short film Depict.

 Thoughts of the short film

The short film follows a girl called Laura who gets chased by a masked killer, killed and turned into a cake for a cooking show, this short film would be 90 seconds long roughly. During filming we had to switch around the shots, and ideas a lot, 1 scene being deleted as a whole (the Bystander scene) as we thought it would make the short film too long and complicated, so we brought in the missing poster at the end with some blood, and throughout the cooking scene we had blood, the killer's mask getting bloodier and bloodier with each shot. The editing of this short film took a lot longer than expected, and we struggled with making it look like our recorded shots were in focus. We also couldn't get a classroom or a room, so we had to end up filming the scene outside, but it ended up working in our favour, making it look like an outside cooking show, although it would of been good to have a table cloth. In the filming of the chase scene as well, we were unable to film it at night, which left some inconsistencies with the film, so next time it would be better to film it all in one go so it all looks consistent. When we filmed the chase scene, it was very rainy, which meant we had to use an umbrella to keep the equipment dry, which made it difficult to film lots of POV shots and moving the camera to different areas to get to new spots to film became a difficult as we had much more equipment to move. The editing however did go to plan (despite taking so long), we were able to edit it to look like how we imagined and making the 3 main sections stick out in editing styles, which could be viewed as jarring, but however I feel in this short film it helps separate the 3 sections into different tones. In conclusion I do like the short film, however in reflection more preparation in the filming of the short film would of helped the film seem more consistent and flow better, like booking a room in advanced for the cooking scene, or planning more time to film the chase scene and the pre-chase scene on the same night to keep it consistent.  

Story Board;

This was our first stage in the planning process of our film once we had an idea of what we were doing. We followed the storyboard mostly, changing a few shots and scenes as we realized that they would either be too difficult to create, not make much sense, or would be better placed elsewhere in the film. For example the scene of showing the missing person's poster we felt would be better place in the cooking scene as it gives more context to the cooking scene. We also added more subtle details like the mask in the cooking scene as it gets bloodier and bloodier to show it might be human he is cooking, but we felt that it wasn't obvious enough so we had the bloody missing person's poster at the end. We also didn't do the shot reverse shot for the chase scene, but replaced it with more POV shots and a few establishing shots. We also didn't film the bystander scene as we felt that it was unneeded and was irrelevant to the film and didn't further the plot. Looking back on the storyboard we could of taken more shots that we wrote down, and spent more time on the storyboard, maybe making another one closer to film as we had a clearer image of what we wanted to record further on rather than earlier on in the project.

storyboard.docx

Production Schedule

This was extremely helpful during filming and we stuck to it as religiously as we could so everyone knew what they were doing. And even if someone couldn't make it we continued with production to not delay production. For example I couldn't attend our second filming to film the lead up to the chase scene, so we had someone fill in for me during filming. Following this production schedule however provided a lot of challenges, as we planned it several weeks ahead we didn't know what the weather would be like. For the chase scene it was very rainy and the time we had scheduled it wasn't dark enough, which made editing much harder to get consistency. The rain also posed a challenge for our equipment, as we had to use umbrellas to keep them dry, which made it more difficult to move the cameras from place to place unless it was a POV shot where we ran with the cameras. In Reflection, I feel like we should of reviewed our dates we were going to film to potentially change days to keep weather consistent, even if someone couldn't make it. 

Production Schedule (ORGANISED).docx

Shot List

This shot was a good guide on what our vision was, however we strayed form it quite a bit in some parts as we realised it wouldn't work on film. For example for shot 8 and 9, we were going to have Georgia (the actor of Laura) to lay on the floor to be a dead body, but due to it being very rainy, there was no logistical way of doing that without getting clothes messy and not being good health wise. So instead we cut the bystander scene and replaced the dead body scene with Laura being stabbed in the neck and pulling it out. I however feel like other than that we followed it relatively well, but we could of used it for more guidance, like for example we completely cut out shot 11 and 12, and just replaced it with multiple mixing and dancing scenes. Next time we should update it as we go along so it resembles the end result more. We could also print it off and take it with us as well, so we can tick off what shots we managed to film, and cross off ones we didn't. 

Shot List.docx

Script

This script we made to try and get down the small amounts of dialogue we wanted written down. We kept the "what the hell" dialogue as the victim picks up the keys and the removing of the headphones, but we didn't apply much of the rest, I personally think this is due to us not really wanting much dialogue, and that we didn't refer to it during the filming and editing phase. In hindsight we could of made the script much more detailed and used it a lot more in the filming process (maybe printing it off so we have something to refer back to), as a lot of the ideas we had in the script could of worked very well, but for some of it we changed out ideas (like for the bystander scene), or even the victim Laura yelling "help" we cut as we forgot it was in the script. So in reflection I would print the script off and use it during filming and editing and make sure we refer back to it more to help get a more reflective and accurate representation of what we planned for the film.

The Script

Talent Releases

The Talent Releases were so we could keep track of who was participating in the production of the film, and so we made sure we had everyone outside of the group's contact information.

Talent Releases 

Minutes

This is what we spent each lesson and day doing for the film, so we could keep track of how much time it took, and how many days it took so we could look back in hindsight to see where we could improve on our efficiency. 

Minutes