Welcome

Welcome moderator!

CHRISTINA TAYLOR
CANDIDATE NUMBER 1899

CLAREMONT FAN COURT SCHOOL

Welcome to my blog!

I worked entirely independently and took on the majority of the work, casting actors from my school and the Rose Youth Theatre, a professional company I belong to outside of school.

My brief was to make a 2 minute long film opening, and I made a romantic comedy opening called Fallen, which can be seen below.

All of my RESEARCH and PLANNING can be found on this blog clearly marked, and listed within the sidebar within the calendar organiser. I completed these tasks despite a change in actor during the editing stage, forcing me to refilm, and even re story board my film opening.

EDITING

The majority of editing was completed on Final Cut Pro X. I used this software when I filmed my final piece, as it was much easier to change exposure and colours on the Final Cut Pro X software. For my Preliminary Exercises, I used YouCut Pictures on my phone.

DIRECTING

As someone who has experience in directing and acting, I had to choose whether I would act in the film or direct. Because I had several friends who were willing to act for free in Fallen, I took a directorial role, and wrote the script as well. I found it easier to implement the ideas I had as a director, as I was also acting as cameraman, allowing me to only shoot clips I thought would work well in my film. As I have acting experience, I helped my actors by demonstrating how they should act and asked them to repeat the way I performed the lines.

CAMERA WORK

I acted as camera man for all the clips, and I used a Canon camera. This gave me easy access to high quality shots, especially as I had not filmed anything more than a short clip on my phone before this project. For the preliminary exercises I used my phone again, as I was simply practicing.

FINAL PRODUCT

 My final product was uploaded to YouTube with the permission of the actors. 

CONSTRUCTION: SOUND

I knew that for my film, it needed to fit a particular sound, like with most rom-coms. After looking at several rom-coms, I decided to look at love songs that were at a medium tempo that were relatively upbeat even if the lyrics weren't as upbeat. I chose Michael Buble's Just Haven't Met You Yet as I felt it resonated with the main character, Katie's problems. However, due to copyright, I decided to ask my friend to cover it, with her buying the rights to cover it and then buying the covered track off her. This worked out well because I was able to change bits of the melody to better suit the film, than if I was to use the original track.

I didn't need too much more sound over this track as I knew I wanted it to keep playing over the top of every shot, with changes in volume to suit whether there was dialogue or not. I added a cafe background track to create the hustle and bustle feel of a real cafe, and then added a text notification to accompany a photo on screen.

After this I was okay with how it sounded but I felt it was missing something. I added a voice over from my actor playing Katie, and was happy with the new effect as the story line was more clean too.

CONSTRUCTION: SOCIAL MEDIA

In order to promote Fallen, I looked at many other websites for official films and decided to create social media for my production company. I chose Instagram and Twitter as my audience demographic showed that they were the main platforms fans of my film would use.

TWITTER:

https://mobile.twitter.com/acorn_theatre

I chose Twitter to upload character based promotions as it is largely used for mainly text posts. It is easy to create tag lines and big questions on Twitter s was ideal for my film opening.

INSTAGRAM

https://www.instagram.com/acorn.theatre.productions/?hl=en

I largely prefer Instagram for promoting films as it focuses on the visuals, and is more for image sharing. This suited Fallen as I felt I could draw people in through varied posts within the account.

PLANNING: CHARACTERS

I have already cast my three main characters, but upon discussing the direction they also wanted the characters to go, we came up with three clear character profiles.

CUPID:

Cupid is traditionally from Mount Olympus, and has the status of God. His moral standing is that he is a pacifist, and believes everyone will find happiness, even if he and his friends have to assist slightly. He has an average age of 300 but on the outside looks 18, or even younger. He is easy going and funny, but is very serious when it comes to his duty. He never thinks about himself and his life, preferring to make everyone around him happy first. Out of all the Gods back on Mount Olympus, he is particularly close with Venus as she saw the potential in him, and is a supportive mother.

KATIE PARKER:

Katie Parker is originally from Earth, and is a mortal in the eyes of the God. She can be feisty but she is mostly sweet and sensitive. She has given up on love as her last relationship turned abusive and she lost all trust in men. She wants to be better with relationships but it never works out. She longs for the perfect guy but doesn't recognise that maybe there is someone just next to her who could give her everything and more.

VENUS:

Venus, another god, and Cupid's mother, is feisty and knows what she wants. She is very assertive but has a sweet spot in her heart for Cupid. She wants the best for her son. She appears much younger than she is as she is also the Goddess of love. She will stop at nothing to get what she wants.

CONSTRUCTION: BBFC CERTIFICATE

Our brief for this part of coursework was to create a film opening. Part of this meant that I had to choose and create a BBFC certificate. I chose the rating PG for my film as it is a light hearted rom-com. This means there is no violence, or nudity. There is the possible 'mild emotional peril' scene but it is not unsuitable for kids over 8.

Once I chose the rating, I took a pg BBFC certificate into photoshop to put my film name in it. This will be inserted into my film before the scenes start.

CONSTRUCTION: FILMING

After complications with my main actor, I decided to recast Cupid as a talent from my school. Unfortunately this meant refilming the entire title sequence. However, upon reviewing my first edit, I found I hadn't been able to produce the overall aesthetic of a rom-com and decided to come up with a new concept for the title sequence.

I took the initiative of contacting my female love interest talent to film some scenes at Claremont Fan Court School, as two of my actors are based there, as well as the equipment required. I also took the opportunity of casting a new character, Venus, with another female talent, as she is also a media student, allowing for easy filming scheduling.

I used several shots, such as an arc pan, an extreme close up and a tracking shot. This will make the film very protagonist based as it is entirely focused on Cupid and Katie.

Below are some photos of the talent as Cupid while I am filming.

PLANNING: CHARACTER PINTEREST

In order to understand my characters I decided to set up several pinterest boards.

The first board is for my piece as a whole. As I continue to develop my film, the aesthetic of this board may change.



The next board is for my main male protagonist, Cupid. This board can be split into 2 categories, how Cupid looks on Mount Olympus as represented through statues and paintings, and the inspiration for Cupid's look on Earth, as inspired by the actor Tom Holland.



Lastly, the next board is for my main female protagonist, Katie Parker. Her aesthetic is chic librarian so I decided to add many notebooks and autumnal themes in order to represent Katie as a whole, rather than just the outside.

PLANNING: HOT-SEATING MY CHARACTERS

In order to further understand my characters, I decided to hot-seat my characters to allow my actors to also understand my characters. In a book by Pen Densham, we found a check list of questions every writer and director should ask themselves when they are developing their characters.

Cupid- Cameron Hardcastle
Katie- Leah O'Grady
Interviewer- Christina Taylor

Cupid has come down from Mount Olympus to help a writer, Katie find love. The idea I had for presenting this interview was a passing notes exchange which represents the love they both have for writing and the covert nature of their friendship and later, relationship.

This did not work out and so I posed it as a text conversation instead, which represented the new age of digital, especially due to the various dating apps that are used nowadays. I have enclosed pictures below of the text messages.

PLANNING: RISK ASSESSMENT

PLANNING: LOCATION

For my film, I needed a secluded wood near my house so I chose to film in Ham Common Woods.

The
The next location I picked was a 5 minute walk away, on Ham Common. This was nice and easy for open air filming with lots of wide shots.

The last location which I hope to use for the body of my film is the Rose Cafe. This is located in the centre of Kingston, so is easy to get to in off-peak hours. It is a cosy space with already set seats and tables.

PLANNING: PROPS

In my piece, I will need to source quite a few props, and I will need to ask my actors to source some props too.

PROPS I NEED TO SOURCE NOW:

Several notebooks

Pens

Phone

PROPS I NEED TO SOURCE LATER:

Coffee cups

Books

Newspapers

Cake slices

PLANNING: CASTING AND CHARACTER PROFILES

I have already cast my three main characters, but upon discussing the direction they also wanted the characters to go, we came up with three clear character profiles.

CUPID:

Cupid is traditionally from Mount Olympus, and has the status of God. His moral standing is that he is a pacifist, and believes everyone will find happiness, even if he and his friends have to assist slightly. He has an average age of 300 but on the outside looks 18, or even younger. He is easy going and funny, but is very serious when it comes to his duty. He never thinks about himself and his life, preferring to make everyone around him happy first. Out of all the Gods back on Mount Olympus, he is particularly close with Venus as she saw the potential in him, and is a supportive mother.

KATIE PARKER:

Katie Parker is originally from Earth, and is a mortal in the eyes of the God. She can be feisty but she is mostly sweet and sensitive. She has given up on love as her last relationship turned abusive and she lost all trust in men. She wants to be better with relationships but it never works out. She longs for the perfect guy but doesn't recognise that maybe there is someone just next to her who could give her everything and more.

VENUS:

Venus, another god, and Cupid's mother, is feisty and knows what she wants. She is very assertive but has a sweet spot in her heart for Cupid. She wants the best for her son. She appears much younger than she is as she is also the Goddess of love. She will stop at nothing to get what she wants.

PLANNING: TREATMENT

I have decided to call my film 'Fallen' as the first shot of the film is Cupid falling to the ground. Also, my film is a rom-com where Cupid and the his love interest realise they have fallen in love with each other. It also connotes the idea of a fallen angel that goes against the rules, which plays into Cupid's character.

Tagline: An immortal god. A mortal writer. When love comes into the mix, will they keep what they're used to, or will their lives fall apart?

Cupid falls from Mount Olympus down to Earth, landing in a remote part of the woods. Upon venturing out on to the common he is still bewildered and confused. Katie, a young writer, given up on love, sits on this common, writing her fantasy love stories, in an attempt to feel better about being single. They bump into each other quite literally, and Cupid realises from her handwriting in the dropped notebook, that he has been sent to help her find love.

They develop a good friendship, and learn about each other more. Cupid keeps setting Katie up on dates that somehow never seem to last. Through these dates, Katie soon comes to realise that Cupid is actually the one she is falling in love with. Katie confronts Cupid with this information, and this pushes Cupid away.

Cupid soon comes to realise that he too is in love with Katie but he cannot stay a god and love her. The rules have changed on Mount Olympus and mortals can no longer be brought back to Mount Olympus. Cupid decides that Katie is worth it, and becomes a fallen god, he no longer holds the title of Cupid, god of love. Katie, realising that he has done all this for her, gets together with him and they are finally happy.

PLANNING: MY TARGET AUDIENCE

My primary target audience is women, typically single, but some in long-term relationships between the ages of 20-55. This group of women typically watch romantic slow burning films. This usually is because either the women want the sort of relationships portrayed in these movies, or they are comfortable within their own relationships and so use the fictional relationships to remember when they weren't so stable within their relationships. A popular film amongst my target would probably be Love Actually or Notting Hill as these are traditional romantic-comedies. Most of my target audience would watch in the cinema or on television as they are older, and may not be used to digital streaming services.

I would assume that most of my audience are main-streamers, as seen in psycho-graphs, which would mean they would probably shop in places like Kingston High Street, rather than Oxford Street. Typical brands my audience would buy would be Slazenger, Waitrose, Bentalls, and John Lewis. They would be very aware of how their home looks and perhaps most often buy decorations and make their home presentable for all occasions.

This is a representation of the type of brands and products my target audience might like.

My film stands out from the competition as rather than purely being a conventional love story with two humans because one of my main protagonists is from the Greek and Roman mythology. It also has an unusual ending in that, usually with a god and mortal, the mortal becomes a god, whereas in my film, the god becomes a mortal. This will appeal to audiences as Cupid is always portrayed as the one making people fall in love, rather than falling in love himself.

Audiences should watch 'Fallen' as Empire states 'this film is absolutely without a doubt, the most boundary-breaking rom-com in the new decade'.

PLANNING: SHOT LIST

NOTE FOR SOUND: Marina Kornilova's cover of Just Haven't Met You Yet will be playing throughout, with the addition of a few extra noises such as bangs. As the song will be the main audio under the visuals, this will be at an increased volume to the sound effects. I may add other effects to the song in order to make it fit the piece better, but the majority of music production will be undertaken by Marina. As she has purchased the copyright, via the track she is using, I will need to pay her a fee in order to transfer the copyright and be allowed to use the song.

PLANNING: CALL SHEET

CALL SHEET

5.1.2020                                                                              Emergency number: 07517086327

11am meet at Kingston Station

ACTORS CALLED: CAMERON HARDCASTLE 07840 219078

We will be taking the 65 bus to Ham Common Woods.

SHOTS:

Title sequence shots featuring CUPID. These include the ‘fall’ and the ‘costume changes’ shots.

We will walk to Ham Common  for 1pm.

1pm meet at Ham Common

ACTORS CALLED: CAMERON HARDCASTLE 07840 219078  and LEAH O’GRADY 07840 219078 .

SHOTS: 

Title sequence shots featuring CUPID and KATIE. These include the ‘fake tinder’ and the ‘collision’ scenes.

COSTUME REQUIRED:
CUPID- Cameron Hardcastle

Costume 1- Bring a base of Black sweats and a White undershirt. Bring a bedsheet to manipulate into a toga style outfit.

Costume 2- Bring a 1950s style blue suit set, with dress shoes. Also required will be a tie and a shirt.

Costume 3- The white undershirt from before, with ripped blue jeans and combat boots.

THERE WILL BE NO TOILETS OR CHANGING ROOM SO PLEASE USE A SHEET FOR A CHANGING ROOM SET-UP!

Katie- Leah O'Grady

Costume 1- Floral jumpsuit, white top underneath, fluffy coat and boots with tights.

ALL ACTORS MUST PROVIDE ALL ITEMS OF COSTUME.

PROPS REQUIRED:
Phone- Christina Taylor

Notebook- Christina Taylor

Pen- Christina Taylor

EQUIPMENT REQUIRED:
Camera- Christina Taylor, loaned from Media Department

Tripod- Christina Taylor, loaned from Media Department