of the band," she said.
Already having shots in mind we plan to attend one of Vincent Mango's shows and discuss our ideas with them. Hopefully we will start storyboarding in the upcoming week and begin rough cuts in the following.

INTRO

Hi! I'm Lim, creator and admin of this blog. Here you can watch the process of my journey of creating a film opening for my final project in AICE media studies. All of my achievements, struggles, and failures will be posted right here, so, stick around!