String Along

Tuesday, 23 November 2010

Ancillary Poster Research

For our first Ancillary task we're creating 3 posters as part of our films campaign. Researching for poster art, I'm gathering ideas of how i can present my posters, and the conventions of different poster types.

My first look into poster styles is based on a vintage look, i felt for a silent film perhaps a more classic style can act as a homage to early cinema.I've looked at mostly drama or book based films, with some more abstract and creative film genres. This way i can experiment with showing the two sides of my film.




Clockwork Orange is a classic film, with the wacky and disturbing world in it. This poster uses a very creative way of presenting the themes of 'abstract'. It has a clean, white backdrop, with the main image drawing all the attention, the font and arrangement are both very iconic, looking at this example, i can pay close attention to my own use of arrangement to make my poster image unforgettable.





This poster, of a foreign film 'vaduva neagra' has a very stand out design. The image of the lips with the spider legs suggest a woman who is not all she seems to be, an idea that can be used in poster. Its an interesting way of depicting a drama genre with possible thriller. These two posters however more aimed at a film enthusiast audience as they focus more on the art than advertising the film. I would like to include one poster with a more vintage, artist style in the campaign, to be aimed at a film enthusiast audience.




Cat on the tin roof, another vintage film, does well to establish the main character, with hints at the story. One of my main objectives is to portray the power of the woman (Delilah) in the campaign, which we see used in this poster, with Elizabeth Taylor's character seen as a powerful, sensual woman. I've also noticed a pattern or convention in vintage posters based on drama and romance genre's. The font is usually bold, with a red and black outline style. This design would also easily suit my film, and i may use it.






The Great Gatsby! one of my favourite novels and film adaptations.Once again a film poster which suggests drama and romantic themes in the story. The use of the couple in a dramatic pose hint at the scandal to come. This also uses the red and black font as with Cat on the tin roof, and this poster is my favourite out of my research, its clear to the genre, but also leaves mystery into the story.



The details of director, production company etc. are in a subtle arrangement, so the main focus is on the images, but its still included. This is something i would like to re create in my poster. Also despite being a vintage poster, this is open to and will easily attract a female target audience because of the strong themes. This helps me in developing a poster which will both appeal to film enthusiasts and young women, who are most likely to enjoy our film.




For a more comtempary poster i've researched into 500 Days Of Summer, a film that has been a big inspiration to our film, and has had great sucess at both film festivals and in the cinema.This poster focuses on summer, just how i want to focus on Delilah and uses a strong poster layout for the target audience. This is a good reference for me when doing a poster for cinemas and magazines.

During Filming



An inside look into our filming days, and how we worked to create our sets, costume and filming :)

Monday, 8 November 2010

Script ~ Final

Pan from the window down to the dressing table, Delilah walks in to the frame and sits down at the table; she has just come out of the shower and has a towel on her head and a dressing gown on. Delilah starts applying her make up on. There are snap shots, close up of her eyes whilst putting her mascara on and also of her lips whilst putting her lipstick on. (This is all shot through the reflection of Delilah in the mirror, over the shoulder shot)
Delilah walks to the wardrobe (tracking shot)

Delilah

(Over the shoulder) Delilah opens wardrobe, we see a front veiw of her from inside as she shifts the clothes from side to side. We see as she moves it, she's dressed. Delilah closes wardrobe.
The camera then goes back to the dressing table and focuses on the pictures of the two men (stuck on the mirror of the dressing table) in the background we see Delilah (reflection in the mirror) slowly approaching the pictures)
Delilah grabs the pictures.
Close up of Delilah starring at the pictures, Delilah looks up (daydreaming)

Daydream (weird lighting)

Shot of Delilah on bed with James and she is smiling at him, wee see James smiling too, pans to Delilah smiling and when we pan back again we see David, then they start play fighting (action reaction shots, every time shot changes the guy changes too) at the end James grabs the end of the covers and pulls it over them.

Reality scene (in bedroom)

Delilah looks down at the pictures again
Close up of Delilah’s hand as she throws the pictures on the bed
Close up of pictures on be (foreground) Delilah walking out of the room (background)

Camera goes to the bottom of the stairs and we see Delilah walking down the stairs , whilst doing so we change to a close up of her feet to see her red shoes, then go back to a long shot as she is coming down the stairs.
Delilah walks past the camera into the dining room.

In the sitting room.

One long take of Delilah setting up the table. Delilah takes the glasses out and lights the candles, Delilah puts the forks and knifes out on the table. Delilah picks up a knife and (casually) and smiles at her own reflection in the knife.

Ding dong (doorbell)

Delilah

Looks up realises that the doorbell has rung and she puts the knife down, as she does so she realises that she has got a string coming out of her dress and she just pulls it out and makes her way to the door.

Abstract scene

Delilah has red strings tied to her fingers and we see David and James tied to the other end of the strings. Delilah starts pulling James forward.
Cut back to reality and James is coming forward through the front door and hugs Delilah.
Delilah grabs James by the hand and leads him into the dining room (go out of the frame) camera stays focused on the door as James left it open by accident.

Sittiing room

Delilah and James are eating and smiling at each other, sitting on the sofa, casual picking food from the table.

Cuts to abstract

Delilah whispering in James’ ear

Cut back to reality

Delilah whispering in James’ ear
Camera pans down to see Delilah rubbing James’ foot with her foot camera pans back up and Delilah lays back on her chair
There is a mid shot of the couple and James passes Delilah a fortune cookie
Delilah takes cookie (happy) she looks down at the cookie

Hallway

Camera cuts to outside the house where David is coming with red flowers. (Over the shoulder) David sees that the front door is open so he knocks and no one answers so he lets himself inside in order to surprise Delilah.

Delilah opens cookie, inside reads ‘The strings of false love will break’
She looks confused and looks up to see David standing behind James, Delilah looks very scared.

James sees Delilah’s face and in curiosity turns around
(Point of view, from David’s perspective)
James turns to see David and looks at him in disbelief
Shot of flowers falling into the floor
Delilah stands up but is lost for words

Cuts to abstract

The red thread has gone very loose and is all over the place, it is all tangled up and the men are spinning around Delilah

Cut back to reality

Men are standing on both sides of Delilah and are arguing

Delilah covers her ears and closes her eyes

James and David

'Were Breaking up!'

(this will not be heard)

Everything gets out of control, David spills the wine and leaves
James leaves stepping on the flowers on the floor

Abstract

See broken string all over the floor (Delilah has lost control) surrounding Delilah.
Delilah closes her eyes (camera blackout)

Shot of the window in the bedroom, camera pans down to the bed where Delilah is sleeping, the bed looks very messy and all Delilah’s makeup is smudged

Alarm goes off
Delilah grabs alarm and throws it to the wall (camera follows the alarm being thrown), camera is slowly panning back to the bed. Whilst panning we see the photos of the two men on the dressing table and they are crossed off, and we also see dead flowers on the dressing table and all her make up is all over the place and it is very messy.
When camera goes back to Delilah she is slowly getting up, there is a close up of her feet and near them are her red slippers, she pushes them to one side and she just falls back in bed.

Abstract

In the same position as she was in the real world, Delilah is surrounded by strings.

Sunday, 7 November 2010

Making the Fortune Cookies?

As where unsure of using a pre made fortune cookie, I've looked into recipes i can try

Fortune cookies can be tricky to make - it's important to make sure that the cookie batter is spread out evenly on the baking sheet. Instead of using the back of a wooden spoon to spread the batter, it's better to gently tilt the baking sheet back and forth as needed. Wearing cotton gloves makes it easier to handle and shape the hot cookies. This fortune cookie recipe makes about 10 cookies.
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 15 minutes
Total Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:

* 2 large egg whites
* 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
* 1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract
* 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
* 8 tablespoons all-purpose flour
* 1 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch
* 1/4 teaspoon salt
* 8 tablespoons granulated sugar
* 3 teaspoons water

Preparation:
1. Write fortunes on pieces of paper that are 3 1/2 inches long and 1/2 inch wide. Preheat oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease 2 9-X-13 inch baking sheets.

2. In a medium bowl, lightly beat the egg white, vanilla extract, almond extract and vegetable oil until frothy, but not stiff.

3. Sift the flour, cornstarch, salt and sugar into a separate bowl. Stir the water into the flour mixture.

4. Add the flour into the egg white mixture and stir until you have a smooth batter. The batter should not be runny, but should drop easily off a wooden spoon.
Note: if you want to dye the fortune cookies, add the food coloring at this point, stirring it into the batter. For example, I used 1/2 teaspoon green food coloring to make green fortune cookies.

5. Place level tablespoons of batter onto the cookie sheet, spacing them at least 3 inches apart. Gently tilt the baking sheet back and forth and from side to side so that each tablespoon of batter forms into a circle 4 inches in diameter.

6. Bake until the outer 1/2-inch of each cookie turns golden brown and they are easy to remove from the baking sheet with a spatula (14 - 15 minutes).

7. Working quickly, remove the cookie with a spatula and flip it over in your hand. Place a fortune in the middle of a cookie. To form the fortune cookie shape, fold the cookie in half, then gently pull the edges downward over the rim of a glass, wooden spoon or the edge of a muffin tin. Place the finished cookie in the cup of the muffin tin so that it keeps its shape. Continue with the rest of the cookies.

Note: If you haven't made this recipe before, you might want to check out my Top 9 Tips for Making Fortune Cookies.
Each serving includes (based on a total yield of 9 cookies):
Calories 93, 11 g Carbohydrates, 1 g Protein, 5 g total Fat, 1 g Saturated Fat, 0 mg Cholesterol, trace Fibre, 72 mg Sodium, 18 mg Potassium.

When also making our cookies, I prepared some fortunes for our cookie which we've considered using as tag lines too.
There all concentrated on the themes of the story, we looked at other fortunes to word our's in a mystic way.
With the red string created from the Chinese myth, we felt comfortable using references to it in the fortune.

Thursday, 4 November 2010

Title Ideas and Experiments.



Noriane and I had a discussion about our titles today, and what our ideas were after her meeting with Stewart Connen, who's helping us to create our titles, and finding out what we can do with the software we have. After finding out our options i suggested this idea of falling fabric for our opening titles, something similar to what I've seen in Little Dragons music video of twice. After showing Noriane and her liking the idea she's taking our notes to Stewart to develop it further.

Photo StoryBoard

Because our storyboard was split into 3 main sections, for filming practicality, I've repeated the same for the photo story boards.





StoryBoards ~ Abstract Setting