Creative Critical Reflection

Link to CCR:

Part 1: https://youtu.be/YwZTBZi-cYY

Part 2: https://youtu.be/q1IBfg2-JVo

A Level Project

Here is the link to my A Level Project website. This website functions as my short film marketing website as well as links to my film postcard and short film itself. If the video embedded in the website does not play, it can be found here.

Website: http://www.imxprs.com/free/lauver/deeper

Finishing

I finished up my editing and had to run around filming tons of friends for my ending sequence that I decided at the last second to add in (while not packing for a trip to NYC in 4 hours). My postcard turned out more or less how I wanted it to, the color scheme is definetly along the lines of what I was aiming for. I think all of my products, including the website and video adopt a more netural color scheme giving a cohesive feel. I wish I had modeled my stickers a little better in photoshop but I couldn't find a plausible way to do it. It's so interesting to think how little we pay attention to the representation of 3D objects in a 2D space (ex: a sticker on a page). My website is everything I hoped it would be. I initally had a hard time finding a good site that was easy to use and had decent domain names. For example, Wix was good, but the creator was way too laggy and there wasn't enough flexibility with the templates so I couldn't tailor the design to what I had envisioned. A creator called XPRS ended up beign the perfect balance of chic design elements and easy-to-use software. Additionally, the domain name is very reserved (as in not random phrases and words) and fitting. I think I included a pretty good range of information in the website that was consistent in my earlier posts. I really think integrating my postcard and video into the site will make it more accessible and cohesive to all audiences. Throughout this process I used a program called lightshot to capture screenshots to use in my website design. It is so helpful as it allows you to copy a screenshot as a picture, save the screenshot, write on the screenshot etc. This came in handy when I wanted to use screen grabs in my website design. I was talking with a Columbia student earlier today who mentioned she was in a bunch of film clubs and editied regularly, so I pulled her aside and asked what programs she used and she uses Premiere as well (and edits for National Geographic). She explained while it is mostly manual, you can create the most professional looking product with it. On the other hand, I have heard good things about final cut pro. Either way, I enjoyed experimenting with XPRS, Photoshop, Premiere, and lightshot to create these products.

Until the CCR,

Laurel

Film Marketing (and it's evolution)

Some Recent History on Movie Marketing:

The way movies are marketed is changing. Four years ago movies spent about 70% of the film budget amount of advertising. Recently this percentage and spending in marketing in general. Today, production costs are a fraction of the marketing budgets. The recent trend of low-budget horror and thriller films are a great example: The Purge, Insidious 1 & 2, Dark Skies, Sinister, Skyline, You’re Next, etc.  All of them had production budgets under $5 million dollars, and marketing budgets over $20 million. Subsequently you have probably seen these terrible movies way "over-hyped." While the budget doesn't apply to my production it does show the importance of marketing in film in general.

The Current Flaw in Movie Marketing:

The major flaw in current marketing is producers inability to target their target audience. In the past many movies were produced for mass and general audiences.  However, the future of the movie business lies in niche markets - not in generalized mass appeal. Audiences are growing numb to homogenized movie marketing and trailers. Budgets for niche films (as in anything besides franchises such as Batman, Avengers, etc.) are rapidly dropping as the economy fails. In this case it is becoming harder and harder to justify funding ineffective marketing such as T.V. commercials.

The next large shift in the film industry will come about when marketing companies are able to effectively and efficiently match content with the perfect consumer - like companies such as Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon prime are spearheading. To get ahead in the film marketing world it would be helpful to have a background in mathematics and/or computer science to target marketing towards niche consumers. The future is data, and he (or she) who writes the algorithm holds the keys.

The Bottom Line:

Soon everyone in the U.S. will have access to any media at anytime, anywhere, at the click of a button. New content will have to now compete with other new content and old content.  In this future, being new, fresh, original, and having a strong, unique voice will be more important than ever. Having a hackneyed "marketing hook" that can "open a weekend" (a la The Purge or The Devil Inside) will eventually become irrelevant.  The era of regurgitated clichés, or as they're more commonly known, "event movies," is almost over.  The new digital distribution revolution will become the problem of a whole new generation of filmmakers, who can continue to make quality niche content and organically grow their audience over time.


I really enjoyed reading this and it helped me think about my target audience a lot. For example, who is may audience? Probably young adults, late teens and adults. What about distribution? Black Mirror for example is aired on BBC but many watch it through Netflix so I would probably do a short special agreement with Netflix as they do future a few short films. For the website I'll appeal to my age group by maintaing clean lines and picture etc.

That's all for today friends!

Short Film Website Design (2)

For this website case study I chose another Oscar nominated short "Sing." It actually won the academy award for best short film this year so big expectations on this one!

This website also has a personalized logo but has 8 tabs: Festivals, About, News, Trailer, Team, Music, Press, and Meteor Films.  Again, I really enjoy the breadth of information they include in their website. I especially enjoyed their music tab as it gave an embedded sound cloud player. This was a great marketing strategy as the short film is based around music. They also included a outside link to their production companies website. In their website they included important stills from the movie which seems to be a trend. I think I definitely will include the festival location tab along with a music, about, festivals, and team tab. In general, films are made to entertain audiences, and film websites are much the same. In order to get visitors’ attention and encourage them to see the film, a website needs to give them what they are looking for and provide some entertainment at the same time.  In order to do this I have to make my site visually engaging through photos and video clips.

I researched some typical movie website conventions in addition to the above case study:

1. FLASH
Most movie websites rely heavily on Flash for a dynamic and interactive experience. The audience of these websites typically expects to be entertained, so bells and whistles take priority, and heavy use of these elements is more acceptable than it would be on other types of websites.I'm sure my wesbite will be somewhat interactive even if it is not insanely so, we have to keep it simple.

2. LARGE BACKGROUND IMAGES

In addition to Flash, larger photos and images play a huge role in creating attractive and interesting movie websites. Most movie websites make use of large images, in many cases as the background of the page. Like I said earlier, these can be stills from the film.

3. VIDEO/TRAILERS
Almost all movie websites include a full trailer, and in some cases a few different trailers. Many websites put the trailer on the home page or a splash page, and the trailers often start without being prompted by the user. While audio and video that automatically starts is usually considered a negative feature, because of their subject matter, movie websites are a bit different than the average website. Because video is a priority for most visitors, it seems to be an accepted fact that movie websites will play a trailer automatically when the page loads. Those movie websites that don’t put the trailer on a splash page or the home page typically have a link in the navigation menu that clearly points to the trailer. I don't think is necessarily important for my short as it is well, short, already.

4. SHOW TIMES AND TICKET INFO
Because the goal of movie websites is to sell tickets, each one includes a link or form for visitors who want to find show times and ticket information for their area. Many websites link to Fandango and/or Moviefone. Making it easy for people to get tickets is a priority.I think this is really important even if I make up the festival times and locations.

5. SPLASH PAGES
About half of the movie websites we’ll look at later in this article show a splash page before the visitor enters the main website. Some of these splash pages are more useful than others. Many include a video of the trailer, and some have options to access country-specific sections of the website if the movie is playing worldwide. Probably not necessary for my site.

6. DISPLAY OF NOMINATIONS AND AWARDS
Movie websites often attempt to demonstrate the quality of a movie by listing or displaying nominations and awards it has received. You’ll see this a lot on splash pages and home pages of award-winning pictures. Again, my film doesn't have any awards or recognition, so I'm going to avoid this.

7. SHORT PAGE LENGTH
It’s very common for movie websites to take up only the height of the screen, or just a bit more. It’s rare to find pages that are long and require a lot of vertical scrolling. With most websites being Flash-based or set against a large background image, the short page length keeps everything in view at all times. Probably something I'll stick to.

8. SOCIAL NETWORKING /MEDIA INTERACTION
Many movies have pages set up on Facebook and MySpace to take advantage of social networking opportunities. With the popularity of these social networking websites, especially among younger users, it’s no surprise that movie companies are seeing the value of getting involved. A bit more surprising is the number of movie websites that include links to encourage votes on social media websites such as Digg, Delicious, StumbleUpon and Reddit. I'll Include links to fake social media accounts.

9. DOWNLOADS
Most movie websites include a downloads section where visitors can get free wallpaper, posters and buddy icons. This is kinda cheesy but I kind of think it could be a cute advertising idea especially if the wall papers were aesthetically pleasing.

That's all for tonight friends!

Sources: 
http://www.singshortfilm.com/#music
http://meteorfilmstudio.hu/en/
https://onextrapixel.com/30-awesome-interactive-movie-and-film-official-websites/
http://www.webdesign-inspiration.com/web-designs/industry/movie

Short Film Website Design

So I'm not well-versed in Short Film website design so I found a site of an Oscar-Nominated short.
This short, timecode, has a very encompassing and thorough website that I think is a good starting point for the structure of mine.

The tabs include "About, Trailer, Festivals/Screenings, Awards, Press, Multimedia, and Around the World" each pages is backed by slowly changing stills from the film (very cool idea). The layout is minimal and clean, something that I think is appropriate for my website, however, I would go with a very white and in general "less dark" color scheme to match my mise-en-scene. I would most likely skip out on the "Awards" and "Trailers" tab as my short film has neither. I think it would be cool to take the time to make up some fake screening dates that converge with my postcard. By providing a QR code on the card, their phone will take them to the website where they can see up-to-date and accurate screening locations and times. I really enjoyed that they had an interactive map for these This context would suggest an "R" rating form my film. In general I think the most technically difficult task will be creating a logo (or font) for the film that Timecode used in their site.

locations under "Around the World," this makes the website more engaging and convienient for those searching for show times.  This site included their poster under "Multimedia" but I would probably include a digital version of my festival postcard for individuals who are viewing the silk details solely online. Their homepage includes contact details, a synopsis, cast, crew, technical specifications and acknowledgements all of which I will include in my website. One interesting aspect I hdn't thought about was their inclusion of a rating on their homepage. I may include this on mine as well as on my post card in order to inform viewers of the "violence" and alcohol consumption in the film.

One last thing I would like to include is an option to join a mailing list. While, admittedly, it may be ignored by many in fear of spam, I don't think it would hurt to include if it were done aesthetically. By creating a fan base or at least a pool of interested people through this email feature, word abut the film can spread more easily.

Sources:

http://www.timecodeshortfilm.com/news/
http://www.filmmakingstuff.com/how-to-create-a-filmmaker-website/
http://m.filmratings.com/

Montage Editing

First off, Adobe sucks. My trial ran out on my Premiere Pro 2017, where I saved my file. So I had to downgrade to 2015. Guess what file won't open in 2015-yep! I'm going to try to open it on another computer and save the sequence alternatively, but I may have to start from scratch. 8 hours of work? Hardly.

Anyway, I hadn't gotten to editing my "time passing" or montage sequence yet so I wanted to research montage editing. Here is what I found and some idea on applications:

Adding, Not Taking Away
Continuity editing (used at the beginning and end of my piece) is about taking shots away, while montage is about adding shots in. In fact, sometimes montage editing is called additive editing, while continuity editing might be called reductive editing. Montages are made with the the goal of adding shots in rather than taking them out. These shots may be shorter and faster, but that helps to disorientate the viewer. In this regard, I filmed more footage yesterday for the montage of my main character doing "random things" and "being bored." The more footage to work with the better.

Disorientate
The aim of montage editing is the opposite of continuity. The editing needs to throw the viewer off balance, to disorientate and to unsettle. The viewer should be confused and disturbed. To this aim, montage editing is perfect for my main sequence, as it should be disturbing, unsettling even because that is how the viewer would feel in a similar situation.The confusion does not cause audience disconnect from the movie; instead they get more involved, like a puzzle they can’t figure out, like Alice following the rabbit down the hole. The audience watching and following the movie because you need to make it add up somehow. The more opposite the images that clash against each other, the more disorientated we’ll be. Here's where my film deviates from that norm, I need the shots to be similar, monotone, drawn out. I need the audience to feel that conformity to the point where they are disturbed by it-- day after day is the same. How do I avoid loosing the audience? Music, of course.

Dreams
In dreams we tend to see a mix of our authentic, real lives with small but crucial bits of weirdness. It gives this weirdness a context and makes it stand out. If your dreams were movies, they’d seem to have no rhythm, and they change suddenly without warning. People change places, change shape, outfits, expressions. The weather alters like you flicked a switch; time speeds up and slows down. In fact, just about everything that we do in continuity editing is turned on its head. Obviously for my film the montage should feel like a dream, because it is. The actor is in a virtual reality time is slow for him but as the viewer we see this through broken jump-cut images.

Lose Control
Editing in continuity style means being totally in control all the time. Nothing should creep in that could derail the straight path of the freight train that is the plot. Not so in montage. Montage asks that you lose control and trust your instincts; you don’t need to know why you like a certain shot and you don’t need to explain it. You like it and it feels right, so move on. Of course, this is impossible for me so I'll classify my stringing of shots as controlled montage chaos.

Mix Close-ups and Deep Shots
Montage works by keeping you guessing, by throwing you off-balance because you just don’t know what is coming next.This doesn't really mean placing two totally random clips side by side. Terry Gilliam creates a similar effect in the viewer’s mind by putting shots that constantly alter depth on screen. In montage, you can achieve disorientation by mixing dramatic close-up and then a long, wide shot, then both together as a part of the image enters the frame close by. For this reason I filmed a lot of close ups on actions of my actor and wide shots of his actions (playing cards, reading a book, etc.)

Use Color and Tone
The only problem with montage is that it can get a little out of hand, sometimes too crazy. To ameliorate this in my piece with a use of color (or black and white) which stays the same throughout the whole sequence (in this case, the mise-en-scene is all white and the actor is consistently wearing all black). Also, lighting remains mostly constant throughout the montage clips.

Use Music
we've talked about this again and again but use music to enhance the montage. If two images can collide with each other to create other ideas, then music can add to the battle even further. For my piece, I'm using music as an emotional cue throughout the montage as seen in Bella's depression scene in Twilight that I mentioned in an earlier posting.

Finally, I want to progress to an accelerated montage where I use subtly faster and faster cuts to create a turbulent stream of images that the viewer just can’t process fast enough to keep up. The result is a big disorientating overload, but if the images relate somehow it should add up to an overwhelming theme or feeling (in this case the actor and viewer share this "overwhelming feeling" and the actor eventually commits suicide). This will eventually culminate to the suicide scene.

I really enjoyed researching this so I would have jumping off point for my montage and the rest of my now-extended editing. Until next time!

Sources
http://www.elementsofcinema.com/editing/montage.html
https://www.videomaker.com/article/10709-tips-for-editing-montages
http://nofilmschool.com/2014/09/larry-jordan-teaches-us-how-create-video-montage-set-music
http://www.openculture.com/2014/11/a-visual-introduction-to-soviet-montage-theory-a-revolution-in-filmmaking.html

Music Choices

Music adds to the emotional quality of the film. Loud music arouses, slow and soft music calms. Motion and emotion are often entwined. Obviously my short is not an action-packed film with chase scenes and the like, so "loud" is off the table. Alternatively I've found a few song options that fall under the "slow and soft" category to act as emotional cues and "silence fillers."

1. Teddy- Anxious 
2. Kevin MacLeod- B- Somber Ballads
3. Chris Zabriskie- I Am a Man Who Will Fight for Your Honor 

Option 1 has lyrics and originally drew me because of its slow melody, somber notes, and unique voice, however, the most effective soundtracks are those which operate just below the consciousness of the moviegoer and overall I think it may be too distracting for my onscreen image. Option 2 is solely instrumental but it is less introspective and "sadder" than anything else. After all many in the film industry, including the composers, feel that music offers a kind of sub-text; it serves as thought bubbles on screen-- I not looking for that level of emotion. Option 3 offers a perfect balance between "filler," "introspection," and depression, listening to it actually gave me a few ideas for the film (key: introspection)-- I may have to recruit my actor one last time if he doesn't decide to kill me first. Anyway, the track is 11 minutes long which gives a lot of raw audio to work with-- even better? It's royalty free.

In general this music is going to be a guiding factor. While my mise-en-scene is carefully chosen and directed my piece is based in emotion. This is especially complicated due to actor availability. I can't call up Jake Gyllenhaal to act in my short film. Don't get me wrong... my main actor was surprisingly a good option but amateur teenage acting can only go so far in evoking an emotional response for the audience.  Interestingly, I was watching a video that showed music as reminiscent of the Kuleshov effect where the editor placed different soundtracks over a scene (Jack Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean) and close up of a actors face and with each new soundtrack the emotions we associate with the actor changed despite the footage being exactly the same. Music will need to underscore emotion (depression, anxiety) for my film which I think music Option 3 does well.

Furthermore, without a film crew and teams of editors it is more difficult for the visual product to shine. In our culture, the eye is thought to be more superior than the ear but music, used skillfully, can cover up otherwise weak directing and/or cinematography. We typically underestimate the power of music because we over-trust our eyes, by adding the subconscious (or at least underestimated) music cue into my short, hopefully I can add an extra layer of emotion and dynamics to my piece.


Sources:
http://nofilmschool.com/2015/10/5-ways-you-can-use-film-scores-make-your-films-more-dynamic

https://youtu.be/bCpYbSz1KqE
http://www.e-filmmusic.de/article1.htm

Production and Beginning Post Production

Link to Video Blog

Sources:
Alfred Hitchcock: Six Fundamentals of Good Suspense
The Kuleshov Effect