First Draft

This is the first draft of our teaser trailer for the film 'Topaz Spectre'. This was constructed on Windows Movie Maker, and the editing was done with After Effects. At this point there isn't any audio in our movie, because we hadn't decided on any soundtrack.

It starts off with a panning shot of the surrounding area, which was taken in a crane.This then fades in to the title sequence for our production company. The filming then begins with a shot which is taken in the canteen, with 'Georgia' sat on her own, eating. The shot is panning, and shows a lot of movement from other people in the canteen, which distracts from the protagonist and makes her a lot less visible. However, we did make sure she stood out a little by making her wear what would be considered as 'her own clothes' which was the outfit that we had planned from the beginning. It then cuts to a shot of the star sat on her own in a classroom, which once again enforces that she isn't very popular at school. In this shot we used a lot of zoom, which afterwards we were advised against, as it doesn't look professional. Also, the next shot, you can see a young boy walk directly at the camera which ruins it slightly, and also we use the zoom again. I really like the scene where the dinner lady cleans up around Georgia as it shows that she isn't really noticed by anyone. However, once again, and as the next few shots also display, we have overused the zoom in this draft of the trailer, which is definatly something we need to improve upon. We both really like the next few sequence of shots, of her coming in to the house, and we have decided that we would like to re film them, without the use of zoom! The invisibility sequence is something that I am quite proud of, as someone who is new to After Effects. We did this by making the layer with Georgia in opaque when we wanted her to become invisible, and doing the opposite when we wanted her to reappear. We also then added a distortion map to the layers, which made them distort as she disappeared. We made this a lot more difficult for ourselves by using a mirror for her to become invisible from, as it meant we had to make her vanish twice. I placed this invisibility sequence online for some feedback, and one of the main things that was commented on is how she was invisible for much too long, so this is something we will change next time round. The next few shots were originally intended to be very fast and snappy, however this is something that we didn't really achieve with Movie Maker. One of the ideas for working on it now is for us to speed up the clips, to make them seem more speedy. We then go to the shots on top of a car park. Once again we use a lot of zoom, but I think we could cut the zoom out rather than refilm. The next shot of 'The Infinitive' walking through a doorway is my favourite shot so far. I really like how the wind is blowing through his cape as it creates quite an eerie effect. The next few shots work quite well, however we may change the order and transitions. I like the rest of the trailer all the way up to the final shot of the explosion, as this was made when I was just playing around with After Effects and it just looks fake. I don't know whether we will improve on the editing of this shot or just remove it completley.

Firestone Shots

The opening shot of this sequence is a suspense building shot because it fades out from|dark into the characters running at each other. This is my favourite shot because I like how it begins quite blurry and dark, so you can't really see what is going on, but then you can see the suspense between the two main characters as the face each other. I also like how they run together, because we could cut it off just as they would hit each other which would leave the audience hanging on how the scene could end. We then took some over the shoulder shots of the characters running at each other, which was using a variety of shots. We had some issues with this shooting because by the time we got round to doing it the clocks had already gone forward, and the earliest we could go was straight after school at half three ish, which meant it was already getting dark. However, I think we managed to survive quite well given the circumstances. The next few shots are a variety of Bella teaching Henry how to do the stage combat, with it looking effective for our trailer. You can hear the dialogue of Bella teaching Henry throughout this shoot, and also Tayler and I giving our feedback on how it looks. I really like the shot where the camera is positioned underneath Bella as she pushes Henry against a wall. I like the light seeping through from the trees as it lights the whole scene up in quite a dramatic manner. The next few is a variety of punching shots, but you can see that the light is fading drastically as they progress. We came up with the idea of shooting Bella punch Henry from behind him, so as to include a bigger variety of shots. Following on from this, we thought about shooting from below, which I think was a brilliant idea, because once again, it lights up the scene differently. The last shot was of Henry pushing Bella to the floor of the forest, but once again, the light was almost completely gone by this point, so we will have to lighten it up in post production.

Problems and solutions:
- The light was very limited, so we will have to sort it out in post production, or film again on a day when we can make it earlier.
- Sometimes you can't really see anything on the costumes, so we painted over them to help with visibility.
- There was a chance that Bella or Henry might get injured by the stage combat going wrong, so we ensured we did practise shots and made sure that both of them were fully trained to help prevent this. We also removed any dangerous items that were lying around to help to further prevent injuries.
- Finally, because we were in a forest, the ground wasn't completley stable to hold uip our tripod. To help make it sturdy we took a platform made of a plank of wood with us, which help to make sure the shots were straight.

Title Sequence

We decided we wanted to make our own title sequence for our Why Fronts Production company, to make everything our own original material. We did some researching on YouTube and the internet in which we found some templates and tutorials in making one. We did some editing on After Effects and after a while we made a sequence that we were quite proud of.

We showed this to both of our teachers and recieved some feedback which we decided we would work on. The most thought provoking feedback was after we had shown this to one of our teachers, the first thing he replied with was 'So your film is a comedy genre then?'. This worried us quite a lot, as our film was not intended to be funny at all. So we decided to play with the colour schemes a little, and make the background darker to reflect the genre. We changed the background to black, and this was the finishing result:

After Effects

Once we knew that we had to make the geek turn invisible, we began researching how to on the internet. We searched through endless YouTube videos to find something that we might be able to do. There were several little bits of videos that we really liked, for example:


We really liked the explosive return from this guy.



Really liked the transitions from this video.

No matter how many test and diffiernet videos we looked through, one program kept appearing, After Effects. This is a program from the Adobe range, which does of course mean that it would be very expensive to purchase. However, on our laptops, both of us have downloaded the trial version, meaning we can play around with the program at home. Also recently at school, the full Adobe range has been downloaded onto some of the computers that we can use. This is extremely useful for us because our laptops are quite difficult to work with for several reasons, and the school computers are a lot faster. One other problem is how difficult the program is to use and manouvre. Because the software is industry standard, with it being used in films such as Iron Man, The Orphanage and in quite a few video games for example, Tiger Woods games for PSP, PS2, Wii and Xbox, it is quite fiddly to use. However, we are teaching ourselves by playing around with it, and using different tutorials from Youtube and also Andrew Kramer, from Video Copilot.

Fighting scene shooting

One of the major events from our storyboard was the fighting scene between the villain, The Infinitive and the hero, Topaz Spectre. We tried to think of a suitable location and came up with many suggestions including the beach, the forest, a golf course and a field. We wanted an area which would be empty, as [WRITE RESEARCH BACKING UP]. As we live on an Island, we are very lucky to have a wide range of different sceneries which are very close to our base point. For example, the firestone copse, where we decided to film this scene, is here and is only 5 minutes walk from mine, and also the actor who plays The Infinitve's houses. We are also lucky as a pair that I have a car, so nowhere is too far for us and we don't have to plan to public transport which would be getting incresingly difficult, especially as it is starting to get darker earlier.

We went straight to the scene after school to give us optimum filming time before the light vanished. However, you can see from these pictures, one of which is before we shot, and one of which is from after, that the light did get significantly smaller during our filming.

However, I think that we managed to get the majority of our shots done before dark got too bad, and if any of the shoots are a little too dark we can lighten them up in After Effects.

The actress who plays Topaz Spectre/Georgia Murphy spent the summer of 2011 at the NYCDA (The New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts?) where one of the courses there was stage combat. This is one of the reasons that we picked her in the audition process that we staged. She taught the actor how to do stage combat, to make it look like there was actually a realistic fight happening. I am quite impressed with our final shoots for this scene, as I think it looks really realistic.

Atherfield Shooting

Below is all of the filming that we did at Atherfield, including all of the dialogue of us directing the actors, and any shots which we feel didn't work out.



This was the first bit of shooting that we did in Atherfield Bay. The idea was that we would be able to see Bella running across the room, in apparent search of Henry. First off you can see her running across the hatch quite a way away from the hatch that we are behind, but you can hear us then direct her closer so that we can only see her torso. Up next is a shot of Henry walking through a door way. Personally this is one of my favourite shots of the whole set, because I think the wind works really well billowing through his cape, making it look even more eerie than the location does. The rest of the shots are shot around some of the abandoned chalets, with Bella on a hunt for Henry. The first of the chalet shots wasn't used because because you could see that Bella started to laugh after she had kicked the door in. The second shot is the one we will probably continue to use for the rest of the trailers. We then tried the same action from different angles, which I personally don't like as much as the previous shot. We were really lucky with the wind this day because in many of the shots we had the capes of the both of the main characters billowing around creating a very dramatic effect. Tayler had the idea of shooting from inside one of the chalets of Bella bursting in, which originally I was a bit scared about doing (hence why I'm outside!). The first attempt of this worked quite well, but unfortunatley you can see me outside. The next shot outside Bella just stays still in the door way which leads to the door coming back and hitting her, so we thought of an alternative which would be to continue walking through the door and into the toilets, creating more of a searching effect. However, this time we followed her with the camera, which didn't work quite as well. A couple of shots down the line Tayler had another idea of Henry being stood in one of the doorways outside so you could just catch a glimpse of him creeping up on Bella. We took this same shot a couple of times because the zoom on my camera kept playing up, and we found it hard to keep it still. We also did some shots without zooming in to see Henry, so it made it even more subtle that he was hiding there. We took some panning shots of the buildings opposite as I am planning to attempt to make the buildings explode on After Effects. Then we took some shots of Bella just kicking in some doors as we are planning on making a montage of all the shots of her kicking them in to create a more searching effect. Our last burst of inspiration was to have Henry already inside the building when Bella kicked down the door and saw him inside. This is an over the shoulder shot so it incudes different angles that we haven't included before in our trailer. Some of the lighting in this scene is a little dark at some points which we may have to edit on After Effects if we want to use these particular shots.

Cartoons

Atherfield Location

Tayler and I were discussing about different locations we would like to film in, and we thought that we would like to film some chasing and fighting of the two main characters in a building that they would be able to run through. We wanted somewhere that would be public, as it meant that it would be likely that the two characters could meet there. However, we didn't want anywhere too civilised if it was inside, as that wouldn't really go with the rest of our locations for the superhero shots. First of all, we thought about doing it in the town, or in a mall on the mainland, and have Bella (Georgia) run through the streets, which would hopefully be busy, searching for Henry (The Infinitive). However, we discarded this idea for a few reasons, one of which would be that it may cause some moral panic for members of the public if they saw two 'superheroes' chasing each other across town. So we tried to think of a more original location for some shooting and did some research across the Island. Because I am able to drive, it means that Tayler and I have a lot more freedom about where we can shoot, as it is easier to get to and from places and we don't have to rely on public transport. We came up with the idea of shooting in an abandoned location as we wouldn't be disturbed by anyone, and it could create a more interesting effect. I remembered when I went on a camping trip to the other side of the Island, right next to a Holiday Park which had been abandoned in 2007, after being on the reality TV programme 'Wakey Wakey Campers' on channel 4. We did some more research in to it and found out it was accessible, so we took the chance and went there. The whole location was very eerie, and it there was a great deal of vandalism around the whole site. Here are some pictures we took of the location:

Atherfield2

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Atherfield

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We decided that the action we wanted to film need to include subtle hints of a chase going on, we didn't want to film the actors actually chasing each other as this wasn't stereotypical of superhero trailers. We wanted to do this in several ways, as the location was already pretty much destroyed, it meant that we could be a little rough with anything on the site and it wouldn't really

matter. When we got there the first thing we did was explore the entire site and decide where our shooting locations on site would be. The places that we decided to film in where: The kitchen, just outside the kitchen, and outside and inside the chalets. 

Costume - The Infinitive

Making of:The same applied to the costume of the villain as the hero. However, we decided that we would make the costume for The Infinitve lesshigh key as he would only be in one or two scenes so it would be a less productive use of our time to spend ages on his costume. However, we still made a cape for him, which we used in the same way as Topaz Spectres'. You can see how we chose the logo in an earlier post [LINK] and we decided that it would be best if, unlike the previous cape, we repeated the logo throughout the cape. The colour scheme of him also identifies with our [RESEARCH] and we decided that the main colours of his costume would be black and green as these are traditional evil colours. However, we painted the infinity signs on in a silver to make them stand out and contrast from the black cape. The rest of his costume was composed of a pair of black jeans, a dark green and black shirt, and some boots. We also had a mask for him but we have chopped it in half to increase his 'evilness'. The finished product is posted below.

  

 However, we decided that his hair did not really stand out enough, as we wanted something quite big, like Topaz Spectre, so we found a wig and tried it on. We both liked the wig more than without the wig, and so we decided to keep it for the final costume.

Invisibility.

One of the main problems we had from the beginning of the trailer was deciding what super power our geek should have. Our survey  showed us that our target audience would prefer the power of invisibility for our hero:

 Because neither of us are very advanced on After Effects we had some trouble finding some simple tutorials that would teach us how to do this. I found many on YouTube that used a feature called 'Rotoscoping', but the version that I had downloaded onto my laptop was before this feature had been developed. However, I found this one tutorial that didn't use this feature, and it is available here:
                           

I watched this tutorial and was able to create an effect where you could still slightly see the body of Georgia but it was invisible, like described and shown above. However, this looked quite weird in the mirror, as Tayler and I have made it quite difficult for ourselves. So I messed around with some of the settings and managed to create this for our first attempt.
                           
 We were quite pleased with this as a first attempt however there are a few problems with it. First of all the time when she is invisible is far too long. Also, when she comes back, the video of her is very dark, which makes the whole invisibility stunt seem less real and believable. I am not to keen on the distortion of the images during the disappearing and reappearing, but I was just messing around with this and it was only a first draft so I kept it. After Tayler and I had discussed this, and shown it to our focus group, as well as our teacher we decided to make a few changes to it.
[INSERT VID OF SECOND ATTEMPT]

I am even more pleased with this video than the first one. I have cut down the time that she is invisible for, which creates more tension and surprise when she reappears. I also added an effects to the second video of her reappearing which makes it more brighter, making it look more realistic. We both also had a look at all of the distortatio effects which are available n After Effects  and found this one that we really liked. It is called CC Flo Motion, and we both really like the way that it looks like she is being sucked into the mirror. [INSERT MORE COMMENTS ABOUT FOCUS GROUP AND TEACHERS]