Little bit of a problem!

When we sat down to transfer the footage onto our computers from the camera and start editing, we discovered a problem! It turned out that we managed to film all of the shots with no sound! We decided that this was not going to work and arranged to go out again and record dialogue, sound effects and diegetic sounds with the hope that we would be able to edit it in accurately. Once we had recorded the sounds we transferred them over to the program that we are working on, we got to work. Just to our luck, we were able to voice over the parts where there was dialogue and also add in the sound effects of the car doors slamming and others such as walking and driving across the gravel. Thankfully, we did not have too much dialogue to record as we had planned to have the phone call to the police silent anyway for effect. Editing the part where both parents are calling Charlie's name was also not too difficult as our actors managed to shout the name more or less exactly the same again.

Research for the Titles

I researched different fonts to try and decide which one would suit our film opening the most. At first I wanted to use an old fashioned handwriting type font such as ‘Lucida Handwriting’

However, I decided this did not fit as it looked too old as our media product is modern, therefore I looked for some more with a less old fashioned style.

Calbiri (Body)

Century

Arial black

Microsoft Sans Serif

The fonts above seemed more relevant to our film opening as they are modern and bold, outlining the serious event that occurs in the film. I did not want anything such as ‘Curlz MT’ due to the fact that this portrays fun and happiness, something that may be used on a party invitation as opposed to a film opening involving a kidnapping.

I used the programme ‘Abobe Premiere Pro’ to edit the film opening and insert the titles, therefore I used one of the fonts from there. It is similar to the ones above with the simple, bold appearance. I coloured the titles white, ensuring only one came up on every shot to make sure they were nicely spread out and not clustered together. I left the title of the film until the end for impact and emphasis. The colour of this was red to connect to the danger aspect and to the red coat that Charlie wears. 

Script

(.) pause
(1) 1 second pause

1. Father: Everyone strapped in and ready to go?
2. Both children: Yeah
Son: Dad (.) what beach we going to?
3. Father: urm (.) I think Southbourne’s gunna’ be the quickest
4. Daughter: Daddy can you put the radio on? (5)

Radio comes on
5. Radio plays and then fades out as car tyre’s pull up in Car Park in shot 10.
11.Doors slam shut and the entire family walk away.

Quietly new piano music starts to play

Music continues to play and builds gradually. Diegetic beach sounds heard in the background
(shots 12-17)

15. Son can be heard laughing
16. Shots flow and family continues
18-19. Daughter giggles as she runs and hides from her family

Shot 20-25 music builds and other diegetic sounds of the beach and talking can no longer be heard, the only sound is the music¬- edited in. At this point the family realise the daughter is missing


25. Mother: Charlie! Charlie! (Voice is exhausted and strained)
26-29 No sound- silence( this will be edited so it doesn’t affect the actual shooting)
(Parents are calling for help)
28-29. Father calls the police but there is no sound, this is to emphasise the devastation and the unknown of what has happened

30-34. Music plays out


(This is what we have planned for the actors to say in our opening, however we are well aware that this is not exactly what the end result will be!)

Cast

We were lucky enough to find our cast very easily! My partner’s family were willing to act in our film opening which saved us a lot of time and hassle. They live just down the road from the beach where we wanted to film which made things very easy. They were also willing to drive us to the filming destinations as well as co-operate in filming at their house when leaving for the beach.

The family consists of a Mother (Becky), Father (Phil), Son (Alex) and Daughter (Charlie). They are a typical modern middle-class family which is ideal for our film opening as it matches the plan and story line. They are also quite confident which was very good as they acted well which gives our film opening a professional appearance.

We dressed the family in clothes that we had chosen in order to fit our storyboard and plan as it is important to portray the message in our media product. It was essential for Charlie to wear the red coat and dress for her innocent look. We also dressed her in white socks and black school shoes to add to her innocent appearance as well as her pig tails that we tied up with red ribbons.

The coat that we had for Charlie is one that I borrowed from a friend’s sister. It was size 8-9 which is a couple of years younger than Charlie’s actual age, however we managed to squeeze her into it and pull of the character looking young and innocent. 

Filming

The weather for out filming day was perfect, it was not windy and the sun was shining. However it was not too hot for our actors to wear the costume we had decided on. The actors we used are my partners’ family which worked well as they were willing to help out wherever possible. They also agreed to be filmed at their house and were willing to drive around to get to the destinations we wanted to film at. The surrounding area of their house was perfect for our film as we were able to shoot the car traveling to the beach as the roads were not busy, meaning we were able to take several shots of the car coming up and down the road. This was to our advantage as we were able to take several shots of the same place in order to have a good amount of shots to choose from, making it easier to edit together. The beach was not too busy and was the perfect condition for filming. It did not take too long to get all of the footage together as all of the things we had in mind to film were all at the same beach. We were also lucky enough to come across a police car with two police officers present. They were kind enough to stand and talk whilst we filmed them and then drive away with the sirens on for us to include in our opening.

Sound research

We watched clips on youtube of films with the same genre to see the sound effects used to create suspense and to represent different emotions. We recognised that ghost like sounds and ‘rush’ sound were used to create this which helped us know what to look for.

Originally, we were going to have church music and choirs for the sound when the family is walking along the beach, however we decided this was too sinister and didn’t fit. Therefore we decided to use a piano based piece of music which is more light-hearted and represents a happier feel for when the siblings are running across the sand.  

We knew that we would need ambience type music and other sound effects to emphasise the kidnapping and to represent the emotions of fear and horror, therefore we had to find them. Being that most of the songs are copyrighted and protected, we looked on internet sites that offered free sound effects, royalty free. The main two sites we looked at were ‘freeSFX’: http://www.freesfx.co.uk/ and ‘freesound’: http://www.freesound.org/  where we got the ambience music and the small sound effects such as the ‘ghost noise’ for the rush of suspense when Charlie disappears round the corner. We also needed to find a siren sound effect for when the police car drives away as we did not manage to capture it when filming. These sound sites proved to be very helpful and accommodated us for everything we needed. 

Mood Board

Mood board

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