The Final Countdown

     Good evening blog, t minus 5 days until my AICE Media AS Cambridge Portfolio Project will be submitted. On Tuesday at 12am I believe I will either be asleep at my computer (with a turned-in project) or I will be happily dancing. Either way, I am so excited to share with you "Can You Help Me?" I am crazy proud of how far this opener has come and all that I have learned from this experience.

    I recommend you listen to "The Final Countdown" by Europe either before, while, or after reading this blog as it is what I feel while writing this. 

 As I shared Monday sounds were created. Today, Wednesday I created a few more sounds I realized I missed Monday. All of the sounds were relatively easy to create since they are basic sounds such as doors closing and footsteps.  

Sounds Created:

Footsteps of Patti, Meredith, and the unnamed patient.

Dripping water

Running water

Doors closing and opening

Pencil

Notebook close and open

Hitting of sink

Drying of notebook

Breathing

Sitting down

Vocals

    For the unnamed patient, I tried to make my voice sound muffled by covering my mouth with a piece of paper. This somewhat worked but I wanted more so I decided to use the Muffled audio effect on iMovie

Tired Monday Me

    I did remember my good old friend Foley sound and decided to use it when creating the water sound for when Meredith drips water on Patti's paper. I had used foley in a past project where Foley was used to create a football games soundscape. In that project, I dropped rice on a pie pan to create deep heavy rain noise sounds. I knew this noise would not fit the light water drip I wanted to create so instead I dropped the rice on notebook paper. 

    Not all sounds are yet imported as I am typing this blog but I will not sleep until I do so. I will be up till dawn if I need to. I could just do it in study hall tomorrow afternoon but I feel a bolt of energy. 

Lighting:

    I am using Camo an iMovie clip filter. I believe the darkness of the filter I believe fits our opener in the imagined scenes since lighting wise we did not use a ring light to differentiate as planned.  I also currently have the Blast iMovie clip filter on the last scene. I want to see Julie's opinion on this as I am not sure I fully like it.  I also discovered the Match Color button on Imovie. I would like to hug whoever created this button as you saved me a lot of stress and time. Match Color helped me make sure all of my real scenes and imagined scenes respectively had the same lighting.

Camo

    Blast

Match Color

Moving Foward:

    Progress on music has been made! My music idea changed a bit, so I want to take a full blog post to discuss this so that will be tomorrow. Stay tuned...

    Other than that our project is wrapping up and our CCR is beginning. I will discuss the CCR Friday. For now, my idea consists of a rant. It would be like my therapy sessions but instead of my psychologist, it's the camera. I think this would fit really well with our genre and opener theme. This would also allow my panic personality to have its five seconds of fame! I am oddly excited to create the CCR. This year I am in AICE Global Perspectives AS level and one of our components is a presentation that is recorded. My peers said I had a very newscaster voice likely due to my background in acting in theatre so I think this background will help me make my CCR informative and engaging. 

Still to be completed:

Editing of sound, lighting, timing, etc. - Julie and I in class Friday will be comparing our edited versions and creating our final edit.

Creation of production company - Julie wants to animate this but has a busy work schedule this week so she has not been able to yet. If she does not by Saturday I will make it. 

Credits - We just need to add them to our opener. This will be likely the final addition, the cherry on top. 

CCR- I am devoting my weekend to the CCR.

Currently thinking I may become a blogger as I enjoy this a little too much. I am rambling so I will end it here, goodnight. 

Oscars Progress

    Hi blog, I am currently watching the Oscars, maybe one day I will be on that stage. Today progress was made!! 

Sound:

    All verbal sound was recorded! I was worried about how I would find a quiet place to record the sound and well it was a little difficult. I live in a home right next to a major road so I decided to record in my brother's room which is near the neighborhood street. I had to stop and start recording a lot but we (my mom and I) got it done! 

I then imported the sound into Imovie and have the majority of it edited in.

How it's going

How it started

    Progress was also made in finding our font and production company.

Font:

    I love this font. Julie and I agreed we really wanted all caps, we believe this gives off the thriller energy. It also looks a lot like water which ties into our opener.

Production Company:

    I came up with the name "deep productions". I thought of deep due to water but Julie believes it could also be deep mentally. Our production company focuses on real mentally challenging things that people go through. The logo will likely be a brain but we have not designed it yet. 

Moving Foward:
    Tomorrow I will be recording sounds such as walking and water. I will then do what I did today, import and edit the sounds! I will also reach out to Julie to see if she has any lighting suggestions as I still am unsure what to do. I will send my edited version to Tyler tomorrow. 

Live from New York, it's My Blog!

    Hi blog, New York City has been quite busy. I leave tomorrow and planned to stay home and focus on my project Saturday-Monday. I then discovered that I do not get home till very late, past midnight, so I did some editing tonight.

Editing:

    Major progress has been made time-wise! I got the film opener down to two minutes and thirty-seven seconds. All clips we filmed combined totaled to over five minutes so I am very glad this number has shrunk. Our goal is a two-minute film opener so our length needs to shorten some more but I am proud of what I edited today. I am still so excited about how smooth the transitions between imagined scenes and real scenes are. 

Sound:

    Minimal progress on sound has been made. I found out Julie is for sure okay with all spoken sound, other than the patient's voice recording, being dub. For now, I have muted all clips.

Lighting:

    I am going to mess around a little more with lighting in the future I thought about using one of the existing clip filter options but I am not sure if this is what we will end up using. This is something else I will discuss with Julie. 

Music:

    Today I called my brother Tyler, our score creator, to discuss our score. He believes if I am able to get him a finalized edit by Sunday night he can have it done sometime this upcoming week. I also discussed that I want sad piano music to cover the entire bathroom scene. I think it would be interesting if it gets louder each time the imagined room is shown and maybe ends the way it started showing nothing has really changed. I will be sharing this with Julie to get her opinion.

Moving Foward:

    Tomorrow I will reach out to the cast about dubbing. Luckily the majority of the sound comes from two voices. Patti and the unnamed patient/my mother and I. Sunday, I will record my lines and if my mother is up for it, I will help her record. I will see if Julie and Paola can get their line to me Sunday as well. 

    Once all sound is recorded I will begin to edit the sound into the opener. I believe this may be the most difficult part of the process since I need to make sure the sound lines up with the movement of the mouth. I will edit my own voice recording first, for the patient, as I believe this will be easier than editing the dub will be. Then I will take on the task of editing the dub.

    Once all dubbing and my voice recordings are edited in we can move focus to record diegetic sounds such as the door closing, walking, the water running, etc. I have no school Monday so I will spend the day focusing on this task and then editing the sounds into the opener. 

    I will then edit the lighting. Once I have my final edit I will share and compare to Julie's edit. We will then together edit whoever's turned out to be our combined favorite. 

    We need to find our font still and create the production company logo. Our screenplay is done... but Julie wants to put it into Word instead of the original website we used. Once she gets it formated the final way I will share it here! 

    In Saturday Night Live fashion I will end this blog with the words "We have a great film opener in the works for future viewers! Hard work is here so stick around!"

 

Reshoot Monday

     Reshoot day was today!! I will explain how it went, but first, I recommend you to watch the vlog!

Explanation:

    Julie and Paola got to my house around 10:15 first I explained to Paola what the film opener is about and how we planned to shoot. We began to shoot in order of appearance. This was difficult, to say the least. The actress playing Patti, Laura/My mom, found it hard to stay still between scenes as everything was being moved around her. Also, at times I worried whether or not each prop was always in its exact location. At one point I bumped the phone so the phone looks different in one shot compared to the next and I am really mad at myself for causing that. Other than my mistake and my mom not enjoying sitting still in between shots, everything went well

    Somewhat sad news, my dad was at work so now Paola is playing the role of the person who bumps into Patti. We are changing this role to a patient and not a coworker since Paola is a short teen and we did not have professional-looking clothing for her to change into. 

    We finished shooting the office and hallway scenes and got midway through the bathroom scene when Julie had to leave. I was unaware she was going to have to leave since she did not have work today I just assumed she could stay till whenever. I was wrong though and should have asked her prior what time she needed to leave. 

    I had a panic attack as Julie was leaving. I am quite surprised this is my first panic attack caused by this film opener project. I panicked worrying that when she came back we would have to reshoot the bathrooms scene since the camera and tripod were majorly moved. I should not have had a panic attack but I can not control them. 

    We broke for lunch and I took Paola home. Julie came back around four pm and we shot the remaining bathroom scenes. This time she did not have her tripod so we used this phone stand I have had for a long time and never used till now. Julie left once we were done and I inserted all clips into Imovie. 

    Overall, shooting was a bit hectic but I am glad it is done. Paola was a great help so I am glad I decided to not be afraid to ask for help. I am also thankful Julie was able to come back to film after having dental fillings and that my mom was able to power through this process.

Editing:

    When I first inserted the clips we were way over time as I expected the opener to be. We were at over five minutes. 

I found a spot that needed to be reshot so I did reshoot it. My camera quality is not the same as Julie's but unless we have time to reshoot this short clip the version I have will work. The problem shot is once Patti walks into the bathroom. In the shot we took during refilming the door is visible. The door is open but in the previous shot Patti closed the door, so I reshot this scene with the door not visible. 

Original Refilmed Shot

Refilmed Refilmed Shot

    I have not edited to great detail yet, but I do think I figured out how to do the mirror trick inspired by "Last Night In Soho" directed by Edgar Wright

    I did this by using iMovies Green/Blue Screen tool. It looks a little choppy but I will fix this. 

Moving Foward:

     I will begin to edit the lighting and sound whilst in New York. I also am going to send the current version of the opening to Tyler so he knows exactly where music is needed. I hope to get the music back by next Monday this gives him around a week. I need to talk with Julie again to make sure the screenplay is completed and that we begin to look for fonts. I also need to make sure she is okay with all audio being dubbed. If so, I can begin recording the dub for Patti and the voiceover for the patient and I will make sure Paola and Julie record their few lines. 

    I am still very nervous since the time till my due date continues to creep closer. 

Film Fails

     Film day is tomorrow! Today I reviewed what we did the last shoot to see where we went wrong and how we can improve. 

Order of Opener:

    I do not want to share the film opener as I would like to leave this as a surprise revealed during the final edit. But here is the current shot order. 

Error Examples:

Shots #3 and #4

    These two mid-shots are supposed to be used in a match cut. The change in camera position creates the inability for this cut to work. The two different camera positions can be seen by looking at the window and props. Also shooting in order will allow for Laura our actress playing Patti to stay in the exact same position and not have to try and copy the position she was in the day prior. 

Shot #12 and #13

    These two close-up zoom shots are back to back yet have completely different framing and a different angle used. In shot twelve the poster can be seen whereas in shot thirteen it can not be seen. This is due to shot thirteen being a tighter shot. Filming back to back will allow this to not happen again. One person will stay holding the tripod with the camera on it and another person will switch the posters. 

Shots #21 and #22 (Also known as "glass off glass on")

    Here is another example of why we should have shot in one day. In the real bathroom shot Patti takes her glasses off but in the imagined bathroom shot Patti's glasses are back on. Also, her body and fingers are in different places. Filming in order on one day only will cause these issues to not occur again. 

Shot #30

    In this midshot, our plan was for Meredith to be seen in the mirror behind Patti. The way we filmed it Meredith is barely visible and while yes, this may look creepy, our goal was for it to be clear that Meredith is behind Patti. This shot will instead be similar to the mirror scene in "Last Night in Soho" directed by Edgar Wright. This will allow for both characters' facial expressions to be seen. 

Overall:

    The above are just a few examples of the issues I found along with how the issue will not happen again. 

    Initially, I said, "I would like to film all bathroom shots, then bedroom, and lastly hallway." But I now realize we should shoot in order of appearance. Shooting in order will make the flow of the opener work making sure little things such as Patti's hair look exactly the same between real and imagined room. We also must use the same lighting in both the real and imagined rooms. This will allow for minimal camera movements allowing for match cuts allowing for easy transition between rooms.

Moving Foward:

    I am eager to start refilming stay tuned for the vlog!

Update

     Welp blog it is Saturday and we still have not refilmed as I planned to. The issue is Julie was unavailable Saturday and Sunday and I leave for New York City Tuesday, so... we are filming everything on Monday. I am scared, to say the least. Now hopefully since we already did a first shoot things will run smoothly. 

    Also, I have asked my friend Paola to help us. She has agreed to help! This additional person will be very beneficial since we are now planning to shoot in order. We will be having a lot of quick set changes between real and imagined. 

Introduction to Paola:

    Paola has been a great friend of mine since the sixth grade. She took TV production in eighth grade and is currently in DECA where she has learned all things business-related. I believe she will be a great help since she is very dedicated to all that she does. She has experience in theatre and is very artistic so I believe she will understand our set easily and have an eye for where each item should be placed. I am very thankful for her future help on set!

Worries:

    Overall, the cuts between real and imagined must be cleaner. We are trying to have match cuts and the way we filmed last time did not allow for these cuts. We need to make sure the camera is always in the same location and we have decided to not use my ring light and instead edit the lighting after filming so the camera does not have to be moved for the ring light to be placed on it.

    Another worry of mine is sound, we have planned to add all sound during post-production but I am worried the dub will not match up, I guess if worse comes to worst we will keep the sound coming from Patti from filming, but it may not be very clear. 

 Music Update:

    Tyler has gone back to school, I want to have my first edit of the reshot opener by Friday so I can send it to him and he can begin working on our piece. Hopefully, he can have this done by Monday! Tyler is not very worried about this creation since it will be a very short piece and he has lots of experience. The sooner I can have my first edit finished, the better!

Moving Foward:
    Today is a short blog, as I will admit little progress has been made due to scheduling conflicts. My anxiety is at a high which can be shown by the pure panic of this blog.  Tomorrow I will share sections from the opener I edited last week. I will share what went wrong during the filming process and how I plan to fix these problems on Monday. On Monday I will be vlogging our film process since the members in my group discussion loved the vlog as it let them see directly how the process went. I want to make sure this vlog is longer and goes into greater detail. 

    Our screenplay is still not done but Julie wants to do it so I am letting her but will gladly help if needed. Sometime next week we will be looking at fonts for our titles. 

    We have a lot to get done and not exactly a good amount of time left, but we can do this!

Reflection on Film

     Today we had group meetings in class, it was also ASL Deaf Day and as the ASL Co-Secretary and an ASL Two student, I participated. ASL Deaf Day is where all of the students in the club and class go a day only signing not speaking, some students even are wearing earplugs so they do not hear. 

Plot Reminder:

A psychologist named Patti is haunted by the memory of her dead daughter, Meredith. Meredith committed suicide by drowning. Patti feels it was her fault for not being able to help her, therefore she became a psychologist to help others and atone. The film starts off in Patti's organized and cute office with her staring at her notes, not listening to the patient in front of her, who is unnamed for psychological privacy reasons. The patient's voice is muffled to represent that Patti is zoned out, thinking of something but the audience does not know what yet. Patti the focus is surrounded by happy-looking items such as self-care books, bright colored pictures, and signs that have words such as love and hope. There are also family pictures. The opening credits would be displayed during close shots of the items surrounding Patti. An alarm goes off, signifying that the time is up, and Patti is snapped out of her trance. As the patient is leaving, we see a jump cut of the same room slightly off, a person is in the corner of the screen, and Patti gasps, obviously shaken. The scene goes back to the real room, the patient asks if she is ok, Patti says yes but looks at a photo of her daughter as the patient leaves. Patti looks shaken up and is comforting herself rocking back and forth. The scene goes back to the imagined room. Close-ups are shown as they were prior, but this time with dark, emotional items. As the different shots are shown the ghost person is seen. The noise of a door opening back up is heard as the patient enters the room due to forgetting something, jump cut to the real room. The psychologist is seen trying to calm down but still in panic so fast-paced edits from real to imagined room are shown as the patient asks if Patti is okay. Patti tells the patient not to worry and hopes that the therapy session will help her. The title "Can You Help Me" is shown as the patient leaves. Patti stands up, saying "I'm ok. Everything is ok."  She sits down at her desk to organize notes and sees a longer flash of the girl we now know is her daughter. She tries to continue doing her work, but her papers are now soaked. She quickly stands up and walks out of her office, rushing to the bathroom to dry her papers. As she walks down the hallway there is water leading to the bathroom. She bumps into someone who asks if she is ok. She says yes and walks faster. Now she is in the bathroom. She puts the papers under a dryer and goes to the sink to wash her face. She washes her face, but when she looks up her daughter is standing behind her. End. 

My Group:

    I typed up everything I wanted to be said, and my group member, Miguel Parra, was nice and read it aloud for my group to hear. Everyone enjoyed my blog, especially my vlog! They enjoyed the number of multimedia such as videos and pictures I used on my blog. Like myself, they were shocked that Asthmatic Kitty Records responded the way they did. No one seemed to have any real critiques but this may just be since it was somewhat short of a discussion due to my no talking. They did not really discuss the plot/opinions on the plot, I will check in with Julie to see if anyone in her group has more of an input and will add that here.

Julie's Group:
    Julie also received positive feedback and like me thought about reshooting scenes. She also received the idea of filming at the library, they have small study rooms that could look like an office, but I do not think this will work as we will be filming for a long period of type and have props we want to use to make the office feel real.

Editing Update:

    Well, my editing is not fully complete, but I wanted to share the current version with Tyler so he can gain inspiration and start the creation process of our music. He leaves Friday and his break ends Monday, he says he will start once the filming is done.

Tyler's Thoughts:

    Well as I said prior my brother will and did tell me when things are better. He thinks the match shots could be better and would look cleaner if all filmed on one day. He explained there are easier ways to film if we film all in one day. He loves the makeup of Meredith but thinks it should be a little more, in some of the long shots you can not really see it. He thinks the lighting we should add the difference to the imagined room during the editing process and not during the production process. He thinks our mirror scene could look like one from "Last Night in Soho" directed by Edgar Wright. I love this idea and will be attempting it!

  He also loves the blood oozing out of the sink, he thinks this hits the target of psychological thriller very well. Overall his help was tremendous, since I had to be silent during the group meetings today I did not exactly get many opinions, so I am thankful he is home. 

Moving Foward:

    I have discccused the idea of reshooting with Julie and she is not opposed. I would like to shoot Thursday, it is a school half day, but Friday or sometime over the weekend will work too.  I would like to see if I could get a friend to help us film, I think it would be easier with another set of hands. If not, we can make it work.

    Editing wise my crappy edit did help as I now know what shots look good and others that do not. I also will be able to easily direct the filming process as I know very well the order of what we are filming.

    I would like to film all bathroom shots, then bedroom, and lastly hallway.

    Wish us luck blog... we may need it!

I am NOT a Vlogger

     Today, day two of filming did not go as well as yesterday. I have discovered a lot more goes into vlogging than what I thought went into vlogging. First off I realized half the time I was not looking at the camera. Also, I realized vlogs with just talking are boring (in my opinion) when I vlog next time I want to include images and other materials that would catch the eyes of my audience. 

The Vlog

https://youtu.be/3Sjht0VC8jE

I will be vlogging during one of my editing days, I will take the time to edit a good vlog as I want to vlog to my fullest potential.  

Planned Sets Vs Final Sets

Office

Planned Real Office

Final Real Office

Planed Imagined Office

Final Imagined Office

In both offices, we added the picture of Meredith and Patti, a cup, and a notebook. These additions made our office look more realistic.

Bathroom

Planned Real Bathroom

Final Real Bathroom

Planned Imagined Bathroom

Final Imagined Bathroom

No changes were made to the bathroom design other than the addition of the same notebooks as in the office.

Overall Filming

Overall filming was okay. Luckily, the shot I was worried about the most, the shot where Meredith turns into the coworker (who ended up being played by my dad Donald) only took two takes! Another worry of mine, lighting, was solved using my phone ring light.

Moving Foward:

I have started working on a messy version of our film opener and with all shots, we have filmed we are at three minutes, a minute above our goal of two minutes. Lots of editing is to be done and I do believe some shots may need to be redone to make the switch between real and imagined flow better. I will continue to work on seeing what I can do to our current version to get it looking the way I would like it to. I will be discussing my messy version with Julie on Tuesday and plan for when/what/how/etc to refilm and make the necessary changes. 

Over this week I will give an in-depth look at our chosen props, costumes, set, etc, and the meaning behind all of these important factors. 

First Filming

    Hey blog, today's filming went way better than expected!! Today we filmed all shots without Meredith, Tomorrow we will be focusing on the shots with Meredith. I play to film to hallway scene last as I believe this one may be the most difficult to get perfect. 

    I will show the final sets tomorrow as we did not set up/film in the imagined office today. We filmed using an iPhone and a tripod. Lightning-wise, we were nervous, but for all shots today my normal room and bathroom lighting were used and we believe turned out to be accurate lighting. The visuals are most important to us currently as sound will be added in later. Tomorrow I believe we will be using a ring light for the imagined room. 

Editing:

    I insert all of the clips we recorded today to get an idea as to where we are and to make sure everything flowed. This also allowed me to see that one clip may need to be reshot as Julie's hand is in it, but I will discuss this with her tomorrow and we can decide.

Issue:

    We already have over two minutes of footage. I am worried as I believe we will get around a minute of footage tomorrow.

    I do spot lots of awkward beginnings and ends that will be edited out, so I believe the time will go down and or scenes will be cut out.

Screenplay:

    Minimal progress was made today on our screenplay due to the focus on filming, I will make sure this is done before editing. 

Fine:

    Okay, I will share a sneak peek. My idea came to life! I really wanted the water Patti is splashing her face with to turn red/blood and it did! I am super excited to edit this section of our opener. I also believe due to all of the red colors in our opener that Meredith's makeup can look a little bloody.

Moving Foward:

    My partner Julie and I talked post-shoot and decided we need to do the screenwriter, find a font for our opening titles/credits, and talk with Tyler (who successfully made it home in bad weather) about our music. 

    Also,  my brother (Tyler, creator of our score) wants to see what we film tomorrow along with today's recording before he begins the creation process, so post-shoot tomorrow I will be inserting all new clips and creating a temporary edited version to share with him. 

    Today's blog is a short one, as I want to rest up for tomorrow's filming but I am going to vlog tomorrow! I am super excited to take you all along into a day in the life filming the film opening edition. I will vlog the makeup application process, costume wetness, set up, introduce you to the cast/crew, and more! Maybe I can even get Tyler to briefly explain his music idea in the blog!

Film Finalization Friday

  Hi blog today is the final day of preparation for our start of shoot tomorrow!! This may be a hectic weekend, (my brother gets home for spring break tomorrow during our filming set time) but I am super excited for what is to come. 

Updated Storyboard:

Only slight changes were made to make my drawing a little less painful to look at. Thank you Julie for your artistic help!

                        

Screenplay:

Our screenplay is our current task being completed. It is not done, little progress was made. 

Current screenplay

Introducing Tyler:

    Tyler is my nineteen-year-old brother (only sibling) who graduated high school last year (with a national merit scholarship) and now in college is pursuing actuarial science. He may not be studying media production but as a band kid and former tv kid he has lots of experience with creating music, editing music, editing in general, filming, etc.

Tyler's Senior Portrait 

Experience:

Television Production:

Television Production class in middle school for - years

Television Production class in high school for two years!

Awards Won:

Honorable mention for a podcast at the Student Television Network in Seattle, Washington in 2019

Band:

Middle school and high school band for seven years

Continues to pursue his music interest in college by taking a band class this semester

Hopes to join the Marching band next semester

Awards:

Many awards in the band were won but those aren't exactly in relation to music production, but this band experience allowed for him to have experience transcribing music for himself and other band members, which this year he has still continued to do.

    I am very thankful he said yes to creating our short music piece when I was painfully rejected by Asthmatic Kitty Records (still a bit upset). He will be creating our music using MuseScore which he has lots of experience with as seen below

Tyler editing on MuseScore

    Also, I am very excited to be able to receive opinions on our film opening from someone I know who will be honest and unafraid to say "I believe you can do better than this." Once the piece is finished I will make sure he sends me an email/official document stating I have the right to use the song!

Moving Foward:

Thursday and today (Friday) I planned out the sett and created a poster along with adjusting a few items

Props Created: 

Black tissue boxes for imagined rooms

These boxes were created by wrapping tissue boxes in sleek black wrapping paper.

Bloody soap for the imagined bathroom

This concoction was created using red food die, hand soap, an empty hand soap bottle, and baby oil.

Materials for the negative sign creation

I printed the fingerspelled alphabet to make sure I used the correct signs

The negative sign for the imagined room

    Tomorrow we begin to film!! I will show the final looks of the sets tomorrow as I want to compare my plan with how our set actually ended up looking! Nerves are starting to form a bit especially since our screenplay is not done less than twenty four hours before the shoot.  I believe (more like hope) these nerves will be over taken by excitement when I wake up tomorrow and realize the day has come.